#and wound care and various other things illegal for me)

[obscureshipsandchips]

I saw your post about having a patient and I was wondering if you were a nurse too?? I’m trying to track down the nursing side of tumblr…

Yep 🫶

[tragicstarz]

My in depth psycho-analysis on Gus fring and why he is one of the most complex characters in the show even with the very little background he is given. Lol enjoy for all who read :3

Gus fring since the very beginning has been one of the most compelling characters in the show. For some people it’s his cold and calculating demeanor and for others it’s what actually goes on underneath it all. (For the record this is not me woobifying Gus- I’m just going deeper than most into his actual personality and life lolol).

Loyalty

Anyways, the first takeaway I had when I finished breaking bad was that Gus gave out his loyalty like a kid running a lemonade stand even though he claimed to not trust a lot of people. (even though it only took a short talk about family for him to be loyal to Walter and Jesse) But, this loyalty kept coming to bite him in the ass. Because of this loyalty, he deals with betrayal and incompetence harshly. He claims loyalty to the right person/s is crucial to maintain order and efficiency in his operations but it’s the very thing that leads to his downfall. His trust and respect for Jesse led to him not ‘taking care of’ Walt which in the end was the one factor that ruined his goal of defeating hector that he was THIS close to completing.

Public persona

I also feel that his involvement with the public and the community is a genuine aspect to his character. I feel like it’s more than a mask to shield his illegal activities. I’ve analyzed it through various psychological lenses and it reveals some deeper motivations and insecurities. In the drug world, Gus is like an outsider even if he IS their highest earner. He will never be one of them. This is kind of emphasized in brba/bcs with his non-Mexican origin and his orientation (through slurs and jokes) he was and never would be fully accepted or respected by his drug peers. In the Albuquerque community, when he’s not working with drugs, his philanthropic persona, I believe, is Gus trying to compensate for his lack of genuine respect and acceptance in the cartel. He’s basically playing dress up with an identity where he valued and respected, which he doesn’t receive in his criminal life (because even Jesse and Walt kinda hate him). Gus is building and creating a psychological space where he can fulfill his need for social acceptance and respect- closeting himself because he knows that something like that can ruin what he’s got. So even in his make believe world of the public entrepreneur/benefactor, he’s not actually himself. But obviously it helps him take his mind off of the disrespect he faces in the drug trade

Max Arciniega

Obviously, if you’ve studied Gus’s character and payed at least a little bit of attention to brba/bcs you can see that Gus’s relationship with Max was more than just a silly partnership. Max’s murder by Hector was a pivotal moment for Gus, sparking his need for control and vengeance but also a set back in his business and giving him a deeply personal wound. In the hyper-masculine and homophobic environment of the cartel, Gus’s sexuality could easily be seen as vulnerability. Hector does say at one point “I know what you are” and the Salamancas are quick to make jokes on the matter so if we’re going the route that they DO know about his sexuality, it only further proves why he doesn’t fit in or isn’t respected as much because the only reason he is, is because of his role in Chile as “big generalissimo” and the amount of money he brings in for Eladio. As a way to counterbalance this vulnerability and insecurity, his meticulous public persona paints Gus out as someone who is deeply respectable. Something I am sad about when it comes to Gus and his character is the way we see quite a bit of his drug and community life (not as much as the other characters) but basically none of his personal life. I believe Vince did this to maintain his villainous coldness which in the end made Gus one of the best TV villains of all time but obviously quite a bit of people would have given an arm and a burned off face to see more of Gustavo not just Gus. His compartmentalization of his true personality in both of his worlds I believe is a coping mechanism to manage the complexities of his identity, including his sexuality. Because even in the early 2000s it still wasn’t as accepted as it is today and obviously he realized if he shared this aspect, his respect would deteriorate (in his mind at least) I couldn’t speak about the other characters but I just know Walter would have had a field day if Gus was more open. Gus’s fear of scrutiny and judgment play a big role when studying his efforts to protect his true self through his need for control and precision.

Moral code/sexuality

Gus’s actions are driven by a personal moral code that includes loyalty and retribution. The murder of Max, his lover, becomes the catalyst for his meticulous, long term plan to dismantle the cartel from within. This mission of his is both a professional vendetta and a deeply personal quest for justice and respect for Max’s memory. But even me just looking at Gus, in my humble opinion, I don’t believe Gus to be one who cares about the money- I think he only cared about being greater than that cartel and the Salamancas to prove them wrong or ya know at least roll in their graves. Gus’s sexuality and the trauma associated with Max’s death I believe contributes deeply to his complex interplay of empathy and ruthlessness. The only times we ever see Gus become ruthless is when his operation/plan to avenge max is in danger. With a lot of characters, he contributes a lot of compassion and empathy. (Ex. Mike, Gale).

Public persona (Pt 2)

Gus’s efforts to gain public respect can be interpreted as attempts to seek validation and acceptance that may have been denied in other aspects of his life (private and cartel). His respectable identity in the community contrasts with the potential stigma of being open with his sexuality in the same environment. I also believe that his construction of this positive legacy through his community work is a way Gus has found to honor Max’s memory. His philanthropic activities and support for the community, I can see as an extension of his affection for Max, reflecting his desire to create something good.

WALTER WHITE

What I said before “if Gus was more open about his sexuality, Walt would have had a field day” I stand by this because to me Walter is the epitome of toxic masculinity a real sigma male if you must. I just know for a fact that if max were still around Walter wouldn’t have been able to even breath the same air as Gus. I feel like if Walter ever did find out about Gus’s sexuality he would have exploited it. Walters need for control and his need to assert dominance would have probably driven him to undermine Gus. Obviously this might have been helpful to Gus in some ways because if Walter perceived him as “weak” and let his guard down even a little Gus would’ve eradicated that bald bastard. Anyways, I was ranting sorry LMFAOOO now onto the family aspect between the two. We have to first look at Gus’s core motivations which I got into earlier with Max and all that. When Walter begins to talk about his motivations being rooted in providing for his family, he presents himself to Gus as someone who is driven by authentic and relatable goals. For Gus, this authenticity and vulnerability stands in stark contrast from the rest of the deceptive and self-serving cunts in the drug trade. Family, loyalty, and providing for a loved one are all values that resonate deeply with Gus and Walters emphasis on these values creates a common ground between them. Gus sees in Walter a reflection of himself which made him more inclined to trust and respect Walter.

Why Walter was so pivotal for Gus

Gus sees potential in Walter. By Walters talk about family, this leads Gus to believe that he can invest in Walter. He thinks he is inventing in someone who is dedicated and motivated by the desire to secure his families future. Because by doing this, Gus would also be investing in the continuity of his own operations. A partner, who is driven by family values in Gus’s eyes is likely to strive for stability and longevity, which aligns with Gus’s vision for a lasting legacy. Sadly, Walters talk about family also makes Gus believe that his actions are not driven by ego or recklessness, but by a deeper, more relatable motivation. But in reality, Walter is exactly what Gus was hoping he wasn’t. However this moment in the booth creates an emotional connection between him and Walter because Gus mirrors it as the loyalty he once had with Max. Ugh it makes me so upset.

I can’t think of anything else to put here at the moment because I still have so many thoughts to gather but I’ll definitely be adding to this in the future

Thank you for reading :)

[sabo-has-my-heart]

IMW Ch. 8: Thinking Too Much

I’m so sorry it’s been so long since my last chapter of “Isekai’d to the Modern World” so much has been happening since chapter 7! with my ask box closed I’m going to be trying to update this and “The Princess’s Royal Guard” more frequently. Without further adieu, enjoy.

Warnings: illegal fights, Ace getting ‘wounded’

Word Count: 1320 

     The spotlights were blinding, especially in the mostly dark room, but he’d started getting used to it. It was his third fight this week and honestly, he was half bored, half amused. Everyone he’d fought so far had been a pushover. People were starting to bet on him now that he’d won a few fights without breaking a sweat, though perhaps that was to be expected. He still didn’t understand the black, padded, fingerless gloves they made him wear, but at this point, he really didn’t care. If they wanted him to wear ‘protective gloves’ he’d wear them. It was good money. Paying you to feed him was easy, he was buying various clothes other than what you’d first got him, and your world had so many amusing toys and games! You’d even started teaching him about video games… after he promised not to break anything. He didn’t think he was going to break anything, after you plugged everything in. Heck, aside from the tablet he’d accidentally broken when watching a video, he hadn’t broken a single thing! And the video he’d been watching had been rigged! They’d wanted him to jump! Cute cat video his ass! That was like asking him to break your tablet! Besides, he’d just thrown it against the wall, it’s not like he’d done anything else to it, it’s not like he could do much else to it. All of his abilities seemed to have disappeared. His higan, his enkai, hotarubi, his HIKEN! It was all gone. He kind of missed being made of fire, being invulnerable to anything but haki and seastone. On top of that, he was starting to wish he could show you what he was capable of, to see a look of awe on your face as you watched him light up the night sky, see the way the light danced across your face. He was willing to bet you were the most beautiful person in the world in the light of a fire. Climbing into the ring, he wondered what people of this world would think of someone just randomly summoning fire. They’d probably lose their shit. Despite his distracted state, Ace was able to end the match without issue, though not without minor ‘injury’, his opponent managing to take advantage of Ace’s lack of attention and get a few hits in before Ace knocked him on his ass. A few bruises, nothing serious, but you’d probably sigh and scold him. It was sweet how much you worried about him, how you paced your dorm room until he came back and immediately inspected him for any problems. Though this would be the first time you found anything. Growling, he heard the announcer introduce another fighter. So far, they’d only given him one opponent per fight, but perhaps he was becoming too good. The crowd became chaotic when the announcer called out his next opponent, many of them rushing to make bets. His guess, this new fighter was quite a bit stronger than those he’d fought before, meaning people thought he was going to lose. Chuckling, he shook off his thoughts. He’d taken 2 or 3 hits last fight and now people were rushing to make bets against him, it would be best if he paid attention. 

     Walking into the dorm, he sighed, giving you a slightly tired smile when you turned to him. Almost instantly, you were by his side and forcing him to sit in a chair as you looked him over. He had a number of bruises forming across his stomach, another on his cheek, and a small graze on his shoulder, but was otherwise fine.

     “Sorry, tough night. They put me against 3 different guys. I think I’m a little too good.” Ace said with a chuckle as you tended to his ‘injuries’, “don’t worry, it's mostly just bruising. I’ve had worse. A lot worse. You should have seen it when I fought against Pops. One time, he threw me through a wall, it was crazy.” Ace said, shaking his head as he remembered when he fought against the man that he called father. 

     “Are you sure you’re okay? The bruising isn’t too deep? It doesn’t hurt too bad?” you asked, biting your lip as he laughed.

     “Are you kidding? My little brother can hit harder than this! Man, you would’ve lost it if you knew how hard gramps could punch! That man’s ‘fist of love’ could knock down fully grown trees with ease!” he said, shaking his head, “I’m fine, trust me. This was nothing. I probably wouldn’t have even gotten hit if I was actually paying full attention. The first guy I wasn’t paying a whole lot of attention to at all.” he said with a shrug. You sighed and shook your head.

     “Then pay attention next time, dumbass! I don’t want you getting hurt because you were lost in a daydream.” you said, lightly flicking his forehead.

     “Even if it’s a daydream about you?” he asked, giving you a flirty wink. 

     “W-why would you be daydreaming about me? Stop saying ridiculous things!” you said, hurrying away to the kitchen, “I’ll make us some food. I’m sure you’re hungry.” you said, starting on something simple. Ace smiled at you, his head tilting adorably to the side as he watched you. He’d been here for a little while, living with you, and he’d learned quite a bit. Not just about your world, but about you. You were nice, kind, sweet, smart. He wondered why you didn’t have someone special yet. Though perhaps that worked out well for him. No one to question why you had a guy staying with you, no one to bother either of you with dates or affection, just the two of you. While he was still looking for a way home, part of him knew that he wouldn’t want to leave you. At the same time, he knew you wouldn’t leave, you had too much keeping you here. If he found a way home, he’d have to leave you and that thought had his chest tightening. Placing a plate of food in front of him, you snapped him out of his trance, the young man smiling at you as he dug in. 

     Laying on the couch, he stared up at your ceiling, it was growing closer and closer to the end of the semester, meaning that you’d, hopefully, be getting a bigger place soon, meaning he’d get his own room. Not that your couch was uncomfortable, hell, he’d slept in far, far more uncomfortable places before, but you’d insisted that he be able to sleep in his own room in his own bed. Vaguely his thoughts wandered to his last memories of his world again. No matter how hard he tried to remember, they were hazy. He’d been at Marineford, on the execution platform. Pops had come to rescue him, then Luffy… the boy had reached him, Luffy had actually managed to free him. Shaking his head, he smiled. It was nice to know how far Luffy had come, how strong he’d gotten. Thinking back, he sighed. He’d been running back towards the others, been trying to escape. He remembered Akainu. The man had said something… Ace’s brow furrowed as he tried to remember what the man had said. He knew that, whatever it was, it had bothered him, but he couldn’t remember what, couldn’t remember what had happened next. The only thing he could remember clearly after that was waking up in your dorm room. Running a hand through his hair, he squeezed his eyes shut. He needed to stop thinking about this so much, especially when he was trying to sleep! Pulling on the blankets, he rolled over, easily falling asleep. He still had studying to do, things he needed to know to catch up with your world, he could figure out his hazy memories later. It probably wasn’t important anyway. 

[breathofmyown]

“You’re still sure?” Sara asked, her face pinched and nervous as we stood before the door to her family manor. People say it’s impossible to tell what a Union nun is feeling under their skull paint, but I don’t understand how anyone could miss the way Sara glows. The way her black and white paint shifted with her every expression.

“Of course,” I said, lacing my fingers through hers. Sara's dark skin contrasting against my own paleness.

“I just… I never thought I’d be able to ever bring someone home for this. That anyone would want to.”

“Well, I’m here. I’m not going anywhere,” I said, leaning down as Sara tilted her head up. Our lips met, and I pulled her closer by her hips. Sara always tasted faintly of her astringent face-paint, but there was also the warmth that was purely her I couldn’t get enough of. There’s definitely something special about making out with your necromancer girlfriend on the steps of her family manor.

The more scandalous gossip magazines back in the republic would have you believe these celebrations were horrific convents of blood magic and orgies, but the party that greeted us was remarkably more mundane. It was just a family gathering like any other, really. It just so happened that everyone wore black robes and had painted their faces in skulls, which might have been more off-putting had I not long since grown used to Sara’s bone nun aesthetic.

Sara’s mom hugged us both, talking joyously about how excited she was to finally meet me. How she’d been waiting so long for Sara to bring someone home. Her father seemed more taciturn, merely greeting us with a nod, but Sara seemed happy with it. Smiling brightly in the way that makes me feel all warm. So who was I to complain?

There was food and music. Various members of Sara’s family were scattered through the large home, chatting in groups of twos and threes. Really, the only thing that was truly unusual was all the skeletons. The Union was rather infamous for its widespread use of necromancy. A practice deeply illegal elsewhere in the world. I knew what my girlfriend was involved with, but it was strange being confronted with that reality.

Sara had explained to me that for them this wasn’t a desecration. It was a way to remember those who’ve moved on, and to support those you care about when you’re gone. How they could spend their life however they liked. Freed from the burden of needing to perform menial labor simply to support themselves. And in return they would pass that privilege onto the next generation by giving their bodies to the support of their family when they passed on. It all was such a far cry from the way I’d grown up needing to work dead-end job after dead-end job the moment I became an adult. It was hard to wrap my head around.

Even if the animated dead weren’t truly aware, though, they were still given such respect here. Today was a holiday in The Union. The reason that I’d come with Sara to her home. Today they would bring the skeletons in from their work to spend time with them and remember their lives. It was strangely touching seeing people of all ages crowded around skeletons, talking about the person’s life. Each skeleton had various gifts given to them. Flowers, candles, some were even clad in clearly hand-knit sweaters. Having grown up without a family really, it was hard to wrap my head around the way they seemed to love one another so. So much for being a bunch of spooky cultists (well, I guess they were still a little spooky, but I think I just loved them more for it.)

Sara held my hand as we made our way down the driveway. Night had well and truly fallen as the party wound down, and after a lengthy goodbye with seemingly every single member of Sara’s extended family wanting to give me a hug, we’d made our escape. We slowed, each turning to face the other. Seeming to decide on it at the same time. Sara’s eyes almost seemed to shine in the glimmering magelight that illuminated the street, her golden eyes tinted with the pale blue of the light, and the white of her face-paint seemed to glow. The automated cab we’d ordered pulled up to the curb next to us with a hum of electric engines, its door swinging open for us.

“Ready to head home my love?” Sara said, her voice soft in the gathering dark.

[btsficsforthehumble]

Rapture

Pairing: reader x Yoongi

Genre: Mafia au; angst, fluff

Warnings: Injury, medical terms, blood, sexual insinuations

WC: 2.2k

A/N: This is for the ficcafe dialogue prompt event! The three italicized lines are the ones chosen from this event --- thanks to the admins for creating such a great list! I really love this scenario and am thinking about making it into a larger story if there’s interest… so let me know if you want to see more!

----

“Stop screaming, it’s just me.”

You sag with relief when you recognize Yoongi’s voice. You had woken up to the sound of a large crash, from what you assume now was caused by Yoongi navigating your dark apartment. Your relief only disappears for a second, however. If he was coming to your apartment in the middle of the night like this, something was wrong.

You scoot your butt to the edge of your bed to reach your side table tamp, pulling the string to allow soft light to illuminate the room. This allows you to see Yoongi fully, not just the dark figure he had been seconds ago.

The sight that awaits your eyes makes you take a sharp inhale. Yoongi was leaning against your dresser, hunched over slightly, still in his tactical gear from what you assume was his job tonight. What had caused your surprise though wasn’t that, but the large gash that travelled from his hip bone to right above the inside of his knee. It must have been not too deep, seeing as he was able to make his way all the way here, but was still actively bleeding --- you could see the dark metallic liquid reflecting the light, standing out against the black of his cargo pants.

You immediately jump up to grab the rather large first aid kit you keep in your bathroom. You weren’t a stranger to patching up the boys after a particularly dangerous job. Usually though, they weren’t stumbling around your apartment in the middle of the night, but calling you over to one of their apartments.

The truth was, you were no doctor --- or even nurse for that matter. You were a waitress. After you made friends with the seven boys who would frequent the small restaurant in which you worked, you learned that they were members of the local Bangtan gang. You had seen how they roughly patched each other up after they got hurt, fearing going to the hospital to where they could be linked to the various illegal activities that they participated in. So, you took it upon yourself to learn rudimentary first aid skills to help them when they were injured --- such as right now.

You pull out a bottle of alcohol, gauze, needle and surgical thread from your kit after washing your hands thoroughly. Yoongi was still putting his weight on your furniture, easing the pressure off of his injured leg. He had a grimace on his face, obviously in pain from the large gash.

You hurry over, lifting his opposite arm up and around your neck to allow you to support some of his weight. Slowly hobbling to the edge of your bed, you assist him in sitting on the mattress where he could rest while you could fix him up.

Once you have him positioned comfortably, well --- as comfortably as he could get, you sink to your knees in front of him to be able to be close enough to the wound to work on it. First, you realize you would have to cut back some of the fabric of his pants to prevent contamination and allow you to get a clear view of the full cut. Grabbing the medical scissors, you begin to but at his pants, but careful to not sacrifice his modesty too much. Honestly, you don’t think you’d be able to focus very well with him exposed anyway.

After you finish, you look up to see his face, wanting to make sure he was still comfortable and prepared to handle the pain the alcohol would surely bring. Seeing his frown turn into a knowing smile once your eyes meet, you hurry to sterilize the cut. You two didn’t need words to understand each other, same as always.

You lift the open bottle of isopropyl alcohol to hover above his thigh, and begin to carefully pour just enough to cover the wound, moving from the top to the bottom of the gash. At its contact, Yoongi lets out a hiss and grips your bedsheets in both hands. He’s felt the sting a million times, but it never fails to make him tense up in pain.

“I know. Sorry,” you give at his tense reaction.

Putting away the alcohol, you thread your needle. Checking in with him again, he gives you a tense nod. You begin stitching him up, knotting the first stitch at his hip and traveling down his thigh. At the first stitch, you feel him jump slightly from the prick.

“Stay still. The more you move, the more this is going to hurt,” you warn.

He lets out a low grunt of acknowledgement at your words. He knew you were right.

You put your full focus back into your task, wanting to make sure the stitches weren’t excessively crude. In the process, you don’t notice you getting your body shifting to be more in between his spread legs than in front of them. He notices though.

He keeps his eyes trained on you as you work. Partially to keep himself distracted from the needle going in and out of his skin, but also partially because you looked so beautiful bathed in the soft light your lamp was casting on you. He had woken you up from your sleep, so you had a case of slight bedhead and puffy eyes --- a completely unfiltered version of yourself. After looking at your furrowed brows and slight pout, obviously lost in your task, he lets his gaze drop to your body.

You were wearing a large, oversized white tee-shirt and black sleeping shorts that were smaller than anything he’d seen you in before. Not wanting to make himself think dirtily about you while you were currently in between his thighs --- he’d surely get hard and then he’d feel like a complete asshole --- he slides his gaze back up to your torso.

Wait a second… your shirt looks an awful lot like the one that he had been searching for a few weeks ago. The shirt was one of his favorites, and he was irritated when he couldn’t find it anywhere.

“Is that… is that my shirt?”

You snap your head up at his words, take a look down to remind yourself of what you were wearing, and snap your head back up again, but this time with an owlish look. Of course the one night Yoongi stumbles in your door you are wearing the t-shirt you had stolen from his room while you were over playing card games with Jungkook and Taehyung. You all were drinking, and you accidentally spilled the contents of your glass right down the front of your top. You had gotten up to steal one of the boys shirts from their rooms, but you knew Yoongi had this shirt in his drawer. It always looked so comfortable; plus, you thought it would probably have his masculine citrusy scent. You were right, on both accounts.

Now, you were embarrassed having been caught red-handed. “May... maybe?” The heat in your cheeks didn’t help your situation.

He raises his eyebrows at your answer, and you could see the faint trace of a smile on his lips.

“You know, I looked for a whole week for that shirt. And now, come to find out, it was all the way here in your thieving hands this whole time,” he gruffly says, in his special Yoongi way. But you could tell from his tone he wasn’t actually mad.

“Thought it needed a change of environment, that’s all,” you answer cheekily. You resume his stitches where you had left off.

He just shakes his head, watching you for another moment. “It looks better on you anyways.”

You blush at his words, but don’t look up from your task. At this point, you were nearly done --- your stitching had grown faster with the practice the boys kept giving you.

You tie off the last stitch, and stand up wiping the dust of the floor off your knees. You collect the used supplies, depositing them in the bathroom to deal with tomorrow. When you come back in, you find Yoongi examining your work. He said nothing, apparently satisfied.

