#anyways. the point here is i enjoy crossovers where its less about two sets of characters meeting each other

[235uranium]

on one hand I always feel highly embarassed thinking about anime crossovers with my Adult American TV Shows, on the other I do think of that one extremely well written hannibal/soul eater crossover

[eliasdrid]

you keep putting these tokusatsu shows on my dash for months and I have less than zero context what they're about. what's the cliffnotes version to get me interested in whatever these odd looking robots or perhaps creatures are doing?

Alright I'll try my best but it might get long.

To me, the most appealing thing about them is that the suits are very much suits, they often try to use practical effects where they can and there's a lot of neat choreographed fights. There's also often sci-fi elements (which I'm a fan of). Each season of each show seems to be made with love and passion for the genre* too and I've read/seen a few interviews which support this. There's also some very talented actors and it's amazing to watch them play pretend the colorful plastic weapons are real and can hurt you (they really sell it to you if you can suspend your disbelief a little and have some fun).

*edited - I wrote labor of love but forgot it is a specific thing and might not apply very well here?

Anyway. I'll give you the basics. The three big tokusatsu shows you may often see around are: Kamen Rider and Super Sentai (both from Toei) and Ultraman (from Tsuburaya).

Screenshots from: Kamen Rider OOO (2010), Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger (2021) and Ultraman Blazar (2023)

There's others! like Dogengers (screenshot below) - but I'll try to focus on those three.

In general these shows are aimed at young audiences so you have to watch with that in mind. Also, like any superhero show, they will want to sell you merch (figures, toys, plushies, etc).

Another important thing to know is that the seasons of these shows are usually self contained, and each have their own theme, so you can pick any season that catches your eye to check out with no previous knowledge. There are crossovers events (movies and especials) and anniversary seasons which will explore and/or showcase previous content too! I personally really enjoyed Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger (2021) which is a 45th Anniversary Sentai season and I had watched only two other sentais before it.

Now, some differences! so you can tell the shows apart and also know what you will potentially have in store if you decide to watch any. I'll put a read more because this is getting long 👍

Kamen Rider and Super Sentai air all year long, for this reason, seasons usually have 45-50 episodes. All the Ultraman shows I've watched have 25 episodes per season. Meanwhile Dogengers has kept a 12 episodes per season formula so far. Spin offs, specials and reboots have no defined number of episodes (to my knowledge).

I feel like I should mention that (especially in the case of 45-50 episodes shows) the episodes might feel a bit off sometimes? Be aware there's often release schedules with toylines involved* From what I've noticed this usually happens past the mid-season point the closer you get to finale territory. My guess is that, generally at that point, the writing team (or writer) was trying to do things they forgot to properly set up before, tie loose ends and/or finish arcs quickly. *Sometimes other things affect production, like COVID or an actor suddenly not being able to continue with their role.

All shows value The Power Of Love and Friendship and usually feature a team of heroes (or allies) fighting against an enemy faction. There's also, almost always, some sort of transformation device involved and in all these shows the heroes must collect some season-themed item to get power ups. The key difference between each show will be how they decide to play with these things.

Super Sentai is what Power Rangers is based on. If that tells you nothing: there's a team of heroes ("rangers"), color coded suits that are generally not too complex in design and one giant mech vs. giant monster fight per episode (on average). I've not seen too much Sentai so that's all I got for you.

Kamen Rider gives its heroes more complex suit designs and (usually) multiple forms (ascending in strength/skill). Kamen Rider's signature elements are probably: the drivers (belts), the henshins (transformation scenes) and the fact that they often have motorbikes (they gotta ride something).

Ultraman has more of a shared universe between seasons situation going on than the previous two so there's recurring lore. I won't explain that lore to keep this as short as possible. Either there's a host-alien situation (to varying degrees) or the protagonist has the ability to transform. In this show there's always an almost guaranteed Titular Ultraman vs. giant monster fight per episode.

More visuals that might help you tell them apart:

Screenshots from Ohsama Sentai King Ohger (2023)

Screenshots from Kamen Rider Ryuki (2002), Kamen Rider Den-O (2007), Kamen Rider OOO (2010), Kamen Rider Build (2017)

Screenshots from Ultraman Orb (2016), Ultraman Geed (2017) and Ultraman Blazar (2023)

I hope this was helpful! sorry it got long!

