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ventiskies · 4 years ago

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When he rejects you | Chongyun, Scaramouche, Albedo

a/n: hello friends!! i apologize for my somewhat disappearance TwT im currently having exam season but i couldnt help but write something for my favorite three (and yes, scara is there... and honestly, I don't know when I started simping for him either but you can now call me a future scaramouche haver >:)) so not a request, but do enjoy !! <3 (apologies if there are any errors!!)

pairing: chongyun x gn! reader, scaramouche x gn! reader, albedo x gn! reader (platonic)

Chongyun

★ Chongyun, Xingqiu and you had been best friends since you were kids. And although you were a trio, you and Chongyun had always known each other much longer.

★ If your life were a book, it would be a sweet childhood best friends growing up together genre, something that often piqued Xingqiu’s interests when he drags the two of you to Wanwen bookhouse

★ The books you had borrowed from Xingqiu about them all ended with the same thing; that they end up becoming a couple and growing up together. Reminiscing about their childhood youth when they were old.

★ You knew not to trust the books or use them as a guide, but just like the books, you had grown to fall in love with the icy-haired boy.

★ Chongyun was like a breath of fresh air. His determination in exorcising ‘evil spirits' to the point that he blindly falls for Xingqiu and your pranks were the things that you loved about him. He was filled with enthusiasm and positivity (literally).

★ You grew into enjoying his positive attitude, you couldn't imagine a day going by without Chongyun telling you and Xingqiu about a so called 'haunted' place he had found, and forcing the two of you to come with him. and even if it had ended without meeting a single spirit, he would still be in high spirits.

★ you loved it, seeing the rush of thrill he feels whenever he senses a spirit nearby, hoping the spirit was able to withstand his excessive yang energy. the repeating days without one successful exorcism, only to end up getting treated to a meal by Xingqiu, and the parting that always ends with a promise to see each other the day after. Chongyun speaks his emotions, and you were in love with that.

★ and him, just in general.

★ And one day, you had decided to tell him just that

★ You were both on the hunt for Jueyun chilies for Xiangling, a small commission that you had decided to take on while waiting for Xingqiu to finish his work at the guild. The sun had set, and you had returned from Qingce village with a bucket full of the chilies and had decided to rest on top of the mountain where you had both Waypointed to just to admire the sunset.

★ In the heat of the moment, you had spoken.

“I like you, Chongyun,” you had said, looking at him with a smile.

★ You would have accepted a silence. You had expected it to be like the books; he would gently laugh and look at you, admitting that he had been waiting for you to say the exact words, lean in to kiss you. It would be awkward at first, but it’ll also be something to look back to in the future when kissing becomes something you do every day. You’d return back to Liyue Harbor hand in hand, and be able to tell Xingqiu and Xiangling that he was your boyfriend now, and admit to the former that maybe his books were right.

★ But instead, you were met with Chongyun’s wide eyes staring at you. His cheeks flushed red with what you had tried hard to hope was shyness, but had appealed more like panic. He had stood up and cleared his throat

“We- we should get back,” he says, too quickly for someone as calm as he is. And you knew it was a wrong step, “I’m-,” he clears his throat, “I’m going to go ahead first. I'm sorry,”

★ You didn’t know if he was apologizing for leaving early, or for not being able to accept your feelings, but when you hadn't seen him the following day, you could only assume.

Scaramouche

★ Honestly, you had it coming for you.

★ Scaramouche is someone whose life is their job. There was nothing that could distract him from working for the Tsaritsa

★ You had (been self-entitled) as his best friend. And honestly, if Scaramouche knew of it, he doesn't blame you. Everyone in the Fatui and who worked under the Fatui knew how close you were. Which was odd because, for one, you were absolutely nothing like him. Although you weren't exactly liked by everyone, you weren't loathed by everyone like the sixth harbinger was.

★ Scaramouche was feared by anyone who hears his name or walks a foot away from him, while you carried a calmer aura. Without glancing, Scaramouche could bring his subordinates trembling, while they would greet you when you pass by them.

★ You were polar opposites, and yet, everyone has seen the two of you together so much that when he wasn't with you or the other way around, people would assume you were on a solo mission or just leaving the other’s quarters

★ Of course, being his best friend, you weren’t spared of his usual harsh words. As a matter of fact, you probably had it much worse than anyone else. It had almost seemed as if every time he spoke, he spoke like he was trying to get rid of you.

★ But if that really were the case, then he hasn’t been trying his best. You had stayed with him since you had become an ally to the Fatui, and ever since then had stayed by his side. When others shake in fear, you shake your head with a laugh and a retort.

★ It had even come as a surprise to you when you had realized you had fallen for the harbinger. You would think that spending time with such a foul-mouthed person who would murder someone in the blink of an eye with no hesitation would make you dislike him. But that didn’t happen.

★ In fact, it was quite the opposite. You had fallen in love with him.

★ It wasn’t obvious to anyone, and even you had to take the time to squint to look for it. But Scaramouche did care for you in his own way. Whether it be toning down the harsh words when he sees your mood dampen after a mission, or beating the shit out of a person who had attacked you ruthlessly, not stopping even after his hands were covered in crimson liquid and the person almost certainly died. Even if he calls you a hindrance afterward for dirtying his hands, he definitely thought of you the same as you thought of him.

★ A friend.

★ Or, you had hoped, something more.

★ It was a mistake to take his slight kindness as a sign of him liking you, it truly was.

★ During your journey to Inazuma for a mission, you had decided to confess to him out of the blue. You knew he was someone who could predict the outcome of something even before you said anything, so a slow confession when the sun was setting in a field of flowers would just be a waste of time. if there was something you learned, it's to cut to the chase with him.

“Hey Scara,” you had said quietly. He had replied with a low hum, not turning back to look at you, “I like you.”

★ Without a second thought, Scaramouche had taken you by surprise as well.

★ He had not stopped in his tracks, instead, his shoulders shook in laugher. His laugh wasn't the same laugh you hear whenever you make a stupid mishap or get slightly injured during a simple mission- no, those laughs were warmer. Although laced with unkindness, they were more familiar.

★ This one was condescending. As if you were a new recruit again, having to work under him. As if all those years as friends had just gone down the drain.

“Stupid. What a fool of me to assume you were different.” he says, voice clear as a bell in the night, “don’t be an inconvenience. I don't have time for people like you.”

Albedo

★ Ever since working under Albedo with Sucrose, your life had been nothing but full of wonder. Although some were dangerous, Albedo and you bonded easily as if you had worked together in a past life.

★ Albedo was a genius. He was someone you looked up to, and sometime during your investigations, he had become a friend. You didn't know when it started. When it had gone from two alchemists staying the night in Dragonspine to observe the different stages of new plant growth, to- with the permission of the acting grandmaster - just two people, two friends, going out to explore the seven nations.

★ Sucrose and Timaeus had stayed back in Mondstadt to finish experiments that you both had decided to put on hold for your trip, and with nothing to worry about, the two of you had gone out with nothing but the protection of each other (and your visions, of course), and a few packed meals from Good Hunter.

★ Albedo had a side that no one saw unless they spent nights camping with him in the middle of nowhere. You were one of the lucky people who were able to see that side of his during your trips around the seven.

★ The alchemist wasn't just curious about the way the world works, he had also been curious with, well, you.

★ Some nights when he couldn't go to sleep (which was often. You’d be surprised to see how messed up his sleep schedule was), he would sit in front of the fire you had both worked hard to make, and simply talk.

★ sometimes, it would be short conversations. but more than often, you find yourself talking about everything and nothing until the sun rose above the mountains, and you would have to continue your journey until one of you (usually being you,) were too tired to continue.

★ Albedo talks with passion, no matter what the topic is. He could be talking about what you were going to be having for dinner for the next night before you reach the first region in your trip, and he would already have you captivated.

★ Albedo also talks with gentleness. And this was the said side not a lot of people would be able to see from the chief alchemist. Whenever the tent was filled with comforting silence, you would be able to hear Albedo asking you questions about yourself. They weren’t your standard, what was your dream growing up? Kind of questions, but they were more specific. More… personal.

★ Is it not funny, how life works? What if a single moment had changed in the past, I and you wouldn't have met. He would question, eyes trained to the flames burning in front of him. It sounded rhetorical, but his tone was laced with wonder. He sounds as if he was expecting an answer, but he doesn't urge you for one. And every time he does, you merely hum.

★ Albedo was gentle in everything he did. Almost all the time you were with him, he had never acted brashly. He was patient, kind.

★ and that was most likely what had prompted your crush on the alchemist

★ crushing on Albedo was like looking up at the stars. he was someone who shined brightly, but you knew he was too far to reach, yet despite that, you had still attempted to.

★ you had decided to finally let it all out on him the night of your final stay before you reached your final region, which was Inazuma.

★ and that, you had realized a little too late, had been the icing on top of a really terrible cake.

"Albedo," you had stared, and the alchemist immediately turned towards you. that was something you had grown fond of. you knew Albedo was a man married to his work, so when he turns to you in the midst of it, you felt your stomach churn in delight, "I have to tell you something,"

“Hm?” he hums, setting his notepad down to give you his full attention, “what is it, y/n?”

★ You took a deep breath, and the moment you had opened your mouth to tell him, you had a sinking feeling you had made a huge mistake.

“I like you, a lot,” you muttered, “not just platonically, Albedo. I… I think you're really interesting. and if you'd like, I would love to be with you. ”

★ Albedo’s face had fallen, and although it had been the slightest, you had still noticed it. He looked at you as if the cogs were turning in his brain, and finally, he looks down

“I must apologize,” he starts, and you feel your stomach drop, “but I’m not interested in you that way, y/n. If it makes you feel better, I see you as a very dear friend,”

★ You nod, apologizing to Albedo before he offers a small smile before continuing his research

★ You both did not speak of it, but there was a very thick air of silence hangs over the two of you afterward, that didn't dissipate even after you both left the camp.

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pridepages · 2 years ago

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Tangled Web: The Atlas Paradox

I just finished The Atlas Paradox by Olivie Blake. I have some thoughts...

Here there be spoilers!

Poet Walter Scott was the first to write “Oh what a tangled web we weave / when first we practice to deceive.”

The residents of the Alexandrian Society manor house spent all of their first year together weaving their deceptions. Now, in Olivie Blake’s followup The Atlas Paradox, all six initiates must face the reckoning of their choices--and find themselves and their affections more deeply entangled than ever.

Many fantasy trilogies tend to suffer from sophomore slump. Often, the second book is the weakest of the lineup. Fair dues to Blake: Paradox is in many ways a stronger novel than The Atlas Six. Firstly, the world-building is much more clearly shaped. Why did our wizards have to murder one of their own to join this academic cult? Because, apparently, the library is a malevolent, sentient force that thirsts for blood. Better still, the disappearance of Libby Rhodes will not suffice. The archives are wise to such cheats. In fact, when Atlas Blakely’s class tried the same thing by disappearing Ezra Fowler, the archives took vengeance: each of the remaining members of the class were eventually killed except for Ezra (bouncing around the timeline) and Atlas (remaining to be fed upon by the murder books). Similarly, we watch as the remaining members of Atlas’s Six begin to fall apart in different ways: Nico sickens, Reina obsesses, Parisa sours, Tristan sulks, and Callum drinks. All of them are still being puppeteered by Atlas, who reveals that his Master Plan appears to be to use the collective gifts of the Six to find a door to a wider multiverse. Meanwhile, Libby has been stranded in 1989. To get home, she will be confronted with the ultimate moral choice and will face her own fall from grace.

Blake has described this book as the characters experiencing their quarter-life crisis. And it shows. Admittedly, it’s a bit aggravating to hear almost all of them repeatedly telling the reader about how life and the world are pointless because Alexandrians all have power and can effectively do nothing to change the world, their individual fates, or otherwise find happiness. But, much like the grating nobody-understands-me adolescent phase, it is a stage that any thinking young adult has to go through. And the characters are charismatic enough that you want to stick with them.

As in the first book, the Six find themselves navigating tangled relationships. Initial attractions are complicated by the choices that each has made and the ways they have hurt each other. The question posed to all of them is: Where do we go from here?

An early question answered (yay for being right!) was about Reina: “she never thought of anyone sexually.” So her arc is all about her friendships. “She developed a talent for isolation,” Reina reminds us early. But the problem with that is that she resents being overlooked. And although she can identify moments when she’s being unfair--expecting other people to reach out to her or praise her or admire her despite the hostile demeanor she radiates--she can never quite get over her own pride enough to try to reach out for the closeness she wants.

Meanwhile, we rejoin some of the couples facing the immediate consequences of their actions. Callum knows that Tristan tried to kill him at the suggestion of Libby Rhodes. Callum also knows that Tristan and Libby slept together. Therefore, Callum concludes, “This was who Tristan had chosen over Callum...He hoped it would pain Tristan for the rest of his life.” A vengeful Callum is perfectly in line with the person we know. Most of book one we were exposed to Callum’s vanity to the point where whether he was interested in other people beyond manipulating them was debatable. But here we see a softer, truly wounded Callum: “Tristan might have betrayed Callum, but he wasn’t the bad guy...This was just the world. You trusted people, you loved them, you offered them the dignity of your time and the intimacy of your thoughts and the frailty of your hope and they either accepted it and cared for it or they rejected it and destroyed it and in the end, none of it was up to you. This was just what you got. Heartbreak was inevitable. Disappointment assured.”

And then there’s Tristan, who shows perhaps the most maturity out of any of the characters in this book when he finally says to Callum: “This--between us--it was real for me. You can pretend that it didn’t matter. That I was the one who wronged you. That you had no hand in how things happened. That I made a choice based on nothing, based on my own insecurities and flaws. But I am not such an idiot--I’m not so devoid of feeling to not be perfectly aware that you and I had something rare and difficult and fucking significant, and in the end it only broke because I broke it.” Unfortunately, it doesn’t make things right between them. Callum is still in deep pain and lashing out because of it. He cannot see that there is a way through the mess between them: forgiveness. But forgiveness takes courage, and more than just recognizing your flaws. It takes accountability for your own imperfections, taking responsibility for your actions both in the past and in the future. Tristan, by actually putting out there that he wronged Callum, was building a bridge that Callum has refused to cross. For all its failure, Tristan’s maturity in trying deserves a gold star.

Another way Tristan has changed is leaning into his affection for Libby. For most of the first book, Tristan was cold, reserved, apparently off-put by Libby’s earnestness and sensitivity. But secretly, he seems to have found it rather attractive. He sets Libby up in his mind as a kind of hero archetype, a contrast to how much he hates himself. But Parisa cautions him: “You like her because she’s innocent...because she’s moral. Because she’s good. Because she represents something to you that the rest of us no longer have, because we came here. And because we made choices. But she made a choice too, Tristan. She knew what the consequences were. Libby Rhodes is not your goodness, Tristan. She’s her own open flame.” Tristan is certainly in danger of idealizing Libby out of existence, fictionalizing her in his head--which is easy to do since she is absent from his life for most of the book. But, in the end, Tristan determines he’d ��rather have whatever version of Libby she had become than face the prospect of having no Libby at all.” Whether he will be able to live with the reality of that choice will remain to be seen in the next installment.

Similarly, Parisa’s journey is one of identity. Parisa has been repeatedly accused of being unable to love. Parisa finally refutes this misconception: “Of course she loved...to her, sex and love and desire and affection were different things--some of which she needed or wanted, and some she firmly did not.” Parisa knows who she is. However, Parisa learns that book one paramour Dalton Ellery is not who she thought he was. She was previously aware that Dalton’s consciousness had been split. She now learns that Dalton split off a part of himself that he did not like--his ambition--in order to both make himself safer to handle his power in the world and because it would allow the archives to trust him with more information for his research. Parisa ultimately contributes to reuniting Dalton’s consciousness, but a ‘healed’ Dalton is a new Dalton: “She realized that without the entirety of himself--with no ambition, and indeed, no formulation of the future, which was a thing she thought they had in common until she realized that, actually, his version of a blank page was wildly different from hers--she had never seen the other intricacies of him. His dreams. His longings. His fears.” Their arc is particularly fascinating because it invites the discussion: would you change what you perceive to be your worst qualities? If you did, you would be a different person. If you were, would you still be right for the people who love you now as you are? Perhaps it is different when life changes who we are gradually, as it inevitably does. But neatly removing one element entirely does not make you a ‘better’ version of yourself. It just makes you different.

Speaking of differences: wow, Libby Rhodes! I admit, I had a pet theory about Libby Rhodes. Part of it arose from the kind of way she spoke about Ezra (like he was a box she was ticking off, like she was acting in ways a good girlfriend should, the way she seemed to easily resent and want to ditch him). I was just getting big closeted sapphic vibes off her. Then, of course, she had threesome with Tristan and Parisa in book one. This at least suggested queerness to me, but still felt unconfirmed...until we get this gem in Paradox: “I’m a time traveler from the future...who maybe kind of slept with one or two of my coworkers, whom I would also (maybe) like to sleep with again.” Them, plural, as in she was into Parisa. But, then again, who isn’t? Firmly orienting Libby with the sapphics is that she gets a crush on a fellow medeian academic during her sojourn into 1989: “a cautious kiss from Belen’s careful mouth, was riotous with sensation. The hint of pressure was like a spark to Libby’s imagination, igniting something dormant in her chest as a purr of satisfaction slipped from her parted lips into Belen’s smiling mouth.” Libby is at first her typical unsure self in this moment, feeling “the kind of weird that preceded a cliff’s edge, a sharp drop. A sip of absinthe and a first kiss.” A sip of absinthe. The drink she shared with Parisa before their tryst. Not to put to fine a point on it, “Libby reached for her...and heard the vestiges of Parisa’s voice in her head: Have what you want, Rhodes. Take it.” Big. Gay. Vibes. We love to see it. But it’s unclear whether Libby is meant to end up with Parisa, Tristan, or anyone else. All we know is that “All this time she’d been desperate for help, for someone else to reassure her, for some form of comfort, or anything that could make her feel she wasn’t alone--but she was alone.” Being cast out on her own forces Libby into a reckoning. Because, for her, companionship has always been about tacit acceptance or approval. Libby has needed to be constantly reassured of her own worth. But now she’s growing beyond that. “She was no longer desperate for the crutch of someone else’s faith. For the first time...she would not presume herself to be deficient. She would not doubt the power in her body. She would not question what was earned. She would do this, and she would do it alone.” If we’re heading toward a Libby who needs to forge a future standing completely alone, uncoupled to signify that she is finally emotionally self-sufficient, wouldn’t hate it. But it would be better if it were gay.

So, thank goodness for my absolute favorite arc in the novel. In book one, an obvious romantic connection to me from the beginning was Nico and his friend Gideon, the one who he claimed to come to the Society to help. The one who he does so much to protect. The one he worries about constantly. It could not be clearer as their interactions pile up in Paradox that it’s two-sided: these idiot boys are so in love. And just when you think they’re never going to do anything about it, Gideo takes the leap: “Relief, that no one had put a stop to that arrogant laugh...some madness in Gideon’s chest made up his mind for him. He leaned forward and caught Nico’s mouth with his in something of a punitive force, a captive blow. More of a gasp that anything else, really. Although technically, it was a kiss.”

Thank you, God. Finally. But these characters are unpredictable. Nico has shown attraction to women before (well, Parisa, but again--who hasn’t?) and maybe we were heading for another heartbreaking twist:

“Gideon felt Nico’s breath catch on his tongue, an audible hitch of surprise, and then Nico pulled away and Gideon thought no, no, no-- ‘Oh, so it’s like that?’ Nico said. His eyes were searching and bewilderingly, confusingly bright. In response Gideon felt unopened and raw, like he’d cracked his chest in two and presented the evidence for Nico’s evaluation... ‘Yeah, it’s like that.’ Nico’s smile broadened. ‘Good.’ Nico caught him by a fistful of his t-shirt, tugging him in again.”

Good. Just good. For so long they struggled with their words, struggled to articulate even to themselves what they are. But at last, they chose to take a risk: no more deceptions. No more tangled thoughts, fears, self-consciousness, or denial. Instead of deciding to stay caught in the web, they tore themselves free.

I think we all have a tendency to overcomplicate our relationships. It’s easy to pull strands of negative thought. We tease out all the reasons that we can’t be happy with someone else: our sense of our inadequacies, our obligations, our histories, our resentments, our fear of risk--and we weave them into nets that keep us trapped. But we have the ability to make new and different choices. In the grand scheme of things, maybe choosing to pull ourselves out of our misery webs may seem like so much wasted or pointless effort. But if this life is all we get, and all we can control is ourselves, then maybe there is something worthy and heroic in setting ourselves free.

#the atlas paradox #olivie blake #lgbt reads #queer lit

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quillandink333 · 4 years ago

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Scarlet Carnations ~ Part IV

BotW Link X Zelda ~ Detective AU

Rating: T

Word Count: 5.1k

WARNINGS: death, murder, loss, trauma, blood and gore, terrorism, organized crime, self-harm

Summary: Inspector Zelda Hyrule, assisted by the faithful Constable Link Fyori, is infamous for cracking the most confounding of cases in a town dominated by crime. Her latest assignment is to solve the murder of her own godmother, Impa Sheikah, the late CEO of Sheikah Tech. Incorporated, while staying under the radar of the dreaded Yiga organization.

Part I • Part II • Part III • Part IV • Part V • Part VI • Part VII • Epilogue • Masterlist

It was nine o’clock in the morning, two days after I’d made my arrest, and Paya’s trial was in its opening stages. I was watching from the gallery. Normally, as the one running the investigations, I would be the first witness to take the stand, but today, for whatever reason, the lead prosecutor, Urbosa Sigatur, planned to summon me second after Auntie Purah. Urbosa was far from a stranger to me, however. She and I had collaborated on several cases in the past, and she shared with me many of my own ideals. She’d once even known my mother before her untimely demise. And so I decided not to question her judgment, however unconventional it may have seemed.

The prosecution’s opening statement had been based on the fact that the stolen Sheikah Slate, along with a bloodstained bullet, had been found in the defendant’s room, which, until recently, hadn’t been searched as it had been deemed irrelevant to the case. With these conclusive pieces of evidence, she’d stated, the defendant had been charged with both the theft of the Slate and the murder of its owner, Impa Sheikah.