“Come on, let me clean you up,” you suggest as you walk over to help him stand from your bed. He still has blood, now dried, in the area around his wound. He leans on you again, standing with a grunt. Hobbling once more, you go to the bathroom and sit him on the closed toilet. You make quick work of getting some sterile cotton pads wet to allow you to swipe away the blood.

You are gentle as you wipe, not wanting to upset the already angry skin any more. He watches your face as you do so, endeared at your care and concern.

Once you finish, it occurs to him that his pants still have a giant gaping hole in them --- oh, and part of his boxers too. You are quick to turn around, heading straight for the dresser Yoongi had been leaning on earlier. You have a small stash of men’s boxers for when you sleep sometimes. Luckily, Yoongi, being slim, would fit into the pairs you had on hand. Grabbing the one on top, you return to the bathroom.

He raises his brows at you, confused at your actions, but understands once you toss the boxers at him.

“Here. I don’t have pants that’ll fit, but those should work at least,” you offer.

“Thanks.”

With a nod, you turn around shutting the door behind you. Oh, he probably wants a clean shirt too --- so you do the first thing you think of, taking his shirt right off your back. You crack open the door, only enough to fit your hand with the shirt through, in offering. A beat later, you feel the tee being pulled from your loose grasp.

Yoongi feels a spark of excitement knowing you were half naked on the other side of the door, but quickly tries to shove it away. Not the time, he reminds himself.

Meanwhile, you pull out another old shirt from your drawer for yourself to wear, and go get a glass of water from the kitchen for Yoongi. You had some painkillers for him, that would hopefully allow him to sleep.

While you are placing the pills next to the glass on your bedside, you hear the door creak open. You rush over to help him walk, wrapping your arm around his waist. You head towards your bed, already set on having him sleep there while you take the couch. He looks down at you confused when he sees the direction you’re taking him, however.

Noticing, you tell him, “I was thinking you take my bed tonight. It’s better than the couch for your leg.”

Meanwhile, he had been planning on ending up on your old couch this entire time. “It’s fine, I already barged in your house for you to sew me up, I can take the couch,” he says. “I promise I’ll be okay.”

But you weren’t taking no for an answer tonight. “Min Yoongi, sit your ass down. You have a huge gash in your thigh, you’re taking the bed.”

He could tell from your tone there was no arguing. He still felt guilty. And, he realized, what he really wanted was for you to just stay with him.

With fake nonchalance, he suggests just that. “Let’s compromise. You’re bed’s big enough for two, we can both use it.”

You eye him for a few seconds, wanting to gauge what that meant. If you let your imagination run wild, that could be a loaded suggestion. You debate in your head for a second, talking yourself down. It was late, and he had never been anything but your friend. His intentions probably were completely pure; and you felt embarrassed for even thinking anything more could be going on.

You sigh, not giving him an answer right away. “Take these,” you point to the medicine, placing your hands on your hips, waiting for him to follow your order.

He dutifully does so, and looks at you expectantly. You hadn’t told him your decision.

“Scoot over.”

He quirks his lip at your command, amused at your delivery of your answer. But, he does scoot over, allowing you to slide your body underneath the sheets. You quickly reach for your lamp, and encase your room in darkness once again.

Tense from having Yoongi in your bed with you, you can’t help but toss and turn for a bit. Meanwhile, he was deathly still. This continues for several minutes, with you not being able to settle.

You flip over again, but this time Yoongi grunts, rolling on his good side, sticking an ankle between your legs and throwing an arm over your hip. You tense immediately at the unexpected, but not unwelcome, contact.

Yoongi’s breath fans across your ear. “Stop moving. You’re driving me nuts.” His voice was low and gravely from sleepiness, and was very sexy. You were glad at that moment he couldn’t see your face, because your eyes had to be the size of saucers.

And, to your surprise, not soon after you were able to fall into a deep slumber that exceeded your normal, lonely nights.

[peachyteez]

death’s grip ≫ EPILOGUE

the tiger hybrid managed to escape from south korea’s top illegal hybird ring fights. of course, they didn’t let him go so easily. losing his chasers in a forest, covered in blood—his and others’—he decided to accept his fate of death from his wounds until a female and two other hybrids managed to take him from death’s grip.

PART OF THE HEAVEN SERIES.

✧ taglist: @defsoul15, @jaeminbluee, @joongiebug, @sunsethw4. @t-tbinnie. @chanyeolol, @danibookmarks, @hello-its-ya-boi, @murralyn, @alienmashup, @panini, @moon8894, @koasworld, @taetae123094, @luv3rxcha, @treasure-hwa, @etherealbyeol, @hwaseongzzz, @lovely-sanie, @orbitiiny, @deep-ocean-dweller, @babydolljo, @ms-starlight, @everrrlasting, @bls-luv-me, @atzgiggle

feel free to let me know if you would like to be added to the list! :)

back。

beomgyu’s eyes widened when a tiger-hybrid opened the front door of jiyu’s home. the last time he remembered, it was only her, seonghwa, and yunho. 

“ahh! who are you?!” he yelped, hiding behind soobin’s towering figure. “what have you done with jiyu?!”

hongjoong blinked, confused at the situation. jiyu just asked him to get the door since she was busy clipping seonghwa’s nails. never did he expect to see a man and two other hybrids looking at him as if they just saw a ghost. 

“um...i’m hongjoong. who are you?”

jiyu poked her head out from behind hongjoong, curious to see what the commotion was all about. “oh, hi guys!” she waved with a grin. “you didn’t tell me you were coming over.”

“s-soobin and beomgyu wanted to hang out,” yeonjun stuttered out, eyes still trained on the tiger hybrid. “you didn’t mention adopting another hybrid...hongjoong, nonetheless.”

yeonjun didn't know much about hongjoong despite being part of the rescue team to bring him back to the recovery center. jiyu mentioned that he was wary and guarded around new people, so he just stepped back and let her do her work. she never mentioned anything about taking him home, so seeing him open the door was a big surprise for him. 

jiyu sheepishly chuckled before reaching up and petting hongjoong’s head. “yeah, he was a sudden addition, but nevertheless, a wonderful one.”

hongjoong let out a small chuff at her touch and comment. he closed his eyes and smiled in content. ever since coming home with her the week before, his life had completely turned upside down. it was so different compared to his previous life. no more cold cells, ring fights, and constant worry for his life—now he had his own room and bed, food to snack on whenever he wanted, and a human who gave him unconditional love and warmth. although, he was also now in charge of the child-like wolf and puppy hybrid (even if seonghwa was the same age). turns out, he had a knack for taking care and looking after them; which often resulted in jiyu asking him to be in charge whenever she had to go out. 

now instead of fearing for his life, he was now fearing for his patience and sanity. but he wouldn’t change a single thing. seonghwa and yunho had refreshing personalities; they were the sunshines in his life. 

“hongjoong, that's soobin,” she gestured to the giant bunny hybrid who had hid behind yeonjun somewhere along the line, “and beomgyu,” she pointed to the golden-retriever hybrid hiding behind both soobin and yeonjun. jiyu pouted at their behavior. “guys, i know he's a predator hybrid, but like seonghwa, he’s harmless, too.”

seonghwa and yunho came out. “he’s really friendly! see?” yunho demonstrated by engulfing the tiger hybrid into a huge bear hug. 

hongjoong yelped from the sudden attack of affection. “yah! too tight, yunho!” his muffled voice called out. it was quite a picture to see since yunho was a giant compared to hongjoong. hongjoong practically disappeared in yunho’s arms. 

seonghwa smiled before joining in on the hug. “he looks mean sometimes, but he's a small baby.”

“guys, you do realize that i’m right here,” hongjoong retorted, playfully rolling his eyes at the wolf. 

beomgyu, literally trusting anything yunho did, revealed himself and ran towards the group. pouncing on the three, they all lost their balance and fell down. jiyu gasped at the pile in front of her. “ohmygod, are you guys okay?” she frantically asked, bending down to their level. 

yeonjun sighed before pinching his nose bridge. “gyu, this is why i told you to not pounce on people.”

beomgyu sheepishly chuckled and scratched the back of his head. he had landed on yunho, who was laying on seonghwa’s leg. it was like a dog pile. 

peeking at hongjoong’s expression, she was surprised to see a smile spread across his lips. he seemed so...relaxed and accepting of everything. warmth bloomed in her chest at the realization that he was content with everything. even if they took a physical toll on him. 

after helping them up, jiyu ushered them in. “come on, luckily i stocked up on snacks yesterday when i went grocery shopping yesterday.”

the hybrids’ eyes lit up at the mention of snacks. tumbling into the home, the five hybrids made a run for it to the pantry where various snacks were waiting for them. even hongjoong joined in on the fun. 

“you’re magical, you know that?” yeonjun commented when jiyu closed the door behind them. “you never would’ve known these hybrids were in a rough patch unless you told them.” he fondly stared at the five hybrids who were currently raiding the kitchen—although it was basically seonghwa, hongjoong, and soobin trying to calm the two hyperactive puppies down before they accidentally broke something.

jiyu chuckled at his compliment. “it’s nothing big. giving hybrids love can go a long way. i just with their former owners knew...”

yeonjun sighed at a thought that crossed his mind. “did your dad...” he trailed off, seeing her eyes dim at the mention of her dad. truthfully, she hasn’t contacted him since that day in the recovery center’s field with seonghwa, beomgyu, and soobin. and vice versa, he never contacted her to ask for her choice of a potential suitor. 

“surprisingly, no...he never asked again after that day. but it doesn’t sit well with me, i feel like he’s planning something.”

“what are you gonna do if he shows up?”

jiyu bit her lip at the thought. her father didn’t know of her three new friends—he didn’t know about anything in general. she kept her whereabouts under the wraps within the years she’s been gone. 

“then i’ll just face him head on, i guess. if he threatens them in any way, then i’ll bite back twice as hard even if it means getting disowned.”

and she meant every word. seeing seonghwa’s, yunho’s, and hongjoong’s change in character whilst living with her gave her an indescribable feeling—warmth, happiness, and motivation were only a few she could name. it made her want to keep going and fight for herself and her loved ones.

“i’m sure they’ll help you when the time comes,” yeonjun mused, ruffling her hair. “i know soobin, beomgyu, and i would.”

she warmly smiled, eyes wandering over towards the hybrid group. “maybe.”

✧ notes: ahhh sorry my uploading schedule’s been out of wack recently! but midterms are over so hopefully things should be back to normal hehe

next up, mingi! 🥺

[isolemnlyswearpevensie]

Paper Cut | Edmund Pevensie x Reader Soulmate AU

Warnings: Mentions of injury/blood, describing pain, seemingly near-death experience and talk about death, probably some cussing

Time/Era: Modern AU but the Pevensies have been to Narnia. 

Word Count: 2.4k

Summary: Every injury your soulmate receives, you also receive. When you finally meet your soulmate, you have a few bones to pick. 

A/N: Hello! This is the first imagine I’ve written on this blog, so I decided to do something a little more light-hearted for our favorite just king. I’m also a sucker for soulmate aus. There will be a part 2 for this story :D Feel free to leave requests :) Also, I’ve never been to Cambridge University so please take everything I say about it with a grain of salt lol

Part 2 | Part 3 | masterlist | read on ao3

It’s a common courtesy to try and be as careful as you can when it comes to your body. Not for your sake, but for your soulmate’s. Every papercut, cramp, broken bone, and even every itch you feel, your other half does as well. So, it was common sense to try to be as careful as you could to not inflict pain on them. Or at least that’s what Y/N thought. She spent her whole life dodging anything she felt could cause her harm. This included “normal kid” things like playing on the playground, rolling down hills, jumping off things, or playing sports. Her heart was always in the right place, even if her friends and family called her a stick in the mud for declining their “fun” requests. She could not, and will not, injure her person. When she was around 8, she had been playing with a paper airplane and it just barely sliced her finger. It left behind a pesky papercut that stung. Bad. The small injury left Y/N guilty for days afterward. She has assumed that her soulmate was on the same page as her for the longest time. Aside from a few skinned knees (they were kids after all,) Y/N was left unscathed. She went on her days carefree until she was about fifteen. 

It seemed as though Y/N’s soulmate had completely changed their deminer overnight. It started with a bit of road rash on her palms. Y/N assumed they had fallen accidentally. Annoying, sure, but it was more than manageable. Then, her lip split open and bled for almost 15 minutes. 

As the week went on, large bruises started appearing on her legs and hips. Maybe the road rash fall was worse than she initially thought. Again, she just rode it off as clumsiness. It wasn’t long until her fingertips started to turn purple. This made Y/N panic. 

“Ma’am?” Y/N interrupted her science teacher in the middle of her lecture, “I think there’s something wrong with my hands.” The purple started to spread down her fingers towards her knuckles. They also proved to be getting harder to move. 

“Oh, dear, you’re freezing.” Ms. Adamson remarks, taking Y/N’s hands into her own. 

“What’s happening? Am I dying?” Her entire hand was now numb. 

“I don’t think so, Miss L/N, but, it’ll help you and them out if we warm you up.” 

Her toes suffered the same fate, she discovered during a visit to the school’s infirmary. (Which wasn’t even worth visiting in Y/N’s opinion.) The nurse at Y/N’s school didn’t have the “jurisdiction” to help Y/N properly, so she had to settle for a wet paper towel that was warmed in the microwave. Y/N just wished to be sent home instead. By the time she was finally set free, the purple had faded but her skin tone was not back to normal. Hopefully, the paper towel did something for her soulmate cause this sure as hell wasn’t Y/N’s fault. Her parents were flabbergasted when she got home, mostly upset that they made her miss so many of her classes. Neither had any explanation but tried to offer unhelpful comforting all the same. 

When Y/N awoke the next morning, all of the fingers in her hand had gone back to normal and she regained feeling. Finally, her soulmate was finally safe. 

She spent the day coming up with ridiculous reasons as to why they had almost given her frostbite. Maybe they got locked in a freezer at an ice cream store and had to wait for the store to reopen to let them out. Maybe they live in Antarctica and they got locked out of their house in their underwear. Maybe they were trying to win a bet to see who could stay in ice water the longest. The daydreams were cut short as she was harshly awoken by a searing pain in her abdomen. 

Ms. Adamson dropped her whiteboard marker and panicked when she heard Y/N scream. It wasn’t a normal teenage girl scream either. No, this scream was filled with pure agony and distress. It echoed against the walls and vibrated the desks. It sounded as if she was getting murdered. Y/N fell to the floor and landed in a big heap. The scientist hurriedly ran towards Y/N and stopped dead in her tracks when she saw the teen’s blood pooling on the linoleum floor. It appeared she had been stabbed, by the looks of it.

Pointing at various other students to do various tasks, call an ambulance, call the office, and to go get another teacher, she took hold of Y/N’s hand. 

“It’s going to be okay,” She whispered, “You’re going to be fine. Keep your eyes open for me.”

Y/N felt very odd. Was this what dying felt like? She felt as though she was underwater; she could hear Ms. Adamson but her voice was muffled and she couldn’t make anything out. Y/N felt dizzy and sick at the same time, all she wanted to do was shut her eyes. So she did. Relief filled her as quickly as the pain. Her wound felt cold as if someone was pushing a damp cloth onto it. The pain lessened and lessened until there was none at all. 

~

Five years later she had almost forgotten about what had happened. Almost. In the years that followed the incident, severe gashes and bruises had become a normal occurrence. Her body was riddled with what seemed like battle scars, and she was almost always on edge. She had no way of knowing what was going to happen to her, nor when it was going to happen. This felt really unfair. She had been so careful for them, but they treated themself like a rag doll. 

Much to her delight, when she hit eighteen all of the injuries suddenly stopped. The last injury she had received was a dark black bruise that covered her entire side, then nothing. It had been two years and all she got were papercuts and burned tongues. 

“Take a break,” Y/N’s roommate grabs the pen out of her hand and places it on the desk. “You’ve been working on that for ages, come get coffee with me.” 

Y/N was currently in her third year at Cambridge University, working on her undergraduate biology degree. For her degree, she had to take organic chemistry and it was, in simple terms, kicking her ass. Her professor is shitty, the work was hard and Y/N was losing motivation. 

“I can’t. If I stop I’ll fail the final, then fail the class then never graduate.” Y/N mumbles, picking up her pen again and scribbling something down. 

“That’s not true, just come with me. Please?” “I said no, Y/B/F/N.”

“What if you take your books with you? A change of environment might help you study.”

Y/N leans back in her chair and looks up at her roommate. Maybe she had a point, it might do her good to get out a little bit. She packs her things and the two make their way to the coffee shop. 

The coffee shop on campus was small and always packed. The school preferred to call it “cozy,” but still, it’s small. Surprisingly, there weren’t many people inside. 

“Most people must’ve already left campus for break,” Y/B/F/N said, seemingly reading your mind. 

Only three of the tables had students sitting at them. One in the far corner had a girl who looked to be a very frustrated first year, huddled over a croissant and an English textbook. A few tables down sat four boys and one girl. Each had books open and pens in their hands, but by picking up snippets of their conversation, they were talking about whether Voldemort or Darth Vader would win in a fight. Finally, near the window, sat a boy who was staring straight at her. She recognized him from a few of her general education classes. Y/N had never talked to this boy, but he was rather cute. He was wearing a crimson sweater and ripped jeans with converse, hair messily tossed to the side. Y/N couldn’t decide whether or not he was staring at her or was in a very deep thought so she waved. No wave back. 

The two girls get their coffee and sit down a few tables away from the boy. 

“Do you know that guy?” Y/B/F/N asks, moving her head towards crimson sweater. 

“Not officially, I recognize him. Oh, what’s his name? I knew it at one point…” Y/N reaches into her bag and pulls out her books again, placing them on the table. As if it were a habit, she immediately starts studying again. She glances past her friend; the guy was still staring at that one spot. 

Time passes fast for Y/N but slow for Y/B/F/N. She tried to speak with you but ultimately gave up. So, bidding you goodbye, she left to go find her boyfriend. Y/N was kind of relieved, she can finally study in peace. The big group also left, after fighting about whether a time turner should be illegal or not, so the cafe was left with an almost eery silence. So silent that you can hear every pencil scratch, every tap of a keyboard, and every gulp of coffee. 

At some point, the boy had gotten up to get another cup of coffee and passed by Y/N. He was wearing a shit ton of cologne, so he left a scent trail wherever he went. Making his way back to his table, he tripped and spilled his coffee all over Y/N’s chemistry notes. 

“No, no, no, no, no!!!!!” Y/N screeches, wiping away the coffee with her bare hands. The drink splashes onto the boy’s pants and shoes. 

“Oh as- oh fuck, I am so sorry!” He grabs a wad of napkins and tries to blot the paper. She had worked on that study guide for hours, and now it was ruined. There was no way her professor would take it now. Thank god her laptop was still in her bag. 

Panicked, Y/N picks up her notebook and starts flipping through it. Her pen marks were bleeding together and there was no way to save them. Coffee crimson boy grimaces and picks up the notebook. 

“I don’t suppose this was an art class and you could turn it in as an abstract piece?” He says in a serious tone, though the words were highly sarcastic. Y/N lets out a single laugh. 

“I wish it were, but no. O Chem,” Coffee crimson’s face contorts even more. 

“Ouch, um, do you have it backed up anywhere?”

“Ah yes, I have my notebook backed up.” The previously broken ice was discarded and Y/N was frustrated again. 

“You should have done it on your laptop.”

“And you should watch where the fuck you’re going.” Y/N snatches the notebook from his hand. Coffee crimson notices your tone and quickly backtracks. 

“Hey, let me redo it for you then,” He glances at the textbook casually. “I’m sure I can figure it out.”

“And why should I trust you? I don’t know you and my grade is riding on this.”

“Okay, that’s fair,” His smile was warm. “I’m Edmund Pevensie, I’m in the prelaw program.” 

“Oh, perfect, a law student that’s going to attempt my organic chemistry homework. Wonder what could go wrong.” 

“I’m sure I can figure it out. Law is hard, maybe a different kind of hard, but still hard. I can do hard.” 

“Take a shot every time sweater guy says hard. I feel like I’m at a frat party.”

“I’m trying to fix my mistake here,” Now Edmund is the one that looks frustrated. “Here, take my number. I’ll text you updates and meet you back here tomorrow.” He looks at the clock. Damn, he had a gorgeous jawline. “4:32 pm. Exactly 24 hours from now.” Edmund scribbles his number onto a napkin and hands it to Y/N. As he writes, she can’t help but notice a long, jagged scar running the back of his hand. She scrunchs her eyebrows. 

~

Edmund actually kept his word. Every hour until four am that night he sent Y/N updates. Goofy pictures of him googling stupid questions or him writing. He sent a video that gave Y/N a perfect shot of the scar. Curiously, Y/N looks down at her own hand. 

The next day, his photo updates started coming again. This time they were more serious, showing the study guide. He ended up putting his own commentary in the margins; some funny some that made her think of the material differently. Y/N could really tell he was smart, even by his handwriting. 

He sent a picture to Y/N at 4:25 of the table in the coffee shop. “I’m early” was sent at the exact moment Y/N opened the door. 

“Wow, I’m impressed. I didn’t actually think you’d show.” Y/N sat opposite of him and smiled. He was wearing the same (coffee stained) jeans as yesterday and a button-up shirt. 

“I wouldn’t do all that work for nothing,” He smiled again and handed Y/N a new notebook she had never seen before. 

As she gripped the pages, the corner dug into her palm and cut her. 

“Ow!” The two said at the same time. They both had a thin cut in the middle of their palms. His large brown eyes met Y/N’s and they stared for a moment. Y/N then grabbed his hand and pushed up his sleeve to show the scar going up the back of his hand. Y/N couldn’t look away from his skin; just as she had thought, it was identical to hers. 

Meeting his gaze again, she pressed a hand to her stomach. Her hand rested right above a large, jagged scar that didn’t seem to heal quite right. His eyes followed the line of her arm.

“Edmund, I think you have a lot of explaining to do.”

[cakeandpi]

Parker!! spoilers abound

hm, so Harry (aka Lawyer) has been fired/let go and no one gave him the memo on it. Is his old job/boss going to be this episodes mark?

oof, Harry is bad at being subtle with his ‘okay look in [place]’ comm directions

ah okay so isn’t a legal firm that’s about representing their clients to the best of their ability. it’s a firm whose about smoothing bad things over for rich clients so that there’s little to no consequences.

“I remember when you wanted to change the world.”/“World did change. We just went along for the ride.” So the world changed the boss, the boss gave up on changing the world because he saw a way to profit from it and didn’t care that he hurt others along the way.

The way that car drove up onto the curve, I thought that was Sophie in a big hurry at first. (I would have thought Parker but there wasn’t enough time for her to crack the safe, get to the relevant files, get out, and then drive there.) But no, it’s Maxwell’s thugs because the man holds a grudge apparently. So I’m going to guess he’s going to be the season big bad? Or is he just a 2-episode bad guy and we’ll find out who the real big bad is later?

Hardison: listing various problems on various international efforts he’s helping with Eliot: let’s make this a restaurant metaphor Hardison: *very much regretting ever buying Eliot that brewpub*

Nuts and bolts about bad guy details

Also that bit about Hardison being distracted by problems is definitely a distraction, there’s no way he’d pause on making sure their safehouse was secure

Eliot is not so much pissed as insulted that the world is at the point of advertising the corruption rather than him needing to beat it out of someone.

drone!!