[britesparc]

Weekend Top Ten #594

Top Ten Individual Film Series Within the MCU

One of the more-or-less unique things about the Marvel Cinematic Universe back when it all kicked off is that you had these individual movies about separate heroes, which had their own sequels and continuity and suchlike, but they were all also interconnected in a shared universe. When Avengers came out in 2012, there’d never quite been something like it before cinematically; a team-up movie starring solo heroes from their own franchises.

(I say “more-or-less” because there have, of course, been other film series where different individual films followed different characters but had the possibility to interact with other characters; the X-Men films began in 2000, and the first solo Wolverine movie came out in 2009, just a year after Iron Man. There, though, I think it���s fair to say that it was a spin-off from an existing franchise. Star Trek, too, had separate stories that had the potential to cross over, but really it only amounted to, say, Bashir showing up on the Enterprise, or Admiral Janeway popping up on a viewscreen in Nemesis. Really, what the MCU was doing had never been done before on any kind of scale or across so many different movies)

Anyway, nowadays, with multiple films and TV shows, we’re more than used to characters who debuted in one corner of the MCU becoming supporting characters in another corner. James “War Machine” Rhodes was an Iron Man character who ended up as an Avenger and has since popped up in Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Secret Invasion. The entire MCU Spider-Man saga has hung upon the gimmick of each movie featuring an established character guest-starring alongside Peter Parker; first Iron Man, then Nick Fury, then Doctor Strange. And let’s not forget Wong, who’s been in about 97 different films since Endgame. But at its core the MCU was always about individual “franchises”; separate series of films following one hero (or a team, I suppose). These franchises or series would then interact and intersect in a major crossover event – basically an Avengers movie. After the first Avengers, which established the template, the MCU upped the ante by bringing in the Guardians of the Galaxy in Infinity War before basically having every single MCU character on-screen in Endgame. These, though, are supposed to be big events; Crisis-Level Events as the DCU used to call them. It’s meant to be a big deal, but at the same time, we’re meant to just enjoy the separate film series, following our favourite heroes from one film to another.

So within the overall arching continuity of the MCU, you’ve got these discrete stories, following one hero or one group from one film to another. Yes, increasingly, there is overlap – Tony Stark’s story is every bit as informed by the evens of a Captain America movie as his own – but you’ve still got a bunch of trilogies kicking about. And which is top? That’s what I’m deciding here. Which hero’s own little saga, within the MCU, is the best? This is harder than you’d think, for a couple of reasons. One is that a few characters – like Tony – have an awful lot of development outside their own sagas. Another is that often the quality is quite variable, as we’ll see; a hero might have one or two genuinely barnstorming films, but the average quality of the others pulls their saga down a bit. And also we have the problem that, well, there aren’t really ten sets of films here.

How’ve I worked it out then? Basically, if there’s a set of films named after a hero, then that counts. Guardians are pretty easy in this regard, because you’ve got three films and a Christmas special. Even if a character stars in another film, though, it only counts as their franchise if the film’s named after them. So, for instance, Nick Fury has been in a dozen or so films at this point, but I’d argue the only one about him is Secret Invasion (which, yes, is a show not a film but I’m using terms interchangeably at this point). And I think you have to have at least two films (or a film and a show), which sadly discounts the likes of Captain Marvel or Shang-Chi. I was going to say that a character having two seasons of a show would count as two separate entries, but no MCU show has had a second season yet; and, yes, that means I’m not counting the old Netflix shows, or Agents of SHIELD, or anything like that. Only the Disney+ stuff is definitively MCU I’d argue. So, yeah, even though Loki season 2 is imminent, as is The Marvels (which is a “second part” to both Captain Marvel and Ms. Marvel, I guess), as things stand all three of those characters have to be discounted right now.

I think in the future I will do another list that ranks the individual characters’ arcs across all MCU films; so, like, how does Star-Lord progress along the entire overall franchise, including his four Guardians appearances and two Avengers movies. That sort of thing. But right now this is about films; which films are the best, and therefore which hero’s own films make for the best mini-franchise within the overall sprawling maxi-franchise.

Make sense? No? Good.