The stolen object was the most central piece of evidence in the prosecution’s case. It had once been a target of my own immense interest, even before its theft. But that had all changed following its recovery. The riddle, though having been solved by means of professional reprogramming, still made little sense to me if any. “Carnation” was its answer, according to Auntie Purah herself. Much to my dismay, the secrets that the riddle had supposedly kept hidden had turned out to be nothing but my own fantasy. Every last piece of data that had once been stored in the Slate had been deleted, meaning the possibility of proving a motive for its theft was next to nonexistent. The only thing left in its memory was a diary entry, written by Auntie Impa the day before her murder. This in itself, however, held the potential to serve as a lead to her killer’s identity, at the very least.

The diary entry, as projected onto the courtroom wall by the Slate, went,

“Today was the first day of Zelda’s holiday visit. It is hard to believe that the last long term visit she paid us was already over a year ago. We have all missed her dearly. She seems as interested in my sister’s work as ever. It brought me joy to see the two of them bonding over their shared passion once again.

“However I must admit, I would still love for her to also spend some quality time with Paya some day soon. I sensed some resentment coming from her directed at my dear granddaughter. Perhaps it is something to do with that boy. Either way, it seems their relationship has hardly changed since she left the nest.

“I cannot say for certain whether anyone will ever be able to read this, but I have faith that Purah will figure it out. I am no good with machines like these, but I believe in her. At any rate, I hope she is the one who gets to read this message, but in the event that it happens to fall into the wrong hands, I will sign off here.”

With this, the prosecution’s argument, though a bit scattered across several different points, seemed sturdy enough so far. That Auntie Impa had seemingly known that her life would be taken the following night after writing her final message, combined with the fact that she’d received no threats from the outside world up until then, was one of the strongest pieces of evidence in our arsenal.

Paya’s defence lawyer, one Revali Twii, had made several attempts to dismantle her argument by claiming she had no possible way of knowing whether or not the victim had received a threat from outside the estate by phone. These attacks were easily deflected. As a foreigner to this city, Mr. Twii had been unaware that, thanks to the Sheikahs’ company, household phones here were all equipped with recording devices. Naturally, Ms. Sigatur had already listened to each recorded call since a month before the murder and had detected no discernible threat in any of them.

And yet in spite of all that, the argument shifted heavily in favour of the defence when it then carried out his cross examination. With how confidently Urbosa had stated her case, I never could’ve imagined how easy it would be for the opposing side to shatter it into countless, tiny pieces.

Mr. Twii’s primary line of questioning was a solid one, to say the least. He concurred with my deduction as presented by Ms. Sigatur that the parlour indeed was not the true scene of the crime. However, he claimed that the real crime scene could not possibly have been the defendant’s bedroom either. His basis for this was the gunshot. Paya’s room was in the same hallway that the sleeping quarters of the current witness, Auntie Purah, as well as myself, were in. Mr. Twii had her testify about the sound of the gunshot that she’d heard. In addition to the fact that it hadn’t seemed loud enough to have come from the very next room over, she’d only heard it once: from the parlour.

No doubt he intended to question me about the same thing when the time came for me to take the stand. I’d been itching to speak my mind and set things straight so badly that I’d had to cross my legs just to keep myself from getting up too soon by the time court was finally adjourned for a half-hour recess.

Now the prosecutor and I were together in a private room reserved for witness prepping. Normally I did just fine testifying on my own, but in this trial, everything was at stake, and I couldn’t seem to stop my heart from racing no matter what I tried. Thankfully I had Urbosa here, and simply talking with her had done much to calm my nerves already.

“You’re originally from out of town too, aren’t you?” I noted, thinking back on her performance.

“That I may be, but unlike that lawyer, I’ve spent enough time here to know of the perils this city is facing, and who’s been holding it together in spite of all that.”

“Right.” My lips rested against the curve of my index as my leg bounced restlessly underneath the table. “That schmuck really doesn’t have a clue, does he?”

“No, not likely. Though he’s quite the formidable opponent, I must say.” She leaned back in her chair, looking pensive, but not the least bit agitated. “My case took quite the beating out there.”

My heart rate was starting to pick up again. “You don’t think you’ll...lose...do you?”

“Who, me? Lose?” She let out a hearty bout of chuckles. “Young lady, are you quite sure you know who you’re speaking to?” I returned her laughter halfheartedly, unable to shake the foreboding feeling lying at the pit of my stomach. Urbosa cleared her throat, preserving her calm smile. “All jokes aside, I wouldn’t worry even if we do end up losing this one. The true criminal is still out there somewhere, and there is no such thing as a perfect crime.”

“I suppose...” Perfect crimes may not have existed, but neither did perfect investigations. If they ruled Paya out as a suspect, then only one other, “safe” option would remain.

“Alright, out with it. What’s on your mind?” Her hand had landed on my shoulder as she’d reached across the desk, over my half empty glass of water. “And why are you so set on getting Paya convicted, if I might ask? Sibling rivalry is one thing, but this is...”

I avoided her perceptive gaze, staring intently at the latch on my bag. What could I possibly tell her? “It’s just,” I stalled, eventually settling for a vague, “I’m running out of time.”

After a long pause, she leaned back, letting go of my arm. “I see. Well, whatever it is, know that I’ll be on your side no matter what, little bird.”

Oh, if only she’d known.

“So to sum up, you were outstandingly negligent in your investigation of the defendant’s bedroom.”

My jaw unhinged at what I’d just heard come out of the attorney’s mouth. I’d just finished giving him an explanation of my findings in as much detail as I could, during which time he’d been surprisingly polite, until now.

“You likely saw the Slate along with the bullet and made your arrest right then and there. You didn’t even stop to consider the possibility that you hadn’t found all there’d been to find in that room, did you?” I opened my mouth to respond, but he cut me off again. “In fact, I’m willing to bet you didn’t even attempt to look for the murder weapon.”

“Excuse me, Sir,” I retaliated with chest puffed up, “but my team and I searched the property from top to bottom, repeatedly, for two whole weeks, and—”

“Yes, I am well aware. However, you failed to complete a thorough search of this so-called ‘true crime scene’ before you arrested Ms. Sheikah. Do you deny it?”

I was floundering for words. Why bother questioning me if he merely intended to cut me off and answer his own questions? “I-I...”

“Objection.”

All eyes fell upon the prosecution. I breathed a heavy sigh of relief.

“The defence is harassing the witness, Your Honour.”

The judge gave a slow, considerate nod of his head. “Objection sustained.”

Twii gave Urbosa a subtle but unmistakable side-eye. I thanked her silently. “Speaking of the murder weapon,” he continued in his signature, holier-than-thou tone, “I have here Exhibit F: a list of traits possessed by the elusive firearm responsible for the victim’s life.”

This wasn’t good. The list in question had been compiled by the prosecution based on traits of the fatal wound revealed by the autopsy, as well as other traits shared by the two bullets that were found at the estate. It contained information like its .38 caliber and that it had likely been fired twice at point blank, to name a few examples.

“My question for you, witness, is the following. What did you find during your ‘investigation’ regarding the weapon?”

This was fine, I kept telling myself. He still had yet to present the most fatal piece of evidence in the record. “As I’ve said before, none of our searches turned up any sign of it, other than what’s listed on that piece of paper you’re holding.”

“Is that so?” The sarcasm rooted in his voice had me sweating bullets. “In that case, Ms. Hyrule, I’d like to turn your attention to this passage here at the bottom.”

That was “Inspector Hyrule” to him, but of course, he couldn’t care less for such trifling things as common decency.

But when I read over the passage at which he was pointing, my throat closed up.

“Allow me to read it aloud for the court.” He snobbishly cleared his throat. “And I quote, ‘The murder weapon and the circumstances surrounding it strongly suggest an Octoric M&P revolver,’ end quote. I’d also like to add that this particular model is favoured by the district bureau of police, who issue them out to many of their detectives for self-defence.”

I gritted my teeth, annunciating each word as I spat, “Get to the point.”

The smarmy bastard was hardly even phased by my unmasked hostility. “Now, now, Ms. Hyrule, you’ve no reason to worry,” he waved off. “After all, I have no intention of accusing you.”

When he spoke that last word, my heart stopped, and deep down, I knew it was over.

“Firstly I wish for you to clarify a few things for me, as you were one of the first to discover the scene of the murder when it happened.”

I gave a slow, strenuous nod, losing strength in my knees by the second, but standing my ground all the same. “Go on.”

“The defendant showed no sign of having a gun on or anywhere near her person when you arrived, correct?”

“Correct,” I lied.

“Good. Now that we’ve established that the defendant was unarmed, I’d like to present another piece of evidence.” He laid out flat a second sheet of paper on the stand in front of me. “Exhibit H. This is part of a record kept by the precinct where the witness is currently employed, alongside the rest of her team. It details a list of the firearms given out to detectives each day, as well as the time when each one was issued and when it was returned to custody at the end of its designated officer’s shift.”

And there it was. I’d known all along that it had only been a matter of time until he’d bring out this piece of evidence, but, evidently, I’d failed to prepare myself mentally for this. Perhaps a part of me had hoped not to be on the stand when it happened. All I could do now was hold my peace and pray that it wouldn’t get worse from here.

“This page corresponds with the day before the murder. Now, Ms. Hyrule,” he addressed, summoning a swarm of butterflies in my stomach, “I’m sure you’ll recognize this badge number here. Would you please read it aloud for me?”

I swallowed my nerves and did as he’d requested. “FB7732Z438LL.”

“Thank you.” He flashed me that shit-eating grin of his. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is the number belonging to one Constable Link Fyori, the witness’ very own investigative partner.” A few whispers drifted through the gallery following that announcement. “One who reads this will also notice that, after his revolver was issued out to him the morning before the murder, it was never returned to the precinct’s custody thereafter. In fact, it is still missing to this day.”

With this, the whispers grew in number, creating a din of distrust that had the attorney smirking from ear to ear.

“Objection.”

The whispering dissipated. Twii’s shoulders sagged as he hypocritically shot Urbosa a look that said, “What now?”

“Mr. Twii, how is this relevant? Unless you have definitive proof linking Constable Fyori to the crime, I see no point in bringing it up.”

The judge gave a pound of his gavel with a bone-chilling shake of his head. “Overruled. The court will allow the defence to continue, provided that it has good reason.”

My mouth fell open, and so had Urbosa’s.

“Thank you, Your Honour. I was just getting to that, my good prosecutor.” Now even she seemed on edge. The tension in the air was thick enough to cut through with a knife. “I may not have proof as things stand currently. However, that is about to change. You see, I have reason to believe that our witness here is covering for someone.”

The courtroom broke out into an even louder din of murmurs, as if I couldn’t clearly hear each backhanded remark the members of the gallery were making at my expense.

The pounding of the judge’s gavel echoed throughout the room, and the whispering ceased once again.

“You must be mistaken.” I stood as tall as I could with how close my legs were to giving up on me. “I happen to be one of the most trusted detectives in the force. Why do you think I was put in charge of this case despite being one of the first on the scene?”

“Ah, but that, dear witness, was your superiors’ fatal mistake.”

Damn that solicitor. “What do you mean?”

“Although my client has elected not to testify to the court, she has let me in on a certain piece of information—one that I believe will make the jaws of everyone here drop to the floor.”

Surely not. Surely even she wouldn’t dare stoop so low.

“Inspector...” The attorney looked me dead in the eyes. The air was suffocating. “What do you have in your briefcase?”

Everyone was staring at me and murmuring amongst themselves, more raucously than ever before, like I was the one on trial.

“N-No, it’s—it’s not what it seems,” I wavered. Then mustering my shattered courage, “You!” I pointed my finger at Twii. “Prove to me that the defendant wasn’t lying. I demand to see proof!”

But my demands were met with silence. Even Urbosa was looking at me with cold contempt and disappointment.

“Bailiff.”

An officer appeared from the sidelines. He seized my bag.

“Wait, stop!”

I tried to wrest it from his grasp, but he was too strong. I watched helplessly as he opened it up, reaching in and revealing the murder weapon for all to see.

“No...!”

“Bailiff, what is the number engraved on that weapon?”

He seemed to recite the number in slow motion, twisting the knife with every digit. “FB7732Z438LL.”

“No, please!” I screamed. “It wasn’t him, he’s been framed! Please, Your Honour, you have to believe me!”

Amidst the roar of the crowd, I saw the conclusive shake of the judge’s head. With a pound of his gavel, he said, “I hereby order the immediate detainment of Link Fyori under the charge of first degree murder.”

I met eyes with my partner but half a second before I saw him be dragged out of his seat with brute force.

“No!”

“As for this witness, she shall receive her sentence after being questioned by the police for the concealing of evidence, contempt of court, and perjury.”

I cried out when an overwhelming pain shot through my arm. My family watched from the gallery in either horror or disgust, or a mixture of both perhaps. I tried with all my might just to get the bailiff to stop hurting me, but it was futile.

“Your Honour, just a moment please.”

With the judge’s approval, the man’s grip on my arm lightened up. The one who’d spoken had been none other than that wretched defence attorney.

“Inspector, if you don’t mind, I have one more question to ask you.”

I held my breath, bracing myself. Though there wasn’t much he could say at this point that could possibly make the situation worse.

“Why?” he finally asked. “Why did you feel the need to conceal such a critical piece of evidence?”

My entire face boiled over with heat. I looked around, taking in the courtroom’s atmosphere, and my whole being was filled to the brim with indescribable anger and shame. Barely able to swallow the charged whimper lodged at the cusp of my throat, I choked out the words, “No comment.”

The trial had ended while I’d still been in the middle of interrogation by my own peers. I was lucky enough to get off with a fine, but it was because of that hour-and-a-half-long lecture that I only found out about Paya’s “not guilty” verdict after the entire courtroom had been cleared out. This was no surprise to me, of course, but still a disappointment, to put it lightly. What was a surprise was that no one, not Paya, nor Auntie Purah, nor even Urbosa, had bothered to wait for me.

That was fine. They could think whatever they wanted of me. I’d simply have to redeem myself by proving Link’s innocence in his trial.

It was to this end that I made my way to the district’s Centre of Detention.

When Link appeared behind the iron bars of the visitors’ room, he was already sporting a worn and faded prisoner’s uniform, surely having just undergone an interrogation of his own. Though, from the looks of him, his had been considerably more thorough than mine.

I cleared my throat. “Hello, Link.”

“Hello,” he replied.

Deathly silence filled the air. The harsh ticking of the clock on the wall behind me was slowly starting to crawl under my skin.

“They, uhm...didn’t go easy on you, eh?”

He shook his head, eyes wandering without aim.

Why did it have to be so hard to talk to him sometimes? He’d never been so unapproachable back in our days as teenagers. Though now, I supposed, recent events were only making things even more difficult for me than usual.

“Look...” I took a deep breath, shifting in my seat. “I’m sorry. Alright? I couldn’t cover for you forever. They were bound to find out eventually. Please, don’t be upset.”

“What? Zelda...” His demeanour morphed from listless to urgent, almost apologetic, as he struggled to find his voice. “Why would I be upset with you? I never asked you to cover for me in the first place.”

“I know.” Now it was I who couldn’t bring myself to look him in the eyes. “I just knew that you couldn’t have possibly... I mean, you would never—”

“I didn’t.”

He’d caught me with my mouth hanging open, when he’d cut me off.

“I didn’t kill her. I promise you.”

Of course he hadn’t. It was obvious, even though the revolver had borne no fingerprints and, with the gloves that he always wore, he wouldn’t have left any. What motive could he have had? He was an amnesiac, and even if he hadn’t been, he still wouldn’t have had a reason to kill my godmother.

I took out my pen and notebook, the only things left in my case that hadn’t been confiscated. “Tell me what you know, Link. Everything.”

A beat. Then he straightened his posture and began to explain his side of the story. As it turned out, my intuition had been spot on. This whole mess was the design of the Yiga organization. Link told me about his encounter with them before the murder. They had blackmailed him into surrendering his revolver to them, after which he would never see it again.

Though, even without a hint of deceit in his tone or manner, I had questions about the means by which the Yiga had blackmailed him. He had virtually nothing to lose. Didn’t he?

In any case, I honestly had considered showing him the gun that I’d found on the scene that night, but somehow I’d had the distinct impression that he’d known nothing about it, despite the very object in question belonging to him. I’d thought perhaps someone from the organization had switched out his weapon for another without his noticing. It was no secret that even the police bureau was infested with their ilk. In the end, I hadn’t been far off the mark.

The whole time he spoke, he had his head lowered, hair falling in front of his eyes, as if something were holding them back from meeting mine. Then he muttered, “When I had my encounter with the organization, I...remembered.”

His limited annunciation meant I had to take a moment to decipher the syllables of the last word he’d uttered. Then they sank in. “Wait. What? You mean you...” It felt beyond strange to even speak the words after so long. “You got your memory back?”

He lowered his head further. Was that a nod?

My mind went back to what he’d said to me on that one occasion in the office, not long after this whole mess had first begun. “Link, you...” My hands curled into themselves around the strap of my satchel. “All this time...why didn’t you tell me?”

“I couldn’t,” he pleaded. “It would’ve been a hindrance to the investigation.” I hated to admit it, but he was right. Dropping that bomb on me would only have thrown my conscience deeper into its already tangled web of turmoil.

Amidst all the questions swirling in my mind, one suddenly appeared, eclipsing all the rest. “Why did you disappear back then?”

At this, he finally looked up and met my gaze. But when he did, his eyes were wide, almost trembling. His look seemed to cast the whole room into a great, looming darkness.

“Oh, it’s...it’s okay if you’d prefer not to talk about—”

“No,” he exclaimed. “I must.” But the way his shoulders came up to meet his ears and how rapidly his chest rose and fell told me it wasn’t going to be an easy story to tell. “It was the Yi—” He choked on his words. “The...organization.”

There it was again. The name of the group I’d been chasing without rest ever since their appearance eighteen years prior. “I knew it...” I mumbled without thinking.

He steeled himself, then continued. “That day, my father was picking me and my sister up after school. Normally we would’ve ridden home with him in his automobile, but that morning, he and I had planned to surprise Aryll by getting...I think it was ice cream, on our way back. Anyway, we decided to walk home that day. But...” His face darkened yet again. “But then...”

Pressing him for more details would have been beyond cruel. I could only imagine the horrors that those blackguards had put him and his family through. “How many of them were there?”

“I’m not sure. All I know is that they had us outnumbered.” I nodded along, without thinking, as he continued his tale. “They were all armed with what looked like military grade shotguns, and they wore those masks with the inverted Sheikah family crest... I’ve always known that I’d seen that image somewhere before.”

No one knew why the organization had chosen this symbol for themselves, though I personally suspected it to be a show of opposition.

“Anyway, after they sh...shot father,” he struggled, a hand coming up to his now quavering lips, “they must’ve felt threatened by Aryll and me, because the next thing they did was...shoot her, too.” The way his tone had started to oscillate and how his face had drained itself of colour made my stomach churn. His anguish was so clear, it was devastating. “One of them had said something to the ends of, ‘We can’t have you scamps telling on us.’ But before they could...’shut me up’ as well, I fled.” Another pause. He kept on breathing. “I was too terrified to notice which way I was going. The whole time I ran, they kept firing at me. They were too reckless to aim properly, though, mind.”

“Well...that’s lucky, at least,” I tried. This was met with a sigh of reluctant agreement. “Still, how did you make it out of that with your life?”

“They stopped chasing me when I made it out of the back alleys and into the open,” he explained. “I suppose they couldn’t risk revealing themselves.”

Now it all made sense. Seven years ago, when he’d vanished without a trace, it was as though he’d never even existed in the first place. No one could get in contact with him or his family, and yet, no one batted an eye about it. It had seemed I’d been the only one who’d thought of it as anything less than perfectly normal. Just like when my mother had lost her life.

“We never had the chance to get ice cream that day.” He looked all but ready to burst into tears with that sentence. That was the moment I realized, no matter how drastically the last seven years of hell had changed him, there was still a fragment of that playful, hollow-legged sixteen-year-old left deep in his dark, forgotten core. If there was a way to bring that bright-eyed child back out into the light, I would find it, even if it spelled my demise.

Even so, there was one thing left that had yet to be explained. “What about your amnesia?”

“Ah...” His brow furrowed in thought. “I don’t know what caused that, to be honest with you.” He seemed to be racking his mind, but to no avail. “By the time those thugs finally gave up, I didn’t recognize my surroundings. I remember trying to find my way home, but I suppose I just ended up getting myself even more lost from there.” It was no wonder. The street names in this town were of little help in navigation, and it wasn’t hard to understand why he might have been apprehensive to ask for directions in such a bustling and hostile environment, especially after what he’d just been subjected to. “So I fell asleep in the streets that night,” he concluded with a shivering exhale. “The next morning, I woke up without the slightest notion of who I was.”

My heart took a plunge at the thought of his young self curled up in some alleyway, like a baby bird who’d fallen from the nest. “It must have been some sort of mental defence mechanism,” I conjectured. “That’s the only explanation I can come up with.” He slowly nodded his agreement. “After that, then, I suppose the rest is history.”

“Indeed...”

The visitors’ room fell into a deep, reflective silence, one nothing like that which had had me gasping for air moments ago. I watched the weary feelings of dread swim in his once bright blue eyes, tearing him apart.

He’d spent five whole years in that cold, cramped ward without even a name by which to call himself. And now we were back where we’d started. He may have regained his memories in the end, but at what cost?

I no longer felt the need to hunt down those who had wronged me. Now, my only desire was to slip between the bars that stood between the two of us and whisk him away to a far off land, where no one would ever hurt us again. But I pushed the impossible daydream aside. Even if escape were an option, we’d only be running straight out into range of Yiga fire.

“After your trial tomorrow...well, at the very least, I’ll lose my badge,” I smiled waywardly. Then, letting it fade and rolling my shoulders back, “Until then, I swear, I’ll do everything within my power to prove your innocence. Then we can go out for ice cream together.”