*snort* eliot's usually the grouchy one, and he’s carrying a trashcan right now. there’s no way hardison doesn’t make some oscar the grouch joke once he sees that.

“It’s like you never stopped.”/“Yeah. Quite the act.” Sophie slows down at Hardison’s comment, then sighs and sits. She’s finding this tiring now. Is it because she’s out of practice? Or because after so many years of retirement, her hearts not in it anymore? And Hardison notices. He doesn’t say anything concrete immediately, because Sophie hasn’t really elaborated on what’s going on with her. When she does - it’s her grief, and how its affecting her grift now - there’s this concern in Hardison’s face. There’s absolutely going to be a meeting between the OT3 about how to straddle not straining Sophie too much and not babying her should she stay on for another job after this.

“But I can’t work forever, can I?” There’s a defeated tone to this, and it’s true - Sophie’s just human, one day she too will pass on. Her grief for Nate (and how being back with the team keeps reopening that wound) is coloring her view on this for sure. (Did Nate work himself to death?) It’s also, very distantly, a remark on the OT3 - they too can’t work forever. They were Sophie’s and Nate’s proteges. And it’s not that the OT3 doesn’t have anything in place if they go down - they’ve got small teams running all over the world. But they don’t have their own personal proteges. Harry’s a decent start, but they’ll need to recruit and open up their circle to at least one, maybe two more before they’re ready to retire. Before they, too, burn too hot for too long.

“You hear that? That’s a very distinctive sound.” YES

Another Basil & Brick truck! This one has.... empanadas, ropa vieja, sancocho, and I think the last one is yuca frita. Mm, yuca fries.

BREANNA!!!

Parker! Taught Breanna to tail people! (Hardison in particular?) When she was 11! Wait does that mean Parker’s met Nana?! Also Parker is so smug and satisfied that Breanna paid attention to her lessons.

“I teach every kid I meet how to do crime.” <3 be gay do crime

This is a big ‘I’m telling mom!’ argument and I love it, especially the “I think she’s napping” LMAO

“How you saved Eliot’s life all those times” Oh man Hardison is sleeping on the metaphorical couch tonight. But also I need to come back to this later because honestly and really? Hardison has - as part of a group team effort - saved Eliot’s life from himself. By giving him a way to work through his anger issues, by caring for him, by showing Eliot he’s needed and that he’s more than just a hitter. The team saved Eliot’s life. (And there’s probably a bunch of erasing digital trails/etc where Hardison did more directly save Eliot’s life but that's besides the point.)

“But hacking’s kind of old school anyway.” And as she goes on, Eliot goes from aggrieved to ‘oh, a new best friend’ because now he has someone to help him annoy Hardison.

Parker pulls Hardison into a side room (by his ear, but he’s not protesting in pain so that’s got to be just for show). And then pushes him up against the wall and Hardison is like ‘okay whatever lecture is coming can it not be like this?’ If it weren’t for the glass walls that’d be some makeout stuff right here.

LOL at Parker’s standard for a ‘normal’ person being ‘uses Uber, pays taxes, and has a birth certificate’.

“Wait is this like that time in Paris?” I... don’t remember an episode set in Paris with a robot and explosions so this must be during the time skip. And - “... but you didn’t want to hurt Eliot’s feelings so you secretly wanted us to agree.” I’m going to scream if there’s no confirmed ot3 by the end of the season. And cry. And read a whole bunch of fic.

Look at these two being honest with each and communicating and respecting each others opinions, they’ve grown so much from pretzel metaphors.

“You’re not mad. You did the Picard tug.”/“I am mad.“/“Did the tug. You know I like that.” Parker might be mad (at Hardison? Breanna? Both?) but not so much that she’s completely shutting out Hardison, giving him a nonverbal signal that she’s not pissed, just needs some time to be upset before everything’s okay.

“One. Job.” Parker says. And we the viewers know it’ll be more than one. But really what that means by now is that this is an audition. Parker may have taught Breanna some things, but now Breanna has to show that they do better with her rather than without, that she’s an asset and not a liability or dead weight.

I laughed so hard that because this shit’s illegal, there’s no cutting corners on the paperwork.

“And you didn’t get tortured.”/“Not this time.” I can’t tell if Eliot wants Harry to get a little bit tortured or if he’s just reminding Harry that this time around people were in a good mood and showing off.

Breanna stops herself before suggesting something, and Hardison, for all that he isn’t delighted at her presence and protested her being here, encourages her to speak up. If she’s going to be part of the team, even for one job, she’s part of the team and that means speaking up and throwing ideas out there for others to bounce around, even if it winds up being a football that can’t be dribbled.

OT3 TEAM JUST GOT DUBBED ‘DRILL TEAM’. (why is that also somehow a dirty joke i’m dying here)

Oh one of the baddies is a Com4r4t fan... oh wait no this is the beginning of a plan backfiring.

Aww Breanna is so proud of what she’s done! It’s very much like season 1 Hardison. So Sophie and Hardison go to do their own thing, only that means the baddies are here to talk to Breanna and she doesn’t have backup.

THE 'LET ME GET MY BOSS’ THE SPIN AROUND AND THE ‘WHY ARE YOU BOTHERING MY STAFF’ I LOVE BREANNA.

“I’m your neighbor who runs a business built on discretion.” This is going to go very badly depending on how Breanna plays this. At least she gets the earbud in to call for help!

Another Brick&Basil truck! Etoufee and jambalaya, dammit eliot stop choosing delicious food to advertise. 

“I monkey-shamed the DJ” I. Love. Her. Also Sophie’s already read Breanna as having the skills to just need general guidelines for an impromptu grift rather than needing to be fed specific lines.

“Okay here’s the thing.” And there’s a pause, we’re thinking he’s about to come down real hard on Breanna, and then we get “I love Com4r4t.” he is a fanboy I guessed it right!! And then he does go through with the threat, but not as a ‘cancel it or die’ sort of threat, but a ‘if i’m disappointed you die’ way.

Breanna nails the impromptu grift though she’s understandably a bit shaken by the threat at the end. (What newcomer wouldn’t be?) But the threat is what pushes Parker into deciding Breanna should go home ASAP. This is Hardison’s family, from before the team, and Parker isn’t about to risk messing that up. If she pushes for Breanna to stay when Hardison doesn’t want Breanna to, and something goes wrong? Parker would never, ever forgive herself.

But as Sophie has pointed out, they’ve all been out of their depth at one point or another. That doesn’t mean that someone should be sent packing.

Lmao Eliot being possessive of the drill.

“Then you ain’t got no more problems ever again.” There’s a certain sense of morbid humor with the team, one that’s both necessary but also a reality. They deal with this level of danger on a semi-regular basis. Harry just hasn’t caught up to that fact yet.

I have a feeling this particular baddie is going to end up dead for managing to drive a 40% cut.

“I’m just saying dude.” I love that Eliot and Hardison don’t have to rehash their entire arguments anymore unless they’re really enjoying themselves, that they can just be all ‘you know I’ve said my piece’.

“Don’t get distracted by the side gig.”/“Is it a side gig?” For all that the team has been their main focus for so long, for all that they all have side projects and gigs, this has been eating up more and more of Hardison’s time. What I thought was him pretending to be distracted earlier may have been a real distraction. And Eliot’s noticed, and he’s noticed that Hardison hasn’t noticed, that Hardison needs to make a choice here.

“In our line of work, you’re one of the best. But in that line of work you’re the only one, man.” Eliot has a soft smile at the end of that, and it's a bit painful, even as I saw it coming, to hear Eliot suggest that Hardison begin to step away from the team’s day to day.

“It’s okay to grow up, to realize you’re not the person you used to be.” None of them are the person they used to be. Not Sophie, not Parker, not Hardison, and certainly not Eliot. They can see that in each other if not in themselves. (Eliot, being the most grounded of all of them, already knew he’d changed eight years ago.)

“You never grew up.”/“Yeah. I achieved perfection pretty early, huh?” Even as Eliot’s the most grounded, even though he’s the one saying that there’s no one else that could fill Hardison’s role in that other work, the idea that Hardison might actually choose to step away from the team is too raw to handle without turning to humor.

Harry’s a bit jumpy, but he’s learning to play it off. I like that he’s a very different character from Nate, that it’s not his anger or ego driving him so much as a desire to make restitution.

And a “Dammit Hardison”

Ooh, Eliot’s in the vents too, just in time to help Parker. (She doubtless has her beloved taser but that would take time away from getting into the vault.)

“I smell lasers” Ahahahahaha

“You’re going to compare me to Eliot right now?” (’over the comms, where others who aren’t Eliot can hear?’ Hardison did not say out loud.)

ouch, okay, Hardison hurting his back like that might be what actually makes him choose the other gig over the team, or at what makes him take a little vacation so he can heal from that. (back injuries are nothing to play around with!)

how did Maxwell get past Eliot? but it’s all good, Eliot’s right behind to disarm him. And Parker’s been doing her hitting lessons, she didn’t even need a taser or to stab anyone!

Oh Harry, the bomb will be used, it’s just not time yet.

New Orleans gumbo is its own food group.

Okay so Hardison’s done a lot of work getting this place in order... WAIT IS THAT A PUNCHING BAG? That’s a punching bag! It might not be the love-letter the brewpub was but it’s definitely a thing added specifically for Eliot.

Oh no, Eliot might realize what Hardison’s doing with this, but Parker hasn’t caught up yet that Hardison’s going to be taking a break from the team.

Parker’s blindsided by this, and she’s upset, but she’s not mad because why didn’t she see this coming she should have seen it, so she leaves to deal with her emotions alone. Hardison follows, naturally, she knew he would, but she can’t face him because then he’ll see her crying, and Parker doesn’t do emotions easily. She’s torn between wanting him to help people and wanting to be with him (and she can’t go with him, she needs to be helping people too).

And Parker doesn’t want Breanna there without Hardison. Again because it’d put Hardison’s family in danger and that’s a step too far for Parker if Hardison doesn’t okay it. And also because with Hardison leaving, Breanna’s just going to be reminders of what Parker’s missing. And Breanna doesn’t have Hardison’s skillset, can’t fill his shoes - not that she should but she can’t, and Parker, I think, is already mentally preparing herself to go it alone again. Because if this job needs Hardison so bad, then surely Eliot’s got some project that needs his specific attention, and it was just one job for Breanna, and Sophie’s been adamant that this is one last job for her, and Harry’s still new and will probably decide to do his own thing given time to think... I think that’s where her brain is at, at least for the next thirty seconds, before she catches up with herself and realizes that more like the time she busted her leg than the team dissolving around her. (This kind of went weird places but that’s stream of thought for me)

And as they come back in Parker’s already cheering up some, because that wave of despair has already blown over. Yeah, she’s not a parent, but she’s good at teaching when she tries.

“It could be a reunion tour.”/“No. I’m retired.” It’s very different from Nate’s old protestations. He was not a thief. Whereas with Sophie it’s not ready. And while they all point out that she’s been happier while doing cons, that they could use the help, it’s not forceful or overpowering. It’s still Sophie’s decision. They’re not going to make her house their new base and taunt her with it; they’re not the sort of people who’d do that anymore, and anyway that’d be cruel instead of a fun sort of goading.

And because they give Sophie space to make a decision, while she doesn’t want to make a long-term commitment, she’s willing to take on ‘just a few more’.

[damienxsheppard]

We’re All Monsters Here Pt. 2

Timing: Present

Location: White Crest, the Outskirts

Summary: Damien faces a choice, and makes a sacrifice.

Content: Gun use (briefly mentioned), Self Harm (stab wound)

Damien had an arsenal packed into his trunk, various weapons brought from New York and hidden into every compartment in his life. Fingers wrapped around the gun as he carried it forward, the safety off. It was his least favorite weapon but he’d been watching the house long enough to know three men were behind its door and he needed something to even the odds. At the time of his approach one thug had slipped out and he wagered from his observation over the past days that he’d be gone for an hour or two before returning with a bag filled with illegal artifacts. He’d deal with him later.

The door of the house was faded and cracked from years of disregard and it held no chance of holding true as Damien kicked where the lock was mounted. With a protest of splinters he was in the entryway, two men lounging on sofas were pulled from their relaxed states into alarm. The man closest to the door turned to Damien and his face was ruined by a bullet. He was gone before he hit the ground.

The second man was one Damien recognized, the man from the alley. He lunged forward and sized the wrist holding the gun, a fist slamming into Damien’s gut. Damien let the handgun go to pick up his favorite weapon. Knuckles crashed into the man’s face, the hand snared turned to trap his opponent now, anchoring him close as another round of blows were delivered to the man’s chest and stomach. The thug pulled a knife free from somewhere hidden but Damien disarmed him with a sharp stab of his elbow.

Every hit Damien landed received a reply, pain flourished across his body, the skin on his hands breaking from the force of the punches. All sensations were secondary however, to the emotions that ravaged his mind. He couldn’t even begin to care about the damage done to his body in pursuit of revenge supported by adrenaline. In hand-to-hand combat Damien clearly held the advantage, his attacks were ruthless and persistent, supplying him with grim satisfaction for every fracture created, every drop of blood beaten to the surface. Then his opponent changed the dynamics of the fight.

Long fingers cracked and grew into claws, the thug leaning into the nature that Damien adamantly avoided as he shifted partially. He tore into Damien’s defenses, nails locking into skin and ripping through muscle. Blood burst from fresh wounds carved into his chest, marks were cleaved into his arms and his vision became impaired as blood from a gash on his brow leaked down his face. Weakened, bleeding heavily, an inhuman blow brought Damien to the ground. He landed in a pool of blood spilled from the man he’d shot earlier, propping himself up on his hands and knees.

The thug laughed as he walked around Damien, his voice was light with victory and laced with violence, “I remember you now, from that bird gang in the city. The one with the crows?” He picked up the gun Damien had dropped before.

Damien looked in the dark remains of the deceased thug, he found eyes lit with fire staring back at him, dark fur stained red, the wolf in him mirrored in the blood. No—he thought—please, let me do this. He wanted to remain himself in the battle, he wanted to be the same man that fought with his family in the city. Not the creature that destroyed them. Lips pulled back to reveal teeth, sharp and savage. Damien felt a growl vibrate along his spine. A low voice echoed inside him, a tone he’d never allowed himself to speak in, it was a feral and vicious sound as it twisted throughout his veins—you will die then.

It was true. He could either die human, or live as a monster.

“I remember how your friends cried as we ripped through them. Your gang made great practice for the new recruits, the boss was pleased.” He wasn’t even the fucking leader. The wolf in him snapped its jaws furiously at the remark. He hated the truth being revealed, his gang—his family, died for practice. Damien struggled with the beast in him, he didn’t know how to release it, he’d spent so much time chaining it down he didn’t know how to undo the lock he’d made. He could remember only one thing that had broken his resolve before. As the man strode forward Damien grabbed the knife. 

It was time to cut ties.

The thug stood over him, the gun aimed at his head, “you’ll be joining them now.” He wanted to. He wanted to be with them so much it hurt. The man pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. Damien had come in here with only one bullet in the chamber. He never intended to use the gun throughout the fight.

Unknown to Damien, there was only one berserker in the pack he’d encountered, the muscle of the group. The gang hadn’t known anyone to survive them yet, till now. As the man was managing his confusion, piecing together what he was seeing, Damien brought the knife up, causing him to lean back instinctively to avoid it. But he was not the target. Damien turned the edge on himself, driving the blade into his stomach. The blade sunk deep into flesh, his skin burning where he pulled it free. The wolf unfurled around the wound, its bindings severed. Its influence spread like a wildfire across his body, setting ablaze every tendon, catching on every nerve. It would not be long till the wolf was free.

Damien lunged forward as his hands snapped and shifted, he drove the blade into the man’s knee and crippled him to the ground. In an untamed frenzy he clawed a hole into his chest, he was not just hungry for vengeance anymore, but blood. He latched onto the bones that were revealed through tattered shreds of skin, broke and bent his way through them as his own splintered and changed. It was the wolf that trapped the man’s heart in its jaws, it was Damien that ate the organ whole. As the third thug returned he suffered the same fate as the last, there was no hiding anymore.

When Damien awoke in his skin once more he was made to realize his sacrifice had gifted him the memory of the carnage. Although he had no control of the feral wolf, unlike before, he hadn’t blacked out during the time he was inhuman. The gang had been ripped to pieces and left exactly like his own for the leader to find. Damien would have happily given his life to save his family, and now, he would willingly sacrifice his humanity to avenge them. All he had to do now was wait for the others to come.

[hopeswriting]

Modern AU (Adult!)Arcobaleno on socials media though. While Flames and mafia are definitely still a thing.

Now I’m by no means well acquainted to all the different popular socials media, but here’s my humble take:

Reborn on Instagram.

He only has pictures of Leon first and foremost, with him in the background in one of his ridiculous but very well-made cosplay. Leon of course also wears the same cosplay as him.

He never shows his full face in any of the pictures, but just enough his followers know he’s handsome as fuck.

The artists/photoshoppers among them regularly put the pieces together to see how he could look like, but in a funny-and-obviously-purposefully-wrong way only.

Reborn loves them and saves them all.

------

Once in a blue moon he does post a picture of himself where you can see him clearly all dressed up and fancy, and then immediately deletes it.

But only after he’s sure it has been seen, so he can watch his followers lose their shit while drinking a nice espresso.

They try hard, but so far none of them managed to save any of the pictures before he deletes them.

------

Often there’s what suspiciously looks like blood stains on their clothes and straight up dead bodies lying in the background, but Reborn went so passive-aggressive with the few who dared to ask, everyone is too afraid to ask now.

Anyone who badmouths Leon in any way is instantly blocked. But only after Reborn ripped them a new one AND let his followers do it too.

*

Skull on Twitter and Snapchat.

He tweets the most random, out of nowhere, highly worrying things, that always sent his followers in a frenzy trying to figure out why the fuck he would think of any of this in the first place??

“aren’t you ever tried of your solid, rigid, restrictive bones? don’t you want to just be Luffy from One Piece, a rubber being that can shape themself in whatever way they wish?”

or:

“nobody ever tells you this, but the stress of picking apart melted leather from your burnt skin before it heals is VERY worth the adrenaline of making fire your BITCH”

or:

“is it REALLY illegal if you break in and eat the food but leave money behind??”

------

That’s just his Twitter only followers though.

The ones on Snapchat have the privilege to watch him stumble head first step by step to his tweets, and are actually very involved and active spectators that keep him out of jail, or killing himself, or killing someone else.

Skull, recording a video, halfway stuck in between two buildings: What’s up guys, there're these guys following me and trying to kill me, quick tell me what bones to break so I can fit in there.

see also:

Skull, riding his bike, both of them suspiciously wet, holding a lighter in his hand: You guys ready for this sick fire stunt I came up with?? If everything goes well I should only get second to third degree burns, let’s do this!!!

see also:

A picture of Skull lying on a roof, his arms full of snacks and his mouth stuffed with food, with police cars in the background, that says: send tips to make sure there’s always food in your fridge for when you need it the most. #midnightsnack #snitchesgetstitches #justsaying

see also:

A picture of Skull crouched in front of a body, posing, that says: don’t worry guys we’re just faking, but hypothetically, if you were to hide a body as quick as possible from here without being seen, what would you do? #hypotheticallyseriousanswersonly #hypotheticallythecopsaremaybeontheirway #quickanswersappreciated

*

Verde on Facebook.

He creates a public group with only him as member that’s basically his scientific diary.

It’s not really to invite intellectual challenging debates (though he’d be all for it if someone smart enough showed up), but he figures it’s in his best interest to make the world a less dumb place if he can.

It finds his public, though there’s only a few comments because god forbid you say something dumb or inaccurate and Verde fucking annihilates you in the comment section.

But like, in a teacher way. Like he’s genuinely trying to make you know better but he’s just ruthless at it lmao.

Verde uses a fake name and a fake everything so there’s quickly a running joke along the lines of “Imagine if it’s really the genius scientist Verde running the group and you just outed yourself as a flat earther lol”.

------

But what gets the group really popular is the in depth flames theory involving weather of all things they have to assume he came up with it all on his own because they can’t figure out to save their lives what the hell he’s talking about?

And it makes them question their sanity sometimes because Verde talks about it like it’s the most obvious thing and in the context of just about every basic aspects of life.

Cue the conspirators and their hot new take of “the aliens were among us all along and hid themselves as the WEATHER!!!” that instantly turns into the new popular meme.

That, and the transcripts posts of Verde trying his theories that nine out of ten apparently involves very unwilling participants whose life are threatened and sometimes they straight up DIE???

------

They think both of these is just him fucking with them and it’s all fictional. They want to think it is anyway.

They’re not so sure, but everyone is too afraid to ask.

*

Colonnello on Snapchat.

70% of his content is about Lal because this man is so in love and it’s like he’s a guest on his own account lol.

There’s the “Pining Hard” content where it’s just him trying to seduce Lal, to romance her and asking her out, and Lal brushing all of it off more often than not.

His followers are very invested in this “old bickering married couple type of best friends in oblivious mutual pining” real live action slow burn fic, and cheers him hard whenever Lal reciprocates the tiniest bit.

------

They don’t know the two are already together.

They think Lal brushing him off or flirting back but in an unmistakably joking/”platonic” way is just her being oblivious and not taking Colonnello seriously.

When she would just rather flirt back off camera because it’s her private life thank you very much.

Colonnello never tells them because he assumes they all know and just choose to be in on the joke.

Lal finds it hilarious whenever she goes through his Snapchat (with his permission of course) to find numerous messages of encouragement, so she never says either.

------

But one day she kind of just steals a kiss from him while he’s recording because she wanted to, and his followers lose their shit.

Lal laughs herself to tears and laughs for days.

------

The other Lal’s related content is the “Lal’s loving hours”, where he just takes pictures of her/records her doing random shit---whether it's her making a disaster out of the kitchen, or wearing three pairs of socks because her feet are cold, or beating the shit out of someone---and him doing heart eyes at the camera.

------

Otherwise it’s just him living his life and letting them in on what happens.

There’s a lot of pictures because he’s handsome and he knows it and he likes the compliments aqsdfghj.

Or videos of him going on and on about how energy drinks are really the best drink ever while doing grocery.

Or ranting videos about how bullets wounds are such a pain to deal with and showing himself patching himself up to show how it’s done (thanks??!!??).

Or him watching series and roasting the characters for their dumb decisions.

Or him commenting in real time an assassination attempt on him in the middle of the night in his own fucking home because the fucker sure is ballsy (????!!!!!!???).

It’s very popular too because of how relatable it is.

Well, most of the time anyway.

*

Viper on Youtube.

They have a DIY type of channel, mostly about fashion---what they think about the new products/clothes they bought from their favorite brand, their thoughts on the new fashion trend, their makeup/skin care routine and favorite outfits for various circumstances, or they’re often on live while going shopping.

(I just really like Fashionista!Viper okay.)

They play videos games too, thinking they’re being very good while being very average to not say they straight up suck asdfghj.