Captain America, 2011-2016 (The First Avenger, The Winter Soldier, Civil War): this is the only series of films within the MCU where I’d give each of them five stars, and all of them sit very high in my personal top ten. Why? Well, it’s partly the execution – these are just very well-made films; the first an old-fashioned men-on-a-mission adventure, the second an on-the-run paranoid thriller, and the third a huge-scale superhero epic. But the heart of these is Steve Rogers, and what he represents, his philosophy underpinning everything, the DNA of the series. The tone and script and cinematography and arc of it all reinforces Steve’s beliefs of honesty and fairness and strength, seen in the friendships forged (Bucky, Sam, Natasha), the sense of sacrifice, and in the bittersweet dramatic ironies at play (Peter unknowingly giving Steve’s argument back to Tony in Civil War). Captain America may be the ideal hero of Marvel, both in print and on screen, and his series of film is the ideal of the whole MCU.

Guardians of the Galaxy, 2014-2023 (Vols 1-3, Holiday Special): the Guardians are great because they’re these big, dumb space adventures that have a kind of filthy streak of irreverence running through them. They’re totally enjoyable as daft action comedies, with their tree aliens and Jackson Pollock jokes and discussions about planets having penises. Except underpinning it all is a really strong emotional heart; James Gunn understands that if you make characters that are just enjoyable to be around, then when bad stuff happens to them it hits harder. The discussion of trauma and grief may be subtly played and pitched at a particular register, but it’s still very real and a massive theme of the trilogy-and-a-bit. And the fact that two supporting characters – Rocket and Nebula – turned out to be the leads of the whole shebang is a great piece of slow-burn development.

The Avengers, 2012-2019 (The Avengers, Age of Ultron, Infinity War, Endgame): the first Avengers was totally unexpected, a terrific ensemble action comedy that took the tone established by Iron Man and filtered it through disparate characters to really define the voice of the MCU. We all hoped it would be good, but with so many plates to spin, I think quite how good was a surprise. Age of Ultron is still pretty good too, but a lot messier; however, it’s the two-part Infinity War/Endgame finale that astounds. Talk about Avengers having plates, these two films had to wrap up ten years and twenty movies’ worth of story, giving satisfying, era-closing arcs to major characters, paying off dozens of hours of development. It’s frankly bonkers that it succeeded, the kind of once-in-a-generation achievement that is just phenomenal to behold. Yes, the epic nature of these films means that sometimes they lack the nuance and focus of a single character piece; but like the best crossover comic book sagas, this hits in a particular register and stands as a spectacle from modern mainstream blockbuster cinema.

Spider-Man, 2017-2021 (Homecoming, Far From Home, No Way Home): the MCU Spidey largely differentiates itself from both the Spider-Man films that came before and most of the rest of the universe by focusing on being a “Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man”; it’s a terrifically-played high school comedy with superhero adventures thrown in. The winning chemistry between Peter, Ned, and MJ all contributes to making these films feel smaller-scale but still important, with a funny, friendly, dynamic. The first one is terrific, the second one a bit looser, but the trilogy overall is elevated by the operatic, epic finale. Far more than just a meta bit of fan service, No Way Home’s references to universes that came before has been the MCU’s best use of the multiverse to date, and the way its central tragedies and notions of sacrifice tie into Peter’s philosophy – going all the way back to that bedside chat with Tony in Civil War – is excellent.

Iron Man, 2008-2013 (Iron Man 1-3): where it all began, a tonally pitch-perfect introduction to the universe. RDJ’s Tony is a masterpiece of a performance, bottling lightning with his rambling, hilarious delivery, louche demeanour, and toughness in he face of danger. He immediately anchors the universe in a sense of heightened realism, and whilst the first film is fairly traditional in its origin story structure, it still serves as a great launchpad for the franchise. Yes, the second film is ropey, but still enjoyable; there’s little further character development and it once again ends with robot suits fighting robot suits, but we get Don Cheadle and Scarlett Johansen and Sam Rockwell, and that ain’t bad. However, the real heavy lifter here is the night-on perfect Iron Man 3, which unpicks the character, offers greater depths, shows his resourcefulness in unique ways, gives us a bigger but also more interesting robot suit finale, and has the entire MCU’s best twist of all time. You can judge a person’s entire character by whether or not they like Iron Man 3. It’s true.