His eyes shimmered with unshed tears when he looked up at me then. Now that I thought about it, this seemed like the first time I’d ever seen him come close to crying, even in the time before the incident. Of course, he’d seen me in tears countless times back then. I wondered if he remembered them.

“Zelda...?” My name had started to leave his lips with conviction, but weakened on its way out. “There’s...something else I should tell you.”

“Anything.”

Just then, I caught him straightening out the cuff of his black-barred sleeve, concealing the fair skin of his wrist, out of the corner of my eye. “Never mind.” He again cast his gaze downwards, muttering an inaudible, “It’s nothing,” under his breath.

#is it obvious yet how much I love Ace Attorney?#my writing #fanfic #botw #zelink #botw zelink #zelink botw #link x zelda #zelda x link #botw link x zelda #botw zelda x link #zelink fanfic #zelink fic #zelink ff #zelda pov #detective au

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tiffdawg · 5 years ago

Text

Full Sabacc | A Din Djarin x Reader Fic

Gif: @bestintheparsec

Pairing: Din Djarin/ The Mandalorian x Reader (no y/n)

Word Count: 4.0k

Rating: E | Warnings: NSFW - explicit smut, dirty talk, mild cursing. 18+ only.

A/N: A game of sabacc turns into soft, steamy, sexy fun with Din Djarin. This is basically one long self-indulgent strip tease. Forgive me, but it’s my birthday and I wanted to treat y’all to something fun 🖤Enjoy!

Read on AO3

My Masterlist

... . ...

Full Sabacc

Din’s gaze was momentarily transfixed on the blur of starlight curving around the transparisteel window as the Razor Crest tore through hyperspace. It’d been a long day and he was tired, but he couldn’t rest. Not yet. Adrenaline still coursed through his veins from the day’s action, making him restless. He’d finally tracked down the last bounty of the three pucks Karga had given him a few weeks prior. He had to put fuel in the Crest somehow, and this was the best way he knew how, despite other matters that needed his attention. Thankfully, the Trandoshan was in carbonite, though not for lack of a fight, and the autopilot was set for Nevarro.

He’d been cycling through starmaps, looking for the smallest hint of a lead as to where he might continue searching for his foundling’s people, but had allowed the blue streaks of hyperspace to distract him from his seemingly futile task. Instead he was thinking of the little foundling, sleeping soundly in his carrier down in the hull, and, in spite of his best efforts, you.

He’d brought you on as crew to help with bounties and keep the ship flying almost a year ago. He needed to focus more on finding the mysterious Jedi and after watching you fight off a couple of thugs who’d mistakenly thought you’d be an easy target, he figured you’d do, at least temporarily. You were strong and capable, and he’d needed the help, but you’d surprised him when you fell in love with the kid and took on Din’s burdens as your own, steadfastly determined to help him in any way you could. A temporary agreement quickly became permanent, and the past few months of crisscrossing the Outer Rim with you and the baby had brought Din a strange but not unwelcome sense of contentment. Something he’d never had as far as he could remember in his adult life.

You quietly reentered the cockpit, having previously left to check on the sleeping toddler and search for food, and reclaimed your seat next to him.

“How much longer?” you asked with a sigh.

“About fifteen minutes less than the last time you asked,” he retorted.

The three of you had spent the majority of the past week within the confines of the Crest, with only brief respites outside the ship when you made planetfall to track a bounty or hurriedly pick up supplies. His most recent jobs had taken you to planets that were less than hospitable, not that you seemed to mind that fact. You were feisty, a bit rough around the edges, and could handle yourself in dangerous situations. Still, he was sympathetic to your frustration. Even the kid was growing restless.

For a moment, he let his mind wander again as he contemplated the starlight before him. He let himself entertain the idea of taking you and his foundling somewhere nice for a few days. He imagined the two of you happy and free somewhere warm with a bright sun shining down on rolling green fields and a sparkling lake far from the chaos that plagued the rest of the galaxy, that seemed intent to follow him everywhere.

With a few swift movements, he double-checked the autopilot and turned to face you, wanting to voice his newfound desire, but the words died on his tongue. He had no idea how to suggest something like that to you. You were just supposed to be his working partner, his friend at best. It didn’t matter if he was starting to consider you so much more than that.

Instead, he said nothing, his head dropping to the stack of cards you shuffled idly in your hands.

“I know how we can pass the time,” you suggested, following his gaze. “It’ll be more fun than staring into hyperspace all night.”

“I don’t do that.”

“You do, but it’s okay. It’s endearing, Mando,” you said with a light laugh. Before he had time to process what your words, you leaned towards him in your seat, a mischievous smirk playing at the corners of your lips. “Do you know how to play sabacc?”

“I’ve been in enough cantinas to know how to play sabacc,” he answered dryly. “I just choose not to.”

You slump back in your seat. “You don’t like playing?” you asked, looking down at the cards, toying with an already bent corner on one, and sounding rather defeated. He was surprised – usually you’d put up more of a fight.

“Never interested me.”

“I know how we can make it interesting.” Your eyes met his again with a newfound blaze. That was the spark he’d been looking for, but he knew instantly that he was going to regret it.

“You’re not suggesting what I think you are,” he deadpanned, his voice even and modulated. Underneath, he felt differently. You gave him a short, playful nod as if hoping to encourage him, beaming at him from across the cockpit, and he felt his resolve crumble. Even if you didn’t realize it, that smile could get him to do anything.

You took his silence as an opening to convince him, and to your credit, it was a fair argument.

“C’mon, what’ve you got to lose? I’m in a tunic, trousers, and a jacket. You’re wearing full body armor and 5,000 layers, Mandalorian.”

You pronounced his title as if daring him to agree.

Din was never one to resist a challenge.

… . …

As it turned out, you were pretty good at sabacc.

Damn good.

That was fast becoming a problem for Din Djarin.

He had yet another shitty hand of cards. At best, he had 18 points. If he played what he currently held in his now ungloved hands, you’d probably beat him. If he drew another card, he’d almost certainly bomb out and you’d still beat him. Again.

At that point, he was down to his helmet and base layers. He’d lost every other piece of Beskar along with his gloves, boots, belt and holsters, cape and outer coverings. You’d seen him in various stages of undress before – not only do you share rather close living quarters but you’d patched up his more serious injuries on a number of occasions – however, this was easily the least amount of clothing he’d ever worn in front of you, even if he was still essentially covered from head to toe.

Of course, you were still wearing almost everything you’d had on at the start of the game. Only your boots and jacket were missing. Hell, you still had your socks. You grinned wickedly at him from your perch on the co-pilot’s seat and he knew you had another good hand. He’d suspect you of cheating somehow, but he’d been watching you closely, and, to be quite honest, he knew you better than that.

You showed him your cards and he groaned.

Pretty soon he’d be in nothing but his gods-forsaken helmet. Not that he hadn’t imagined that exact scenario before – although this definitely was not the time nor place to entertain those kinds of thoughts. Not when he felt so exposed.

Din wasn’t sure how he let this game get away from him. He’d completely lost control of the situation, and he wasn’t getting much in return.

Except that he was, in a way. He supposed he’d let this happen. Din could’ve tapped out of the game at any point and you would’ve obliged him. But it was sort of…exciting. He got to choose what to reveal to you, what part of him to bare next, all under the guise of a game. There was no pressure, no expectations, and he reveled in the way you carefully appraised him every time another layer was removed.

You quirked a brow at him, still waiting for him to indulge you for your latest victory. He shucked off his last protective layer, leaving him in nothing but his trousers and undershirt, and it was easily the least dressed he’d ever been around anyone. Even when he had participated in brief sexual encounters in the past, he’d never removed so much as a piece of Beskar. Yet there he was sitting in front of you wearing next to nothing and he wasn’t entirely uncomfortable.

No, he liked the look in your eyes as you took in his form, finally seeing the outline of a human body beneath the armor. He probably liked it too much.

Until you met his eyes behind the visor again and he saw a glimmer of uncertainty cloud your lusty gaze that looked entirely foreign on you.

“We should stop,” you said, breaking the silence.

“Why stop now? You’ve been kicking my ass so far.”

You considered his words, chewing on your bottom lip in a way he found much too enticing.

“Deal,” he commanded and for some reason you listened. You hardly ever listened to him without at least some snarky comment. He examined his cards and stifled a sigh. He made his best play, anticipating another loss.

You revealed your cards and – he won.

You bombed out on the next round and lost the one after that, playing a meager 15 points worth of cards. Consequently, you’ve lost both of your socks and your thigh holster and the two of you are suddenly on much more even footing.

You dealt another round without so much as looking at him and he couldn’t help but notice the tension in your movement, in your whole body.

He won that round too, but he was studying you closely now. You were lying to him; that wasn’t your best play.

“Bout time you won a few rounds” you said, having noticed him watching you. He heard the hesitation in your voice where no one else would’ve noticed it.

You shifted in your seat and your hands moved to the hem of your tunic. For a brief moment your eyes flick up to meet his just as you're about to lift the garment up and off your body. Acting on reflex, he grabbed your wrist to stop you.

“I want to see the rest of your cards first,” he demanded.

“Okay, you’re definitely the only man in the galaxy to ever say that after winning a round of strip sabacc,” you said rolling your eyes.

He released you from his grip and reached for your unused cards. This time you tried to stop him, but he was stronger than you and broke free easily, still always careful not to hurt you. A quick glance at your cards told him you had a better hand.

A much better hand.

Full sabacc.

You weren’t so stupid that you couldn’t count to 23. You’d lost on purpose.

“Why did you do that?” he asked accusingly.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about” you deflected weakly and started to gather up the strewn about cards, no longer meeting his stare.

But he wasn’t going to let this go. “You’re the most competitive person I know. Why’d you lose on purpose? I don’t understand,” he prompted, seeking some sort of explanation.

“Because I-” You stumbled over your words uncharacteristically, “I didn’t want you to be uncomfortable.”

His head tilted to one side, a silent plea for clarification that he knew you’d understand.

“Look, I honestly didn’t expect you to be that terrible at sabacc. No offense,” you said with an apologetic look. “I didn’t think I’d get you down to next to nothing that fast. Not with how much you wear – which is a little ridiculous by the way. Also, no offense.” He rolled his eyes at you behind the helmet and somehow you sensed that too, offering him a small huff of a laugh and the ghost of a smile. “I just didn’t want you to be uncomfortable” you repeated after a moment, and your care for him made him bold.

“I hate sabacc. I’m fucking horrible at it,” he started, “But I liked losing to you.”

Your eyes locked onto his behind the visor, your lips parting slightly at his words. “Really?” you asked with more than a hint of disbelief.

He hummed noncommittally and then let his helmet tilt downwards a bit more obviously than normal as his gaze trailed over your body. You seemed to come alive under his stare, body arching toward him and the unsteady rise and fall of your chest quickening.

“I liked winning,” you said, grinning at him.

“I know you did. But you still owe me something.”

You rose from your seat and closed the distance between the two of you, standing in between Din’s parted legs with a steading hand on his shoulder. He looked up at you from behind the visor, waiting for you to make your next move.

“You did win the last round,” you said, pretending to consider his suggestion as you took one of his hands in your own and brought it to the hem of your tunic. “Maybe you could help me.”

He didn’t win the last round, not even close. You’d had a full sabacc and yet here you were offering yourself to him as a reward.

Din stood to his full height, practically chest to chest with you, and tentatively lifted your tunic, slowly revealing the smooth skin of your stomach, the soft curves of your hips, the gentle slopes of your shoulders. Only a thin breast band remained to protect your modesty, though it did little to hide the swell of your breasts or your peaked nipples from him. He dropped your shirt onto the pile of long forgotten clothing items that seemed to be growing by the minute. He let his fingers skirt over your sides as he brought his hands back down to settle on your hips, suddenly overcome with the need to hold you in place. He was just barely touching you, but the feel of your skin burned through him, emanating from his fingertips and settling deep in his belly.

But what was he supposed to do now?

You’d always flirted with him much more boldly than he did with you, and he’d assumed that was just part of your personality. You were naturally confident and more than a little coquettish. When he did dare to flirt back, he always took his cues from you. He also stuck to easy truths: your effortless fighting technique, the practiced way you cleaned a blaster, your sharp wit and cunning mind. And even though you couldn’t see past his dark visor, you always caught him staring at you. Always offered a shy, knowing smile in response while never expecting much of anything from him in return.

But now you were staring up at him eagerly.

This was already the most intimate situation he’d ever been in – sexual or otherwise. Never before in his somewhat limited experience, had it ever felt like this before. The air between you was charged, practically volatile, and it felt like it would implode at any minute.

“Your move, Mando,” you prompted, your voice barely more than a whisper.

He let out a sigh he didn’t know he was holding. Even now you were letting him dictate the terms, still making sure he felt comfortable, and your encouragement was all he needed. “Turn around. Close your eyes.”

As soon as you did what he told you, he disengaged the locking mechanism on his helmet. Quickly slipping off his undershirt, he replaced his helmet before reaching out to you again. You let him turn you around with a light touch ghosting over your shoulder.

“You can look.”

Your eyes fluttered open and darted across his body. Instinctively, your hand stretched out towards his bare torso, retracting hesitantly halfway before he took the initiative. Taking your hand in his, he planted your palm to his chest, his own resting firmly over yours. The tightness in his chest dissipated under your touch, aided by the soft smile gracing your lips. Until you glanced up at him and thought he saw a hint of sadness cross your face. There was one layer that couldn’t come off.

Not yet.

He filed that thought away for later. He could only process so much in one night.

“I can’t-”

“I know.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. This is more than enough. I promise.” You smiled again and he tried to believe you. He tried not to dwell on it as you leaned forward and placed a soft kiss on his chest. His heart threatened to beat out of his ribs, and he was sure you could feel it. “Is this okay?”

“Yes,” he choked out and you kissed him again, lower this time as your focus shifted to the button of his trousers.

“And this?” You asked looking up at him with dark, shining eyes. He nodded and you pushed his pants down his legs, bending to help him step out of them. As you stood to your full height again, your fingertips brushed lightly against his calves and thighs, scorching his skin and sending a shock of arousal to his already throbbing erection. You noticed his hardness, hardly concealed by his briefs, as you moved up his body.

“Aren’t you glad I suggested sabacc?” you asked coyly.

He wished you could see the smile behind his helmet. “Yeah, but I think you’re a little overdressed.”

“Care to help me?” You wrapped your hands around his and brought them to your chest, encouraging him to palm your still covered breasts. He enthusiastically helped you remove the offending article, tossing it carelessly aside, and his hands wandered lower, taking your trousers off as well as your panties in one quick movement.

“Hey!” you giggled, wrapping your arms around his neck to balance yourself. “That’s cheating.”

“You cheated first,” he answered with a laugh of his own. He held you to him, delighting in the sensation of your skin, the feeling of your body pressed flush against his. Determined to touch every inch of your body, his hands moved on their own accord, dropping to knead the pliant muscle of your backside.

“I knew you were staring at my ass all this time,” you teased, trailing your hands down to the waistband of his briefs.

“I was hoping you hadn’t noticed.” He supposed there were some things the helmet couldn’t hide. His fingers slid past the swell of your ass cheeks, dipping into the wetness he found at the apex of your thighs.

“Oh,” you moaned breathily, “I’m not complaining.” Your hand slipped into his briefs and freed his cock, pumping it experimentally.

“Fuck,” he cursed. You’d hardly done anything, and he was already faltering on the edge. Except that wasn’t quite true. You’d seen, touched, and explored more of his body than anyone ever before. It was all so much and yet he wanted so much more. He wanted you, only you, and he wanted to give himself over to you completely. But for now, your lips kissing and sucking on his pulse point on his exposed neck brought him back to the present moment. Back to the fact that if you kept stroking him the way you were, with just enough pressure on the base of his cock and a teasing swirl across the head, this would be over before it really started. “Fuck, I’m not gonna-”

“Me either. Take these off, please” you begged, tugging at his briefs. “Need you now, Mando.”

He discarded the last layer of clothing separating the two of you and you walked him backwards, pushing him down when the backs of his knees hit the captain’s chair so that you could climb onto his lap, straddling his hips. With a gentle hand on your lower back, he pulled you closer, guiding you as you sank down on his cock. Your pussy wrapped around him perfectly, enveloping him with your velvety walls.

“You feel so good. I didn’t know this could feel so good,” he said, the vocoder unable to mask the arousal in his voice. Something in the warm smile you gave him told him that you knew he was mumbling on about more than the exquisite clench of your cunt around him, that he actually meant that being with you, having you in his life, felt so good.

“I know. You make me feel good too. So fucking good.” You sighed as you slowly started to move up and down his length, taking him a bit further every time you lowered yourself, “Just- just tell me what you need. Wanna make you feel so- so good, Mando.”

“More,” he responded without clarifying. It didn’t matter – you already knew what he needed. You quickened your pace and all he could do was sit there and watch; he needed to commit this – the blissed-out look on your face, the bounce of your pert tits, the slick coating your thighs and dripping down his cock – to memory. Just in case.

A particularly heady mewl fell from your lips and he snapped back into the moment, realizing he was getting lost in his own thoughts when all he really wanted to do was make you feel just as good. Wrapping an arm around you tightly, he pulled you against his chest. He wanted your flushed body against his; he didn’t want any space between the two of you. With his other hand, he swiped his thumb against your clit, eliciting a wanton moan from you that went straight to his cock.

“You like that?” he asked through gritted teeth, teasing you.

“Fuck! Gods, yes, Mando,” you panted, nails digging into the skin on his shoulders, “Please don’t stop.”

“Don’t worry, cyar’ika. I’ve got you. Always gonna take care of you.” He tightened the circles he was drawing around your sensitive bud and held you steady as he thrusted upwards when you stilled above him.

“I’m gonna- Fuck, Mando, I’m gonna-” You gasped for breath, unable to even finish your sentence.

“I know. Can feel it. So fucking tight around me. You feel so good.”

He started pounding into you, pulling you down hard on his cock, and you shattered around him, practically convulsing in his arms as he fucked you through your orgasm. When you finally slumped against him, you wrapped your arms around his broad shoulders and buried your face in his neck, holding on as if your life depended on it. You kissed his sweat-slicked skin, murmuring meaningless obscenities as you came down from your high.

“Mando,” you uttered breathlessly, “Cum for me.”

Your gentle demand pushed him over the edge and into the abyss. With a few more errant thrusts, he found the release he so desperately needed, filling you with his seed. A warm, sated feeling washed over him and he let his eyes fall shut behind the visor as he struggled to catch his breath. He didn’t dare move, and neither did you. The two of you clung to each other in the afterglow, letting the stolen moment stretch on for as long as possible.

“Why didn’t we do that sooner?” you asked, finally breaking the silence.

“I don’t know,” he replied, half truthfully. You both knew what had kept you from seeking each other out for so long. He absentmindedly started rubbing a soothing hand along your back, tracing every vertebra and sending a shiver of pleasure down your spine.

“Well, I definitely should’ve broken out the sabacc cards a long time ago.” He felt you smile against his neck and a breathy laugh escaped him. “But more importantly, when can we do it again?”

“Give me a minute, cyar’ika,” he chastised playfully, feeling the quiet laughter that shook your body more than he heard it. “But that reminds me,” Din started slowly, “Have you ever been to Dantooine?”

... . ...

Thanks for reading!

#the mandalorian smut #the mandalorian x reader #din djarin x reader #din djarin smut #din djarin x you #the mandalorian x you #my writing #my fic #fic: full sabacc

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seiin-translations · 3 years ago

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2.43 S1 Chapter 5.5 - Stand By Me

5. SACRED COURT

Haijima talks about Yoyogi National Gymnasium similarly to how most kids talk about Disneyland lol

Translation Notes

1. A service ace is a point made on a serve that the opponent had failed to touch

2. A kei car is the smallest highway-legal car in Japan

3. Takeshita Street is a popular street in Harajuku known for its trendy fashion boutiques and for being very busy

4. I feel like this is a reference to something I don’t know, but the wooden fish is a fish gong that is struck while chanting sutras

5. Manuscript paper is the paper used in Japanese schools for compositions and stuff like that. It has boxes in columns to write characters in.

Previous || Index || Next

…Where am I again…?

When he woke up, he couldn’t immediately remember what had happened. The view around him was a hazy milky white, without a single distinct outline. It’s like I’m sinking into the bottom of a beaker filled with a mist of dry ice…it kind of smells like a science lab.

He felt something like a tugging in his left arm. There was a thin line connected to his body, pulling at him from above. The line was holding him back from sinking any further.

A blurry white ball with eyes and a nose was floating in the air.

“I got a text from Kou.”

The ball spoke with a familiar voice. The low-volume voice sounded pleasant to his ears as it seeped through the fog of dry ice.

“…Souta…?”

His consciousness was still fuzzy and his speech was slurred. The white shirt just blended into the background, and when he squinted, he found a proper body below the ball. A uniform…but not Meisei’s uniform. He had heard he went to a different high school.

“You really quit…? Why…?”

“Because I wanted to.”

He was a little surprised by his curt answer and closed his mouth. He heard a short exhale, and then his voice softened.

“…Ever since I entered middle school, I lost interest in volleyball. All I could think about was quitting, and it was getting harder and harder to go to club activities. Everyone entered Meisei, saying that we’ll do volleyball together, so it wasn’t an atmosphere where only I can say I wanted to quit…I was afraid that if I quit, I wouldn’t have any friends at school… I thought Minami-sensei would be disappointed, and besides, my mom’s the head of the parents’ association. I also felt like I had to be at the center of the team…I was tied down by so many things, and everyday was painful… So I came up with the idea that if I hated being in the club to the point of committing suicide, I could get sympathy and quit…That’s how I got involved in everyone’s plan. …I’m sorry.”

After everything that happened, he only has that simple “I’m sorry”?

However, when he learned the reason after two years, he felt like there were no words other than sorry… If you ask Haijima, it was such a trivial thing that he couldn’t even understand what was bothering him.

Was such a boring reason what was behind that incident?

Well…it’s not like I was the one who drove him into a corner…

“…You should have told me, normally.”

His mouth pouted a little despite himself.