Occasionally do reaction videos too.

------

Like Reborn they hardly ever show their face. Actually they don’t show it at all lol. They wear masks to do their videos because a hood is not very reliable.

How do they do their makeup videos then you ask?

They use "volunteer" as models of course.

And by volunteers I mean the Varia qsdftgyhjkl.

------

They also have another very peculiar brand of videos that is the most popular one on their channel. The titles of these videos include but are not limited to:

“A Due Payment Of Yours Is Late? How To Hunt Them For Sport”

“A Little Bitch Doesn’t Respect Your Pronouns/Chosen Name? Step By Step On How To Make Them Shut The Fuck Up Forever”

“How To Efficiently Remove Blood And Various Others Human Residue From Your Clothes”

“Faking Your Death And Taking On A New Identity: Step By Step Tutorial”

“How To Take Over Your Friends Brains And Watch Them Prank Themselves ft. The Varia”

*

Fon on Tumblr.

His blog becomes known as a shitpost blog or a blog run by a bot when really, everything he posts is about actual, very real events that happened in his life.

Except he vague posts every time because he really wants to keep his anonymity.

He posts about the hardships of learning more and more martial arts and staying at the top of the art, and sounds like some dangerous psychopath.

“The body is such a fragile thing, isn’t it? It tends to break quite easily unfortunately. You’d think I’d know that by then, but I really need to remember it more often so I can keep enjoying myself.”

He’s talking about how he always pushes himself too much in training and ends up injuring himself.

“Everyday I dispose of them and reasserts my superiority, and everyday they come back and it’s really hard to not hurt them beyond repair.”

He’s talking about how he’s often challenged by other martial artists who don’t like him being the best and how he always has to beat them up bloody for them to give up.

He also posts about his family's live except it’s the Hibari’s family live, and he doesn’t sound more sane of mind at all.

“I made the mistake of taking Kyo with me on my grocery trip and picked on his tell-tale signs of going through a bad day too late.

But fortunately the shop is still standing and no one was heavily injured.”

or:

“It’s so heartwarming to see Kyo make friends. The brown haired kid didn’t put much of a fight but the one with the pineapple haircut has potential.

He almost managed to stab him that one time, and I can’t wait to tease Kyo about it. He’s very cute when annoyed and embarrassed.”

or:

“Often I look back to the day Kyo got his tonfa and I am always infinitely grateful for this not-so-easy-to-kill-with weapon.

I would like for him to at least finish high school first.”

Yeah it’s very often about Kyoya lmao. And no one knows for sure what in the world a “Kyo” is supposed to be???

An actual human being is NOT the most popular theory qsdfghn.

*

Lal on TikTok.

I guess?? I’m kind of running out of ideas lol, and I know very little about TikTok.

But I’m thinking she makes a series of videos where she looks straight into the camera like she’s on The Office while some bullshit or the other happens in the background.

And it’s not even always her friends or coworkers or Colonnello (yeah he has a category of his own lmao).

As far as she is concerned everyone who chooses to be a fucking dumbass in her vicinity is asking for it aqsdfghj.

------

Also has a “Doing paperwork” series, and the later at night she’s doing it, the more she’s absolutely fucking done with people not being able to do their job properly without collateral damage.

She dryly reads out loud the highlights of the reports and goes straight for their lives lol.

But as funny as it is, everyone is more interested in the very questionable out of context content of these reports???

------

Also does workout videos, as in she demonstrates how to do this one or other exercise, and if these do particularly well it has nothing to do with how people want to look respectfully at her body, of course not.

ALSO has a “Colonnello’s Loving Hours” series because you better believe this woman is also so much in love.

She records him when he’s simply existing---whether he’s snuggling besides her while they’re watching TV, or dancing in the kitchen while cooking, or cleaning his guns---while looking at the camera with this tender, content expression on her face.

*

They become known as the Weather Lovers because boy, do these people like to go on about their favorite weather. Some shipping might even be involved??

It’s how their community introduces them to each other.

Cue even more chaos on their respective socials medias.

Viper’s video of their first meeting is the most popular one on their channel.

*

Yeah I know, I didn’t add the Sky Arco ladies, but I have no idea what they could do. Pinterest maybe? Or Vine? Dunno, they’re all yours guys lol.

[vegetacide]

TaG: Bloodlines (Part 5)

Veg • notables: Any errors in this are strictly my own

Ty to @gumnut-logic and @scribbles97 for the brainstorming help and the encouragement.

Previous: Part 1 | Part 2 Bit 1 & Bit 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

Rating and General warning: Mature content head. If you are not a fan of medical issues of a female nature in relation to pregnancy please proceed with caution.

Characters: Virgil, Kayo, (V/K)…

Location: TaG-verse AU | Auckland Gen.

E N J O Y

8-8-8

Part 5 - Kesan

The room grew incredibly and uncomfortable quiet as soon as the Doctor left and Kayo idly fingered the gold band that encircled her ring finger.

Of all the things she could have done and had done; keeping things from Virgil was one that she hadn’t actively participated in since becoming a couple. Total transparency had been one of the fundamental elements of their relationship.

Sure they sometimes kept things to themselves for a bit until they could process but they always went to each other to discuss whatever was bothering them. And here she was going against one of the main tenants they’d built their whole life together on. All due to fear of worrying him unnecessarily.

She’d fallen back on old habits that she’d sworn she wouldn’t ever resort to again. Holding stuff back from her family had only resulted in unnecessary pain and mistrust. Though none of the brothers would admit that trust had been lost, she knew there had been some that had slipped out of her reach.

Looking at the heavy boots of her lover and confidant Kayo couldn’t figure out where to start to repair the damage she had done. Probably leading with an apology would be the best bet but she wasn’t sure if Virgil was ready to hear her.

She forced her mouth to move and head to rise. She was a Kyrano, damn it and she would face this mess head on just like she’d be taught all those years ago.

“Virgil…”

He held a hand up and stepped up to her side, taking her elbow to help her to her feet. “I don’t want to discuss it right now. We need to get you home and in bed before our security detail has kittens. We’ve been here long enough.”

God, that hurt.

Getting her feet under her, she leaned into her husband and pushed to her feet. Wobbling a bit as the room fogged out a bit around the edges.

Virgil sighed, steadied her and in an easy movement of one used to carting people’s broken bodies around he scooped her up into his arms as if she weighed no more than a feather.

Kayo, thanked him and he shrugged it off as he stepped through the door to the ensuite bathroom and set her down on the toilet.

“Do you want me to stay or…?” He asked, looking around the small space and poking at the shower controls.

Kayo contemplated her options but she really didn’t want to be alone with her thoughts right now. As much as it pained her to have to see the hurt shadowing her husband’s eyes she didn’t trust herself to be able to keep her feet firmly under her.

“Stay...please.”

Virgil gave a curt nod and rolled up his sleeves, the corded muscles of his forearms flexing as he folded the fabric out of the way. “Shower?” He questioned, bobbing his head in the direction of the open faced enclosure.

“Please.”

He turned his broad back and started to fiddle with the controls. Adjusting the temperature and pressure settings until he was satisfied.

Kayo took a moment to look around the tiled space. It was tastefully decorated but completely functional. A full length mirror took up one wall to help dispel any claustrophobia. The colours were all warm toned and pleasing patterns. The lines; all clean and easy to maintain but with an air of elegance.

There was a charming framed print just inside the door out of the way of any of the mandatory grab bars and emergency assistance buttons. Though as she inspected it she wasn’t so sure it was a print…

Basically the place was designed to comfort those that could afford it with no expense spared. The tile flooring beneath her bare feet was even heated and it spoke to how adequately financed the hospital was.

Probably helped that Tracy Industries had made various large donations over the years… not that the general public knew that.

Wishing to break the uncomfortable silence, she pointed to the painting. “Is that real?”

Virgil stole a quick look at it before pursing his lips and nonchalantly shrugging. “Yes, though not one of that artist’s better known work or best for that matter.”

Reaching over her head, he plucked a towel off a wooden linen shelf and set it on the counter before taking her arm and guiding her back to her feet.

“All set. You read to go?”

She indicated that she was and Virgil pulled the ties of her johnny loose and slipped it from her arms.

“Do you need the …?”He indicated the toilet and she shook her head.

“I’m fine, I just want to clean up and get out of here.”

Kneeling down he made quick work of her undergarments, throwing away anything that needed disposing off quickly and efficiently. His own medical training and detachment to what he saw taking firm hold over his emotions.

“I second that notion..” He mumbled leading her over to shower. He eyed the stall a moment, seemed to decide something and shucked his own clothing to step in behind her.

“One can never be too clean.” He commented off handedly, bracing her with his strong hands on her slender hips.

The water was just the right temperature and she couldn’t resist moaning as it hit her skin. Warm water cascaded down and washed away the evidence of the day, circled around her feet and down the drain and she tried to watch it in a detached way.

Feeling her resolve to keep it together starting to shatter she reached for the soap but Virgil beat her too it. Taking the bar between his hands he lathered it up and started the process of cleaning her. He was meticulous, soaping up every inch of her from her toes to her thighs and back down again.

There was nothing sexual to it, just caring determination that she had a hard time processing considering the wound she had inflicted.

Looking anywhere but at her husband and she tried to contain herself but it was a losing battle and she didn’t think she had the energy reserves to keep up the front.

Virgil pressing up against her back and kissing the crown of her head was her undoing. It was as if he had sensed her teetering and he knew exactly what she needed.

The unwanted tears she’d been holding back finally escaped down her cheeks and she sagged against him, his arms encircling her waist and pulling her close.

“I’m so sorry.” She whimpered and he held on tight while she cried into the shower.

An incoming message pinged as a chipped cup was raised to thin lips.

Eyes of an unnatural chartreuse, flashed a malcontent yellow. Bionics rings that lined one iris glowing dangerously bright as a flare of anger sparked to life.

Narrow lips pulled back in a snarl of disgust and his cup was sent sailing. Blistering tea splashing in a blood like spray across a stained wall and dripping on to the floor to mix with putrid waste that littered the illegal café.

The burned out grunt manning the counter bulked in retaliation at the adverse display of destruction. Stepping around the counter with the intent of confronting the offender.

Malice filled eyes turned to him and all thoughts of bravery fled. The narcotics devotee just barely this side of sober latching onto his instinctual response of self preservation that the evil before him threatened.

Like the cockroach he was, scabby skinned and oily he scampered away, hands up in a weak display of surrender. Slinking back behind his offensive counter; a feeble block of dry rot and duct tape placed between him and the cloud of disrepute that encompassed the back corner of the store.

Snarling teeth ground and gnashed in hatred and the long, clean agile fingers that protruded from tatted fingerless gloves threw up a dark web portal beside the offending information.

Orders sent were blunt; concise and decidedly wicked. A plan was forming and the evil snarl turned up into an unholy grin. More information would be needed. It was always needed but the source this time could be one of his own making and his pawns would fall into place.

After many years of trying, a solution and an end appeared to finally be within sight.

The light of the console before him flickered and changed as coded responses started to scroll by. Looking up across the so-called establishment to the waste of skin and bone shivering behind the counter, he pushed from his station and stood...

8-8-8

TBC

NEXT

[soyeahitsmiddleearth]

Back Off

Bard x Reader

I would love a protective/slightly jealous bard, angsty romance style. Probably SFW, but suggestive behavior is fine if it fits the story. Thank you~

Growing up, things were not the easiest. 

Though many have it much worse given the state of this little town on the water. 

There is poverty everywhere, hungry children with raggedy clothes, and food shortages constantly, but no matter how the people plead and weep, the master of this town does nothing. He cares more for his gold and brandy than any person or animal, his only motivation being the chance to make more money and bleed the people dry of everything they have so he may support his over the top, extravagant lifestyle. 

To say you were riddled by hardships would be an overstatement, but growing up with a young seamstress mother and no father left you hungry most nights and scrounging for loose coins on the boardwalks some days. She was only 19 when she had you, after all. 

There are many a children like you, though, and you use this fact to keep you from becoming a martyr. 

As you grew older and your mother more frail and sickly, you began to take over her seamstress duties and run her little business so she could rest more and try and regain some of her strength. 

Only, she never did get stronger. Her health continued to decline, and at the age of 54 she passed in her sleep.

Those were very hard times for you, and for a while you began to wonder if it was even worth it to go on when you knew nothing was waiting for you in the future anyways. 

Change can come in many different forms, and the change for you came in the shape of a tall bargeman awkwardly trying to find a dress for his oldest daughters birthday (she was turning 14, and is now 16). 

You remember that day quite fondly (and very vividly). The way he hesitantly entered your home-ran store, and looked around until his eyes fell upon you. 

You'd seen him around before, sometimes in the barge waters and other times in the market. You also knew his name, for the people of Laketown (especially the women) speak very highly of him for being 'a man of the people.' 

One cheerful greeting and unsure explanation later, the two of you were looking at your fabrics and pre-made garments. He didn't seem to have a clue of what to get her, so you did your best to help him and asked simple questions about her measurements and all of that. 

All he could do is show with his hands approximately how big she was, and at the time it made you laugh. Eventually you just told him to send her over later on and you'd collect your measurements for free.

When you said 'free' he seemed surprised and was very reluctant and stated that it wasn't a good idea, but you only smiled and said rather flirtatiously, "I can give discounts to handsome men if I so desire." 

That certainly shut up his denial of your assistance. 

After that day, he began to come to your home-shop more often. Sometimes to pay you to mend his clothes, sometimes to buy things for his daughters and son, and others just to chat idly and see how you're doing. Around that time you began to give him your extra scraps of fabric for free, and it served to make his youngest daughter, Tilda, ecstatic every time. 

Bard gave your shop very high praise to his friends and people he sees on a daily, and suddenly you found that you've got much more business than you had before. 

You thanked him with a dark blue long-coat, lined in some part on the inside in fleece. You didn't have much fleece, but you really wanted to make him this gift. 

When you first tried to give it to him, he refused to take it saying that it was much too nice and you could fetch a pretty price for it if you sold it instead, but you only dropped it off at his home later and told Sigrid to give it to him for you. 

He came back the very next day wearing it, a bit sheepish and there to thank you instead of give it back like you thought he would. 

Suffice to say, your history with Bard is not the longest nor does it go back very far, but it's still the deepest and most important one you've got. 

Anyways, you'd never taken Bard for the jealous type, and for the most part you were right about that assumption... for the most part. 

You get all sorts of people in your shop at various times during the day. Usually they buy something or look around and promise to come by when they've gotten paid, but sometimes you'll get a 'suitor' that waltzes in, confident that you'll say yes to his sudden proposal. 

When you tell Bard of these occurrences he usually just laughs and asks what you said, though he does seem a bit frustrated when you recount the more... forward men that wander into your shop. 

And it seems that you'll have another story to tell him when he comes by later, because suddenly a man you haven't seen in your shop before comes sauntering in. From the armor he wears and emblem of the town, you realize that he's just another pet of The Master. 

Regardless of your disdain for his type, you put on a pleasant smile and ask, "Hello sir. What can I do you for?" 

He looks over at you with fake surprise on his face, acting like he's only just noticed you, and bows politely, "Miss Y/N, a pleasure." 

"Do I know you?" You ask slowly, wondering how he even knows your name in the first place. 

The man shakes his head no, "No, but I know of you. My name is Elton, my lady." 

Oh gosh, another one of these. 

"Well, alright. To what do I own the pleasure of your appearance here, Elton?" You say it with a fake coyness, really all you want is his money, and give him a small smile. 

It seems that he think's he's won you over at the smugness that replaces his kind smile, "I came to inquire on if you'd like to accompany me to a party The Master is throwing in his halls tonight." 

Haha, yeah, no.

You keep the kind smile on your face and deny just as sweetly, "No, I'm sorry but I'm going to be busy for the rest of the night." 

His confident grin drops when you say no, "What?" It sounds like he's shocked that you're denying him. 

"Um, I said I cannot... Was I not clear?" You remain calm and keep your facial expression pleasant. 

"No...?" He asks slowly, his voice turning a bit angry. 

You take a step back and glance around your front room briefly, suddenly not feeling very proud of yourself. 

He takes a step forward when you step back, and now you're wishing you had just said yes and sent him on his way.

"Why would you say no? I can give you everything you could ever want, why would you say no?" He sounds mad, and as much as you would like to leave this situation, you're in your home so you can't just walk out. 

"I-I said I can't, n-not that I don't want to..." You don't want to, in fact, but you're beginning to worry for your safety. He has power, and no one would blink and eye if he were to do something unsavory. 

"And why can't you? It sounds like you're making excuses." Hell hath no fury like a man with his ego wounded. 

You're at a loss for words, so you just stand there like a deer caught in headlights and don't say anything at all. 

He reaches up and grabs your shoulders suddenly, causing you to flinch, and he demands again, "Tell me!" 

The sound of the door opening gathers both of your attentions, and you're relieved to see Bard standing there. 

His expression is one of surprise, and everything is still as he examines the scene before him. When he takes in your frightened state, the imposing figure of Elton looming over you, and his hands on you, his countenance shifts to one of anger. 

"B-Bard!" You cry, a bit more alarmed sounding than you meant to be.

He steps in and slams the door behind him, demanding harshly, "What are you doing? Take your hands off of her." He doesn't yell, but he doesn't need to, to sound scary. 

Elton digs his fingers into your shoulders a bit harder, making you wince, and asks, "Or what?" 

Yeah, he probably shouldn't test him. 

"I won't tell you twice." 

His voice is dark and if it were aimed at you, you probably would've started crying. 

Elton slowly lets his arms fall back to his sides and turns toward Bard, then glances back at you and 'tsks', "Such a waste." He then brushes past Bard and slams the door on his way out. 

As soon as he's gone you slump back against the wall and press your hands against your face, just taking a moment to breathe and calm your rapidly beating heart. 

"Are you aright?" You hear Bard ask from just in front of you, his voice soft and concerned.

When he got there, you aren't sure, but you don't reply to him right away with fear that your voice may break. 

He reaches up and takes your hands in his gently, pulling them down to rest in his between the two of you. "Y/N?" 

You look up at him slowly and give him a shaky smile, "S-Sorry, I'm just a bit shaken. I though he was gonna hurt me." Your smile drops and you look back down at your feet, feeling a bit embarrassed. 

"You know I won't let that happen." He releases your hands and instead pulls you into a hug, resting his chin on the top of your head as he tries to help you relax a bit, "Bastard was lucky you were right there, I would've-" 

You wrap your arms around his middle and he pauses, letting his hand rub along the expanse of your back, "Sorry..." He whispers, realizing you probably don't want to hear about the illegal acts he would've most definitely committed against him. 

Bard sighs and slowly unwraps his arms from around you, "He might come back." He states suddenly, glancing back towards the door, "At a time when he knows I'm not here like everyone else does." He says 'everyone else' bitterly, no doubt referring to the other suitors who like to visit during the day when they know he's busy working. "Maybe I should have Sigrid and Tilda join you throughout the day... they could keep you company and call for help if he comes back." 

Gosh you love his girls, so having them around more often would be pretty nice. "Yeah, I would like that..." Having him here with you has successfully made you a lot less frazzle.

"Everyone else?" You question after a moment, though you already know who he's referring to.

"Oh don't play coy, those buzzards who swoop in the moment I leave to vie for your attention." He reaches up and rubs your cheek with his knuckles, "They just want what isn't theirs," he states, adding at the end, "Not that you belong to me, of course." 

You giggle quietly at his back-tracking, standing up on your toes so you don't have to look up at him quite so much, "If I didn't know any better, I'd think you're being  jealous." You say teasingly, moving your arms to wrap around the back of his neck. 

His hands fall to your waist and he pulls you up against him, pressing his forehead against yours, "And if I am?"

Another short laugh leaves you at his 'challenge', and respond to it by pressing a kiss against his cheek, "I don't know, I would've thought you'd know already that I'm all yours, metaphorically speaking." 

"You are... just as I am all yours in return." 

[hermitcraftheadcanons]

Hello Internet, welcome to GAME THEORY, where instead of putting a joke here I want to ask you a question. It's time to talk UNDERTALE.

Now I don't think I've ever gotten this many requests to cover a theory, (no requests times no requests is still no requests.) Anyway, across my tumblr dashboard, NO ONE has asked for this. And honestly, I'm disappointed. True loyal theorists will know that Undertale is my favorite game of all time.

Undertale is a game where every character, from goat mom to grind fodder has a sympathetic design and a unique personality, motivations, goals, fears. Whether you're saving or slaughtering them, the game makes you feel something every time you enter an encounter. But to me, one character stood out amongst all the rest. SANS. A skeleton named after the font, Comic Sans. ANYWAYS, Sans is, well, there's a lot of mystery around this guy. And before we get into it, let me put up a very special spoiler warning: UNDERTALE is a game best experienced blind. So if you haven't played it, pause your reading of this and come back after you've finished. I PROMISE YOU, I PROMISE you won't regret it. Alright, so everyone out of the pool and ready for the adult swim? Good. Because I'm feeling pretty determined to get to the bottom of Sans' mystery. So just to recap for those of you who haven't played the game and ignored the SPOILER WARNING, or just need a refresher, Sans is one of the two skeletal brothers who appears in the game. His partner is Papyrus, a loud, goofy trap lover also named after a font. But in the world of Undertale their origins are a big question mark. All you really know is what's given to us by a shopkeeper in Snowdin, who explains that Sans and Papyrus, quote, “just showed up one day and asserted themselves.” Weird, right? What's more is that, well, Papyrus is just kinda the goofy sidekick. Sans is much more complex.

He likes fart jokes, but he's also incredibly powerful and deadly serious. Not only is his boss battle the hardest in the game, he's one of the only characters who has knowledge and power over space and time. He can take shortcuts around the world through ridiculous routes. Even is walking through walls. He also acknowledges that he's only one of infinite versions of himself, making self-aware commentary of the various timelines that you've played through in the game. He can even count the number of times he's killed you. He acts like an arbiter of this world, passing out judgements on the player's actions in the game, even explaining the secrets of EXP and LOVE, or EXECUTION POINTS and LEVELS OF VIOLENCE, just to clarify. In short, he just doesn't quite fit in with the rest of the world of monsters. But then, what, or who, is he? Well, the idea that he doesn't belong in the underworld seems to be correct.

The evidence seems to point to the fact that he WAS, in fact, formerly a surface dweller. In the true pacifist ending of the game, as the group looks out onto the horizon, Papyrus asks Sans about the giant ball in the sky. Sans says, quote, “we call that the sun.” This is important because A, the usage of the word WE, and knowledge of the sun shows that Sans has a kinship or knowledge with other humans, and B, that despite he and Papyrus both being skeletons, or, supposedly, brothers, and apparently appeared in underworld at the same time, they CLEARLY have two very different histories. Why would Papyrus not know the name of the sun but Sans would?

We get further clues to Sans' origins as we hear him say multiple times he wants to "go home" or "go back." He says as much during his dinner date scene at the Mettaton hotel. He notices that the player wants to go home and says, quote, "I know the feeling." He then continues, "maybe sometimes it's better to take what's given to you." As though he ended up in the underworld by accident. AND in a genocide run during his boss fight he says, quote, "look, I gave up trying to go back a long time ago." End quote. And before you say he means going back to the surface world, that's clearly not the full story. His very next line of dialogue is, "and getting to the surface doesn't really appeal anymore either." Key word here is “EITHER.” Yes, he seems to hail from the surface and wants to go back, but based on his dialogue he no longer considers it his home. It's as though the surface world he once knew is gone, as though he's from a different time. It's pretty intriguing. So we're left with a being that appeared out of nowhere, presumably from being from the human surface, but from a different time period, who seemingly has the power to teleport. That's a lot of questions and not a lot of answers.

But here's where things get REALLY interesting. Sans has a hidden workshop that takes a fair amount of searching to find. You could say it takes a lot of DETERMINATION to unlock. Anyways, obligatory determination references aside, as you start to look for this easter egg Sans gives you a key to his room and says "it's time you learn the truth." After some searching you find the workshop which contains items that leave even more questions. A photo album featuring Sans and a bunch of smiling people you don't recognize, a badge, blueprints with illegible handwriting, and a broken machine hidden behind a curtain. In the latest update, one more detail was added. A hand-drawn picture of 3 smiling faces with the words “don't forget.”

So, what does it all mean? Well a lot of Undertale theorists have been linking these details to a feature to a character named W.D Gaster. A ghostly character who never truly appears in the game. Honestly, covering him is a theory all unto itself, and probably one best saved for another day. Even still, none of the Gaster theories I've seen have been able to explain all the details. In particular, the photo album, and the badge. And that's what kept nagging me as I researched Undertale. A badge? That one in particular really stuck out to me. Why would such an oddly specific item to be hidden in the huge easter egg of a room? Something that supposedly reveals the truth about Sans? Badges just aren't important in Undertale. Then it hit me. What if this badge isn't from Undertale? What if this badge is from a completely different series? And was, in fact, the most important badge in the history of gaming? One of the Iskall patreon badges.

Now, for those of you wondering what I'm talking about, the Iskall Patreon Badges are a pivotal item from Iskall’s patreon. You know, the one on Hermitcraft. Anyway, the Iskall Patreon Badges are a really important part of Iskall’s character. So I asked myself; what if the badge in Sans' drawer was ONE OF THOSE EXACT badges? Well first off, it made Undertale connected to my favorite youtuber, thereby making it even COOLER, but that's still a pretty big logical leap. I needed more. Let me tell you, as I started looking, more and more pieces started to fit into place.

In Hermitcraft Season 6, there are three Architechs. (This was before Stress joined in season 7.) These 3 were Iskall, Grian and MumboJumbo. And what does Sans happen to have in his other drawer? A photo album with pictures of Sans with people you don't recognize. Of course you don't know them, they're not characters present in Undertale. And note the word that's used here, PEOPLE you don't recognize. Not underworld monsters. So that's 2 items oddly linked to the Hermitcraft series.

But then, how do the blueprints and broken machine fit in? Well, in the final stretch of Hermitcraft, Iskall is the only one who hasn’t died since the Demise game, so he sells his own body to the highest bidder. Except, it comes with a cost. Everyone is poor. As a result, and with the help of ImpulseSV, the Architechs (minus Mumbo,) are forced to finally kill Iskall, ending his streak since the beginning of demise. I watched this episode in 2020 and I'm not ashamed to admit that when I first saw this scene, I cried. It's DEVASTATING.

Iskall says goodbye to his friends, his co-workers, this character you've grown to love and care about is suddenly promising to sacrifice his life. For all he knows, there is no possibility of him being able to come back after his Demise. It's this incredibly dark departure in the final moments of what was otherwise a fun, quirky, and colorful Season 6.

So what does all of this have to do with Undertale? A LOT, actually. But the first thing you need to know is that the hermits are known for their, let's say, unique written linguistic style.

That would explain the illegible handwriting on the blueprints. And the machine? I think a broken infinity portal is behind that curtain. Now that may seem like a stretch, but it actually explains a lot.

If Sans wound up in Undertale via whacky infinity portal hyjinx, it could provide a reason for why he's a skeleton. He used the machine as organic matter and suffered the consequences. Not killing him, but turning at least a part of him into a pile of bones. That could also explain why Sans has given up hope for going home. Remember the infinity portal is a time machine. By being in the underworld, he's not only in a different place, but based on how he talks, he's also in a different time, with no hope of travelling back to the time he came from. This could theoretically happen. It turned Scar into a wizard and completely disintegrated Welsknight, so the rules are… Flimsy at best.

But the crossovers between Hermitcraft and Undertale continue. In Grian’s episode, (EDIT IN TIMESTAMP) he mentions he’s amazed that Iskall only escaped his demise with a lost arm. He says Iskall had “a lot of determination to not die for real,” and that he’s going to continue to study this. Seems awfully similar to the same experiments happening in Undertale around the trait of determination, no? Especially since so much has shown that Sans was a key player in those experiments.

But I'm sure you also want physical evidence right? Well don't worry, because I have plenty. Take a look at Iskall and Sans side by side. Iskall’s left eye is replaced with a diamond loupe. Sans’ left eye glows blue when he’s mad. Both have extremely chill yet are known for their jokes and, dare I say, laugh.

In short, we have some incredibly strong proof that the Hermitcraft Cinematic Universe, (HCU) is somehow connected to the Undertale world, which brings us back to our initial question, WHO IS SANS?

Well, what if we took it one final step and said that Sans happened to be Iskall from Hermitcraft? Sent through the Infinity Portal at the end of season 6 to go to Season 7, carrying an Iskall Patreon Badge and his photo album. Not only do all the items in the workshop suddenly fit, but so does Sans’ behavior.

Remember, Sans can seemingly travel extremely quickly. And Iskall just happens to have an elytra, a device that allows people to travel hundreds of metres extremely quickly. This even explains why Sans bleeds when you finally hit him. He is, or at least, WAS, a human.

Oh and finally, Sans shares two out of five letters with the name Iskall. That's just a fun one. I thought it was worth mentioning.

But if there was any doubt, we have to look no further than the creator's previous work. Toby Fox, the man behind Undertale is actually DocM77, the creator of every hermit (besides Scar.) Now, if Toby Fox, the creator of Undertale, is also DocM77, creator of Iskall, we know they will most definitely share a universe. Which brings us back to Undertale. 2 faces, with “don't forget” written on it? It's Iskall, trying to remember his 2 friends. In short, Undertale is a continuation of Toby’s version of Hermitcraft Season 6, with Iskall never being able to get home, adopting the name Sans. The pieces all just seem to fit. Now all we need is an appearance from Ethoslab and we’ve got ourselves a true sequel.

But hey, that's just a theory. A GAME THEORY! THANKS FOR WATCHING!

[chasseurdeloup-retired]

What is This Feeling? || Deirdre and Kaden

TIMING: Current LOCATION: The woods PARTIES: @deathduty and @chasseurdeloup SUMMARY: A banshee and a hunter end up stuck in a witch’s magic circle. It’s all fun times. CONTENT WARNINGS: Mentions of emotional abuse

The forest was always familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. Kaden spent his life in various parts of the woods. They were all the same and they were all different. There were always trees and birds and branches. Always monsters and teeth and claws. But they all felt different in the end, just enough. White Crest’s woods felt dangerous and comforting all at once, like it could never pick what it was or who it was for. Some stupid part of it led Kaden back into the thick of it. His knife was still out there, the blade stuck straight into a werewolf’s skull. He could leave it there. That would be simple. He could get a new knife, it hardly mattered. Sure, silver knives were expensive but they’d be easy enough to acquire in this town. Not like he didn't have others, anyway.

It didn’t matter.

He wound his way through the woods anyway. Something pulled him there. Maybe he was looking for comfort, something to dull the aching loneliness that kept building and building every day since the incident in the morgue. Maybe. He wasn’t sure that was it. There was something else. Some sick desire to find the body of the werewolf, see just how very dead it was. Who knew. But he didn’t find his knife. And he didn’t find the body. What he did find was so much worse. “What are you doing out here?” he asked the fae across the way from him. Of all the banshees he wanted to see, she wasn’t the singular one. Her presence didn’t bring him any comfort. In fact, it might be the opposite. “Or can you not tell me?” he added, huffing out a sad laugh. The joke was mostly for his sake, anyway.

Hunting rabbits was a harder venture than Deirdre remembered it being. Of course, the creatures were experts at being hunted; always on alert, swift in the ways they darted around the forest floor, almost as if they loathed to be seen. The game of luring and trapping was only interesting to Deirdre if her prey were touch more advanced than rabbits--humans were interesting creatures when stripped of their comforts. She’d seen enough men try to become like the rabbits; wide eyed, clawing at the ground for speed that would never come to them. Even as survival was written into their bodies, they never were anything like the rabbits. But it didn’t matter. Her task was to catch a rabbit or two, the likelihood of there being any humans around for her to play her games on was too low to even bother getting excited at the idea. As she considered what method she might employ this week (throwing the wide net of a scream and seeing who she’d caught in it was getting boring, on account of her having done it last week), one of such humans she never thought she’d see emerged between the shadows and trees. She frowned as more and more of him came into light. “Oh,” she said, “it’s you.” Kaden Langley was a human that was never any fun, unless he was tumbling down stairs. She could feel the bitterness in his question like it was its own person standing between them. “What? No ‘hello’? No ‘how are you doing’? Where are your manners?” She scoffed in mock insult, grinning widely as she considered what she could do with him (if there just happened to be some moose poop there, and she just happened to push Kaden into it…) “You really want to know what I’m doing?” Her delight grew devilish across her face. “I’m hunting rabbits. I happen to quite like them dead.”

It had been a solid minute and Kaden was already ready for this interaction to be over. It was really unfortunate that Deirdre was integral to Regan and Morgan’s life. He supposed Blanche and Ariana cared for her, too. There was no way to remove Deirdre completely from his life. Or himself from hers. Cleary to both of their dismay. “Hello, Deirdre. Yes. It’s me. Funny enough,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Nope, no ‘how are you doing.’ Because I don’t really care. Noticed you didn’t ask me that, either,” he said with a shrug. Then again, he was sure he looked a little worse for wear. As much as he tried to look less disheveled than he felt, whe wasn’t entirely certain that he’d succeeded.  

“Rabbits, huh? Why are--” Kaden paused and blinked a moment. Wait. Why was he even engaging? “You know what, never mind. I don’t care. Hunting rabbits isn’t illegal. I have questions. But you know, I really don’t give a shit what the answers are. Or about your well being. Or anything at all to do with you.” He felt the tinge of a lie staining his words. He did care about something to do with her. He wanted to know more about what sort of training she was pulling Regan through, why he couldn’t know or “didn’t really want to know.” He cared a lot about Regan’s well being and, unfortunately, Deirdre Dolan had a direct effect on it at the moment. He balled his hand into a fist, squeezing it at his side.

Not worth it, none of it. Kaden sighed and walked past her, storming through the leaves, happy to have her gone and out of his life for another however long it might pleasantly be. His day was only looking up and he was going to forget all about this and move-- “Putain!’ Kaden shouted, his hands jumped up to clutch his nose. What the fuck? It felt like he ran into a fucking wall. Kaden looked around for some source of the barrier but there was nothing there. He tentatively took a step forward, but his knee rammed into the hidden wall. “Shit, shit, what the--” Kaden grabbed his knee and rubbed it, trying to act like it didn’t hurt half as much as it did. He sighed and put his hand out to touch the barrier. “Hello, and welcome to the trust circle,” a woman's disembodied voice boomed into the forest surrounding them. “Let’s begin your healing together.” Kaden stood, blinking, hoping he was hallucinating. Was he stuck with-- No. No, no no. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

Deirdre smiled, “no, I didn’t ask you either.” If there was one thing she could trust, Kaden must have been as annoyed with her as she was of him. Unfortunately, Kaden lacked flair. And while Deirdre was thinking of ways to torment him, she was sure his simple mind only thought of ways to leave. “Is that so?” She stepped aside as he walked past her, leaving her biting comments to herself. There was a lot she could have said to urk him, but maybe it was for the better that he left. She had her hunting to do and could do without an audience. She sighed and began her own trek away when his shouting snapped her attention back. She watched him collide with an invisible wall with amusement before pressing her own hand out and feeling that her end was blocked off as well. Less amusing. A woman’s voice took the air and Deirdre’s displeasure shifted to concern. She threw a knife, whizzing past Kaden, watching her weapon bounce off air and tumble down. “Oh no,” she hissed, walking along the curved edge of their cage. No holes. No gaps. No secret doors. “She wasn’t joking when she called this a circle.” But what was that other part? Trust? She glanced over at Kaden; as if she could trust him. She’d sooner starve to death in their circle than try. Deirdre pulled out her phone, hoping to shoot Morgan a text, finding instead that the cursed rectangle of foregin technology would not operate. “What is this!?” She snapped at Kaden. “I have things to do!” Deirdre turned her head up to the sky, yelling at the disembodied woman. “I have important things to do!”

Compelled by a great idea, Deirdre pulled another knife out. “Maybe I'll just end this quickly.” The woman’s voice chimed in again, “your healing starts with your words.” Deirdre groaned, petulant as she sensed her plan of murder was a losing battle. Huffing, she crossed her arms and slumped down. “Dig us a hole out of this nightmare prison, Kady. Chop chop.”

“Putain!” Kaden shouted as a knife flew past his head, at most an inch away from slicing into his ear. Or worse, his hair. “What the fuck? Are you trying to kill me?!” That was a stupid question. Even when she wasn’t trying, there was no doubt she wished him dead. For all their differences, they shared that in common. He stood, arms folded as he watched her make her way around the circle, confirming they were trapped. Together. The sigh he let out was so intense he was shocked it didn’t rustle the leaves. What a perfect cap to a truly shitty week. He should have seen it coming, really. He’d wondered if the ground could swallow him up whole when sitting on the curb across from Deirdre. He honestly hoped for it once again. Just to make sure, Kaden pulled out his own knife, poked at the barrier. It didn’t break through, pierce anything, not even a little bit. He bent down by the ground, couldn’t make any marks in the dirt to throw off the magic either. “Merde.”

Kaden glanced up to see Deirdre, her own knife in hand and a glint in her eye. “Hey!” He stumbled up and held out his own weapon in defense, ready to throw down if that’s what this was finally coming to. It wasn’t murder then, it was just killing in self defense, completely justifiable. He wasn’t sure if the words from above were a comfort or a disappointment. His shoulders drop and his stance relaxed. “I’m not digging you shit,” he said. “I tried poking at the ground, there’s not disturbing the earth around this bullshit barrier.” The voice came thundering back, “you are correct. In order to experience true growth and go your separate ways feeling better and more whole again, you have a few options.” Kaden reconsidered the need for witch hunters in that very moment. “You can either find a way to truly appreciate something true about each other. Or you can gain a real understanding about your partner in the circle--”

“Hey, no, not a partner!” Kaden shouted back at the sky. “Excuse me, pushy poutine, no interruptions please!” the voice continued. “You and your companion can only leave here once you use your words to build a better relationship between one another. I look forward to experiencing your new found light both in and out of the circle. Blessed be.” Kaden rubbed his temples. This was some next level new age garbage. It made Morgan’s rocks from way back when look grounded. “Fucking hell. Where do you want to start? You know, aside from trying to stab one another. Since it sounds like that just leaves one of us alive stuck here with a dead body until this witch comes back from whatever trip to la la land she’s taking.”

Admitting that she was trying to kill Kaden, or that she wanted to, or that she enjoyed making him think that she wanted to, would be like admitting that she breathed air. Deirdre simply shrugged instead, noting that Kaden’s vocabulary truly was just ‘merde’ and ‘putain’. Maybe she’d get him a nice thesaurus so he could get his feelings out more eloquently. She listened to the woman explain their torture to them, and considered that she really would be dying here. To appreciate Kaden would be to compliment a pile of shit, their value being limited to how great of a fertilizer they made. She wouldn’t do it. She wouldn’t be made to do it. No witch was going to make her. “I appreciate how much of an idiot you are,” she said, raising her hand to knock against the barrier that was--unfortunately--still there. “Well,” Deirdre threw her hands up, “I tried.” She pulled her jacket off and bundled it together, placing it down on the ground as a make-shift pillow. She adjusted herself to get a better sleeping position, but the dirt was gross, her pillow was terrible, and her company was even worse. “I would love to be stuck here with a dead body, they’re far more interesting than you.” And though it wasn’t a compliment at all, Deirdre raised her hand and knocked it against the barrier again. “I don’t think this witch is coming for us. She sounds very dedicated to her healing…” Deirdre yawned and closed her eyes. Accepting her death here, even if she hadn’t screamed for it yet. Maybe that would come some weeks into starving?

After a moment, Deirdre tried again, “your face is slightly above average.” Her hand hit the barrier. She sighed, stirring herself from slumber that wouldn’t come to her anyway, not under these circumstances. “Look, why don’t you tell me something very embarrassing about you and then maybe I’ll--” She gestured quotations in the air. “‘Gain a real understanding of you’. And, well, I would share something embarrassing about myself but I just don’t have any flaws.” She leaned against the barrier, taking her jacket-pillow and stuffing it behind her neck. “Of all the rings to stumble in...it just had to be some witch’s counselling ring.”  

Of course. Insults from Deirdre. How original. Kaden rolled his eyes at her comments but they hardly bothered him. What did was watching her curl up on the forest floor. “You’re not really taking a nap are you? Come on.” He had a feeling he’d be rolling his eyes a lot for the next however long they’d be stuck there. If what the witch said was true, likely hours. Maybe days. Especially with how helpful his current key to getting out of here was being. Bordel de merde. He picked his way along the barrier, looking for any hole she might have missed. “Slightly above average?” Kaden was really wishing that hole in the ground scenario would become real. But only if he could push Deirdre down the pit and watch her fall. “I’m not telling you anything embarrassing, fuck off.” His eyes were going to get tired if they kept rolling around in his fucking head. The last thing he planned to do was be the first one to open up. Not with her.

But they had to do something. Kaden couldn’t find any other way out. And if he didn’t start talking, apparently she was about to doze off. Then again, if she did, throwing rocks at her to wake her up sounded more fun than this. “Fine. Whatever. I, uh,” he paused, searching his mind for something he didn’t hate about Deirdre. It was really a tall order. “I, uh, appreciate that you’re helping Regan. I guess.” He pressed his hand to the barrier. “No lies, please,” the voice whispered. “Come on! It is not a lie! And why didn’t you do that when she mentioned my face? But really, come on, I appreciate that she’s helping Regan, why wouldn’t I appreciate that? Why are you a pice of--” He grumbled and kicked at the stupid barrier. Which hurt his foot. Fucking bullshit circle. Couldn’t even tell the truth from a lie, how the hell were they getting out of there? Because he did appreciate her help with Regan. Didn’t he? He thought of the bandage on her hand, her hurting herself, how closed up she’d been, how much she was isolating and hiding from him. He hated it, all of it. And all he could wonder while glancing over at Deirdre was if Regan was going to have to become more like her, something farther from-- “Stupid fucking cirlce,” he muttered to himself. “I don’t even know how we’re supposed to do this. I mean. What sort of shit is this witch even looking for?” He kicked some more leaves on the ground.

Kaden’s hand reached up to rub the back of his neck, searching his mind for anything likeable about Deirdre. She made Morgan happy. But really if there was anyone else who could do that, he’d swap them out in a heartbeat. One of his, not hers. Anyway, that didn’t feel like what the witch wanted. “Well. You helped with that bies that one time.” A small sliver of the  previously invisible circle, maybe an inch or two, started to glow and turned green. Huh. “You showed a lot of control. With your scream. Which I’m learning is hard. Or something.” Two more inches. “Alright, I moved the dial, it’s your turn.” One inch shrunk back. Fuck this fucking witch.

“I wasn’t lying about your face being slightly above average,” Deirdre laughed, though her amusement was short-lived. Kaden’s words echoed around her, and beyond them, the booming chiding of their witch captor. No lies, please. Of course he didn’t appreciate it, who would? Deirdre opened her eyes, pulling her jacket out from behind her and staring at the leather she just wrinkled. She tried to straighten it out with her fingers as Kaden continued his hysterics. She wanted to fix things, but ironing out leather with her fingers was as futile an effort as trying to teach a banshee kindly was. He said it was her turn, but her mind hadn’t stirred from his earlier lie. “I know you hate it,” she said, “for what it’s worth, I’m sorry Regan couldn’t tell you--at first, anyway. I’m sorry I did that to you.” The green ring grew and Deirdre turned her gaze back down to her jacket, the more she looked at the stupid green glow, the worse she felt about it. She wanted it to go back down, she wanted to spew as many terrible things as she could think of. Something about his hair, another thing about the idiotic way he spoke, something else about how annoying his grumbling was. Each green inch felt like a layer of her that had been peeled raw, and she hadn’t even said anything yet. “I knew you’d try to stop it...because you love her. I know you do. I trust that you do. And taking her away from the pain I have to deliver...that’s exactly the kind of thing someone who loved her would do.” No one ever tried to take her away from anything, and she closed her eyes tightly before they could water anymore than they already had. She swallowed, opening her eyes only when her breathing returned to its steady, ambivalent inhales and exhales. “I know you love how much she cares about people, but she can’t---” Deirdre swallowed again, going back to her attempt to sleep on the floor. Maybe this nightmare would be over when she woke up, maybe Kaden would grow some courage and just stab her already. She bundled the jacket up under her head and flipped over, staring at the forest instead of whatever expression Kaden must have been giving her.

“I don’t care about people,” she said after a moment, “maybe I did once, but I don’t anymore. Maybe the same thing happens to Regan, maybe she figures out control and kindness in a way generations of banshees couldn’t. I don’t know. I can’t give you whatever hope you’re looking for.” Deirdre closed her eyes, finding darkness suddenly far more comforting than the trees. “I feel sorry for you, Kaden.” She couldn’t tell how much she’d moved the green up with her dialogue, but she found quickly that she didn’t care. If her goal had been freeing them, she would have picked something much easier to compliment---she did appreciate how hard he tried, how much he cared, and okay, maybe she didn’t completely hate him. But she had bared her vulnerabilities enough for one lifetime, and couldn’t stomach the idea of doing anymore of it. She didn’t want to be Kaden’s friend, she didn’t want to ‘gain an understanding’ or appreciate him. She wanted to catch the damn rabbits she’d come here for and go home to the only place where being herself didn’t feel like a chore or a crime. “Just compliment my ass and get this over with.”