“If it were you, you would’ve been able to say it. Well, I don’t think you’ll ever want to quit volleyball, even if it kills you. But I’m not you…I didn’t want to be the bad guy. I didn’t want to be hated by everyone.”

It’s not like I want to be hated…he wasn’t happy about that, but it was true that wanting to be liked by people wasn’t that high of a priority for him.

When he was in elementary school, the two of them would talk about high school and national team games after club ended. They could talk and talk and never get bored of it, and he wished the time when Yoshino’s mother came to pick him up would never come. Yoshino also had a lot of old video footage that only existed on videotape, and he was even more enthusiastic than Haijima about that kind of thing.

The shock slowly soaked into him at the idea that someone who was once obsessed with volleyball could stop liking it. Haijima couldn’t even imagine himself not being interested in volleyball anymore. It was the same as asking if he could imagine the afterlife. He couldn’t.

If there was just one starting point for his imagination—it was that on the third day of the Autumn Tournament, going to a game felt bothersome to him for the first time in his life. For him, it even had a feeling of dread. At that time, he had regained his willpower after sleeping a little, but if that kind of constantly continuing heavy mood was the “wanting to quit” that Yoshino experienced, then it might be quite painful to even live everyday.

“Souta, you…”

His brow wrinkled as he frowned, staring at Yoshino’s indistinct face in front of him.

“Nnn…?” There was nervousness in Yoshino’s voice.

“You got fat, didn’t you?”

The contours of his face were quite round. That was why it looked like there was a floating ball.

“…You’re as blunt as ever. Well yeah, I got fat after I quit the team.”

Yoshino’s voice lightened, like he was expecting something more. He didn’t seem to be offended. Probably.

“Are you in any clubs now?”

“Yeah. It’s not sports-related though. I’m in the science club.”

“Is that fun? More than volleyball?”

“It is fun, more than volleyball for me. There aren’t a lot of members, but they’re all good people. I have fun going to club activities every day. We go to the science lab every lunch break to collect data from our experiments.”

He didn’t like that he had affirmed it, but he could tell from the excited way he talked that he was doing what he really wanted to do now. Something fell into his chest with a thump, and he accepted that, Aah, the things that are “fun” for Yoshino and me aren’t the same anymore…

Even though their eyes sparkled at the same things, aimed for the same stage, and planned to do the same things, maybe that didn’t mean they were in the same story.

“Then, I’ll be leaving now.”

He could feel Yoshino standing up. Even though he had no intention of stopping him, Haijima immediately tried to reach out his hand. But his arm was pulled back as if it had been caught on a fish hook, and he was only able to move it a little.

Yoshino, who was about to leave, turned around. “…Take care of yourself. Don’t be too reckless.” Something soft gripped his hand along with a gentle voice. His fatty, plump hands were not bony and didn’t feel like they belonged to an active volleyball player anymore, but he could feel their warmth flowing into his wrapped-up fingers. It was as though the coldness of his fingers, which had been holding him captive ever since the day Yoshino didn’t come, was becoming undone.

Before he let go of his hand, Yoshino’s voice that had been mild and gentle took on a faint gloom.

“Chika, don’t be reckless, okay? You’re a true genius, not an ordinary person like me, and you probably can’t even imagine your limits right now…but I have a feeling that if you were to be betrayed by volleyball one day, you might be surprisingly fragile…I know it’s none of my business, but that’s what I’m worried about.”

***

“When did you get a fever?”

He seemed to have lost consciousness for a bit again until he heard the next voice.

The round outline of Yoshino, who had been by his side since a while ago, had changed into something more vertical and narrower. He looked up at the outline for a while, and then asked,

“…Are you angry?”

“Yeah. If you’re willing to work a little harder to read my mind off the court too, then that’s progress. Here.”

He held out to something to him. He tried to reach for it, but his arm cramped up and the thing was put in his hand instead. “I had them fixed at the optician across the hospital. They said that it would be safer to buy new ones, though.”

“Aah…thanks.”

“You really do have a strange way of getting into trouble during a game, don’t you?”

With his head resting on the pillow, he put on his glasses. For the first time in a long time, his vision was clear again. It was so clear that it actually made the world look distorted, which made him feel a bit dizzy. The lenses were in place on both sides, but there was still a sense of discomfort because the frame was still warped.

Kuroba was sitting on a chair beside the bed with a grumpy look on his face. Behind him, there was a partition with the curtains drawn. It looked like a break room-like space with a simple bed next to the examination room.

There was an IV tube connected to his left arm. Drops of water were dripping regularly from a clear pack that was hooked to a stand above his head. The liquid in the pack was down to about a quarter of its original volume. I was told to stay on the drip for about an hour…so I guess forty-five minutes have passed or something like that?

After resting, he was able to think more clearly and remembered how he had walked to the car by himself. By the time they had arrived at the hospital, it must have been 5:00 or 5:30, so outpatient consultation hours must have been over by now. He could hear the hurried conversations and footsteps of the staff, but they were far away, so it wasn’t noisy. In fact, it was rather isolated and quiet.

The final serve was done perfectly as he had imagined. Just as the gym was buzzing over the two service aces (1) in a row, the Meisei coach and captains returned after their meeting, as though they had timed it.

Although the second-year members were severely reprimanded for skipping practice to play an impromptu two-on-two game, the fact that a former Meisei Middle School student came to visit meant that Haijima and Kuroba didn’t get into much trouble. It was also thanks in part to Komukai and Ikawa coming forward and saying that they had an arrangement beforehand. Come to think of it, Komukai was the one who warned him just before the score board crashed into him…

The coach and captains asked him about this and that, but from that point on, Haijima was completely wobbling and couldn’t answer them properly. Right when he thought, Ah…I can’t stand anymore, he felt hands go around his sides and supporting him. “Sorry, he has a fever,” He heard Kuroba’s voice through the haze of his mind. So the advisor drove him to a nearby hospital.

“No wonder that you were sleeping like you were dead on the train. I should have noticed it earlier, but I thought it was strange how your face was kinda hot, but since it was right before the game began…Really, why did you decide to go to Tokyo in that condition?”

“I didn’t think I had a fever either. I’ve been feeling off since the end of camp, but…”

“What!? Camp was a month ago! Wait, was that why there was something off with you at the Fall Tournament? Why were you practicing every day under the blazing sun in that state, are you stupid!?”

“You’re too loud, shut up…”

He pulled the terry-cloth blanket up to his eyes and dejectedly slithered under it. If there wasn’t a drip connected to him, he would have covered his ears with both hands. He wasn’t happy with the feeling of being below someone and being ordered around by them, but he didn’t have the energy to fight back.

His mother, who passed away before he started elementary school, was a sickly person. Haijima inherited that, and although it wasn’t bad enough to interfere with his daily life, his body wasn’t strong either. When he was little, he would often have fevers of unknown origin that would last for about a month in summer and winter. However, ever since he started playing volleyball in the upper grades of elementary school, he had become physically stronger, and it had been quite a long time since he has had such a long period of discomfort.

It seemed that he didn’t like the words “feeling off.” He got angry.

“It’s not ‘feeling off,’ you’re in bad health. Don’t switch words and gloss over the issue.”

“…My play wasn’t off though.”

“That’s the problem in your case. It didn’t influence your play…in fact, you got even more agile for some reason. I really don’t get it. And when it’s over, look at you. You’re completely out of energy.”

You’re so noisy…If he said that, it seemed like he would continue to get lectured, so he endured it. He normally didn’t consciously hold back what he was about to say that much.

“…I hate it. I hate it when I can’t play volleyball even for a day. I feel sort of…impatient…”

He whispered on the other side of his blanket. Kuroba, who had been talking at great length, stopped for a moment, then sighed quizzically.

“I don’t know why, but it seems like you’re living too fast and recklessly…?”

He was relieved when he realized that his lack of concentration in the semifinals of the Fall Tournament was because he had a fever. The fed-up feeling on the morning of the semifinals as well…he wanted to get rid of that feeling as soon as possible before it took hold in him, and now that he thought about it, even though he felt off, he felt like he couldn’t take a break from practice.

But he was able to explain to himself that it was just the fever that made him sluggish, and he was relieved…but in the end, the desire to play volleyball again welled up within him. It was a waste of time to rest.

“Haijima-saaan?”

An elderly nurse knocked on the partition frame and poked her head in. Kuroba stood and opened up the place.

“You’ve just finished the drip. …Yes, if there is no blood coming out after about ten minutes, you may tear off this bandage. The doctor says that you should rest today and properly go have a checkup at the hospital after you go home. Did you contact your guardian?”

She quickly pulled out the drip and performed the procedure while speaking so rapidly and one-sidedly that he recoiled. “…Not yet,” he answered in a small voice and got up while staring fixedly at the small adhesive bandage that was pasted over the small needle hole. Kuroba, who had moved out of the way to the foot of the bed, looked between Haijima and the nurse like he wanted to say something.

“Then, you’ll have to call them.”

“Oh, thank you very much for helping us!” Kuroba hurriedly said to the nurse, who was pushing the IV stand away from the bed. He waited for the nurse’s figure to disappear on the other side of the partition before asking Haijima.

“Can’t you just call your home in Tokyo?”

“I got the keys. I’ll just go to pick up the train money. If we get on the eight o’clock train, we can return just in time, right? If I stop by home and head for Shinagawa right away, we can make it in time.”

“Why don’t we just stay the night instead of forcing ourselves to go home today? You have a house here.”

“If we don’t go home today, we’ll have to be absent tomorrow too. Get my bags.”

He did some quick stretches on the bed to loosen up his back. Although he still felt sluggish, he had recovered enough to be able to move on his own. He wanted to move his body because he felt like his body would get more and more sluggish if he stayed in bed. The arm that had been connected to the tube was now free, so he felt somewhat liberated.

The taping on both hands had been removed. He was pretty sure he did it himself, though he didn’t remember. He was soaked in sweat from the game and his T-shirt dried as he slept, but either way he had to change into his uniform if he was going back (Kuroba, who didn’t have a replacement T-shirt, seemed to be planning to go home with just his uniform shirt, but as usual he couldn’t tell if that was cool or tacky).

When he tried to take off his T-shirt, it got caught on his glasses and he couldn’t get it off his head, so he tried to take them off inside his T-shirt. As he was doing this, he heard Kuroba’s voice along with the sound of a bag being placed next to him.

“I’ve been wondering about this, but can I ask you something? You don’t get along with your dad, do you?”

“It’s not bad or anything…” He was answering from inside his T-shirt, so his voice was muffled and it sounded like he was hesitating to speak, but he wasn’t trying to hide anything. “…My dad’s like me. Do you think that if there’s two of me in the same house, and one of them isn’t interested in volleyball, there’d be anything to talk about?”

“Ah…haha. I think I can imagine that.”

He interjected like he accepted that easily. He felt somewhat annoyed by that.

His father still lived alone in the apartment in Tokyo where they lived together until the second semester of his second year of middle school. It wasn’t that he had a bad relationship with his father, but he just couldn’t carry on a conversation with him. It was especially difficult to understand each other when it came to phone conversations. He truly wondered how his father and him had become so similar. Since Haijima came to live with his grandparents, they had had very little contact, but his grandmother sometimes told him about what he was doing, so he thought that was enough.

“It’s not bad, and my dad agreed for me to go back to Monshiro, so…there’s nothing for you to worry about.” It seemed like he was worried, so he thought that it would be better to say that wasn’t the case.

“Haijima-san, there’s someone here to pick you up. You properly contacted your guardian, didn’t you?”

He heard the voice of the nurse from before on the other side of the partition again. He finally pulled his T-shirt off his head and put on his glasses, then said, “Pick me up?” and exchanged looks with Kuroba.

“Hello.”

A bright voice came from the other side of the partition.

A person who was tall for a woman, with her long hair tied back and dressed plainly in a simple blouse and slim jeans——.

“Minami, sensei…”

He stood up, the bed rattling. As expected, he got dizzy, as his body that had been receiving an IV drip until right this moment had suddenly stood up. He immediately grabbed the top frame of the partition and ended up looming over it. The other person’s eyes widened as she looked up at him.

“Oh? You got taller than me? You really have grown. Are you at least 180?”

“I…I am. I’m around 181, no, 2, no, 3, no, 4…”

Wait, why am I padding the numbers? Kuroba had a “Who’s that?” look on his face.

“Oh, I’m sorry, you were changing. Have you gotten dressed yet?”

After being told that, his eyes dropped to the T-shirt in his hands in surprise. He turned around and jumped at his bag. “I’ll get changed in ten seconds.”

“No need to rush. You just woke up, right? I parked my car in the parking lot.”

He shoved his T-shirt into his bag and grabbed a change of clothes. His shorts were halfway down his legs when he realized what he was doing and stopped.

Half-standing, he turned around awkwardly.

“Wait over there…Sensei.”

His mouth opened and closed, and then he heard his own tight voice.

***

“That’s right, when you were in elementary school, I used to tell you guys to change in ten seconds in front of me, but that’s no longer possible. Your body is completely a high schooler’s now. But you grew much taller than me. I’m a little shocked.”

Minami-sensei said with a happy smile as she turned the steering wheel. Haijima was seated diagonally behind the driver’s seat, hugging his enamel bag tightly and looking down. In the seat next to him, Kuroba was still looking between Haijima’s profile and the back of Minami-sensei’s head in astonishment.

The car was a small kei car (2), with the head of Minami-sensei crammed into the driver’s seat almost touching the ceiling in a few centimeters. When the three of them with their tall frames got into the car, it looked like a deformed car in a cartoon. The hair on the top of Haijima’s head just brushed against the ceiling, and in Kuroba’s case, he was completely stuck, so he sat so shallowly that his back sank into the seat, but then his knees ended up bumping into the driver’s seat.

“I’m sorry it’s so cramped. I never had two kids who were so big ride in my car before. You’re big, too. Are you a first-year? Center or wing?”

“I’m Kuroba Yuni. I’m a first-year. I play the wing position.”

He leaned forward and answered before she finished her sentence, then scrapped his head against the roof and lowered his head with an “ow.” Calm down, Haijima’s temple twitched, and he narrowed his eyes at him.

“You’re tall too, Sensei.”

“177 centimeters. That’s pretty tall for a woman, isn’t it? But today I’m the smallest, so my vision feels quite fresh.”

“Were you a volleyball player too, Sensei?”

“Yes. I used to play for a corporate team for a little while, but now I quit and teach at an elementary school.”

“You were the teacher at the club Haijima used to go to, right?”

“I was only a coach who assisted the head coach. The same year that Chika and the others started middle school, the school transferred me to a new position, and I lost touch with them.”

“Sensei, may I ask your age?”

Haijima silently pulled Kuroba’s back, who was clinging to the back of the driver’s seat and talking, back down onto his seat and made him sit. Watching them in the rear-view mirror, Minami-sensei grinned and said,

“Ahaha. I was twenty-eight when Chika was in the sixth grade. Are you fine with that answer? Chika, are you still not feeling well? You can go back to sleep. Or are you feeling carsick?”

“Ah…no.”

He hung his head and shook it while pinching Kuroba’s side. Kuroba tilted his head towards him and whispered into his ear.

“What’s with you? You’re suddenly so meek and quiet. Sensei’s worried about you.”

“Don’t call her Sensei. Why are you asking so many questions so over-familiarly?”

Haijima also kept his voice quiet as he and Kuroba pressed their temples together.

“Then what should I call her? Is Minami-san fine?”

“Stop…joking around. Minami is her first name. Her full name is Kashiwagi Minami.”

Minami-sensei said it was fresh, but it was fresh for Haijima that she was smaller than him. In elementary school, Sensei was like a tower, and her nickname was “Tower” (she seemed to have hated that nickname, and when some of the boys teased her with it, she would chase them around angrily). I had the impression that she had an overbearing physique…no, she has broad shoulders and is probably overbearing by average standards, but…she kinda looks more delicate than I thought she would be…

He was glad he was taller. That was a natural thing to think when you’re playing volleyball, and he knew that he still wasn’t tall enough, but he was confused at himself for being happy about it for reasons other than that.

“Yeah, but I didn’t think ‘Minami-sensei’ would be a female teacher.”

“I never said it was a man.”

The two continued to whisper to each other.

“Well, it kinda makes sense. I knew it wouldn’t be Vabo-chan, but I wasn’t entirely wrong either, was I? It’s not like a girl in your class or anything is going to catch your eye. A former athlete, a coach, and much older than you…Yeah, that’s just like you.”

“…What are you talking about?”

“The thing you said before about having a girl you liked, you were talking about Kashiwagi-sensei, right? Even you have normal emotions more or less. No, not even normal. I’m little surprised and shaken right now too.”

He walloped Kuroba on the side of the head with the bag he was holding, messing up his hair and causing him to scrape his elbow against the roof. He then pinned Kuroba down on his seat and pressed down on his face with the bottom of his bag. While they were silently fighting, Kuroba suddenly let out a big “Ah!” As he lied on his back, he looked up at the window and said, “I saw the word Harajuku just now!”

“Yes, we’ll be passing through Harajuku soon. Do you want to get out if I can park?”

Kuroba’s face lit up at the voice from the driver’s seat and he said, “Yeah, but it’ll be a lot of trouble for you if you do that.” “She can’t.” Haijima pressed the bag against Kuroba’s stupid face, which looked like he was quite seriously anticipating the possibility, one more time and got up, then pressed his face against the passenger window on his side and looked out. “It’s okay to sightsee around Tokyo just a little. We came all this way.” Kuroba also got up while muttering that, unwilling to give up, and hugged Haijima’s bag to his knees.

The roads in Tokyo were beginning to get congested as the working adults were heading home, but the cars were still going at a gentle speed. Under the gassy indigo-blue sky, streetlamps appeared at intervals and disappeared behind them. In front of Nanafu Station, where the school was located, there was not a single light on at night, but there were none even in front of Monshiro Station. All light and sound ceased to exist, and it felt like you had drifted ashore a small and isolated island. But no matter how far you went on the streets of Tokyo, the lights and sounds never disappeared.

As they turned onto a certain road from an intersection with a large overpass, he realized where they were driving to. What was up ahead was—.

He attached his hands and glasses to the window glass and fixed his eyes on their direction of travel. Finally, a large grey building appeared, on the other side of round street lights floating in the night sky like a formation of UFOs.

A large round building with a single dorsal fin-like projection on the roof. Although it was made of unrefined concrete, the gently curving form of the structure, like water eddying around, was so beautiful that it captivated his eyes—.

“Sensei, stop here!” While clinging to the window, he forgot himself and reached out to the seat next to him. “Kuroba, Kuroba!”

“Hmm? Is this Takeshita Street?” (3)

Kuroba eagerly said that and leaned forward. Haijima groped around to find his chest and grabbed it close to him.

“Let’s go see the best thing in Tokyo—Yoyogi’s first gymnasium.”

***

Thinking about it now, Minami-sensei must have planned to stop by from the very beginning. She wouldn’t have normally taken this route to get from the hospital near Meisei to Haijima’s home in Tokyo.

A little further down the road, she found an empty spot in the parking lot on the shoulder of the road, parked, and then Haijima dragged Kuroba out of the car and ran back to the admission gate of the gym.

“You’re too excited. I told you to calm down. The building’s not going to run away even if you don’t run.”

The entrance was closed, and the lights in the plaza from the gates to the gym’s entrance were off, leaving the asphalt to sink into the darkness. As it was located on a busy roadway, the noise of cars intermittently behind them.

The first gymnasium of Yoyogi National Gymnasium, the holy ground of the Spring Tournament. Most of the history of the Spring Tournament, which had been held more than forty times, had taken place at this Yoyogi venue.

“There isn’t anything going on today? They have concerts and stuff almost every day, not just sports tournaments.”

Minami-sensei, who came later, said as she peeked through the gaps in the gates.

The gates consisted of an iron fence about 190 centimeters tall. When Haijima gripped the rails and tested their strength, then lifted himself up vigorously with his arm strength. He leaned over the top of the gates and strained his eyes, but was disappointed to see that the building at the end of the dark plaza now only looked like a ruin. “That’s dangerous!” Kuroba grabbed the back of his belt.

“On the tournament day, there was this huge Vabo-chan balloon, and it was a landmark, and even though there was nothing cute about it, watching it bob around was kinda addictive…”

He desperately wanted Kuroba to also imagine that scenery, so he tried his best to explain it to him.

As soon as he enshrined that huge Vabo-chan balloon in his mind, bright line shone on that lonely indigo plaza as though blackout curtains were lifted at once. In the same way he could create a volleyball court around him without relying on his eyesight, the scenery of the day of the tournament was drawn with him as the starting point. Under the early spring morning sky, large crowds of people passed by them, who stood there blocked by the gates, and walked through the gates and into the admission gates.

The cheering squads of parents wearing matching windbreakers and carrying banners and drums. The concert band members in their school uniforms with mufflers around their necks and the cheerleaders in ponytails. The sports reporters holding equipment. And then there were the athletes of the competing schools, wearing their various team jerseys, each of them with feelings of tension, excitement, and fighting spirit in their hearts. Some of them were today’s high school students from vivid high-definition footage, and others were high school students he had seen in footage from a long time ago, with much frailer physiques looking at them now. High schoolers from various eras were mixed together, but the one thing they all had in common was that they were all volleyball players who had marched in carrying their prefectures on their backs.

Once he passed through the dark admission gates, his vision opened up again. In the vast circular space, illuminated by bright lights, was a spectator seating area with a capacity of over ten-thousand people, and in the center of that, there was a glossy sky blue and citrus orange volleyball court.

“The quarter-finals are on a multi-court, but the semi-finals and beyond are on the center court. There’s only court in the center of the arena, and it’s super fancy, and only the best players from the best teams who are capable of winning the title of the best high school in Japan can stand on it…”

“I get it, it’s an amazing stage. I know how much you want to be there, and I know very well that you’re a setter who can stand in the middle of that amazing stage.”

With a pacifying voice, he embraced his trunk and brought him down from the gates.

“That’s not what I meant, what are you talking about? I wasn’t talking about me?”

Haijima brushed off Kuroba’s arm in frustration and grabbed his collar just as he was turning around. Kuroba’s eyes widened as he clutched Haijima’s wrist and drew his chin in.

“Imagine yourself standing there. Try wishing for it seriously. More, more…You’ve got what it takes to be up there. And if you’re competing on that stage with a lot of people like that, you’re going to crave it more and more. You’re going to want strength and time so much that you can’t stand it. You’re going to be unbearably frustrated that there’s only three years of high school. That’s why I want you to be the ace…”

It was frustrating that what was inside of him wasn’t inside Kuroba. He wanted him to understand that somehow, and this might be the first time he had ever squeezed out words like that to try to convey something. He had often let things go, thinking that it was fine if he wasn’t understood. He had never been driven by the desire to actively share his values with someone before.

He let go of Kuroba’s chest, half pushing him away. He turned his back to him, who staggered slightly, and looked back at Minami-sensei.

“Sensei. I promised to go to the Spring Tournament with Meisei, but I’m sorry, I’m correcting that. I want to go there with Seiin…with those guys. That’s what I want now.”

Minami-sensei leaned her shoulder against the iron fence and folded her arms with a slightly scary look on her face. Thinking that she might be angry, Haijima waited a little nervously.

The ends of Sensei’s eyebrows lowered, and she let out a short sigh.

“You don’t have to apologize…am I that scary of a coach? Souta also came all the way to me to ask for permission with a teary face. He asked me if he could quit volleyball. You know, elementary schoolers become high school students, right? It’s not the same as me going from twenty-eight to thirty-one. It’s normal for friends and things you like to change rapidly. Because that’s how compressed the time all of you spent was.”

“Sensei, you spoke with Souta…?”

He hadn’t really thought about the extent to which Minami-sensei had heard about the suicide attempt, but then it occurred to him for the first time that she knew about the incident and the reason why Haijima transferred schools.

If Sensei knew that her students, who left her elementary school club happily and saying that they’ll all play volleyball together, became bullied or bullies in middle school and drifted apart, then she must be sad…

“I’m sorry…Sensei…”

He lowered his head and muttered an apology again.

“You have nothing to apologize for. You were the one who was in a lot of pain. We should be the ones apologizing…the adults shouldn’t have been so unperceptive…”

Minami-sensei’s hand touched his arm. It was a gentle touch. On the day when their club had lost a match, he had been comforted by the same gesture, and he couldn’t help but hug her around the middle and cry. He had never lost or cried like that. Suddenly, he felt as though the time had gone back many years, and he had returned to the time when his teacher still looked as tall as a “tower.”

But he was already taller than the Sensei before him. He couldn’t hug her or anything like that. And he wasn’t as hurt as he had thought he would be when he found out what had happened two years ago that he didn’t know about.

In the end, Komukai and the others probably didn’t think it was such a big deal. They didn’t imagine that they would ruin their teammate’s life, and he thought that Komukai was saying what he really thought when he disappointedly said, “With just that.” They had done it with only the intention of making Haijima pay a little, and he repented, then they would be satisfied. They probably wondered what was going on with him when he stopped going to school and then transferred schools from the incident that had occurred from that simple intention.

But if Komukai and the others really didn’t have a goal to eliminate Haijima, then that was actually…a relief.

He wasn’t eliminated from that team.

Once he understood that, the fear of starting over somewhere else diminished considerably.

“I’m fine now.”

He thought it was good he knew about it now. He thought that was probably because he could accept it now.

“I didn’t come here alone…so I’m fine.”

He could hear Kuroba gasp from behind him.

“I see…” Minami-sensei looked at Kuroba and smiled, as though satisfied. “It was a good thing you went to Seiin High School, after all.”

“Huh…” “Kashiwagi-sensei, you know about Seiin?”

Kuroba’s voice overlapped with Haijima’s surprised voice. Seiin was just a local high school, not a nationally know school. It also bothered him that she spoke like she had known where he transferred to since before.

“Who do you think sent me to pick you up at the hospital? Meisei Middle School’s coach asked me to do it.”

“The coach…?”

Haijima learned that the coach of the Meisei Middle volleyball team had felt responsible for the series of events that had occurred in the second year of middle school and that he had been concerned about Haijima’s condition for a long time. He thought that by the time he entered high school, things would have died down and he could talk to the coach of the high school team and call him back to Meisei. However, when he had heard that Haijima went to Seiin High School, he decided to withdraw and leave him alone——.

“Seiin High School in Fukui has a famous coach, yes?”

Famous coach? He looked back at Kuroba, puzzled, but Kuroba also stared back at him with a puzzled look on his face. They recalled the dried up old advisor who looked like a scarecrow with a wooden fish placed on top of the head. (4)

“…Haa?”

The two exclaimed in unison.

He had heard from Oda that he had been a volleyball player a long time ago. However, the old man usually fell asleep when he came to watch club activities, and he had never done much as an advisor, let alone a coach. Their advisor at Monshiro Middle School, who was an amateur but showed a lot of motivation, was a much better advisor.

“Adults are connected in ways that children don’t know about.”

A corner of Minami-sensei’s mouth raised in a mischievous smile.

“That’s why, the teachers at Seiin High School are already informed that you two are here. I’m sure that your families have been contacted as well. I heard that your senpais on the team were also worried about you. The two of you did skip class and disappeared together after all.”

They both groaned and their faces stiffened. There was no way the school wouldn’t find out that they skipped, so they were prepared to be penalized for it, but if they knew that they were in Tokyo, then…

“I hope they’ll just make us write an apology.”

Kuroba sighed, but for Haijima, who found writing any essay more than two columns on manuscript paper (5) torturous, a written apology was more hellish than any penalty. “Don’t look so miserable. I’ll help you. It’s collective responsibility,” Kuroba said and clapped him on the shoulder.

Minami-sensei looked down at her watch and murmured, “We have to go soon.” When she looked up, she had a big smile on her face, as though she was taking out a special present she was hiding.

“There’s one last message for you. It’s from the captain of your volleyball team. He says, ‘You have club activities tomorrow, so go home.’”

Previous || Index || Next

#2.43 #2.43: Seiin Koukou Danshi Volley-bu #2.43: Seiin High School Boys Volleyball Club #2.43 translation #2.43 book 1 #2.43 seiin high school boys volleyball team #2.43 seiin koukou danshi volley bu

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starlightsearches · 5 years ago

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Could I please request Hux at the academy pining after his f! classmate?? How it resolves is up to you but I really love your writing and one of my favourite parts is how you write people pining! It's so sweet and really makes me feel the pangs of loneliness and flutters of excitement!

Graduation

Definitely! And thank you for saying so many nice things about me 🥺

Requests are closed for now, but will be opening again very soon ✨

Armitage Hux x Classmate! Reader

Warnings: Fluff and Yearning 😘

Ranking days are the worst days at the Academy. Or at least, they’re the worst for Armitage, who is sure that they were invented solely for the purpose of embarrassing him. Finding ways to publicly shame his son is certainly something that his father would approve of, and Commandant Hardaws is always seeking for the general’s approval.

In reality, he shouldn’t be embarrassed by his ranking. In a class of more than thirty officers, second place was quite the achievement. No, the real embarrassment should be saved for people like Javy, who consistently fell to the bottom, or Ari, who could never rank anywhere above tenth. But it was Armitage who always felt the sting the most, because he should be at the top, or at least, that’s the way it felt sometimes. After all, he had received the highest scores of anyone in both military strategy and history, and no one—on or off campus—could match his skills in the sniping simulations. And every time another quarter would end he always felt a small glimmer of hope, like this time he really had won. Those hopes never paid off though. It seemed like Armitage was destined for second best.

This ranking day is shaping up to be the worst of them all; which is fitting, considering it’s the last. He files in with the rest of his class, finding a seat towards the front of the large assembly room, the other seats already filled with the younger cadets, who are chattering about plans for the short break they’ll have before classes resume again. Armitage has no such plans. After the ceremony—and his official graduation next week—he’ll be headed to join his father on the Finalizer. He has mixed feelings about it, for a number of reasons.

His father is here actually, in attendance, sitting on the stage with some of the professors, and when he spies Armitage in the crowd a small frown appears on his face, like he’s smelled something bad. Hardaws—who most of the students refer to as hardass when he isn’t around—moves to the front of the stage, signaling the beginning of the ceremony and everyone stands, saluting him in unison.

“Be seated,” he begins, reading from his prepared notes in a tedious tone, like he can’t wait to get this over with, “thank you for attending the final ranking ceremony for this cycle’s graduates. We are very proud of their dedication to the First Order, and all that it stands for,” Hardaws drones on for a moment before beginning with the actual ranking, reading off names of Armitage’s classmates, starting at the bottom. One by one, they walk to the stage, shaking hands with their professors and his father before returning to their seats.

Armitage listens without interest as Hardaws announces where each of his classmates will be placed upon graduation. Most of the lower-ranking cadets have already been assigned to menial positions at different First Order bases, and only a handful are assigned to work on star destroyers. He counts himself lucky, in that regard.

“In second place, we have Cadet Armitage Hux,” Hardaws reads, and Armitage stands as the crowd offers him a light smattering of applause. He moves to the stage and shakes hands with his professors without much feeling. He likes them well enough, but he’s anxious to use the skills he’s learned in real life. He’s tired of simulations. Armitage returns to his seat, and some of the younger students begin whispering with excitement, ready for the ceremony to be over.

“And the cadet with the highest ranking is-” Hardaws doesn’t even have to read your name; everyone in the Academy already knows who is at the top. The sound of applause fills the room before he finishes, and you stand, accepting the praise with a humble smile. Armitage watches you with careful eyes, and when you catch his gaze, your grin falters. You mouth something to him; he thinks it might be the word sorry. Armitage swallows hard, confused by the attention you’ve given him. What would you be sorry for? Beating him out for first place? He doesn’t hold it against you, and it’s more than well-deserved.

You move to the stage and the applause only grows louder, each professor shaking your hand in earnest as you move down the line, ending with his father, who—miracle of miracles—offers you a small smile as you salute him. A fatherly smile.

Armitage should hate you. He should hate that you make it all look so easy, that you’ve beaten him consistently and done it seemingly without trying. But, despite the competition you’ve offered, you’re the only classmate that he actually likes. It doesn’t help that you were always so nice to him—like the time you offered to work with him on his hand-to-hand skills so that he wouldn’t fail the assessment during year one, or when you stood up to Kendaria after she called him a bitch in front of everyone in the commissary during year five. Armitage doesn’t hate you; in fact, you’re probably the one person he’ll miss the most, after all this is over. Not that he’d ever tell you that.

“She will also be joining the crew of the Finalizer after graduation next week, as one of the star destroyer’s newest lieutenants,” Hardaws says, and Armitage freezes. Did he hear that right? He probably should have expected it; with scores like yours any general would be scrambling to take you on, but the Finalizer? With him? He’s not sure how to feel about that. Part of him is annoyed; it’s so like his father to pick you to join the crew to serve as a constant reminder of Armitage’s shortcomings. But he’s a little pleased as well. Now he won’t have to say goodbye.

“That concludes this cycle’s ranking ceremony. Cadets dismissed.” Hardaws shuffles away from the podium, talking with the other professors, who all crowd around his father. For a moment, Armitage lingers, wondering if he should say goodbye, but he dismisses that thought. He hadn’t even bothered to say hello.

It’s raining as always, on Arkanis, and Armitage stays under the covered walkways as he makes his way back to the barracks. Most of the younger cadets are celebrating their dismissal, splashing around the puddles and making a mess of their uniforms. They’ll be going home tonight, to see their parents, and to spend two blissful weeks without any concerns of schoolwork or regulations. The eldest cadets are showing a little more self-control, but they aren’t immune to the feeling either. Technically, you’re all supposed to use the next week to prepare for your future assignments: studying up on the bases and ships, looking into possible specializations, but that’s unlikely—seeing as how none of you had been allowed to relax for even a moment during the last cycle. He can’t help but feel a little hopeful as well, though. The worst has past, and soon he’ll finally be doing the work he’s trained for his whole life, and you’ll be there, too.

He can see you, a little ways ahead on the path, walking with your friend Keel. You’ve let your hair down—out of the regulation bun now that the ceremony is over—and you shake it out, running your fingers through it at the scalp. Not for the first time, Armitage admires the way you wear your cadet uniform. They’re designed for function—no one is supposed to look good—but it’s somehow different on you than everyone else. Like it was made for you. A blush spreads across Armitage’s face, and he ducks his head down, hoping that no one will notice. He’s had thoughts like this before, but only when he was alone. He balls his hands into fists, squeezing them tightly, hoping to banish the idea of running his fingers through your hair, or unbuttoning the top of your uniform and pulling it down over your shoulders.

“Congratulations, Armitage,” he tries to sneak past you and Keel without notice, but apparently he’s been unsuccessful. He stops, turning to face you, his cheeks undoubtedly still red. You wave goodbye to Keel, who heads to the year six barracks. The grounds are mostly empty now; you’re the only two left.

“Thank you. Congratulations to you, as well,” he says, and you smile, falling into step beside him. He’s known you for years, but suddenly he can’t think of a single thing to say to you. Despite the breeze blowing past, his palms are sweaty, and he knows he must look very stiff, walking with his arms pressed down so firmly at his sides.

“Are you excited for the cadet’s ball?” you ask, breaking the awkward silence, and he suppresses a groan. He had almost managed to forget; Armitage was not looking forward to three hours of standing up against the wall and watching everyone else dance.

“I’ll be excited when we finally get to leave,” he answers, avoiding the question. He doesn’t need to explain all of his insecurities about dancing right now.

“I’m excited too,” you say, brushing the tips of your fingers over his arm for emphasis; it makes him go lightheaded, “have you spent much time on the Finalizer? With your father, I mean?”

“A little,” he says, reaching up to rub a hand over the back of his neck before he catches himself. He had spent some time on the Finalizer, but his father had forbade him from traveling to any of the more exciting areas. He probably only knows as much about the ship as you do.

“You’ll have to tell me all about it,” you say, and you stop when he stops outside the door of his shared quarters. “I don’t want to arrive unprepared.” You lean against the wall next to the door, chewing on your lip, and all of Armitage’s indecent thoughts from earlier are multiplied by a thousand. He really couldn’t wait to get to the Finalizer now. Hours of inevitable grunt work would be slightly more bearable with you at his side.

“Of course,” he says, and your smile is vibrant. He never feels inadequate around you. When he’s with you, he feels like he’s just enough. Armitage drops his gaze, moving to open his door, but you stop him, taking hold of his arm again.

“Armitage?” you say, and time has stopped, his heart has stopped, the entire galaxy has stopped as he waits to hear what you’ll say next.

“I’m glad I won’t be alone, when we go,” you say, “and I’m glad that it’s you.”

#armitage hux x reader #armitage hux x you #armitage hux oneshot #armitage hux fanfiction #my writing #requests #anon #Anonymous

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ghostswillunderstand · 4 years ago

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Hollow Kisses on The Outpost

So The Outpost is back and I guess so am. What is it about this little fantasy concoction that draws me in so? The beautiful people? The low-budget charm? The bubbles of homosexual subtext that seem unable to not float to the surface? All of the of above, of course, but let us focus on the latter today, for the opening episode of Season 3 is an amazingly perfect look at how simple choices made during production can rework what is meant in the text proper by what is said in the subtext.

Kiss Kiss Kiss Kiss There are three scenes in this episode that all serve a similar function, they are moments where characters who have been separated by the circumstances of the story get to briefly reunite. These are:

Talon going to see Gwynn in her bedchamber.

Tobin(and Garret) rescuing Gwynn.

Talon and Garret by the fire.

These three scenes, despite the aforementioned similar function, are all handled wildly different. First and most notable is Talon and Gwynn. This is a scene of what I'll call 'earnest emotion' in that the two ladies actually talk about their feelings, with the staging and direction used to highlight what they are saying/feeling. Most notably, Gwynn, feeling betrayed by Talon, keeps herself at a remove during the scene, not looking up from her desk and then when she stands she turns her back on Talon.

This is a scene of actual character and heart, like pretty much all scenes between the two it is alive in a way that their scenes with others rarely are. But of course this segment differs from the following two in that it lacks a kiss.

Next is Tobin(and Garret) and Gwynn. Sneaking into her room, our heroes rouse her from her sleep so they can all escape together. Upon waking, Gwynn sees Tobin, says his name and immediately kisses him. Tobin(and Garret) help her dress and they all rope climb down to street level, when Gwynn reaches the road Tobin is right there and they start up kissing again. Now I hope my little writeup there made clear what is wildly off about this scene: they don't talk to each other.

In my unanimously praised previous post, "Love In The Time Of Plaguelings"(15 likes from 15 beautiful souls), I lamented the fact that Tobin and Gwynn are a terrible pairing and this episode seems to unintentionally agree with me. The pair does not work on any level except that the actors are hot and this scene, where lovers have been kept apart for a not insignificant amount of time, presents the two as having literally nothing to say to each other. What could they even say that wouldn't ring completely hollow? But unlike the scene with Talon and Gwynn, Tobin gets to kiss her so it must be love.

The final scene in this triptych is the most interesting as it unintentionally invokes a concept that shows up from time to time, I'm not even sure it has a name, so I'll call it 'an emotional proxy'.

Two instances I can think of to help explain the idea is an anecdote by Guy Maddin about one of the inspirations for his film Tales From The Gimli Hospital and Roger Ebert's review of the great Western, Johnny Guitar.

Guy Maddin: "...I had just come through an intense male jealousy situation, male rivalry thing. I just noticed peculiar ways that it manifest itself in me, where I was quite often forgetting the object of the jealousy that I had and just concentrating on the male rivalry. And my rival was mine, no one else is allowed to have this person as a rival, and I became possessive."

Roger Ebert, reviewing of Johnny Guitar: "Crawford's tavern-owner Vienna is, it is claimed, in love with "Johnny Guitar" (Sterling Hayden), but has not seen him in five years. She effortlessly turns tough hombres into girly-men, and her bartender observes to Johnny, "I never met a woman who was more man." Her archenemy Emma (Mercedes McCambridge) is allegedly in love with "The Dancin' Kid" (Scott Brady) and is jealous because he isallegedly in love with Vienna ("I like you, but not that much," Vienna tells him). But there is hardly a moment when Emma can tear her eyes away from Vienna to glance at the Kid. All of the sexual energy is between the two women, no matter what they say about the men."

As those two quotes hopefully showcased, the idea is that there can be a certain emotional displacement either in real life(Guy Maddin's personal story) or within a narrative(Johnny Guitar), where on the surface something is A but the emotional truth is actually in B. So in the scene between Talon and Garret, textually it is about them, they sit by the fire as she tends to his wounds, they talk a bit, they kiss at the end. But, going back the "emotional proxy", here is the dialogue of the scene:

Talon: "I mean you've seen it yourself, Zed is the only thing keeping the Blackfist from killing Gwynn. Kezzun already tried once."

Garret: "Wait, what?"

Talon: "Kezzun snuck into Gwynn's quarters, tried to kill her. Luckily, Zed was there to stop him."

Garret: "This time maybe but what if he tries again?"

Talon: "That is what I've been trying to tell you. The only way I can keep Gwynn alive is to keep Zed in power."

Garret: "Even if it means the rest of us are shackled and beaten?"

Talon: "I tried everything I could to stop that.[...] Do you have any idea what I've had to do to keep Zed believing I was on his side? [...] I did what I had to to keep Gwynn safe."

Admittedly I left out a few bits that are about Talon and Garret but it is to highlight what Talon's actions have been about, what she is worried about, and just what is generally in her head. Gwynn. In a scene about Talon and Garret, the talk is all Gwynn.

And the name Gwynn has actually gained an interesting weight these days as everyone(Tobin, the other humans loyal to her, the Blackbloods)calls her Rosamund in the episode. Garret flips between the two different names, with only Talon calling her the name she(and we) know her as.

So,Talon and Garret kiss. But it is a kiss lacking in any potency, it is two characters kissing because the writing has called for it but in that wonderful way that characters take on a life of their own, it certainly doesn’t feel like the characters are making the decision. Well, Garret maybe is.

So what does all this mean? Well, nothing sadly. The show seems to have no interest in the pairing but the very nature of storytelling keeps creating and recreating this subtext and as the hetero pairings continue to be less than thrilling the subtext becomes richer in equal measure. The unintentionality of it might actually be the most interesting part.

#The Outpost #queer fantasy #sword and sorcery #the cw #fantasy #wlw

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bitterxweetencounters · 4 years ago

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~5 months later~

Ok I lied. I’m not going to talk about my Japan trip in this post. Instead I’m going to provide an update on what’s been going on in my life for the past 5 months since my last post. Lol.

Okaaaay. So we ended up having a second wave. Hahah..aha..hah. A very intense and overwhelming one, at that. There was a day I believe when the number of new covid cases reached almost 800? It happened around mid this year. I remember it being a really devastating and disappointing period of everyone’s lives. It would seem like the number of new cases would only get worse everyday. I would be so put off from watching the news or reading about anything related to covid ‘cause it would only make me depressed.

Today is a notable day to write this post ‘cause today’s the first day, since this second wave started, that VIC reached 0 new cases and 0 new deaths. 4 stages of lockdown (plus an extension) later, we're finally here! Everyone up until this day had been feeling it - despair, restlessness, anger, hopelessness - at this lockdown that seemed would never end. But today we got the news that VIC will be re-opening again (1st stage) this Wednesday (it’s a Monday today), then even more on Nov 8. The glimmer of hope we’ve been waiting for, for literally months now.

Now for the non-covid related updates. Lol.

It’s tempting sometimes to overgeneralise 2020 as “the year wasted”. “Nothing happened this year” (besides covid of course). But there have been a few new things I’ve experienced this year which I think would be worth noting. And a few thoughts I’ve been having lately that I really need to deposit somewhere before I forget them.