With each word Deirdre spoke, the circle glowed more and more and Kaden’s brows furrowed, creases in his forehead getting deeper and deeper. She was sorry Regan couldn’t tell him? But why? She was the one who-- But it was true. It had to be. The magic of the circle confirmed it. She said the same thing as Morgan and Regan. That they knew he’d try to stop it. He bit his lip, considering the words over again. They knew. But he wasn’t sure. No part of him wanted to see her in pain, of course not. But she was in pain not being in control. Hurting people. And he had an obligation, a duty to protect humanity. He’d ignored it for so long with Regan. At what point did he owe it to humanity, to all of them, to step back and let this happen? “I can’t tell anymore what’s crueler. Stopping it or letting it continue,” he said, voice small and tight. He didn’t want to betray too much emotion. “I hate that she has to-- I still haven’t asked for details so I don’t--” It was something he hadn’t tackled yet. And not something he was sure he wanted to, not yet. “But I do understand why it has to. So trust that much.” He knew hard training. If anyone understood having to go through hard and painful training to come out better for it, he did. And he was the first to say that it was lack of control that made werewolves dangerous. So how could he sit here, think that Regan didn’t need control. He understood.

Or Kaden thought he did. “What do you mean she can’t--” Her words gripped him like a chokehold and he went still. What they’d all said, how much he didn’t want to know about this, he assumed it was physical damage they were referring to. And sure, they were right, the thought of her body mangled and torn into, the thought of her suffering made him want to rip apart whoever was causing it. But physical damage healed. This, what Deirdre just suggested, it--- He couldn’t move. Who was Regan if she didn’t care about people? What was the point if she couldn’t give a shit about anyone? What about her family? Why was he even trying if the ‘after’ Morgan kept talking about would leave Regan unable to care about hi-- No. He clenched his jaw and fought against the tightness in his chest. Deirdre was the last person he was going to cry in front of. He took the tightness and balled it into a fist and punched the barrier. It didn’t give. It didn’t even show any wear. There was no evidence left to make him feel better other than the throbbing through his knuckles.

Kaden shook out his hand, welcome for the pain as a distraction, still unable to meet Deirdre’s eyes. “You found a way to care about Morgan. Even-- I mean, you let her in. Somehow. I--” The tightness was back, this time around his throat. Or maybe it never left. “You care about Regan. You care enough to-- I mean you don’t sound like you want to do this.” He inhaled deep. He refused to do the stupid breahting exercises that Regan had treid to show him. They all collectively knew it was crap. All of it. “I wouldn’t want to. I mean. Not that I’d-- I just mean. Hunter training. I swore I’d never. So I get if--” Even without finishing a sentence completely, small bits of green picked their way around the circle. It didn’t matter. “Morgan keeps trying to tell me there’s an ‘after’ to look forward to. I’m-- I’m terrified of what ‘after’ looks like. For both of us.” He caught a glimpse of Deirdre, shut down, turned away, closed off. He clenched his jaw and wished like hell there was no part of it that felt like looking in a mirror, though maybe a more distant one. “For all of us.”

The answer was clear to Deirdre; too obvious to be kept to herself. “Letting it continue is worse,” she hissed through clenched teeth. “Ignorance is a gift.” There were no winners here, exactly, but she knew her truth. And her truth was rolled with anger--she loathed the trees that watched in silence, the dirt that erased her evidence, and her family that looked the other way. It was far worse to be that child, naive and desperate, eating the words of the adults around her, who spoke often of how normal her pain was to be. It was worse to have her trust twisted, her hope of something better crushed so deliberately. It was worse that they knew, and didn’t act. It would always be worse. “I don’t know what your parents did to you,” she whispered, “I thought you might know...how truly terrible it all is.” And if he knew, if he thought about it for a second longer, he might realize what terrible curse it was to have even the sliver of truth that he did. All she could remember now was the faint whispers of a girl that wanted to be saved, the one whose eyes were often lost in the horizon beyond her cramped, creaky bedroom. Somedays, it was as if that child had never existed at all, if it weren’t for the memory of comfort burning in her ears. They told her it would be okay, and that was worse. It would always be. The pain she could forget, if she allowed herself to, but their lies she could never.

Even if Regan wasn’t a child, she was still as vulnerable, as susceptible to the lies others would find themselves virtuous in giving. And what exactly did Deirdre tell the man that loved Regan? Did she lie too? Did she let him think about it, for just a second, looking at the cold woman in front of him, to piece together the truth on his own? There was no magical, kind, better way. There was no saving them, not anymore. She sat up, deliberate in the way her gaze stayed far away from him, and stuck on the muddy ground instead. Distantly, she heard a dull thud, and imagined a number of places that could have stirred it. She didn’t dare chase an explanation for the sound. “Regan and I are very different. She became a doctor, I chose to look at people like numbers--things. After roughly seventeen years, to much heart-ache, I learned how to love someone--and most of the time I feel like I’m doing it wrong anyway. Does that sound right to you? Do you really want to compare me to her? Do you really want to disappoint yourself like that?” She reached out and plucked a dead leaf from where it had been trapped, crushed and embedded, in the mud. She pulled at the dull green, tearing the leaf apart absently. “‘After’ is an endearingly Morgan-like answer. There is no after, Kaden. This is it. This is all it is. This is all it ever is.” When the leaf was nothing but shred, she allowed the pieces to slip between her fingers, fluttering back to the mud below. “No, I don’t want to be doing this. But what I want doesn’t matter, it never has. I do what must be done. And I can tell you, with certainty, that there is no after. This---” She laughed bitterly, gesturing around, “--isn’t even an ‘after’ for me. Control will always be a life-long quest, I can’t forget who I am, not for one second.” Finally, she turned to him, her face impassive, as she had willed it to be--as she had been trained to make it. “If you want to believe in happy endings Kaden, then don’t let me stop you. One of us should be a little hopeful, for Regan’s sake.”

Deirdre picked another leaf from the ground, twirling it around in her fingers. This one was older, and had begun its slow process of decomposition. “Don’t be scared of Fate, it isn’t kind enough to care what you think. You can run yourself to the ground worrying, best to just hope instead. It’d save your heart some trouble. Whatever is going to happen to us has already begun...we’re all just leaves, Kaden, might as well fall gracefully.”

The response he got was not the response Kaden expected. The only thing he had been told more often by now than “he didn’t want to know,” was that “he couldn’t interfere.” “But I tho--” The words couldn’t leave his lips. It wasn’t true. He didn’t think. He hadn’t thought. He was doing everything in his power not to, wasn’t he? For as much as he imagined and fretted, there were spaces in his mind too dark to touch, too deep and tucked away to see. Her words reached into them like a hand, yanking them out of their graves lest they consume him and swallow him whole. What his parents did to him. It hit him like a chill down his spine colder than any he felt near any monster. He didn’t dwell long on what it was they did to him for any longer than he had to. Because they did what they had to. And that was that. Even then, he knew. He felt what she said. He knew he never wanted a child. For the simple fact he never wanted to train a hunter.

Kaden missed the moment that he’d slumped to the forest floor, hands resting on his knees, back against the barrier, eyes glazed and staring straight ahead. She thought he might know how truly terrible it was. Which was exactly what had scared him from the beginning. If he did, that was too much. And if he didn’t, it was even worse. The trees moved side to side. No, that wasn’t right. He was shaking his head. “She needs control. For-- She needs it. She--” An early phrase rang in his ears. Ignorance. Was it a gift? Would Regan be suffering so much now if she hadn't been kept in the dark? Or had it been the only thing to allow her some happiness? The last she’d ever have before-- Something bubbled up to his chest. He wasn’t sure if it was bitterness or bile. He swallowed it back either way.

A puff of air huffed through his nose, something that could be a laugh in another context. “Of course I don’t want to compare her to you. I’d never date you in a million years.” Mostly because she was Deirdre but also because he heard too many mirrors of his own thoughts from her mouth, too many things that felt like eerie echoes of his own life. Still, his attempt at lightening the mood left him feeling just as weighed down and sunk into the ground as before. Maybe more. There was no after. He’d known it. Had he thought about it. He’d known all along. Kaden didn’t get to keep anything good, not for long. Regan was too good for him in every sense. It wasn’t fair that she didn’t get to hold onto that sense of normal she desperately craved, didn’t get to have her life be a little easier. “I should have known it was too good to be true. About as real as the charger rock she made me.” Morgan was truly amazing at building up hope. Sometimes he wondered at what cost. His eyes remained fixed on the blur of trees in front of him, unfocused. It didn’t matter what was there, not really. He could look closer, focus on the branches or the leaves, the patterns of the bark if he wanted. But it didn’t matter. What the fuck did? What was the point? At least when he was a hunter and nothing more, he had that much. He had a purpose, a direction, clear and lasered in. Who cared if he was really happy? “My mother always told me that happiness is silly and fleeting. Family and honor and duty is what’s left when the frivolousness of ‘joy’ fades.” Did he have any of that to even fall back on anymore? He had barely any family to speak of and his honor and duty were tarnished by now at best.

“There’s a reason I made a point not to care about anyone. Ever.” Kaden wasn’t sure why he was speaking, why the words spilled out. He didn’t need her to know or care or, god forbid, sympathize. “There was a fucking good reason.” Because it hurt. When things went wrong, when they went wrong like they always did, it just hurt. The highs? Fuck the highs, the lows were prolonged and sank deeper than the pit burring through his stomach. “I forgot how to stop. I used to know.” The few bursts of laughter that escaped his lips were hollow. If he really wanted to stop caring, he knew a way. Or rather Deirdre did. Make it joint fucking lessons. That’d really solve their problems, wouldn’t it? No one would care and nothing would matter and life could go back to being simple and clean. There was right and there was wrong, black and white, and the middle was all bulslhit. He tried to focus on the leaf twisting in her hand, but his vision wouldn’t let him. All he saw were blurs of the swirling brown and yellow, small tinges of red. “Yeah I don’t think graceful is a word that’s ever applied to me. Guess I’m shit out of luck.”

Silence filled their circular prison, interrupted with half-sentences that died against Kaden’s lips before he dared finish his thoughts. Deirdre could hear the tenseness in his voice, the confusion and anger that broiled beneath it. She imagined his face was going through quite the journey, but she wouldn’t look up to check. She had no fondness for the way his lips pursed or brows furrowed, and she was happy enough leaving her vision of him blank. She felt that she knew some strange corner of his mind too well, and wouldn’t risk knowing any more. It was his mention of Morgan—indirectly—that made her attention snap towards him. She bristled, unsure why it felt like an insult, but uninterested in challenging the feeling anyway. “Don’t say that,” she hissed, “about Morgan she—“ But what was she to say? Often her hope felt too good to be true, too good to be deserved. She had her own struggles with accepting it, but she loved it all the same. “I can be defeatist. I know that.” Morgan had said as much. “But she...Morgan is...she’s good. The things she says, sometimes they sound like a dream, but they’re worth believing in.” She swallowed, turning her attention back to the leaves and the mud. She’d lost her staring spot and was desperate to find a new one. It occurred to her briefly, between deciding which patches of dirt would be better to look at, that it was funny how quickly her tone changed where Morgan was concerned. But whatever that meant, she didn’t think about it too long. The equation was simple, she didn’t much enjoy anyone thinking Morgan’s ideas were pointless, even if she had dismissed them herself. “I know what I said. But I don’t see things like Morgan does. I don’t feel an ‘after’, I just feel like nothing. All the time. Except—“ she swallowed. “Except when I’m with her. I feel things then, I feel like a person. And it’s that feeling...that’s dangerous. To be a person, who loves and cares, is dangerous. It’s what the screams feed on.” It was what she was teaching Regan to ignore, and by providence, what she was remembering how to ignore for herself.

She tilted her head up, laughing into the cold sky. “Fates, my mother says the exact same thing about happiness.” Deirdre’s stomach churned, she snipped whatever invisible tether of connection might have been forming between them—one shared shitty childhood experience didn’t make them equals. But she understood as deeply as one could why he didn’t want to care for people, and why he couldn’t stop caring now. Finally, she turned to him. “Being happy is nice, isn’t it? Being loved. Loving someone...some people, even. Caring about them. Having that kind of life is nice, isn’t it? It feels wrong, like maybe you should be off doing the killing you were born to do instead of cuddling on a couch. Like maybe you’re betraying yourself, your family, everything you were born to do—Fates, betraying humanity, even.” She offered a small smile, as weak as it was fleeting. “I know what I said. I know what I’ve been saying. But this isn’t about me, or how I feel. That’s not your concern. The truth is, Morgan taught me how to love and care. And when Regan has learned control, if you’re still around, you can teach her again, just the same. And I promise you, lessons in love are far more valuable. You’re not graceful, no. You’re terribly clumsy. But so is life, so is love. And she needs clumsy; earnest. She needs you. You’re not out of luck, Kaden. As long as you’re in love, you’re the luckiest.”

Deirdre erupted in laughter, as if possessed by the spirit of madness. Hot tears spilled from the corners of her eyes, streaming down her face in much of the same clumsy way she described; stuck where she wiped them haphazardly, leaving salty traces against her lips, free to discredit all she claimed about coldness and unfeeling. “Fates,” she cursed, wiping at more tears, “I know what I was saying. I know how stupid this sounds coming from me now. But you mentioned Morgan’s charge rock and I remembered...I don’t know a thing….and also that Morgan has wonderful ideas, always. And especially about that rock.” Deirdre sighed, confident enough that she wasn’t an embarrassing mess of tears and snot. “We just sound so fucking depressing that I couldn’t take it anymore. I know you want to be happy, Kaden. And I know that you can’t go back to your old life of hunting and not caring because this new one is so much better. And I know now that you have to love Regan more than ever, better than ever, because she needs it. She’s hurting, exactly as bad as you think she is, probably exactly as bad as you did once, and you shouldn’t listen to whatever crap I tell you because that’s the only thing that matters—you love Regan, she loves you.”

Deirdre stood and brushed her hands clean against her pants. “You ought to believe in yourself a little more, Kaden. So what if she forgets how to care about you? When you met her, I don’t think she had a single friend. Now she’s got White Crest’s broodiest boyfriend and a gaggle of people she feels the need to distance from in the first place. You clearly seduced her from a lonely life of autopsies, you can seduce her from one of ritual pain. Don’t look to me for some magical charge-rock hope, I’ve got none to spare for you, but if you’d just take a second to think, you’d realize you already have it.” She sighed, itching to see where the green was now, though wholly afraid it hadn’t moved at all.

Kaden was startled by the sudden ire thrown his way. Had he even said anything disparaging about his friend? Nothing he said was untrue. Hell, he still had the stupid rock. Right. He remembered why he kept it. Because she-- Right. He used his palm to wipe away the stupid tear that broke through his defenses. “She is good. Hell he’s talked me off a few ledges. I know that.” Odd enough, though, Deirdre’s words had a smile creeping onto his face. It wasn’t the most lighthearted topic, sure, but he could feel how much Deirdre cared for his friend. It was good to see and know. She deserved it; someone who loved her back as much as she loved her. Even if he was sure Deirdre thought she deserved better. Hell, he thought that Regan did most of the time. “Maybe it is dangerous. But I think she’d say it’s worth the risk. I mean, all things considered.” He picked up a stick from the ground and started scratching small lines in the dirt, watched it break up, shift around and move away with each line he made. He knew he considered every second he was with Regan worth the risk. And she was far riskier to be around at the moment. There was no doubt in his mind Morgan would say the same. Only likely she’d say it more verbosely and poetically. That was certain something she and Deirdre had in common that he lacked.

Her laughter was almost off-putting, uncomfortable at first but Kaden couldn’t argue the need to relieve some tension and found his laughter following behind hers. “Funny, I don’t think either of our mothers would be thrilled to know they had anything in common.” Somehow that was easier to absorb than the rest of what she said. Kaden kept his focus on the lines he was drawing into the dirt. Deirdre talked a lot. A lot. And all of it was... She didn’t mean it, right? She was working so hard to chip away at Regan’s humanity, to bottle her up. Why would she push him to undo it? It definitely didn’t seem like lessons in love and compassion were more important at the moment, either. If they were then fuck all of them, they wouldn’t have to do any of this. And, really? He’d have to teach Regan to love and care? “Right. Who the fuck am I to teach anyone about love and caring.” The laughter was half hearted by then. Regan needed him. He was the luckiest. Neither of those felt true just then. He hadn’t missed the comment of “if you’re still around.” He fucking hated the sound of that. It felt like a balancing act of who would push away who first. Both because they stupidly cared too much and were afraid of hurting each other. Putain, all of this was too complicated. Maybe the real reason he avoided commitment was due to all the fucking complications. It was certainly part of it. “Come on, I’m only lucky if she loves me. Otherwise I’m just an idiot.”

The lines in the ground were no longer lines anymore but one big rut that he kept digging farther and farther into the ground. “Yeah well when we’re both surrounded by death so much, it’s hard to be a lively bunch.” It was a poor attempt at a joke but he laughed at it anyway. “You seem to know a lot about me, huh?” She wasn’t wrong, though. He did want to be happy and he wasn’t sure if he could ever go back to his old life. And he did feel like it was a betrayal to everything he was taught to do and be. He kind of hated how much she understood about him. And it sure sounded like it was coming from a place of real understanding, like she was talking about herself. He wasn’t sure if he hated knowing that would push that stupid green farther along the circle’s edge. “It’s a lot fucking harder to do when it hurts. I never jumped into any of this shit because. It hurts. When things go wrong.” And they always did. It was his life. Things always went wrong. “But I’ll keep that in mind. You know. While you’re torturing my girlfriend.” He wasn’t sure if it was funny or not. He wasn’t sure if he cared either way or if that was his intent. It likely didn’t matter. It didn’t change anything.

It was truly impressive how much Deirdre could talk. And how she could still insult him all while trying to encourage him. “I am not the broodiest. Fuck off,” Kaden said, taking a small pebble and chucking it towards her, mostly in jest, a small attempt at a smile on his face. It didn’t linger long as he looked up at her, still sitting and leaning against the invisible wall of the circle. It was strange to have Deirdre of all people giving him a pep talk, telling him he could and even should hold onto Regan. “I don’t want to be the one to undo it all. To leave her a target for wardens and dangerous to everyone around her. And fuck I don’t want to prolong this shit either.” He shook his head and looked to the sky, hoping that this wasn’t the moment that the barrier gave way. “Maybe I’m just being selfish.” Everything Deirdre said seemed to suggest the opposite. But how much stock did he really put in her words? He was shirking his duty for love and “happiness,” something that his mother would tell him was pointless and completely selfish. It was certainly affecting his hunting, there was no doubt there. Worrying if he died absolutely made him worse at what he did and had to do. On top of that, the love and happiness he was chasing might be pointless and might damage the very thing Regan was trying to, undo the sacrifice she was making. It was probably true. He was being selfish. And he was so selfish that he wasn’t going to quit now. “Well one thing’s for sure. We have to get her out of that fucking shed.”

“You’re lucky still by virtue of her having loved you at all.” Deirdre breathed, done with her monologue of strange, discordant thoughts. She winced at his mention of torture, as true as it was, nodded at his admission of fearing pain, and laughed again, as he continued. She dodged his pebble narrowly, holding her tongue at chiding him for throwing it in the first place. If she could toss him down the stairs, he could get away with one pebble toss. She didn’t have the energy to argue it much, anyway. “Who would’ve thought that a man so accustomed to pain would be afraid of it?” She didn’t have any poetic observation to make about it, she just laughed, clutching her stomach and falling over. It wasn’t the funniest thing, him seemingly having only two outfits he wore on rotation was funnier, but she could stop laughing about it. She had begun the noisy process of expelling their self-pity out, and as her laughter hiccuped to a stop and her vision focused on the sky--she thought that maybe, just right now, Kaden wasn’t so bad.

“It’s not undoing it, by the way.” Deirdre sighed, standing up and brushing herself off. “I’m no more a target now than I was the months before I knew Morgan. It’s giving her a life, Kaden. You know how empty your own life was before finding friends and love here, I’m sure. Or even how empty her own life must have been. You don’t want that for her. You’re not being selfish. You love her, you should know better.” She smiled, picking her jacket off the floor and slipping it on after another bout of vigorous dusting. Beyond him, she could see finally that the green had crept up to its end. She didn’t like what that meant, emotionally, but she was pleased to think of what it would mean physically. “Or maybe you are being selfish. But a little selfishness is due; if wanting Regan is going to save her life, then be selfish. Ask for her. Love her. Brood in her arms--” She waved her hand in the air, “I don’t know, what ever it is that you two do.” The rules she set in place for Regan, all the unfeeling she had to do, all the hating herself, and then not caring about herself, she knew she was undermining it right then and there by telling her boyfriend of the value of teaching her the opposite, but she didn’t care. She wanted to be different from her mother in some way, help Regan well and truly, and this was it. She trusted Kaden; she trusted him to love Regan against all this pain, against the things he’d been taught. She trusted him to believe in her, believe that she would come back to herself one day. And she trusted him to wait. After all of it, if it was possible for Regan to still be in control of her screams, then they’d have proven centuries of banshee training wrong. Maybe there was, maybe there could be, a better way.

Deirdre smiled, “Kaden...I appreciate you.”

“Yeah but past tense still fucking sucks.” The stick he was scratching into the dirt with snapped. Kaden sighed. Stupid piece of shit. He was curious to know how much longer they’d be here, how far they’d come, but he was entirely afraid to look and opted instead to lean his head back against the barrier. “Physical pain is much easier than this emotion crap,” he retorted. He had a feeling some people would disagree, but physical pain he trained for. The body helped minimize it in a lot more ways than people always realized and it was a matter of tapping into that, making it work for you. Emotions? They were bullshit and complicated and stupid. And he hated how much more value he wanted to place on them recently. The physical pain would end. Emotional crap lingered. Death taught him that, ironically. The same way a harbinger of death taught him what the highs felt like, the rewards that strung him along long enough to put up with the pain.

Kaden wanted to argue with her. It took her years to get to that point. And he got the impression that she didn’t fall into Morgan’s arms overnight. He took the stupid stick and whipped it away, watched it bounce off the far end of the barrier. “You know, for someone just as new to this love shit as me, you sure do know a lot.” He didn't have to look to know a bit of the green receded. Fuck it, he needd to get one shot in. Just one. “You might have a point. I really figured you were the one of the two of us saving her, to be honest.” He shrugged. Sure it was destroying her in a way and-- fuck, that hurt to think about, but she couldn’t live her life in fear of what she was or what she could do. “I still don’t know the details, you know. Too much of a coward to ask. Considered getting you to bind me from fucking it up but here the fuck we are. I can’t figure you out, you know. Sometimes I think I get it and then you fucking throw me.” The laughter bubbled up inside him. “Sometimes literally down the goddamn stairs.” This whole thing was absurd. Mad to think that he was listening to Deirdre and that the things she said were something close to nice and maybe even encouraging. Then Kaden rolled his eyes at her suggestion of brooding in Regan’s arms and never felt more relief to do so. This, this was right. This was how he remembered Deirdre. Overbearing and frustrating. It truly warmed his heart to remember it. “Anyway, I’ll keep that in mind.”

It took everything in Kaden not to roll his eyes again. “I appreciate you, too. I gu--” The words turned into a shocked shout as he tumbled backwards, thwacking hard on the forest floor. “Putain de merde!” Stupid fucking witch circle had to screw him over one more time. He should have been watching the green but he had to admit, he didn’t like having visible evidence that he understood Deirdre. Or vice versa. It was awful. “Let’s never talk about this again,” he mumbled as he stood up and brushed himself off.