Ever since I became single early this year, I’ve received some interesting dm’s via Instagram. One of the first ones was from this guy from Canada, who sent me one of my posts via my DM then proceeded to comment “cute haha *monkey covering it’s mouth emoji*”. I got this message while I was showering, at like 3am, so it was pretty unexpected. This was the beginning of a very strange friendship (?) thing. Long story short, and around a month later, I found out him to be a very strange guy. He was cute, seemed like a catch at first. BUT he gave off major player vibes and also, he was basically 4-5 years younger than me, and didn’t live up to the maturity he claimed to have (emotional maturity mainly). He would make it seem like he was after a relationship with me sometime in the future but also kept implying that he wasn’t necessarily after a relationship right now, and just wanted to “go with the flow”. He was always complimenting me, always wanted to FaceTime everyday, and would sweet talk me with things that were nice to hear. But I couldn’t shake off the feeling that he was bad news and wasn’t really serious about any of this (I even kept telling him I was thinking this). I should mention he was asking for a selfie and wanted to FaceTime from the very first conversation we had (after only exchanging a few messages). We didn’t even know each other yet?? Lmao. After a few weeks of talking to him I eventually caught him in a lie, and yeah. That was one of the biggest red flags. I had a weird feeling about him from the get go, but I guess I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt (and also what threw me off a lot is that he told me that he told his Mum about me - but I’ll never know if that was just a lie too). He also told me that he was going to visit here from Canada in August (it’s October now) and kept going on about how he wanted to spend a whole week out of the two weeks he was going to be here, with me, and how I’m so chill and fun to talk to that we would have so much fun spending time together. Lmaooo. He told me he’s dated a lot of older girls (I’m not sure if this is a fetish of his), but every time I asked him how many exes he’s had, it would always be a different number (which is hella sus ‘cause it seemed like he was lying then). He tried to do some weird sexual stuff as well which I never entertained and pretty much shut him down straight away whenever he tried. Not sure if he was just joking, but it was disturbing nonetheless. I won’t go into detail ‘cause this isn’t the place for it. It eventually got to a point where I was decided on the fact that I couldn’t take this guy seriously and didn’t want to waste both our time so I started replying less/later to his messages, basically friend-zoned him by calling him “man” and “dude”, and teased him about other girls saying that he had potential with them. I think he eventually got the hint ‘cause one day he just stopped texting me “good morning” everyday. Lol. But anyway, yeah that was more or less the main stuff about guy #1.

Guy #2 was from London and it started with one of my girl friends messaging me and asking me if I was talking to someone at the moment. I said I wasn’t and she proceeded to tell me that one of her boyfriend’s friends found me really pretty and wanted to follow me on Instagram. She then sent me a few photos of him (screenshots from his IG account), asking if I would be interested (I felt like I was on a dating site for a moment lmao). While flattering, I remember thinking this was so bizarre. To be honest with you though the guy wasn’t my type (looks-wise). My friend said he was “a real sweetheart”. Even though he wasn’t my type, I gave it a chance and told her that I don’t mind him following me. We both agreed that the guy and I had nothing to lose, and if anything we’d just become international friends. Lol. So soon enough the guy follows me on IG and then starts a convo via DM. He introduces himself, seemed like a nice/decent guy. Very articulate, and well versed. He would comment on my stories here and there and try to get a conversation going, try to get to know me better and try to share things about himself. I think I recall him saying he thought I lived in Japan ‘cause I had a lot of posts from Japan. Lmao. It would get to the point though where he would write massive paragraphs, but the energy wasn’t called for, and didn’t feel mutual. I think I found it a bit overwhelming and felt like he wanted to take every opportunity to write an essay about his views on everything. There was a particular time I did an IG story post where I was venting about something, and he replied to it with like two long paragraphs worth of his thoughts, and then said he would be there for me even though we didn’t really know each other that well yet etc. Which was really sweet - yes. But also felt too early, premature. It almost felt like he was trying to forge an emotional connection too early on in a relationship which wasn’t even at the friends stage yet. We’d only been talking for like 2 weeks or so. I couldn’t help it, but I think my neutral and short replies gave off a hint, and he commented less and less on my stories. Till eventually he stopped altogether. Lol. Also I think I may have accidentally called him “man”....on purpose. I feel like a horrible person. There was a point early on though that I looked through his IG profile and tried to find things about him that I liked (I basically tried to convince myself that maybe the guy wasn't so bad). But I think that wasn’t successful. And yeah, it was hard to hide that fact for long I think.

Guy #3 is this random guy that just followed me out of no where and liked a bunch of my photos on IG all at once. He then started commenting on my stories quite a lot. He would leave brief comical comments, and tried to get me to play animal crossing with him. Lol. He tried to start a convo one time but I didn’t reply to it for a few hours, and then found that he deleted it. Lol?? He would then like a few more of my IG pics. He was a bit strange. I wasn’t quite sure if he was trying to show that he was interested, or if he was just bored and wanted more friends. But yeah he doesn’t comment on my stories much anymore. Now that I’ve gotten those out of the way, just thought I’d go on about my recent thoughts. So lately I’ve been feeling really stuck. I have a quarter-life crisis pretty much every day. I feel like I’ve plateaued, and I’m not really growing much right now. I feel like I need new experiences, new company. Most of the ones I have at the moment aren’t serving me well or helping me become a better person, if I’m honest. And I’m not happy. The company I have right now aren’t encouraging me to level up, or helping me expand my thoughts and horizons. I’ve noticed that a lot of the friends I was close to pre-covid have changed a lot, and so have I, so we’re not really offering much to each other. I’ve become so low energy lately that I find myself trying to avoid or escape dealing with people or situations that I feel aren’t worth my energy. Which I want to start doing more of from now on. I want to be more selective of the people I chose to surround myself with. I also want to find my community or a new community which I can be part of and grow from. Not sure how or where I will find that, but it’s something I’m keen on delving into more as time goes by. I want to be more myself, I want to change up my look, my fashion. I want to expand my knowledge, expand my vocabulary, expand the diversity of ways I talk/present myself or respond/reply to situations. I want to feel like I have something to offer - not only to my future partner, but to the friends I make in this lifetime. I feel like I’m too basic and uninteresting. I feel like I’m also too careful, too slow, too afraid to make mistakes. Too afraid to take risks. I want to stop “complaining about things, but doing nothing about them”. I want to be confident in myself, no matter what I feel that I am. If that makes sense. I want to speak more clearly, slower. I want to be able to speak Filipino fluently. I want to find the career that I love and work in it. I want to work with people that I can genuinely be friends with, not just colleagues or “fake friends”. I want to not care about what people will think about me, and just do me (especially on IG). I want to be unapologetically myself. But before that, I want that self to be the kind of self I aspire to be. Can you want to be different, but also want to just be yourself at the same time? Can someone confirm this?

#personal #update #coviddays

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rikerxworf · 4 years ago

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☆. Meta: Frame of Mind ⭒*

Despite it being quite dark in its tone and themes, I felt like writing about this episode, s6e21. It has some very nice Worfriker moments that say a lot about their canon relationship. In fact, I’d argue that if you put on your shipping goggles, it’s one of their ‘shippiest’ episodes (´ ᵕ ` *)

! Trigger warnings for abusive treatments of mental illness, and violence !

Plot summary: For one of Beverly’s plays, Will rehearses the role of a mentally ill character in an asylum. He’s afraid of screwing up but tries rather eagerly to nail his dialogue. Meanwhile, Picard wants him to find a lost Federation science team on an anarchistic alien planet, and Will gets briefed on the undercover mission by Worf, who seems downright anxious to secure Will’s safety during the operation. Unintendedly, he cuts Will with a knife.

Will slowly grows more paranoid and restless, and eventually finds himself trapped in the alien asylum from the play, where the doctors say that he was a killer and was having hallucinations about a Starship. Will agrees to let himself be treated with ‘reflection therapy’, where it turns out that Picard, Troi and Worf each represent a part of his personality. Attempts by the Enterprise crew wanting to rescue Will fall flat because by now, he is convinced that he’s imagining all of this and really ‘insane’.

He finally escapes the illusion on his own, waking in an alien lab, and manages to reach the communicator Worf gave him to have the Enterprise beam him up to safety – turns out he had been abducted during his mission and experimented on. The pain and images he saw were his mind trying to keep him same, Troi explains. In the end, Will clears the stage for the play with his bare hands because he could not sleep knowing it was still up.

Despite Will being such a humorous character, his character episodes can be really dark, and “Frame of Mind” is surely one of TNG’s darkest episodes overall. However, there are really sweet strands drawn throughout it, namely Will’s connection to his fellow crewmates. And Worf’s is the most interesting one to me, so it will be the focus of my text *:･ﾟ✧

Which brings me to my first point – we don’t see the real Worf in this episode at all. Everything before the lab scene takes place entirely in Will’s head as he’s being experimented on for strategic information that’s being pulled directly from his brain, so much so that he’s close to ‘becoming insane’. In retrospect, this is really important for the interpretation of the previous scenes, because at the end of the episode, Deanna explains that

“Your mind must have created a defense mechanism that helped you resist the neurosomatic process. Your unconscious fastened on to elements of your real life in an attempt to keep you grounded, to keep you sane.”

So, everything we see is not a one-to-one reliving of Will’s memories, but rather an idealized version that his mind fabricated to “keep him grounded” and comforted, I might add. Deanna talking to Will in Ten Forward, Beverly caring for his mental health, Data complementing him on his performance – those are all very comforting experiences for Will.

And oh, not to mention – the mission briefing scene alone with Worf. Oh, Lord, this scene. It serves as clever foreshadowing AND plays like textbook fanfic to be honest, and I mean that in a thoroughly good way: flirty Will, grumpy Worf, irritated Will, flustered Worf.

When I first watched it, I was super taken aback by how extremely protective Worf was about Will. When Will keeps making nonchalant comments throughout the briefing, Worf reacts in strong disapproval, saying

“I suggest you pay closer attention, Commander. Your life will be at stake. Do you understand what I am saying?”

Like, chill dude sdfjskdsk – That was my initial reaction! Will’s comments were in good will after all. At first, he says “That’s a lot of land for one man to cover. I guess I’d better pack an extra pair of boots” with a small smile, and Worf just… sighs sdfjskdsk. (On a sidenote, I discovered the American expression ‘knocking boots’ through Star Trek, and now every time I hear it the word ‘boots’ I remember it, which is not very helpful if it’s accompanied by William T. Riker’s smile toward Worf).

Afterwards, Worf shows Will the alien outfit that he will use for his alien disguise, and hands him the communicator, hid in a pendant. And Will literally goes, “Hmmm doesn't really match the outfit”, after which Worf suggests he’d pay “closer attention” because “his life will be at stake”, making Will straighten up to say “I do [understand what you’re saying]”.

It’s… a lot. But we’re not done yet, because Worf continues by showing Will the nisroh, the knife used for the traditional bartering ceremony that will complete Will’s disguise. It’s a very pretty looking knife, and Worf seemingly takes a lot of delight in showing Will how to move it. It’s… really cute, actually.

But then he cuts Will, and needless to say, when I first saw it I thought, man, the budget can not possibly be this low. Because it doesn’t look like a cut from a knife at all! It’s just a round wound on his temple, like a circle. And also – Jonathan Frakes’ acting isn’t that fucking bad. William looks absolutely horrified by what just happened; the look in his eyes is so uneasy that it left me really perplexed. Of course, everything clears up as we near the episode’s end: The wound never was Will getting cut by Worf’s knife, it was the circular plug the aliens used to extract information from his brain. And the horrified look was probably coupled to the immense pain Will felt from the extraction and the feeling that something wasn’t right.

Which is super intriguing, because the pain from the knife is eventually what drives him back to his former self, out of the circle of delusions, but more on that later. I want to close on the briefing scene by calling to everyone’s attention Worf’s cute reaction to the ‘cut’: he looks DEVASTATED sjdfksk

The gasp, the flustered and breathy way he apologizes, plus Will cutting him off by saying “it’s okay” – I love it, what can I say. I love it even more when I imagine that, in the real briefing, Worf never cut Will, and this situation only occurred in his mind to “keep him grounded”. It’s… a lot, as I said. Especially considering that “a Klingon who had cut me with a knife” is one of the first things Will remembers in the asylum.

The asylum scenes have been pure terror to me, in a very horror film kind of way. When Will gets trapped there first, it’s bad, apart from a few things he remembers (like Worf). But when he returns there, running across the Enterprise’s corridors, terrified, thinking he had returned safely to his quarters but actually finding himself in the ward yet again – poor Will screams “No!” and “Let me out of here!”, which would have been a perfectly okay time to cut to black. But they didn’t.

To break everyone’s heart, they showed him sinking down against the door, quietly crying “Help me”, which… don’t worry, we’ll come back to. “Help” is an important word in this script.

Earlier in the asylum, the alien doctor explains to Will why he is here. He is accused of having murdered someone and behaving extremely violent, as one of the alien guards explains:

“I remember when they brought you in. You were struggling, screaming. We could barely hold you down. In fact, just getting the blood off your hands took over an hour.”

I’ll get back to this description later. It is also mentioned that Will murdered the person with a knife, stabbing them “nine times”. We later learn that was Will fighting his abductors with the nisroh Worf had given him.

Let’s go to another important scene, the ‘reflection therapy’. The alien doctor scans Will’s head with a device that projects different aspects of Will’s mind as holographic images that, in Will’s case, take the form of his Enterprise colleagues.

When the doctor asks Will to describe his feelings during the murder – in reality: the abduction, but Will doesn’t know that at this point – Deanna materializes and says she (Will) was “terrified”. The doctor explains to Will that Deanna represents the part of his mind dealing with “feelings”. And when he asks about “actions”, an image of Worf appears, and the first thing he says is that he (Will) was “angry”. Worf representing Will’s actions is interesting if you recall how much of a fight Will had put up when he was to be brought to the asylum, struggling and screaming.

The third image of his mind, Picard, represents some sort of rational thinking.

Soon, the reflection of feelings says, “Don’t believe this, Will. None of it’s real”, with the Picard reflection adding, “You can trust us. Everything will be all right”. Will calls them delusions when the doctors asks him if he had something to say to those comments. And then Worf goes,

“Do not listen to him, Commander. He is trying to trick you. You are in danger here.”

Notice how Worf keeps telling Will that he is not safe now. He said it before during the briefing, he says it now, and he will say it again when he and Data try to save Will. Which kind of has me wondering – does Worf really ‘just’ represent Will’s actions? It sounds to me as though he’s the part of Will’s mind that grants him safety and protection, but hey that’s just me ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Also, the quote from above is not all the reflection says. After a brief cut to Will, there’s a close-up of Worf, saying

BOOM. For those unaware, these words are special in Trek. See, in the brilliant TOS episode “The City on the Edge of Forever”, James Kirk explains that “a famous novelist” wrote a classic in which they recommended the words “let me help” even over “I love you”, which kind of made these words carry a special meaning among Trekkies. (It also didn’t help that Spock said them to Kirk in the very next fucking episode, followed by Kirk proclaiming “I need you, Spock”. It’s a lot.)

One could argue that Worf’s reflection doesn’t explicitly say “let me help” but “let us help you”. But what difference does it make, really? It’s not Worf saying these words, it’s a reflection of the part of Will’s mind that is represented by Worf. In this context, I wouldn’t give the pronouns too much emphasis. Basically, it’s Will’s need of safety telling him that he is loved and not alone. It’s honestly very touching (´ ᵕ ` *)

However, after talking to him more and more, Will does not want to see these reflections anymore. He chases them away with a loud “no”, clearly distraught by what he just saw.

In the night following the ‘reflection therapy’, Will is woken by Data and Worf breaking into his ward to help him escape to the common area, where they have placed transporter pattern enhancers to beam him back to the Enterprise. Remember, none of this really happens, it’s all Will’s mind trying to “keep him grounded”. Worf says, “You must come with us, you are in danger here”, which, as I pointed out before, makes him sound like he is Will’s sense of protection or something.

However, Will does not want to go with them, because he still believes the Enterprise crew are delusions of his ill mind. Again, he loudly cries “Help me!” (notice a pattern here?), which makes two guards appear. They are quickly overtaken by Data and Worf, who still fight for Will even though he had turned his back on them. They then proceed to beam up to the Enterprise. I kind of think they chose these two characters as the rescuers because they were the only ones strong enough to hold William T. Riker in case he protested, which he did. However, only Worf is present in the next scene, sickbay, while Data is gone.

Beverly examines Will and treats the round wound on his temple – somehow, it had reappeared. Knowing that it’s the plug connected to real-life Will on the lab table, things now get interesting: The wound closes and reopens instantly. Will notices this illogic, and the pain keeps resurfacing as Worf and Picard explain that Will has been abducted on his undercover mission. The same wound Will thought had been inflicted on him by Worf and the knife. Exclaiming “This isn’t real!”, he knocks Worf out, takes his phaser and shots himself – because the phaser isn’t real, right?

On the next level of delusion, with the doctors and guard gaslighting Will, the pain on his temple resurfaces again, and again on the third level of delusion when he’s told to “stop fighting”. I’m sorry, but that’s a very clear line here: The pain that Will thought had been given to him by Worf (i.e. his “actions” / his ‘need for safety’) is what keeps him on the right track, namely that none of this is real.

When he’s about to give up, wearily asking “What’s happening to me…?”, the alien doctor tells him, “Listen to me. We can still save you, but you must stop fighting us”, followed by Will gasping in pain and declaring that he’s being lied to because the pain is still there.

And boy, now the ASSHOLE ALIEN DOCTOR says to him “let me help you”, which makes Will go feral. He screams and fights the doctor and the stage set, finally making him wake in-real-life, on a lab table with a cable plugged into his temple, where the wound had been all along.

I’m… Okay, listen. Even if you deny the subtext of a Worf-reflection saying “let us help you”, the contrast to the villain saying “let me help you” and Will’s reaction to it speak for themselves. He had wanted help throughout this episode. Being offered it by his friends made him speechless, but being offered it by the one who abused him all this time is what agitates Will so much that he returns to reality. I know the script was kind of last-minute, but parallels like this must be intentional.

So, now Will is finally back in reality, for the first time in this episode. He looks around and finds the equipment he’s been given by Worf before the mission and manages to reach it before the scientists can get a hold of him. He activates the pendant’s communicator and is answered by – Worf. Who proceeds to beam him up. This is the only time ‘real Worf’ is in this episode, and it’s only his voice. But boy, after going through so much bullshit, can you imagine what Will must feel like hearing this voice? Oh, I know: safe. It’s another point in the theme of ‘protectiveness’ that Will and Worf have going on in this episode.

Also, do you notice how Will takes the knife in his left hand and the pendant in his right? I don’t know if he’s supposed to be left-handed, because unless he is, holding a knife in your weak hand isn’t that much of a fighting advantage. But Will still goes for the pendant first, to call Worf who gave him the communicator in the first place. Plus the alien doctor watches the nisroh with such fear it’s an actual delight shdfjksk

The nisroh as a symbol is so intriguing. It’s not what gets Will into all of this, like we first think when Worf injures Will with it. It’s the thing that he uses to fight his abductors and that ultimately gets him out of there. The resurfacing pain it inflicted (in Will’s mind, that is) and the threatening gesture help Will return to the real Enterprise, where he dismantles the stage ward with such violence it really makes you think about all the times he tried to escape the ward by pushing away its walls.

So, yeah, that’s my take on “Frame of Mind”! There are really nice and sweet moments in this otherwise rather disturbing episode, for example ‘Worf’ saying “let us help you” in that firm voice of his (´ ∀ ` *)

More than that though, I think this story is very intimate because 95% of it take place in Will’s head. His subconscious, as Deanna explains it, argues that he and Worf are ultimately connected by protectiveness. Either that, or Will just likes to think of Worf as someone who worries a lot about him lol. It’s Worf who keeps warning him of danger, making him fight and ultimately making him return to safety. That even extends keeping him “grounded” and “sane” if you ask me.

Thank you for reading this spontaneous outpouring haha! Please tell me your thoughts about it, or other episodes you find interesting! ♡

#this got... long wow sdhfjksdsk #text post #stills #ep. frame of mind #let me help #riker x worf #*#i am never allowed to make *in this essay i will* jokes ever again

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wings-of-indigo · 5 years ago

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So, Waitress is closing and Why I am Happy about that: An Exceedingly long essay Rant about Broadway

Look. Nobody's gonna read this, most likely, but it's 2 in the morning and my brain's been obsessing over Broadway (more than usual, anyway) since communing with my people at intensive this week. So, in the interest of getting some sleep before 8 hrs of dance and shitty high notes tomorrow, here goes.

I love classic, high-school-and-community standard musicals. I love new and experimental musicals. I love Disney film-to-stage musicals. I love institution musicals like Chorus Line, Cats, and Wicked; I even have a soft spot for Phantom. I am eagerly anticipating West Side Story next Christmas (seriously, I have a calander).

BUT.

As I said to one of my fellow dancers during post-class stretch (after noting his insane flexibilty and making yet another resolution to stretch more) I am Sick to GoDAMnEd DEATH of revivals, franchise adaptions, and restagings taking up the Broadway and greater theater markets.

I get why it's happening; I do. Musical theater, even shows that never make it out of Regional productions (Be More Chill, btw, I'm so proud of you bby :'-D ) are REALLY FREAKING EXPENSIVE, not just to stage, but also to develop. Broadway productions nowadays regularly go upwards of TENS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS in costs.

Those costs are more and more frequently being met through funding by large groups of wealthy investors, who can expect basically little to no return on that investment. Only a select few shows that make it to the Great White Way do well enough to turn a profit (let alone the kinds of numbers that Hamilton, DEH, and Wicked continue to make), and more and more shows are closing in defict or once they break even. (Coincidentally, this is probably why we're seeing more and more straight plays on Broadway, especially in limited engagements. They're quicker, cheaper, and still have the same level of prestige.)

It makes sense then to assume that a show linked to an already successful property has a better chance of reaching that break-even mark, or perhaps generating a small return, than a more original idea. It's a surer bet, and we've seen it a lot these past few seasons. Anastasia, Beetlejuice, Pretty Woman, Moulin Rouge, Mean Girls... we get it. We promise. Investors want some security in an extremely and notoriously insecure market before they're willing to lay out the dough.

I get it. Everybody gets it.

And, to be fair, some of those shows are and continue to be GOOD. Tony nominees and award winners, even. But here's the problem: it's boring.

And not because I know how Act 2 ends without getting spoilers on tumblr. Unless they're younger than ten, the population of Broadway-and-musicals fans generally has a good handle on where a show's relevant plotlines are going. It's really not the wanting to know the end that keeps your butt in your overpriced red velvet seat and your eyes on the stage. It's the score, the words, occasionally the choreography, and most importantly the magicians on, off, and backstage bringing those things to life in a new and interesting way.

The antithesis of this, then, is having to watch slavish recreation of iconic scenes, lines, and characters from iconic films, presented Onstage! (TM), now with Bonus Songs! for your reconsumption. (Yes, Pretty Woman, I'm looking at you.)

Hey, I love Pretty Woman the Movie, slightly dodgy messages about feminity aside. I love it as a movie, and I really don't need to watch the knock off version of it, even if it comes in a shiny Broadway package.

Anastasia, and Beetlejuice, on the other hand, work extrodinarily well as musicals because they are NOT carbon copies of the original, somehow miraculously transplanted onto the stage.

Ironically, musicals based on original ideas are actually some of the most successful and well reviewed recent productions. Hamilton, Dear Evan Hansen, Come From Away, and Hadestown this season are all original works, and well, look at them. (Fishy, huh? Coincidence, I think the fuck not.)

Recently I got to see The Prom on Broadway, the day after I saw Pretty Woman. The contrast between shows and my enjoyment of them was well defined. I couldn't look away from The Prom, despite many of the major story beats being as obvious as our Cheeto-in-Chief's spray tan. I and the entire rest of the theater were completely engaged by what was going on onstage, both comedically and dramatically. At Pretty Woman, I found myself checking the Playbill to see how many songs were left for me to make it through and anxiously comparing the size of my thighs to the dancers onstage to pass the time (ah, pre pro Body Issues, welcome back! We all thought you'd retired!)

Three guesses which show I'd choose to see again.

When I read that Waitress was closing, the first thing I did was panic and start marking pre January weekends where I would both be free and possibly have disposable income (I've never gotten to see the show, and frankly I would like too). My second reaction was, yes, to mourn the closure of a wonderful show, but it was mixed with hopeful anticipation. Waitress had a good long time in the sun, and just like a well lived life, eventually it must and should end. It's better, in my humble student opinion, to live with memories and cast albums (and regional productions) than the stodgy life of a show that's jealously clung to its Broadway berth through the tourist-and-date-night trade (*cough*Phantom*cough*). It's sort of like your 40 something mother taking selfies in booty shorts in an effort to prove she's still 'hip' and in her twenties. Cringe.

Ephemera is the nature of live performance, and probably part of its allure. And just like in the natural world, old things have to end so that new things can become. Waitress closing is a vital part of this cycle.

Broadway has a limited number of theaters. That's a hard and absolute fact. Maybe a quarter of them are effectively taken off the market for new shows by productions apparently cursed with immortality. Waitress has just opened up another spot both physically and creatively for a new project- hopefully something we haven't seen before- and I hope to God, Satan, and Sondheim that it doesn't get filled with another franchise spinoff, celebrity jukebox musical, or -Lin Miranda forbid - yet another revival.

Why the revival hate, though? Aren't revivals an major way to revisit the landmark and important musicals of the past and bring them to a new audience?

Well, yes. They are, especially when they're staged and presented with the emphasis on letting the music and words speak for themselves and giving the actors leeway to work with the material, without the typical levels of Broadway Extra (TM) and creative meddling from the producers. (The recent Lincoln Center staging of A Chorus Line is a good example of the stripped down style I'm talking about.) But even if they have their place, once again, revivals (while valuable and cool and all that) are Something We've Already Seen.

Let's take Newsies for example. A show with a huge fan base (mostly teen, mostly girls) who I frequently see wishing for a revival.

Now, I am a raging Newsies fan. Newsies is the show that got me started on attempting to make a profession out of dance and theater. I can sing both the OBC and Live albums back to front. I may or may not have had embarrassing crushes on certain cast and characters that I will take to my grave (I'll never tell and you'll never know, mwahhaha). So, do I love and worship ever iteration of this show? Yes. Do I wish I had been able to see either the Natl Tour or Broadway productions? Hell yes, with all my heart. Do I wish the Gatelli choreography was in any way accessible for me to learn? More than I want Broadway tickets to cost less than my soul, kidney, and hypothetical but unlikely first born combined.

But do I want a Broadway revival? Hell FUCKING No.

It's over, it's done, and it lives on in reinterpretation in regional and junior productions. Good. That, to be quite honest, is where it should belong.

It doesn't need to be rehashed on the biggest stages, and to be frank, neither do most of the ultra popular revivals that have been happening. (Yes, Ali Stoker is awesome and deserves the world, but Broadway does not need Oklahoma. If you need to see it that bad, go find a high school production somewhere. I recommend the midwest.) Broadway does not need 1776 (even though I am looking forward to it). Broadway does not need a Sweeney Todd revival (even though I want one like I want ice cream after suffering through jazz class in an un-air-conditioned studio on a 90 degree afternoon with no breeze. Seriously, I might be making sacrifices at my altar to this cause in the back of my closet).

Broadway needs musicals that are at least nominally original, and if not, come from something obscure enough (Kinky Boots, Waitress, Newsies) that they can make their own way. Barring that, investors, writers, and directors, please have the courage and decency to take established content in a new direction. Please, I'm begging you. I'd honestly-and-truly much rather sit through something that didn't try to shove the better version of itself down my throat even as it bored and annoyed me to tears. If I'm going to pay $80+ to sit through two hours of something terrible (and less engaging than my dancer body image issues) at least let me get my money's worth in unique horribleness.

#broadway #newsies #hadestown #mean girls #anastasia the musical #musical theater #waitress #hamilton #beetlejuice #tony awards

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supremeuppityone · 5 years ago

Photo

Written for Klaroline Valentine's Day Bingo 2020 @kcvalentinesbingo

Prompt: “His name is NOT ‘Cupid McDimples’!”

Author’s note: This is the much-requested sequel to Chapter 67: The Best Safety Plan, found in my Klaroline series, A Beautiful Symmetry.

Please review here.

It started with a dozen candy cane sorrels delivered in an exquisite crystal vase.

“Oxalis versicolors?! Those have to be shipped in from South Africa!”

Caroline rolled her eyes at Bonnie, doing her best to fight back a silly grin as she read the note from Klaus: Thinking of you. She still wasn’t sure what to think of their encounter with the hot weirdo in the woods who thinks he’s an immortal Viking hybrid something with fangs who buried Damon’s body for them in exchange for a date with her. And he’s probably a psycho killer. And a week ago she was worried her life had become dull.

And then he sent a platinum and diamond encrusted charm bracelet. From the exclusive Arcadius flame logo, she probably could’ve funded her and Bonnie’s practice for the next year if she pawned it. It was beautifully designed and somehow perfectly tailored to her background and tastes — from the miniature eye chart and glasses charms to the scrolled letter ‘C’, her sapphire birthstone, and, surprisingly, a raven. How the hell did he know “The Raven” was her favorite poem?

“Cupid McDimples is stepping up his game,” Bonnie teased as she eyed the shiny bracelet. “Can’t wait to see what he has planned for your date. Well, our date since I’m going with you in case he actually is a crazy murderer and we need to get all shovel-happy again.”

“His name is NOT Cupid McDimples! He’s a random lunatic we ran into and it’s entirely possible he wants to wear our skin. And damn right you’re going with me since you’re the one who suggested I go on the date in the first place AFTER he admitted to being in the woods for a body dump. Come to think of it, shovels might be a good idea.” Letting out along-suffering sigh, she added, “Of course someone that attractive would have some glaring defects.”

“Not to throw stones, but you two lovelies were traipsing about the woods for the same reason,” Klaus’ amused voice suddenly interrupted, startling them both. With a dimpled smirk, he held out two shovels, cheekily topped by frilly pink bows. “In case you decide to end our date by getting ‘shovel-happy’.”

Seriously? There was no reason for her heart to be fluttering like this over a pair of shovels. And yet it was. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been so charmed. “Are you always so considerate with your dates?”

“Honestly, I can’t recall the last date I went on,” he remarked, his accented voice warm and inviting. “Does sharing a glass of champagne with one of the chambermaids at Tuileries count as a date? We were having a rather lovely time before the Parisian mob invaded and the royals marked it as a prudent time to flee.”

“You’re seriously talking about the French Revolution. Like you were there,” Caroline replied flatly, throwing an exasperated glance at Bonnie.

Swinging her shovel up until the handle rested on a shoulder, Bonnie muttered, “Why the hell not? Caroline’s last date was convinced a powerful secret society is running the Starbucks franchise, which is why they’re on every corner.”

Favoring him with a wink, Caroline kept a grip on her shovel while linking her other arm with his. “I do enjoy a good nervous breakdown.”

______________________

There was a delicious-looking meal set out in the auditorium. She’d been surprised when Klaus drove them to a community theater, and immediately squealed when she saw they were performing a series of Poe’s works. “Poe is my favorite author! I had no idea this was going on.”

She could’ve sworn the tips of his ears turned red and his voice was a bit tight as he said, “Yes, well, what a coincidence.” As a handsome man with a blinding white smile stepped out of the shadows, he nodded his head at Bonnie and said, “I brought along Marcel to keep you company. Marcel is a...friend.”

Bonnie studied the stranger skeptically, but Caroline also noticed a flicker of interest in her friend’s gaze. So, clearly she wasn’t the only one who had terrible taste in men. “And I suppose Marcel’s a werewolf-vampire Viking too?”

“Actually, I was a plantation slave in Louisiana. Just a little over 200 now,” Marcel replied silkily, with enough of a flirty undertone that Bonnie’s eye twitched.

Caroline snorted, telling her friend, “See? I told you all the hot ones were crazy.”

Marcel threw back his head, laughing. “I’ve been perfectly sane for years now. The Quarter Coven isn’t nearly as powerful as they think.”

As Klaus held out a chair for Caroline, he wryly answered, “Now, let’s not be too hasty — you weren’t under a spell when you summoned my father to try to kill me after you returned from World War I.”

Seriously?! French Revolution. Werewolf-vampire Viking. Plantation slave. Witch coven. World War I. Caroline exchanged a look with Bonnie, in which they wordlessly weighed the hot-to-crazy ratio of their dates and decided to just roll with it. Besides, the dating pool was far too shallow in their little town to be overly picky. What’s a bit of crazy between friends?

The antique sconces along the walls began to flash, signaling the performance would begin soon despite the empty theater. Confused, Caroline leaned over to whisper in Klaus’ ear, “Are we early? Where’s the rest of the audience?”

Marcel gleefully explained, “Klaus bought out the whole place. In fact, he actually hired them to—”

“Try the saffron crab cakes, Marcel. It seems your mouth needs to be occupied,” Klaus interrupted, cheeks slightly pink as he couldn’t quite meet Caroline’s inquisitive gaze.

Was Marcel going to reveal that Klaus paid an acting troupe to perform Poe’s works because he was her favorite author? Seriously?! The last date she went on wanted her to reimburse him for the drinks because she ended the date early after he told her that he and his twin sister just loved blondes and ‘shared everything’. “You’re really setting the bar high for our second date,” she told Klaus, enjoying the hopeful gleam in his gray eyes.

“Second date? That’s quite forward of you, sweetheart,” he teased. “I’ll need a bit more wooing before I agree to a second date.”

She couldn’t help but return his impish grin. “Then I probably need to figure out your favorite author.”

“I’m quite fond of Chaucer. Now, he’s heralded as one of the greatest English poets of the Middle Ages, but in his time, kept getting into quarrels with those who believed legitimate literature should be written only in French or Latin. I might’ve had a compelling argument in ensuring his proper burial at Westminster Abbey.”

Caroline rolled her eyes as she replied, “And after that, you gave Columbus directions and helped Henry VIII hire a divorce lawyer.”

He chuckled, caressing her hand with his thumb. His voice low and seductive as he murmured, “You are a delight.”

Nearly identical snorts came from Bonnie and Marcel’s table, but Caroline couldn’t be bothered as her heart did that fluttery thing again while Klaus looked at her. Onstage, the red velvet curtains rose to reveal a cozy fireplace and an actor in a wingback chair. From the ominous bird perched on the bookcase overhead, it looked like she’d be treated to her favorite poem first.

Since it was Poe, the shrill screams backstage seemed to blend perfectly with the foreboding atmosphere, and it wasn’t until the sounds of furniture breaking and muted thuds against walls reached her ears that Caroline realized something was wrong. The lone actor who’d been sitting in the chair seemed paralyzed with fear as a pale young man strutted onto the stage, a single trail of blood at the corner of his mouth.

If it wasn’t for the blood, Caroline would’ve dismissed him as another pretty boy who’d never love anyone as much as he loved himself. The supercilious curl of his smile gave her chills — not to mention the black veins that crawled underneath his eyes. Plus, there were fangs. Actual fangs.

“Klaus, I’ve come for your kingdom — and your head,” he proclaimed with a snarling hiss.

Wow. Apparently monsters are a thing. Caroline couldn’t help her knee-jerk reaction as she blurted out, “So, werewolf-vampire Viking or plantation slave?”

Although clearly in shock, Bonnie managed to reply, “Probably not plantation slave.”

Klaus snickered, seemingly pleased by the women’s ability to keep a sense of humor during this bizarre situation. “Actually, Lucien’s just an upstart stable boy.”

As Klaus and Marcel both bared their fangs, leaping onto the stage to face off with Lucien in a whoosh of air that was impossible to comprehend, Caroline started thinking that maybe those shovels would come in handy after all.

#kcvalentinesdaybingo #uppity bitch fanfic #klaroline fanfic #klaroline #klaroline aesthetic #aesthetic #awkward klaus with his grand gestures #kcvalentinesbingo #supernatural shenanigans

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sing-for-theongreyjoy · 5 years ago

Text

Alfie Allen bares his soul in Equus

By Jim Greenhalf

Some people are born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Others are born to parents with a silver spoon under their noses.

Alfie Allen was born with a generous sprinkling of stardust on his eyelids.

His parents are multi-talented, four-times married actor Keith Allen and film producer Alison Owen; and he is the younger brother of chart-topping singer Lily Allen.

His acting credits include roles in movies such as Elizabeth, Atonement and The Other Boleyn Girl. He's worked with Stephen Poliakoff and appears in the three-part BBC drama Casualty 1907.

All this by the age of 21.

Now he's heading for the stage in Bradford in an acclaimed revival of Peter Shaffer's psychological drama Equus, in his first stage role as a professional actor. The pazzaz with which he brings it off is a tour-de-force or, pardon the terrible pun, a tour-de-horse.

He plays Alan Strang, a friendless stable-lad passionately devoted to horses. In fact he worships them. But he is so screwed up by his dysfunctional parents' conflicting views about sex and religion that, in a paroxysm of guilt, shame and rage after a failed attempt to have sex with a girl in a stable, he hacks out the eyes of six horses. On stage Alfie has to do this completely naked. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, sustained full-frontal nudity is about to make its debut at the Alhambra. You have been warned, so don't go along and then ask for your money back.

But, hey, what's it all about, Alfie?

"The most difficult thing about doing the play was losing weight, toning up, eating healthily, not smoking as many cigarettes. The nudity wasn't difficult for me: I just got on with it. It was harder doing it in rehearsal rooms than on stage. The most challenging thing for me has been being away from my family, my loved ones," he said.

With his clothes on he looked somewhat smaller, slighter, than on stage without his clothes. Lighting has a way of modulating and highlighting the curves and bumps of the body to make it look bigger, fuller.

Taking on the role indicates a level of maturity, for Alan Strang is a very demanding part to play.

"I saw it as a fantastic opportunity. What scared me most about it was the amount of dialogue I had to learn, and when I got to rehearsals how physical it was. When you are reading it in rehearsal you are not thinking about that; but when you've got people like Simon Callow and Linda Thorson with you, it makes it so much easier."

Meaning what, he was more relaxed?

"Definitely, especially being on stage with Simon. Some people said he could be difficult, but he has been such a nice, nice person and has really helped me through it," Alfie said.

After the performance that I saw, Mr Callow made a point of hugging Alfie at the curtain call. It was the experienced actor's way of proclaiming his appreciation of the younger man's efforts.

"This is the biggest role I have had," Alfie added, laughing as I, mindful of his need to watch his weight, moved a bowl of deliciously crunchy crisps out of his reach.

This being very much a young person's age, when fame and celebrity are marked very high by magazines, newspapers and television, I wondered how he was handling the pressure of it all.

"I am just so focused on the play as a whole," he said.

Does that mean that he lives it in every waking moment, from the time he wakes up to the time he goes to sleep. He nodded in the affirmative.

"My day is quite routine. I try to eat well, drink lots of water. My mind is fixed on this part completely. I knew I was going to do this."

Have his mum and dad helped?

"My mum helped me to learn my lines. My dad told me to relax. I always think you can't really tell someone how to act, it has to come from within; but you can give tips. My dad gave me some tips."

Such as?

"How to learn lines by reading them out to myself over and over again - and to try to make it seem like the first time every time," he added.

I was particularly impressed with his voice. That may seem a strange observation to make about an actor, but having your own voice (as opposed to sounding like someone else) is like having stage presence, hence the impression, I suppose, that on stage Alfie Allen is more imposing than he is in the flesh. On stage he comes across as a young man. Sitting at a table nibbling crisps he looks like a fresh-faced teenager.

However, his acting prowess has been noted in other quarters.

"I have had some interest shown. I have been asked to do a photo-shoot for a film I would really like to do. I can't tell you the name," he said.

So is he making plans for the future?

"I don't like to plan for the future, I just like to live life in the present and see what comes my way. This play is just a huge learning curve. You can never stop learning."

I thought of the hundreds of young people at stage school of some description in the Bradford district, perhaps from a background less propitious for acting than Alfie's, hoping against hope that their lucky number will come up. What, I wondered, had he to say to them and to others not fortunate enough to have a role model or mentor?

"You've got to find something you enjoy. I guess most people don't have a choice. Anything I do I would try to do to the best of my ability; but I would need to enjoy it.

"I guess discipline does come into it a lot. I was at boarding school. I had problems with discipline when I was younger - I was mouthy. I had to take myself in hand and stop being like that. You have to learn not to take yourself too seriously," he said.

At the time of writing, Alfie Allen is not scheduled to take the role of Alan Strang to America in the autumn when Equus transfers to Broadway. Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe has agreed to resume the part. Likewise, Richard Griffith will reprise the role of Dysart.

But the consensus of opinion among those of us who saw Alfie Allen do his stuff in Newcastle was that this was a young actor of whom a great deal more is going to be heard. If you get the opportunity to see him on stage, take it.

Equus is on at the Alhambra from April 28 to May 3. The box office number is (01274) 432000.

#alfie allen #equus

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evien-stark · 5 years ago

Text

✧I Need You✧ Chapter 32

While somewhere deep in your unconsciousness you were resolved to stay in bed for the entire day, not having slept this long or this well in quite some time, the smell of food dragged you out of your slumber. Not just the smell but the sound. Something sizzling away in the kitchen- not your kitchen- not at the house. Right. You remembered.

In the penthouse suite in Manhattan.

Because you and Tony had nearly died last night at the Expo. Because of Justin Hammer. Who was probably out on bail by now. And Ivan Vanko who was no longer alive at all. Right right right.

The house in Malibu was still destroyed, no doubt. The two of you could throw money at it to get it fixed all you wanted, it would probably still take a couple weeks before it was livable again. Which got you thinking.

Wasn’t it strange that Stark Industries had no headquarters in NYC? One of the biggest cities in the United States. At least then you could have sectioned off a small floor for bare bones living quarters. Something more familiar and desirable than- well… you couldn’t really complain about waking up in the luxury you were surrounded with.

Grabbing an overly plush robe from the hook on the bathroom door, you padded over to the kitchen, where Tony was humming away to some song playing on his phone and flipping what looked to be a quite fluffy pancake. Feeling bold, you wrapped your arms around him. “Good morning.” Your voice a mere croak.

“Good morning. Relatively speaking. I was just about to start contemplating calling a hospital.”

Moving aside him, you propped yourself up to sit on the counter. “Why’s that?” You didn’t feel worse for wear- and he seemed peachy keen.

All smiles, in fact, as he looked at you. “It’s one o’clock. You were pretty far gone.”

“One o’clock?!” You’d never slept so late in your life. Well. Not your professional adult life anyway. “How is it one o’clock?!” There was too much to get done for it to be that late in the day.

“Well, you know. You had a pretty big day yesterday.” Ah, yes. Finding out Tony may have just had a chance to come back from dying. Not having slept the night before- ...and the night before that? Was that right? How is it you hadn’t collapsed? And then being whisked away to meetings and then- oh yes, almost dying again. “And a pretty big night.”

The grin he was aiming at you earned him a little smack to the arm. Something he chuckled at as he turned the burner off on the stove. “You still shouldn’t have let me sleep that long.”

“Yes I should have. Which is why I did.” Said in that matter-of-fact way of his when he was sure he was right about something. And the only smart person in the room. He tilted the pan over on the opposite counter, plating the one pancake he’d been cooking on top of a large stack.

You ran your hands through your hair and then rubbed your face. “No.” Simple as that.

“I let you sleep in, I cook you breakfast, I set up the press briefing for this evening and the SHIELD debrief for tomorrow, get started on the clean up of the Expo, put our lawyers to work on the case against Hammer- and this is the thanks I get?” He lifted the plate, jamming a fork into the stack, digging out a piece, shoving it right into his mouth. Still full as he said, “If that’s how it is I’ll just eat these myself.”

You were sure you must have been glowing with happiness as you touched the sides of your face in a mock gasp. “You did all that?” Despite the expression, you were actually genuinely surprised.

“You guys act like I’ve never run my own company before.” In the process of taking a second bite.

Narrowing your eyes, only playfully so, “But did you really though?”

He pointed his empty fork your way. “I’m gonna let that go. Because it might be a fair point. But because I’m letting it go, we won’t discuss it.” Finally he handed over your plate, which you gratefully accepted, but he turned to the counter and then dipped back to you to offer you a glass of orange juice. “Wash it down with this.”

Pursing your lips to the side, you gave it a squint. “It’s not a screwdriver is it?” You doubted it. But one could never be too sure with him.