Deirdre wasn’t sure what Kaden thought would happen when the circle fell away and he was still leaning against it, but for everything that had happened, she watched him tumble backwards with unhinged delight. She scurried quickly out of the old circle, wanting to be completely sure she couldn’t be caught back inside before she opened her mouth. Laughter came first, sharp and bubbling, then it was the jeering. “Fates, I love watching you fall down.” And then, finally, the desire to undo all the work they had done and the resounding truth in her head that no, wait, she did actually hate Kaden. “Oh! And you stink! And your hair is stupid! And I hope you trip into a pile of shit!” Even to herself, her words and voice sounded childish, but she didn’t care. The delight from being freed, watching Kaden tumble down as she thought he would, and the ability to cover up her past kindness with petty insults was too great. She wasn’t his friend. She hadn’t just gained an ‘understanding’ of him. He sucked. And he was stinky. And he was human and she hated him and his dumb leather jackets. “Regan should find someone better.” She laughed, “maybe someone with more of a sense of balance, hm?” She pointed at him, “and I’m not saving Regan, I’m ruining her life!” That one wasn’t an insult but she felt like correcting Kaden on his point anyway. “Well, I’m going to leave now, Kady. I’ll hold the memory of you falling over fondly, human.” And though she felt far more like a pixie fluttering away after tying a human’s shoe laces together, she would have rather felt gleefully unlike herself than accept that some stupid witch’s stupid therapy circle of stupidness, had worked. It hadn’t. Kaden still sucked. She still wanted to stab him. And he was stinky.

“Fuck off!” Kaden shouted back at her as he pulled himself out of the circle. Why he ever thought for any span of time that she had anything at all in common with him, he didn’t know. The only thing they would ever share was how much they loathed each other and their unfortunate overlap in people they cared for. “Yeah, well Morgan deserves much better than you!” he shot back, straightening his jacket and dusting off the last of the leaves. If only he carried iron on him, he’d love to get a shot in, maybe remind her what he was capable of. The thought didn’t sit great for a moment, but fuck it, it wasn’t him that was fucked up. It was her. Clearly. He stormed off, not even sure why he was out there anymore. It didn’t matter. So long as he was far away from her.

[breakingsomething]

silver

basic summary: anti meets an old friend.

trigger warnings: abuse, vauge mentions of self harm

ok, this might make no sense without context, so here. this is a long ass fic, so be warned, but it's basically the context for this fic. have fun! :P

dapper was used to anti's secrets.

he knew, of course, that anti didn't tell him everything. he didn't talk about the scar on his neck beyond simply saying "it was jack's fault." he often left during the day and didn't say where he was going. he never spoke of his connection with jinx and doctor, the two of the creator's boys that anti seemed to hate the most. and he never spoke of the creator himself if he could help it, unless it was a sudden, unpredictable burst of rage, an angry fit that dapper would occasionally have to rewind and prevent by distracting anti in any way he could. dapper had to rewind a lot of anti's mistakes, actually. that was his secret. most of the time he just had to hope anti would stay in a good mood and nothing would set him off.

dapper remembered a day when kitten had been with them, right after he'd arrived, when he'd found something in anti's office he shouldn't have. then there was the night anti had brought home alcohol and gotten so drunk he'd started saying thing that scared dapper, screaming himself into a full on breakdown and tearing up his arms. and then was the night that kitten had become marvin again, and anti had gone too far with his punishment. all were mistakes that dapper had rewinded. not that he forgot any of them. not that he was ever allowed to forget.

he still remembered kitten's silence after his discovery, the horrible things anti had said in his drunken haze, kitten's flat, glassy eyes, pale and limp in anti's eyes. funny, how all the things he remembered were the things he wished he could scrub from his memory the most.

so anti kept his secrets, and dapper kept his. anti would usually know when he had rewinded because of the glow of his eyes, but there were days when he wouldn't ask, days when the silver magic lingered between them, heavy and quiet. sometimes better not to know. so they kept their secrets. maybe it was better for both of them.

after the loss of kitten, things had gotten a lot more difficult for them both. first of all, dapper had a bullet wound in his side from jinx, that perfect gunman, and they'd both had to count their losses and run. the home they'd built for themselves, gone. they'd went back a few days later, when anti deemed it safe to do so, but the council had already reclaimed the house and most of their things were gone. their clothes, their weapons, all their various entertainment, supplies and food. all dapper's sketchbooks and puppet toys. anti's radios and laptops. gone, gone, gone.

all they'd been able to recover was one single toy - a suited puppet that dapper had christened "rara" - and a packet of batteries. dapper wondered what had happened to their things. he wondered if they were being well taken care of. gods, he really hoped so. he'd hate to see his well loved puppets being treated cruelly.

now they lived in a small flat on the top floor, the cheapest place they could rent. dapper didn't know where anti was getting the money and he didn't want to know, quite honestly, although he had a feeling it had something to do with the black bag anti took with him every time he went out that was always a lot lighter when he returned. anyway, they couldn't seem to make quite the same home for themselves here, especially with the tension between dapper and anti over everything that had happened. dapper wondered if anything would ever be the same again.

after a while, anti had started taking him out with him.

"it's not safe here alone," he'd said when he first told him. anti looked so tired; sickly pale, bags under his eyes, hands that never quite stopped shaking. "you'll be better off with me. don't want the hero to find us here, fucking bastard. how he found us before is beyond me… fuck, probably tracked us through you." he shot dapper a harsh glare, running fingers through his own tangled curly hair. "seeing as you don't know how to be bloody subtle in public. i should just get shit done myself."

dapper was used to anti taking his anger out on him. he didn't bother giving him a reply.

it turned out that dapper's suspicions had been correct and anti was, in fact, selling drugs and various other bootlegged stuff. weird drinks, unlabeled boxes, weapons. dapper had been shocked to see a whole handgun in an innocent looking pencilcase, deep beneath the tictac boxes and plastic bags. "you'd be surprised how easy it is for me to get this shit," anti said nonchalantly, grinning at dapper's expression. "other people do the hard work for me, getting illegal bull into the country, then i hack it and sell it myself. it's like a fun little dance, almost. goes the same way every time, always the same moves and steps. it gets boring after a while."

"how do you find this stuff?" dapper asked, too curious to keep his hands still.

anti quirked an eyebrow, smirking, and brought something from his pocket. his new shiny butterfly knife that he'd gotten gods know where. "anything is possible through the internet," he grinned wickedly, twirling the blade in his fingers like in the videos he and dapper watched late at night when bad dreams kept them both awake. "all you have to do is know the right people to threaten."

he successfully completed his trick and sat back on his seat, trying not to look too pleased with himself.

so dapper and anti became bootleggers. honestly, that was something he was fine with. without his art supplies or toys he had nothing to do in the flat, so he was glad anti was letting him help out. not that he did much. mostly he just hung around, not getting in the way and being quiet as usual. the deals were always very silent affairs, and dapper was usually able to escape unnoticed. "why'd you bring your little brother along?" asked one man in a low voice as he received his goods. anti had just smiled at him dangerously, dapper mimicking the face he made.

"he's my watcher," anti said simply. "so i wouldn't try to cross me."

no one ever did. dapper wondered if anti secretly wished one of them would just so they could have something fun to do. he knew he did.

it was a couple months of this before something unusual did happen.

the day had started off normal. anti was up early - he had barely slept, dapper knew, he'd heard him wake screaming from a nightmare in the wee hours that morning - and had eaten a breakfast of whatever cheap dry cereal anti had been able to afford. well, dapper had; anti had tried to hide the fact that he wasn't eating by busying himself cleaning out his bag and washing the dishes, of which there were very few. dapper normally wouldn't say anything, but this had been going on so long that he felt the need to speak up. "why aren't you eating?"

anti had looked round at dapper's signalling whistle, his expression flickering as he read his brother's hands. "i - not hungry," he mumbled, purposefully turning away again. "i'm never really hungry recently."

dapper knew that was a lie. and despite all the terrible things anti had done, it hurt to see his brother like this. "lies," he signed, whistling again to catch anti's attention and banging the table for emphasis. "we have enough food, anti. are you…" a realization struck him. "are you not eating so there's enough for me?"

anti's shoulders shot to his ears, but he covered his emotional slip by scowling and making a growling noise in the back of his throat. "no, i'm fucking not," he spat, his shaking voice giving him away. "i don't have to do shit for you, ok? i'll eat when i want to, f-fuck…" he swayed on his feet slightly, grabbing the table for support. dapper popped his lips in distress and leapt up to help him, but anti shoved him away. "don't t-touch me! christ on a bleeding bike, dap, fucking calm it. finish eating, we've got shit to do."

they had been very silent on their way to the assigned drop off point, which was in a different part of the city that dapper never really went, way off the high street near the darker areas of town. dapper had his knife held in his sleeve, rolling it round and round to comfort himself. even anti seemed on edge, dark eyes darting back and forth as he breathed heavily, running his fingers down his own skin. "fucking hate this," he hissed, scowling. it didn't escape dapper's notice how anti's lip was quivering slightly. "hate this, hate this. i asked him to fucking meet me somewhere else, i don't goddamn like this."

dapper wondered why anti particularly disliked this part of town. in any case, they got to the bus stop where they were meant to meet and collapsed to the plastic seats, dapper bringing out his rara puppet to hold as anti began fidgeting uncontrollably, leg bouncing. dapper frowned - it wasn't like anti to be so panicked. "anti?" he signed, kicking the ground and leaning forward to look at his face. "anti, you ok?"

anti didn't answer, just stared down at his boots, face twitching. dapper sat up, sighing, and looked at the surrounding area outside the bus stop. everything seemed normal, just average shops and people and a zebra crossing in the middle of the road. the only unusual thing was the building in the middle of a bunch of others, a building that was blackened and surrounded by construction. dapper watched people skip by it as they walked. very weird. dapper swung his legs, popping his lips absentmindedly.

after nearly fifteen minutes of waiting, anti gave a short cry and clutched at his head, leaping to his feet. "fuck this. fuck this. this isn't bloody worth - i'm gonna find this fucking guy and tear his guts out so i can shove them down his throat and hang him from the bloody rafters by them. we're leaving. fuck this."

dapper hadn't seen anti so agitated in a while, and he whistled softly, running his thumb along the back of anti's hand. that usually calm him, dapper knew anti liked contact from people he trusted, but this time anti pulled away like he'd been burned. he was shaking slightly. "don't touch," he said angrily. "i'm gonna… i'm gonna call my contact, that bastard, give me a second here. walk over to the river if you want, i don't care."

dapper decided to take him up on that offer. he'd seen anti when he was his furious at someone, and it was worse now because it was very likely that anti was in a bad enough mood to actually track this man down and torture him later. he slid off his seat and bounced over down the street behind the bus stop to the river, not going too far so that anti could still see him if he turned around. he knew that, despite anti's uncaring act, he genuinely did love dapper and wanted him safe.

there were a few boats lingering in the water, plus a few ducks and even a swan. anti didn't care for most animals, but dapper loved them. "swan," he signed, curling his hand and making a sweeping motion with his whole arm. "and duck." the sign for duck was an open and closed repetitive hand movement in front of his mouth. that was a sign he enjoyed. he leaned over the fence, making the duck sign again and grinning to himself. the ducks and swan paid no mind, but dapper didn't care. he just watched them, enjoying the breeze in his hair, enjoying being alone.

"anti?"

ok, so he maybe wasn't alone.

dapper whirled round to face whoever it was, the knife in his sleeve sliding down into his palm. the person standing there was a man with a chin length mess of curly hair, wide eyes and a long black jacket over dark clothes. he was breathing shallowly, eyes darting all over dapper like he was analyzing him. dapper couldn't properly growl or hiss like anti could, but he bared his teeth, clicking his tongue in warning.

the man held up both hands, expression flickering from shock to confusion. "anti?" he said again, more uncertain this time. "i - is that you?"

dapper shook his head sharply.

the other man exhaled, slowly lowering his hands. "i'm sorry. i - i must have… mistaken you…" even as he said it, he was still scrutinizing dapper, biting his lip. "do you - would you happen to know a man named anti? or - i don't think that's his real name, but something beginning with a? he looks just like you except without a mustache and uh - he had green hair?"

this man knew too much. far too much. anti never used his real name around other people. he always went by other names, usually starting with a too - anthony, august, axel - but never by anti, how did this man know his name? how did he know his green hair? now was one of the rare occasions in which dapper wished he had a voice just so he could yell all the questions he needed answered. he was starting to think he should kill this man and be done with it.

anti often told dapper that he should pretend to be deaf if someone tried to speak to him in public. he wasn't sure if that applied now, but he made an exaggerated face of confusion and began signing. "who are you?" he asked. "why do you know my anti?"

just as dapper had thought, the man blinked, uncertain of himself. "oh, i - i don't know sign language, i'm sorry," he said. then he screwed up his face, realizing that dapper wouldn't be able to hear him anyway. dapper took this opportunity to quickly walk past the man, blood pumping in his ears, making his way back to anti. before he went back, however, he walked round down the waterfront over the bridge and back again, trying to throw the man off his trail just in case.

anti was still at the bus stop. he had his legs pulled up to his chest, face buried in his knees. dapper clapped to show he was coming, and anti jumped. he unfolded himself and softened his glare, sighing softly. "hey, dap," he mumbled before going silent. the fact that he hadn't noticed dapper had gone was enough to show how stressed he was. "fucker didn't answer. probably bailed, the bastard. i'll find him, i will - let's just go."

dapper hesitated, considering whether to tell anti about what had happened or not. eventually he decided that would be best to let him know, in case the man was dangerous. "someone was looking for you."

anti raised an eyebrow, slinging his back back over his shoulder. "who? my contact? did he have a mullet, awful beard, wearing a dark coat? i'll kill the bitch, i swear i will."

dapper shook his head. "curly black hair, white, weird ear piercing. wearing a black coat. he called you by name."

anti had gone very still. "by name?" he said faintly. "like - anthony, or anything like that?"

dapper winced. "no. anti. he asked me if i was anti, or if i knew you. he said i looked like you but without the green hair."

anti didn't respond. his eyes were wide and had turned solid black like they tended to do when he was anxious or angry. dapper couldn't tell which one it was now. his face had gone ashen, all the colour drained from it. his bottom lip quivered with every ragged breath he took.

"we're leaving," he said loudly. he grabbed dapper's hand and yanked him to his feet again, ignoring his sharp whistle of protest. "come on, hurry the fuck up, we're -"

"anti!"

they froze in their tracks, and something dropped in dapper's chest.

the man had followed him, somehow. dapper had been certain he'd been alone, but evidently the persistent bastard had managed to trail him all the way back here. he was standing right in front of them, panting - he'd clearly ran - and staring at anti with parted lips, unmoving.

anti stared back.

"anti," breathed the man, shaking his head just slightly, chest rising and falling. "oh my god, fuck, it's really you, where have you been, where the hell did you go?"

anti was shaking. he swallowed hard, taking a sudden step back. mouth open like he wanted to speak. "i - don't know who you are," he said in a hoarse voice. it was clearly a lie. dapper could almost hear his brother's heart racing. "stay aw̛͞aỳ from me."

the other man lifted his hands, stepping towards them again. in the silence, his footsteps sounded thunderous. "please listen to me a sec," he said. "i've been - i've been looking for you for goddamn years, anti, fuck, i - i missed you."

dapper was now thoroughly baffled, looking back and forth from anti to the stranger. someone anti had once known who missed him? who knew anti by his real name but wasn't afraid of him? that was something dapper couldn't imagine. it seemed that anti couldn't either, as he suddenly gripped dapper's hand, breathing so hard he looked like he was going to be sick. "you're talking shit," anti spat, trembling. "i - i want you to fuck off, i swear to the gods, i'll kill you."

the man shuffled back, hands still up to show no harm. "please, i - you just vanished and i was so scared," he said, eyes wide and wet. "i looked everywhere but i couldn't find you, then the shop burned down - was that you?" his voice broke on the last word. "anti, fuck, i - fuck!"

"don't," anti choked out, letting go of dapper to claw at his throat, yanking the ends of his scarf. "don't, don't, please leave me alone, i don't - leave me alone. i'm - dapper, come on."

dapper almost couldn't move. "who?" he demanded, turning on anti to sign. "who is this?"

anti's expression contorted with anger. "none of your - doesn't matter, i'm going, i can't be -"

he stepped back again, and this time the other man leapt forward to grab anti's arm with a cry of "wait, please!" dapper fell back as anti shook the man off, crying out and shoving the man right to the ground so hard that dapper heard his back crack.

"ah - ah, shit -" he swore, hissing in pain, but before he could even sit up anti had turned on heel and raced down the street. dapper watched as he glitched away before he could turn the corner.

leaving dapper alone with the stranger on the ground.

he didn't know what to do. had this man hurt anti, was dapper supposed to help him? in any case, the man pushed himself up on shaky arms, head snapping back and forth until his eyes landed on dapper and he deflated, sighing. "he did it again," he mumbled, sitting up fully and brushing his hair out with his fingers. "that disappearing act. why does he always do that?"

dapper didn't know how to respond to that. he suddenly had so much to ask this man, but he knew anti was probably having a breakdown somewhere and he should find him before he did something bad. quickly, he rummaged in his small messenger bag, pulling out his sketchbook and a blunt pencil. who are you? he scribbled, showing the paper to the man. he squinted to read it, still rubbing the back of his head.

"uh - can you hear me?" he asked, and dapper nodded. the man exhaled. "ok. my name's rhudy, and i'm - i… was a friend of anti's. or whatever his name is. i just called him that, ha. i never found out his real name."

dapper frowned. his name is anti. that's the name he's always had.

rhudy's eyes widened. "wait, actual? or... did he take the name i gave him?" he gave a small laugh that almost sounded like a sob. "oh, fucking christ, oh my god."

this was only raising more questions in dapper's mind. he kept writing, painfully aware of the fact that anti was probably going to murder him for this. who are you to him? he's never told me about you.

rhudy sniffed, blinking. "i - don't know, actually. i mean, we were friends, then we -" he flushed, exhaling. "i guess we messed up. i didn't realize he was magic too, and by the time i realized he was already vanishing away. i never saw him again." he bit his lip, clenching his fists. "he burned down the fucking shop i worked in. i just - i wanted to know why."

dapper's gaze wandered across the road to the blackened building on the other side. that's your shop? he scribbled. i'm sorry about what he did.

rhudy was silent for a moment. "are you his brother?" he asked. dapper nodded again, rhudy following afterwards. "thought so, right. he… he never told me he had any siblings." his voice broke and he let out a shuddering sigh, tilting his head back and hitting the wall of the bus stop. "ok. i get the feeling you're - you're gonna disappear too. strange how i can detect more from you than him… will you tell him something from me?"

dapper wanted to ask about what "detect" meant, but didn't bother. what is it?

rhudy lifted a hand to wipe at his eyes, screwing up his face. "tell him i'm sorry?" he croaked. "i must have messed up. some days i wondered if he was ever even real or if i fell in love with a fucking ghost. i just - i've been looking for him in my spare time, of which there isn't much, i just wanted to find him so badly. is he - is he ok? tell me that at least, please."

dapper was still reeling from the "fell in love" part - trying to imagine anti with someone romantically was wild enough - but he tried to summon an answer to his question. looking into the man's desperate eyes, he decided there was only one thing to say. he's doing good, dapper lied. we're both good. and i'll tell him you said that, yeah.

rhudy covered his mouth, squeezing his eyes shut. "good," he managed, voice high pitched and muffled. "ok, good. good for him, glad he's ok." he gave a small laugh. "i - don't think there will be another way to contact you again, if i'm seeing correctly. but, uh - yeah. fuck, fuck, i'm…"

dapper's heart was racing, confusion bubbling in his head. all he could think of to do was write i'm sorry on the paper, rip it out and hand it to the man. he took it with shaking hands, reading it over and over.

dapper stood and left the man behind. it was all he could do.

he knew anti wouldn't have went home. it wasn't even "home" anyway, so to speak. just an illegally rented flat with peeling walls and cold, bare floors. no, anti would have gone somewhere more familiar. somewhere that wasn't far - it only took dapper ten minutes to walk to the empty field, another two to climb all the way up. the whole time, dapper's mind was racing thinking about that man at the bus stop. had anti been with him? what had happened between them? with anti, it wouldn't have needed to be much. gods, this was too much to think about all at once.

he found anti on the front steps of the abandoned waterworks.

he was curled forwards the way he usually was when he was upset, face planted in his knees and arms wrapped around his head. dapper clicked his tongue softly as he walked towards him. anti shook his head and ignored him. "anti," dapper signed, despite knowing his brother couldn't see him. he crouched in front of his shivering form, noticing how anti's shoulders were shaking, the small, wheezy gasps he kept making. "anti, look up. look up."

anti shook his head, drawing further into himself. dapper whistled in warning before gently putting a hand in his hair, trying to soothe him. anti made a noise, a small noise that sounded almost like a sob.

"fuck," anti whimpered, and lifted his head just a bit, scrubbing at his face. "i - stop it, ow, shit, christ - this isn't fair, i wasn't supposed to -"

and oh, dapper could see anti's face now and he wished he couldn't because his brother was crying, he was really crying and dapper had never seen anti cry before and he was at a sudden loss for what to do. anti hissed in pain, pulling his sleeve over his hand to clean his face. the tears were… burning into his skin. leaving thin, dark trails down his face and them dripping onto the ground below. dapper suddenly realized where the raised white scars on anti's face must have came from.

"anti," dapper signed again, stunned. "i'm -"

"rewind it," anti blurted. he wasn't breathing right, was staring straight ahead with unfocused black eyes. "rewind it. i don't want any - i don't want to see - don't want to see him."

dapper swallowed a lump in his throat, biting down on his lip. "anti. i can't do that."

anti suddenly turned on him. "fucking rewind it!" he roared, and he'd stopped crying, his face dark and bleeding slightly where the tears had fallen. "that's what you're for! bloody rewind, i don't care, just get rid of it, fuck's sake, fuck's sake!"

dapper's mouth fell open, hands hanging in the air uselessly. anti suddenly grabbed them, squeezing his wrists together. "undo this!" he sobbed, his eyes flashing from light to dark to light to dark. "fucking undo it, dapper, that's all you're bloody here for, isn't it? to fix my fucking mistakes where i mess up! so undo it, and prevent it from happening! and if - if i protest not going out today -" he coughed, dropping dapper's hands and clutching his throat again, eyes too wide and shiny. "just tell me to stay away from that shop."

dapper knew if he rewinded, anti wouldn't remember any of this. he might as well just ask what he wanted to ask.

"you loved him?" dapper signed, keeping his eyes trained on anti's. "he loved you?"

for a moment, the question hung in the air, almost painfully, and dapper waited for anti to slap him. to grab the string on his neck and pull it to remind him of his place. to kick him to the ground and pin him there before demanding he turned back time before anti suffocated him in the dirt. but none of that happened.

in fact, anti almost softened.

"yes," he mumbled, eyes unfocused, tracing his fingers gently over his neck through his bandages. "please… dapper, please. please."

anti was begging and anti never begged for anything.