“No. Just your average run of the mill orange juice Plan B cocktail. Very tasty.”

The two of you shared a long, long look before you grinned, accepting the glass. “Why aren’t you just the most romantic gentleman in town.” Not even going to question where the hell he got his hands on that. But, on second thought… “Did you actually drink some??”

He smiled back, propping his hip on the counter, reaching over to a little open tub of blueberries, popping a handful in his mouth. “I had to make sure it tasted good. I’m not going to serve you the best pancakes known to man with a glass of bitter orange juice.”

Tony Stark may have just been the most ridiculous man in the world. Truly. “Well thanks for looking out for me.” Down the hatch it went.

“Any time, honey.”

About as much discussion as you needed for not only why he had the pills in the first place, but why he was giving them to you. Maybe sometime in the future- the very far future- you’d revisit it. Until then… orange juice cocktail it is.

-------------------------------------------------------

While Tony had actually done the work he’d claimed to do while you were knocked out, setting up a briefing in one of CNN’s borrowed press rooms, he hadn’t bothered to start writing pointers out for himself. Which was why you knew it was extremely important that you do all the talking, and write your own speech. Letting him go off the cuff had gotten you in a lot of trouble twice now. There was no need for a third time.

The noise outside was bothersome, though, despite the private room. You really only had to focus on a few key points- most of the important ones being blaming Justin Hammer for everything. Because it absolutely was all his fault, and letting the public know you were pursuing him.

But as your hands stilled over your laptop, a sigh escaping just as two interns collided with each other in the hallway, Tony looked up from his phone. “You want me to yell at them?”

At this you couldn’t help a brief smile. “We don’t work here. They’re doing us a favor.” Though that really wouldn’t stop him if you said yes. And they’d probably run off all the same. “That is an interesting thought, though.”

His brows went up. “What? You want me to buy CNN?”

“Why doesn’t Stark Industries have a building in the city?” It made perfect sense. An expansion. And having a dedicated place to go when you actually had to work here would be wonderful.

“Haven’t gotten around to it yet.”

“I think we should.” Nodding in agreement with yourself as you went back to your brief on the laptop screen. When he didn’t follow up, “It’d be good for press. It’d be good to have a place to go when we come here- and we do. A lot.” More often than you’d like to mention. “With the Expo, too. We could put a lot of people to work… open a whole new bout of research and development… and maybe we could start looking into all that clean energy...”

Though you weren’t looking at him, you could feel his grin. “You don’t have to ask me, you know. If you want to start looking at land, that’s well within your rights as CEO.”

“Who said I was asking?” Coy as you shrugged your shoulders. “Maybe I’m just talking out loud.”

He stood up from the stool poised at the makeup table, moving to come behind you and put his hands on your shoulders, leaning in. You looked up. “Keep talking.”

“I think it’s a great idea.”

“Me, too. Big tower. Huge. With Stark in big letters on the top.”

A half giggle half snort escaped you. “Now I feel like you’re trying to talk me out of it.”

“Too on the nose?” His smile warmed you to your core, but more so was the kiss he pressed to the tip of your nose as he leaned down. As if making a point.

Only encouraging more giggles. Probably his goal, as when he pulled back he looked mighty pleased. “Not as much as that, maybe.” Reaching up you put a hand over his on your shoulder. “Let’s look for a spot after the conference. We’re here for a few more days, anyway.”

“Let’s do it.”

-------------------------------------------------------

The lights were white hot as the two of you stepped out onto the press stage. Cameras had been going the second you stepped into the room. Voices lulled to a murmur. Tony only leaned into the podium to say, “I’m gonna uh… I’m gonna let her do all the talking this time. Less trouble that way.” Getting a laugh across the room.

Something you smiled at as you put both hands on the side, and then took a deep breath. “Thanks everyone for coming. The events last night at the Stark Expo were shocking and appalling, to say the least. It is only with the efforts of the police force and firefighters of New York City, Iron Man, and Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes piloting the Iron Man Mark II suit that nobody was severely hurt, and we owe a lot to them. At this moment in time we will be shutting down the Stark Expo for cleanup and reassessment, but we will be reopening the gates in October of this year. Anyone who purchased tickets will be able to get a refund through the Stark Industries website, or you can hold on to your passes and they’ll be redeemable later in the year.

Stark Industries is also setting up a family fund for those effected in the events last night. Anyone that needs medical bills looked after can contact our fund through our website and we will handle everything and anything you need. No questions asked. In addition to that...” Another deep breath.

You’d have to be as calm as possible for this one, no matter how much you felt otherwise. “Justin Hammer has been taken into police custody, and Stark Industries is now pursuing him to the fullest extent of the law. His absolute negligence- his disgusting need to try and show up Stark Tech led him to act wildly, aiding and abetting the criminal Ivan Vanko in order to secure stolen plans for a primitive version of the Arc Reactor. To power primitive suits that in no way could stand up to the force of Iron Man himself.

Let me be clear about this, every one of those suits was destroyed last night. Ivan Vanko lost his own life as a result. Justin Hammer will face a life behind bars, make no mistake. And it is why Stark Industries is also assisting any family, any individual, that wishes to file in a class action lawsuit against him for his rash and vile actions. Our lawyers are at your disposal. Pro bono.

We are deeply saddened that Justin Hammer used the Stark Expo, a venue that was about coming together to create technologies that help the world, as a playground for destruction. Stark Industries will do everything we can to make it right.” Pausing, taking a breath, and then opening the floor for them. “I’ll take only a couple questions.”

Even doing this was dangerous. Now that you were done, you’d much rather take off and not have to deal with any more of this at the moment. But you could only control the headlines so far with an impassioned speech like that.

Pointing at one of the reporters at the right of the room, she stood up. “How is it that Justin Hammer was able to get this dangerous presentation together without either of you being any the wiser?”

You figured this one was coming, so at least you were ready. “While in what little credit Justin deserves, I don’t believe his intent was to cause mass hysteria and violence last night. But his negligence in doing so anyway, and the means he took to get there, is not going to be looked the other way on.” When she tried to speak over you you raised your hand to stop her. “I’m not finished.” Because you weren’t dodging her question. “His presentation on the docket had been severely altered to hide its true nature. He only allowed his own workers on stage to get it ready, and bribed one of our Expo managers to get it rushed and to look the other way on the coordination. This is why we are shutting down the Expo at this time and reassessing.”

“And that staff member?”

“Will go unnamed for right now. But be assured they will also be punished.” Breath in. Breath out. You picked another person in the back.

“Excuse me- are the rumors true that you and Tony Stark entered into a romantic relationship before the co-assignment of the company?”

You allowed the utter disgust to take hold of your expression. “I’m sorry- are you asking me about my personal life after people were hurt last night? Is that really your focus?”

The man in the back tried to speak up, but Tony took hold of one of the little mics on the podium and leaned in again. “I’m right here, you know. If you wanna ask, ask.” But when the guy tried to talk again Tony cut him off. “Are you really just asking if I’m single because you wanna take me out? Because I’m flattered at the offer. Really.”

Taking the mic forcibly from his hand, you pushed it back into its position forward. “What Tony is trying to say is that trying to assess either of our romantic lives after the events of last night is incredibly tacky and short-sighted. And, frankly, I’m embarrassed for you. We’re done. Thank you, everyone else, for your time.”

Hands and voices all raised to get over one another. Shouting hundreds of other questions. You left the stage, Tony following only after you stepped down. The walk through the back halls to the green room again was a short one, but even so you felt exhausted again once there. “We really should say something. Eventually.” Another reason you really wished someone had not asked that. You didn’t need him thinking about it.

“You want to?” Then again… You slung your laptop bag over your shoulder and picked up your purse from the table. “Are you really sure about that? What if your image can’t survive playboy being shaved from your title?” Teasing. Mildly. You were slightly concerned- or at least concerned that he would be concerned. ...should be concerned? Now you were getting yourself confused.

It was hard to tell anymore.

He put his hands in his pockets as you came over to him by the closed door. “I can survive anything.” Little smirk, self assured.

You squinted your eyes at him. Scrutinizing. But more putting on a show than anything. “So you say. Why now, Tony?”

“It’d be easier to get through pressers if you weren’t always asked about it. Or me. Either. Because if someone just asks me while you’re not around I’m liable just to say yes.” Being the smart ass that he was. You believed he really would, too.

Reaching up to lay a hand over his chest, you sighed. “Not that I’m saying you’re right-”

“Oh. But you are.” Grinning widely.

“Not that I’m saying you’re right.” You doubled down. “But you may… have a point. A small one. Very minor.”

Taking your hand, he pulled it further up to lay a kiss to the back. “Uh huh. A point. So what should we do about me and you?”

Turning your hand over you cupped his cheek in your palm. “I’d prefer something subtle...” Not especially his forte.

“Hm. So no big banner on the back of the jet?”

You couldn’t help the snort. “No. Don’t you start getting tacky on me, too.” If not something completely subtle, it at least had to be tasteful. Slipping your hand down to take hold of his own, you opened the door, finding Happy waiting with a nod on the other side to escort you out of the building. People already knew. There really was no point in hiding it anymore. “What about the gala after Basel?”

He hummed out a thought. “The art show? Look- I’m not interested in buying back all those pieces-”

“Neither am I. But...” The art show in Switzerland, at least the after party where all the media would be poised out front, and all the rich people that you loathed cavorted… “I’m picturing you in a nice suit. And me in a beautiful dress. You can lead me by the hand out of the car, and we’ll go up the steps arm in arm and dance the night away...” Ah. What a blissfully wonderful life.

“Painting quite the picture, aren’t you?” A light chuckle in his voice as the two of you exited the building and he held the car door open for you.

“It’s better than a banner in the sky. Or a press release. We’ll let them feel like they’ve finally caught us.” Pretending you were going to throw the media a bone.

It was his smile that told you you’d gone too far in your head. Because he was already half leaned in the car, hand on the door, too close to you, with cameras flashing on the sidewalk fifty feet away. His voice was low and warm. “Haven’t they already?”

The car door blocked the pictures snapped thousands at a time, and the rush of raised voices faded as he kissed you. In that easy way of his making the rest of the world disappear. No matter what trouble he was causing.

Damn him.

#Tony Stark #Tony Stark x Reader #INY Chapter Thirty Two

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howwelldoyouknowyourmoon · 5 years ago

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Fear and Loathing at Cheonbo (was known as Cheongpyeong)

There was a brief time in my life as a Moonie when all the pressure and theatrics of the Moon family dynasty seemed far away and the effects of Mass Psychosis had died down to a minimum. Family life and domestic issues were given high priority and folks had time to breathe and actually plan for their futures. Except for the occasional visits to our fair city from one of the members of Moon’s family, church life proceeded in a calm and predictable manner. The members were happy to turn out the assembly for the touring Moon family speaker, perhaps a few employees and the occasional VIP would attend. The speech covered all the familiar points to which all agreed and warmly applauded on cue. The Moon family member was feted at a luxury hotel and given a tour of the local facilities, all proudly provided with the donations of the local Moonie community. Then they were sent home amid Mansei cheers and congratulations….a total victory for God over Satan! The providence was marching on and on.

Then the madness started again. We had heard the rumors about a certain spiritualist in South Korea that was channeling messages from Mrs. Moon’s dead mother and others in spirit world, but no one really assigned any importance to this development. Perhaps we thought that our experience with the black Heung Jin was enough to scare the devil out of the membership and we had quietly moved on to another chapter in the dispensation. Sadly, it wasn’t to be. Workshops were being organized at a church facility in a place called Cheongpyeong Lake where members could attend and, for a hefty donation, have their burdensome evil ancestors exorcized. How this was accomplished wasn’t explained at first and the members returning from these workshops were reluctant to explain the process. Perhaps they were embarrassed or because it was so complicated or maybe it was just a mystery – nobody knew until they were initiated.

▲ Hyo-nam Kim beating evil spirits out of a member in New York.

I didn’t have much interest based on my previous experiences with this sort of thing in New York City and expressed as much to my wife. She seemed to agree but as time went on the pressure from both peers and church headquarters to participate was gradually increased until my wife relinquished and committed herself. She decided to take a circuitous tour and visit her family in Japan first then spend the required time at Cheongpyeong Lake and alleviate herself of her sinful ancestors. Since we both agreed that my ancestors were probably more sinful than hers, we would forgo their liberation until some later date when we could better afford the cost of the service. Since we had three small children we decided it would be easier for her to take the eldest and I keep the younger two until the last week of her workshop when we would be reunited at the facility at the culmination of the workshop.

I really had reservations about the whole thing and we did argue about the importance of the event over our family finances but she eventually wore me down as most wives do. I was calculating in my mind the net cost savings of the money spent on “ancestor liberation” over extended stays in Japan with numerous visits to the hot springs, shopping malls, etc. Compromise for the sake of family unity seemed to be the order of the day so off she went for the forty day workshop.

My trip to Korea started pleasantly enough albeit with minor irritations like heavy snow fall and delayed luggage. My children and I were happily greeted by my wife and eldest daughter upon arrival at Cheongpyeong Lake but something about her seemed different. My wife’s neck and face were so swollen that her eyes were almost closed. I asked her repeatedly what happened but she declined to explain and assured me that it was nothing … really. We proceeded to our accommodation where I was surprised to find the members were sleeping in sleeping bags on foam mats on the floor of a building that was little more than a finished warehouse. Heat was furnished through the floor but only in the evening hours. My wife insisted on preparing our beds now even though it was still daylight because there were no lights and the choice spots on the floor filled up quickly. I was incredulous as I looked around me. There were families there with babies who were sick with deep hacking coughs; actually everybody seemed to be sick and miserable. I started to ply my wife with questions about the facility to which she was still reluctant to answer. She quickly adopted the pleading tone that she used to get me to go along with difficult directions from the church. I decided it was best not to make a scene and went into survival mode, preparing our bed along the wall so that we wouldn’t be trampled in the night by new arrivals.

The next morning I went outside to survey our situation and it became apparent then that there was no escaping the place without the assistance of the organizers. We were truly in the boonies as we had taken a two hour bus ride from Seoul to reach it. The nearest settlement was a couple miles down the road and would have required a taxi and probably a translator. Panic started to settle in as I suddenly realized that we were trapped. The only vehicles around were black sport utilities with tinted out windows. I walked past one glowering at the occupants who I could see through their open driver’s window. There were two Korean men inside who were smoking and laughing hilariously at me as if they could read my mind. My wife came running up to me to tell me with urgency that it was time for “Ansoo”. What’s that? Said I with trepidation as my world was spinning out of control. “Just come, please”. We started to walk back to the facility where I could hear singing, clapping and drumming. I reassured myself that it couldn’t be so bad – surely it was just preparation for lectures on Divine Principle like the old days.

We gathered the children and proceeded to the hall where all the singing was taking place and entered to find the members neatly sitting in straight rows facing toward the front stage. There were three or four youths on stage who were busy dancing and belting out holy songs to the driving beat provided by a bass drum and the clapping of the members.

One of them would start screaming something incoherent in Korean and the members commenced slapping their bodies on locations proscribed by the cheerleader. These commands changed periodically to include a different location of your body. Sometimes someone behind would start pounding the person in front of them and then they would swap. Children weren’t spared in the ritual. The cheerleaders seemed to be working themselves into some sort of frenzied trance. There appeared to be cadre pacing the rows ready to swoop in and start pounding someone who lacked sufficient enthusiasm.

I immediately recognized where the swelling came from on my wife’s face as I watched her organize our kids into rows. She couldn’t look me in the eyes as I was furious and appalled at the same time. I grabbed her hand and dragged her to the back of the hall where I could explain how I felt to her. She tried to explain to me that she was doing this for our sake and I could see that she was torn between her desire to believe and participate and the frightening illogic of the whole scene. I grabbed the children and took them out of the hall and she followed me pleading with me to return. It became clear to me that she was embarrassed by my behavior in front of the other members so I moved back to the empty sleeping quarters to speak to her. I explained to her that I wasn’t going to be subjected to this mindless behavior and would not allow the children to suffer it either. I told her that we would leave on the first available bus with or without her and she started crying. At that point I didn’t care what the members thought about me as I was so indignant at the fact that she thought she could deceive me into participating against my own better judgment.

Eventually she relinquished when I offered to compromise by staying to the end of her workshop with the children so that she could go on beating herself up. I couldn’t change our flight schedule and staying in Seoul would have been more expensive. I spent the next three days touring the facility and amusing myself at what I observed. I wasn’t the only non-participant there as I found large numbers of Korean teenagers wandering around and in some cases pairing off in the hills surrounding the facility. The kids seemed to have more sense than their parents. I also discovered why the organizers were so adamant about using environmentally safe personal care products. It seems that the planners felt it was more important to ship in expensive marble from Italy than build a sewage treatment plant for the facility. Outfall pipes were plainly visible extending into the lake. While taking a walk in the front courtyard one frigid morning I noticed a kindred soul had expressed himself creatively on the monument that was dedicated to Moon. It was a giant phallic symbol resembling the Washington monument with highly detailed reliefs at the base depicting Moon doing battle with Satan and his minions. Someone had urinated on Moon’s face leaving frozen yellow icicles extending from his marble features. Moon was scheduled to visit the facility that very night so I felt the sacrilege was very appropriate.

While creature comforts were far and few between at Cheong Pyeong, we were delighted to find a public bathhouse on the facility one day, and quite by accident. There was a loud row between a large European sister and one of the Korean grounds keepers out front of the bath house. He had firmly planted himself with his broom in front of the entrance of the sister’s bath and was helping himself to glimpses of their glistening bodies when the door swung open. I met a member that I had been acquainted with on MFT many years previously while languishing in the bath house with my kids. He was now employed at the Washington Times and we had a hearty chuckle together as he recounted Moon’s sudden but timely about-face in the editorials of the paper on President Clinton’s adulterous affairs. Moon seemed to have switched abruptly from revulsion to open empathy right at the same time that his daughter and Nan Sook Hong were making very revealing public statements about Moon’s private life.

The food at Cheongpyeong was rather plain even by Korean standards and consisted mainly of rice, Kimchee and a curious dish that was diplomatically described as “spicy crabs”. It consisted of tiny sea crabs cooked in cayenne sauce until crunchy but digestible. I had never encountered it before or since and it reminded me of other traveller’s accounts of eating locusts in Africa. The only other choice was ramen noodles and other vending food being sold for a premium at the company store. When sitting in the cafeteria one time enjoying my spicy crabs, I noticed the local church honchos chowing down on a six course meal in the corner, complete with Bulgogi and other Korean delicacies. I made my displeasure evident as I slowly lead my children around their table on our way out and they responded by loudly sucking their teeth.

Moon finally made his promised appearance and the members lined up on either side of the main road six deep to greet him. I chose to go up on top of the roof of the main hall with my family for a better view. I was alarmed to see him arrive in a fancy Mercedes sedan at a high rate of speed which barely missed some of the members by inches as it roared up the road. Rather than stop in front of the hall and enter in grand style as he always did in the US, he chose to speed by the crowds and go down into a secret underground parking garage. The members began packing themselves into the main hall to hear Moon speak and I could see the cadre organizing the members on the floor by ethnicity. Japanese members seemed to get preference in the front rows closest to Moon with Westerners in the back. I assumed that this was done for security reasons, probably an indication that Moon shrewdly anticipated possible attacks from his own followers.

Predictably, his speech was long and barely engaging, especially for those of us in the back of the hall with small children. I gently placed my kids on the piles of bedding along the wall as they each dropped off to sleep and turned to whisper to my neighbors. It seems that we were all struggling with the same issues of humiliation and dismay over what had become of our time in the church. Finally Moon announced a break around midnight for us to get food. What about sleep? I thought out loud as the members stood, stretched and gathered their kids up to start shuffling toward the exits. I quickly realized that there was going to be a bottleneck at the stairwells and lifted one child onto my shoulders and placed one in front of me. I was trying to follow my wife and eldest daughter through the crowd. The horde of bodies began pressing together in the stairwell when my daughter looked up at me and told me she couldn’t breathe. I quickly reversed course and led her back into the hall against the flood of humanity. She had a mild case of asthma and I wasn’t going to take any chances. We later met at our sleeping quarters with my wife and eldest daughter who brought us each a plate of spicy crabs. After our midnight snack I told my wife that I preferred to go to bed early on the last evening of our vacation at Moonie land. She was disappointed but understanding and returned for the glorious finale of Moon’s speech.

The kids and I awoke refreshed and full of anticipation for our long flight home to the US. We didn’t have an opportunity to see the celebrated Dae Mo Nim in person but I didn’t have any regrets. I was just glad to be done with the whole sordid affair and as we queued up for the bus, I could tell that the other members were equally relieved that it was over. It has been a number of years since our experience and my wife and I haven’t discussed it in detail. I think it’s safe to say that we are both grateful to almighty God to have returned us from the edge of the abyss with mind, body and family intact.

Sincerely as always, Frank Frivilous

______________________________________

Soon-ae Hong (the mother of Hak Ja Han) spent two years in Chuncheon Prison after Ansu beating an 18-year old boy to death.

“Ancestor Liberation must be done” Hak Ja Han 2015

Dae Mo Nim (Hyo-nam Kim) pours guilt on the Japanese Fear, guilt and shame used to trap the Japanese members.

What Makes an Ex-Moonie Tick? – Frank Frivilous

The FFWPU / Unification Church and Shamanism

Sun Myung Moon – Emperor, and God

FFWPU Holy Grounds and the Shamanic Guardians of the Five Directions

Shamanism: The Spirit World of Korea Any understanding of the so-called New Religions of Korea would be difficult without some knowledge of shamanistic influences upon them.

Hananim and other Spirits in Korean Shamanism

Black Heung Jin Moon – Violence in the FFWPU

FFWPU / UC of Japan used members for profit, not religious purposes

The Atsuko Kumon Hong “suicide / murder” of August 2013

Hwang Gook-joo and his orgies

#Hyo-nam Kim #Kim Hyo-nam #Dae Mo Nim #shamanism #scam #FFWPU #Shamanism in the FFWPU #ancestor liberation #guilt #Hak Ja Han

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