"i'll rewind," dapper said. the magic was already boiling in his blood, numbing the tips of his fingers and making his eyes well up. "anti. i never knew you could love anyone."

and anti just looked up, dark eyes wet, dark eyes so different from dapper's own, from all their brothers. "neither did i," he mumbled. he barked a laugh. "oh - dapper, dapper. don't remind me this happened, please. i don't want to know."

and just before dapper let the magic take over, he wondered if anti wore his eyes dark because the others were all so light.

silver. a colour anti told dapper about often. "dames, your eyes are silver," he would say. "your hands are all silver. why the silver today, dap? is it a silver day?"

dapper loved the word silver. he'd learned how to mouth the word, forming the shape with his mouth like he could say it aloud. silver was the colour of his eyes, even if dapper was blind to colour. silver the colour of his eyes and hands and tips of his hair when he was using magic. sometimes dapper couldn't get rid of the colour. silver days, were what anti always called them. on those days, when dapper was too distressed to come down from his magic haze and wanted nothing more than to use every ounce of energy he had to push himself back to his creation and further, anti would lay dapper on his shoulder or his lap and play with his hair, sometimes even softly singing if dapper was shaking hard enough. dapper liked silver days because of this. he always got the feeling anti did too. they both needed an excuse for the quiet warmth and contact between the two of them.

today was not a silver day. there would be no comfort for it.

river, sea, ocean. shining pale, silver water rising to his knees. already dapper was tired. time magic took so much out of him, and his legs were shaking, struggling to keep himself up. there was nothing in this black void to hold onto. nothing but water to paddle, pushing time back with nothing more than aching hands that had removed hours from the universe, days, weeks, each drop a second that dapper controlled. power. this was his place. his time. his time.

and they were back in the flat within seconds -

anti's shoulders shot to his ears, but he covered his emotional slip by scowling and making a growling noise in the back of his throat. "no, i'm fucking not," he spat, his shaking voice giving him away. "i don't have to do shit for you, ok? i'll eat when i want to, f-fuck…" he swayed on his feet slightly, grabbing the table for support.

dapper readjusted himself quickly. didn't move to help him this time. instead, he clapped his hands in front of anti's face, making him look up. "you can't go out," he told him matter of factly. "you want to stay away from the shop."

anti paled even further. dapper turned away and left the room.

dapper was used to anti's secrets.

he knew, of course, that anti didn't tell him everything. there were things about him that maybe he would never know; the pretty dark haired man who'd called anti a friend, the names anti used that even dapper hadn't heard, the years with the light eyed creator that he had long suspected anti had loved once. but anti could keep his secrets. dapper didn't need them. dapper was hurting enough without the knowledge of who anti could have been, who even dapper himself could have been.

anti kept his secrets, and dapper kept his.

his brother never asked why dapper had rewinded that day. maybe he suspected. maybe he was too afraid to hear the truth. all dapper knew was that he would have nightmares containing the dark haired man for a long time to come.

[neshabeingchildish]

League of Extraordinary Geniuses || The Prologue

The Girl with the Purple Hair AKA The Smartest Woman in the World 

Author’s Notes

‘They just GAVE her this honorific! The Smartest Woman in the World? How insulting! I didn’t spend the entirety of my life working beyond my hardware and having to remodel and upgrade frequently for some normal human girl to get a few degrees and just RECEIVE status as my female counterpart!’ 

Chase Davenport was in a very bad mood, and currently stuck in his own head. Davenport Industries was donating a dozen high quality, top grade androids to one of its employees, for an assignment in Dystopia, on which she would be attempting to deconstruct and rebuild the city to make it a Davencity - one of the many cities where basically all of the income and resources fit into an ecosystem created and maintained by the success of a Davenport driven economy. 

Chase felt like it was gentrification and colonization, but as long as Mr. Davenport saw to it that the people in the communities selected were allowed to stay and contribute, then at least, they wouldn’t be completely taking away people’s homes and lives. 

So… more of an occupation of sorts, but… Dystopia was one of those places that was such a mess that ANY change had to be for the better, and it was very close to this lady’s heart, apparently. She’d worked there for many years, traveling back and forth on charity missions between semesters in her academic career, ‘until she ingeniously swindled universities into giving her degrees.’ 

Chase pulled up her information in his bionic system, something he had been doing quite religiously ever since finding out that he was expected to be a part of these shenanigans. Mr. Davenport lauded this woman as “the person most fit for this job,” and as a condition of Chase’s current position in the company, he would have to shake the hand of this person in front of the world and approve of that sentiment, ‘thus endorsing the so-called “SmArtEst WOmAn In thE wOrld”’

Feeling that she “swindled” universities was unfair, but he was still pretty raw about all of these plans and mostly about that ‘COMPLETELY UNFATHOMABLE TITLE.’ Secretly, he admired her audacity and her follow through. He would never be able to admit it, as long as she was considered his intellectual equal and a high priority for Mr. Davenport.

She began a little challenge that she called "The Degree Collection Challenge." She would contact the Deans of Ivy League campuses and basically profess that she would be able to complete certain degrees in (some unprecedented amount of time), with their permission. Initially, they would agree, out of the pride and certainty that she couldn't do this. It became her brand - doing all of the work possible to earn an official degree in what should have been not enough time. Organizations began to try to monitor her endeavors and make sure she wasn't somehow cheating, hacking, doing SOMETHING illegal to yield the results that she was yielding, and eventually androids were utilized. Universities paid Davenport Industries A FORTUNE to basically stalk this woman with the intent to prove that she was unfairly gaining elite degrees from their institutions. 

She kept fairly earning her degrees, racking up work, experience, and notoriety as one of the smartest people in the world and her new title as the Degree Collector, ‘a title she can be worthy of.’

It was on her verified social media, and whenever she went to do interviews and speak at colleges, it would always be on the caption or the headlines. He was fine with that. In fact, after a mention from a fan who said that they would LOVE to see her have a conversation with Chase Davenport, the bionic smartest man alive, she confessed that she was a HUGE follower of his work and would also love a conversation with him. He was flattered. She was famous, in her own right, and smart, as well. Also, she looked pretty in all of the photos and footage he saw of her, so finding out that she was a fan was highly favorable.

Her announcement led to Donald arranging the meeting AND giving her a job in one of his places close to her Alma mater, Harvard. She was already earning him money with the android monitoring systems from several colleges, and he wanted someone that popular and smart under his umbrella. Chase would be her “introduction to Davenport Industries” in her biography, even though he didn’t actually have the opportunity to meet her. In fact, his brother, Leo wound up having to pick her up and getting her settled into her new Davenport provided space, because Chase was out on missions. 

She understood. As a self proclaimed huge follower of his work, she knew he went all over the world to tend to various threats, and after a while, the prospect of having a conversation with him became lost and he forgot all about the girl with the purple hair who Donald used as a publicity stunt a few years ago. ‘UNTIL… She became lauded as “the Smartest Woman Alive.” 

For THAT to be true, she would need bionic access to all of the world’s information, to computer connections, satellites, etc. She would have to be extraordinary. She was just some woman with a bunch of degrees that she did get impressively quickly for a typical woman… but still… She was just a typical woman and he got frustrated every time he thought about the fact that her title pretended to rival his! 

“Mr. Davenport?” He heard from behind him and he cleared off his research and cleared out his eye before turning and seeing a slim, petite, far more beautiful in person than in any of the publicity photos where she was typically working. “Hi!” She said, excited and extended her hand, “Charlotte Page. I know that I’m early, but The Dom said that I could let myself in with my access permissions, and I really wanted to be able to speak with you outside of all of his… panoply.” 

Chase shook her hand. It was soft and her handshake was firm. She had on a cream colored pantsuit that fit her form, but was sleeveless and her arms indicated someone who took great care of her body. In fact, her body indicated someone who took great care of her body. And her face, her hair, and so on. 

She didn’t look distressed, disheveled, with a mound of purple hair tied up in a puffy, messy bun. She wasn’t to her knees in an assignment or charity work, or in protective gear in her lab, and she wasn’t online, in a dimly lit room, speaking tired, because of the lack of rest she had. Her hair wasn’t purple either, or curly or puffy... It was... they call those goddess locs, if he remembered correctly from having seen the hairstyle before, and hers were a mixture of browns, with golden accents and charms in them. 

He saw several superhero emblems - Captain Man, Kid Danger, the Dystopian Defenders, ‘So, she’s a superhero fangirl’ some African symbols and cutesy stuff too, a few lightening rods... She was staring at him and he wondered if he was studying her looks too long.

This was the first time he saw her face to face, and it was an amazing sight. “Well… Nice to meet the…” He paused. He realized at that moment that he had never said it out loud and also that he could not.

“The Degree Collector?” She said, saving him the discomfort of calling her the smartest woman alive. She folded her arms casually and said, “Although, my degrees can’t really be at all impressive to you, with the educational catalog that you’ve got. And for what it's worth, I never actually refer to myself as the other thing, either. When there’s someone like you out there and nobody else comparable, that would seem gauche. Not to mention the fact that my life has been teeming with privilege and opportunities. There’s probably a woman out there right now that might have mollywhopped me in the degree collecting challenge if she had more access and wealth, so… I’m good with being Charlotte Page. Charlotte Page is amazing.”

He relaxed a little and felt secretly justified in his silent protest of her being called that. But, now that it was out of the way, he did have other questions and interests about her that he would have already addressed had he not been simmering in anger. He began with, “What is it about Dystopia that makes you so passionate about it?”

A twinkle sparkled in her brown eyes and she was the prettiest and softest thing he could ever remember, in that moment where she thought about Dystopia. She unfolded her arms and began to move her hands around as she talked, “I think it’s because it was my first chosen home. I decided to go there and try to make a small difference. I brought along the two most important people in the world to me and together, we made it our home, for a little while, but made a big difference in a small span of time. Whenever I had to leave, my heart stayed there. My friends didn’t come with me because there was just so much to do and they felt more needed there than I might have needed them with me.” She called over one of the water boys and grabbed a fresh bottle of water from them. “I was working on a Biological and Biomedical Sciences degree and after only one year of doing that, realized that it would take too long for me to do everything that I wanted to do in Dystopia, or even in this world. SO, I took a note out of my friend’s little sister’s book… She managed to graduate high school early because she had to take so many summer classes. I shot for the same basic principle, but on the college level and once it began to be a thing that I just do… I continued and I use everything that I can to try to make Dystopia better, for my friends and for my fondness of it as the first home that I chose for myself.”

“Wow. I’ve actually never chosen a home, so I don’t know this attachment. Mr. Davenport has orchestrated where I go for all of my life,” he admitted.

“Why?”

“Well… Because, he’s the one in charge,” he said and shrugged his shoulders, slightly embarrassed. She studied him for a while and he felt mildly uncomfortable under her watch, but simultaneously enjoyed the attention.

“At least he’s a genius. The gods know I’ve worked under the control of complete idiots before..” She thought for a little while longer, then added, “But… not genius enough, I would say.” She finally commented and averted her eyes to glance around the room. “He’s definitely probably smarter than me, but nobody’s smarter than you. You’re Smartie GOALS. It doesn’t rationally make sense to me that you’re in a room with someone, but you’re not the one in charge.” She shrugged and called over a recycling collector to pass off her empty bottle. “You know?” She punctuated the thought, hoping she wasn’t completely out of line for speaking it.

He placed his hands in his pockets and said, “I’m always the smartest man in the room… but not necessarily the wisest person, and definitely not always right. There has to be some humility to make our dynamic work, and if there are these gods you speak of somewhere, they know that HE’S not going to have any. I’ve challenged his authority a couple of times, but it never works in my favor. He really has an infrastructure that calls for his leadership.”

“Maybe you need to separate yourself from that infrastructure to reach your fullest potential,” she said. He looked at her, startled and she laughed and shook her hands and head, “Sorry, sorry! I realized after I said it that I totally sound like an up-and-coming supervillain trying to get the smartest man alive in her corner! I’ll shut up immediately about that. It’s just...my parents weren’t really that involved in a lot of my decisions… They did this thing where they raised me from the first moment I seemed cognizant to learn to do for myself. I don’t always understand those of you who have a more codependent situation with your parents. I think that I expected less commitment, since you refer to him as “Mr. Davenport. I don’t even refer to him as Mr. Davenport!”

He just laughed a little. It wasn’t really her business how he was raised in a capsule in a basement, that his biological father was someone else, etc. She was just making conversation, and you don’t spring heavy things on pretty girls in the middle of conversation. That’s how you never get pretty girls. One of the many ways, at least. His list was still growing at this stage in his life.

After a while, Donald Davenport came through with the camera crew and the dozen androids. He and Chase presented Charlotte with the supplies and she gave a thank you speech to him, and to Chase, although with all of the emphasis that she put on Chase in this thank you, she noticed that The Dom took it as a slight against him. 

That was one of the reasons she called Donald Davenport, “The Dom,” instead of Mr. Davenport or even Donald. That man would honestly be completely comfortable with total submission from others and she often wondered and worried about his wife with these habits, though his brother, Douglas, told her that the wife “wore the pants” at home. A likely story!

She liked Douglas. He was usually her means of contact. While she did bond with Leo upon her first meeting over their shared experience of limited bionics (and hers being even LESS accessible than his, at the time), it was Douglas that she could count on for fun experiment approval and such. She wished that he was here today, but he had some things to do in Centium City, so he had to miss it. He did promise to help her get settled with the equipment in her Dystopia office, whenever he  finished.

After the speech, Chase escorted Charlotte to the shuttle, hating the thought that when this conversation ended, he’d never see her again, and resenting himself for not being able to meet her sooner, or at the very least, to appreciate her for who she was and seemed to be. “Well, thank you for indulging me,” she said. “I’ve wanted to meet you for so long, and now that dream has been achieved!” Her smile was bright and her eyes were hopeful. “Should… we exchange info, or would that be weird for you?” 

“NO!” He said, too excitedly, with a chaotic smile, then followed up with, “I mean, no, it wouldn’t be weird! Yes, to we should!” 

She laughed uncomfortably and handed him something, “Here’s my contact info.” He looked at the  chip inside of the palm of his hand. “New tech that your Uncle Donald and my mentor Schwoz have been working on. It’s an information chip. It basically lets you, as a bionic have access to a normal that you would have to the other bionics.”

“Like… I can track your GPS?”

“On my devices. I don’t have a GPS system in me, but, you definitely have all my numbers, email addresses, etc, and contact with my devices. So… If you don’t get in touch with me this time around, I’ll know that you just didn’t want to.”

“What if I were a stalker?” He asked.

“You aren’t. You’re not the only person who can do extensive research, Mr. Davenport.” She winked at him and he practically melted. ‘Charlotte Page IS amazing.’

.

Three Years Ago...

She heard an electronic alert in her inner ear and uncovered her forearm to check the notification. She tapped the side of her face a few times in order to translate the message, then delete it. “The drop off is here,” she told Henry and Jasper, over the comm. 

“What? We can’t go now!” Henry complained and punched one of the henchmen.

“I know. WE can’t. But, I’ll rendezvous with the supplier and we’ll reassemble at the base,” she said. 

“No! That’s too dangerous.”

“Danger is our brand,” she reminded him.

“Defense. Defense is our brand. That’s why we’re called the Dystopian Defende- Cha… Dystress!” He called out loud. But, she was already barreling her way passed the automatic gunfire being aimed at her and dived behind a collapsed statue.

On the comm, she said, “Deflector… Focus on your mission, and I’ll focus on mind. Catch you when we get back.”

“Dystress, you do not have a forcefield and there is gunfire!”

“T-Force is here with the shipment and if they have to leave it at the drop off, you know that everything will be pillaged. The kids need those supplies.” She adjusted her metal glove gauntlet, pressed some codes on her forearm and groaned as she lifted the biggest piece of the statue and flung it at the shooters. Two were crushed and two ran for cover. Henry and Jasper fought with other henchmen as she made a run for it and slid beneath a pulled up piece of gate to get off of the site.

She notified her contact to beg them not to leave, because she was on her way, then proceeded to run for 15 minutes, dodging curious onlookers and maneuvering through sporadic waves of people. Whenever she reached the drop off, her contact was still there. “Max! Thank God you stayed,” she said and rushed to give him a hug. 

He smiled, “For you? Of course.” They slapped hands and he shook his in pain and hissed. She was quickly apologetic. She still had on her metal glove gauntlet AND her strength was still enhanced. “Were you in a fight?” He wondered. They were usually the contact and coyote for the charity that Charlotte worked with to get quality supplies brought in - everything from seeds, food, school resources, and hygiene products. Sometimes, they couldn’t even PAY for them in the city, because their charity put a dent in the business of too many crime lords depending on child trafficking, child soldiers, and other exploitation of the impoverished kids of Dystopia. But, Max always seemed far more concerned about how Charlotte was doing than the kids he was helping. She had a feeling that he might have had a crush on her.

“Yeah. I had to leave Deflector and Dogwalk in battle to come collect. Supply theft is one of the few crimes that has INCREASED since we got here. We’re causing such a dent in the organized crime, some of the well kept criminals are turning to petty crimes, and some of the bosses are trying to hit our shipments personally. We need an entire goddamn redo with this place. I’m supposed to be leaving after a short while... I didn’t even want to leave them today for this. I hate that they’ll be fighting crime here, probably until they die!” she complained, knowing that she was exaggerating, but also that Max would let her complain to him.

He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes, “Hey. You get this stuff to the kids and don’t worry about your team. Give me their coordinates,” he said. He was already in his super suit and mentally prepared for a fight.

She tapped on the screen on her arm, sent the coordinates, and he opened a portal, “This one will bring you and your supplies to the base,” he said. Then another opened beside it, “I’m gonna go make sure that your dudes don’t die.” She covered her heart with both hands as he stepped into the golden light and it evaporated with him going to Henry and Jasper’s aid. Charlotte collected all of her things and stepped into the light. Workers would meet her on the other end. 

She came through the other end right outside of the camp, tapped her face twice and her outfit morphed back into regular wear. Her purple hair was even tied up. She took the handle of the trolley and moved towards the base. 

And that was exactly what she thought about whenever she walked back onto base with supplies and resources, from Davenport Industries, ready to execute her most ambitious plan ever.

“Is that Charlotte?” Someone asked. She turned to see the director of the charity and was going to go greet her, but “CHAR!!!” from two very eager big boys came roaring towards her as Jasper and Henry ran up to hug her. 

Jasper lifted her into the air and spun her around. Henry yanked her down and bear hugged her painfully. “Ummm… Are you two trying to incapacitate me?” She asked. They put her down and she shook the director’s hand. Everyone was talking to her at once, but whenever several jets landed nearby, she grimaced and promised, “I’m sorry, but I have to touch base with T-Force and with my deconstruction team,” she pointed a thumb at each of the jets. “I’ll definitely regroup and do stuff with you guys later, though.” She turned to go towards the jets, and Henry and Jasper frowned.

Though, Henry squeezed Jasper’s shoulder and said, “You know her work is very important.”

“And we’re not?” Jasper wondered.

“Yeah, but… I’m sure she’s on a tight schedule. And that’s millions of dollars of support that she has to oversee. Come on. Let’s start on dinner!”

Charlotte’s heart rate sped up the closer she got to the T-Force jet. She had gotten word specifically from Max Thunderman, himself that he was going to be heading up this mission (which was basically to guard the Davenport staff as they set up operations for the project, personally vowing to guard Charlotte with his life. She didn’t need it, but the sentiment still made her all giddy inside. He’d never know it, though. 

Whenever he got out of the jet and approached, advanced and new black super suit with an emblem that rotated fire and ice around a lightning bolt; she dipped her head courteously and said in a calm voice, “Nice to see you, Thunderstrike. How’s the suit working out?” He smiled and pulled her into a hug that she returned, but quickly ended, lest she get caught up in her feelings. 

“It’s working out wonderfully. The best fashion designer that I know designed it and the best biological technologist and engineer that I know made it.” 

Her face warmed up and she couldn’t believe how after not even seeing him for years, the thought of being around him already had her semi floating. “So, you ready to help me to create a whole new Dystopia?”

“I’m ready to watch your back while YOU create a whole new Dystopia,” he said, with his hands held out.

“That works!” It was a good day for her. She had been able to see her favorite people in the world, and set out on a journey that would maybe rightfully earn her that title that made Chase Davenport cringe. 

Throughout the deconstruction, The Defenders kept working Dystopia and with T-Force nearby, Charlotte’s work was able to be done without attacks and theft, AND, she set up daily feeding cycles to discourage stealing and establish healthier diets for less privileged Dystopians. One of the first buildings that was worked on was the high tech, maximum security prison. The other one had been overcrowding since she, Jasper and Henry first came to Dystopia, and Henry had told her that a lot of the lower level criminals were simply released because the courts couldn’t ethically put or keep many of them in there under the population conditions. Charlotte named the place for Max. The Thunderman Super Max Penitentiary of Dystopia. He liked having his name on something and all, but he was more concerned about rehabilitation and reformation. So, she got with an architect for designing a rehabilitation center for criminals and villains who could be redeemed. That one, she put his full name on.

She was working on her favorite thesis during that time on the necessity of superhuman and nonsupers relations for the balance of global inequities and her rapport with Max became a better gateway into the supers world than she previously had, while her relationship with Swellview’s finest gave her the down home and small scale hero angle. 

As things became more functional, and more Davencentric, T-Force was reassigned to other missions and the Elite Force would be rushed in for any emergencies in Dystopia. Charlotte was sad to not be able to see Max as much, but it was kind of nice that she got to see Chase sometimes. Unfortunate that it was usually during a crisis, but they actually worked well together in those. The last visit that the Elite Force (his team) came to assist, she was able to show him the Chase Davenport Reference Library of Dystopia. He was honored, though shocked that “Mr. Davenport would approve this.” She laughed about that. She hadn’t gotten approval on anything and as long as the statistics she sent him kept improving, he wasn’t bothering her for it.

In her time there, jobs had been created with the nearly constant building, the pollution problems had been addressed, littering and waste disposal rectified, plant life and trees planted, wastelands beautified, and the corrupt government and laws cleaned up. The head of the charity was now the Mayor and Henry and Jasper inherited the charity and renamed it Budding Flowers. The base was fortified and remodeled, while The Dystopia Defenders’ lair, the Defender Dome, was erected nearby. 

Dystopia became the most flourishing Davencity in the world. The Dom loved being “the most” something “in the world,” so she was pretty much set for life and the Defender Dome was the lair that Henry and Jasper had both always dreamed of. She had revived the ecosystem and the economy - not on her own of course, but as the leader of the project, she would get the credit deserved of her work and announce additional credit while in her spotlight. She loved Dystopia, and now, she could always be proud of it... But... She didn’t necessarily want to just quit while she was ahead and rest of the fruits of this venture. Charlotte Page was amazing. One city was absolutely an accomplishment for her to save. But... how much more of the world could she save if she kept pressing forward?

“Charlotte Page is amazing,” she said, looking out of the Defender Dome at the city below that was unrecognizable from all of the before photos taken via satellite and from the place that she lived a year and visited on “breaks” from school. It was a new place. She was capable of possibly molding an entire new world.