Thor, 2011-2022 (Thor, The Dark World, Ragnarok, Love and Thunder): Thor is one of my favourite MCU characters – well, Marvel characters full stop – but his films are a little bit variable. The first one is definitely enjoyable, a very arch and stylised high fantasy epic mees dork fish-out-of-water comedy; the second attempts to add a layer of darkness but is incredibly muddled and creaky. It was Taika Waititi who realised both the comedic potential of the concept and its star, giving us the hilarious Ragnarok – which, for all its comedy, still gives us multiple character deaths and the destruction of Asgard. Waititi also leaned into the wild Jack Kirby comic book iconography, with some brilliantly realised sci-fi design that’s evocative of Heavy Metal magazine. Love and Thunder is divisive, but personally I adored it; yes, the comedy is broader and the story itself a bit woollier, but it’s also a film where its themes are carried over perfectly into its subject matter, and the realisation of why it’s called “Love and Thunder” hit me like a ton of bricks.

Ant-Man, 2015-2023 (Ant-Man, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Quantumania): a bit like Spider-Man, the Ant-Man films revel in their low stakes. I don’t think they’re quite as charming or successful, but they’re still great; street-level caper comedies of escalating craziness, with their goofy, affable charm heightened by the way Peyton Reed handles the whole size-changing concept. This gives us some great special effects and action scenes, true; but it also offers the potential for great gags (Hank’s building turning into a carry case; the giant Thomas the Tank Engine). Quantumania is a different beast, retaining the films’ cheery, dopey humour, but injecting a little bit more pathos and a lot more action, a technicolour sci-fi marvel that definitely isn’t for everyone – and I think has the real risk of putting off people who really enjoyed the low-key charm of the first two – but still gives us a really exciting Avengers-style romp.

Black Panther, 2018-2022 (Black Panther, Wakanda Forever): now we’re getting onto film series with fewer entries, and here I think we begin to see individual films having more of an impact. Because I would have thought Black Panther would have ranked higher on the strength of its first film; a brilliantly realised bit of Afro-Futurism from Ryan Coogler, with a commanding central performance and fantastically constructed world. Wakanda was unlike anything we’d seen before, and even if the story descended into usual mo-cap superhero tropes, it still gave us moments like Killmonger’s “bury me at sea” speech. The sequel, perhaps, could never live up to it; especially once the tragedy of Chadwick Boseman’s death unfolded. You can, sadly, see the joins where the existing narrative had to be retrofitted to harsh realities, but regardless, it’s still a very uneven film, with moments of great power nestled amongst wasted characters, back-and-forth plotting, and a rather wet finale.

Doctor Strange, 2014-2022 (Doctor Strange, Multiverse of Madness): two films here that, perhaps individually, pale before Black Panther, but hold their own against its sequel. The first Strange is a somewhat by-the-numbers MCU origin – mardy protagonist gets some powers or something, learns not to be quite so much of a dick – but the wacky visuals give it strength and originality. Leaning into that, the sequel has even bolder, weirder moments, but brilliantly they’re filtered through the prism of Sam Raimi’s gonzo horror lens. A zombie Strange with a cloak of demons; Wanda emerging from a cracked mirror; Black Bolt’s head. True, it doesn’t make quite as much out of the multiverse concept as it could have; and the sudden development of some of its characters isn’t really handled in a as nuanced a way as perhaps we’d like. But overall these are two very good films, with great visuals and a nice sense of freakiness.

The Incredible Hulk, 2010-2022 (The Incredible Hulk, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law): okay, here’s where we get really tenuous. The fact is, there have only been nine proper series within the MCU; that is, a film that’s had a sequel. I was briefly tempted to include Captain Marvel and Ms. Marvel, but those are really two separate things that are crossing over this winter in The Marvels, even though there’s obviously a lot of connective tissue. So, to get it to ten, I cheated a bit, and decided that She-Hulk was sort of a continuation of the overall Hulk franchise within the MCU. Bruce Banner is a major supporting character, after all, with the extended first episode dealing with him and situation quite a bit; and there’s a major revelation towards the end too. Tim Roth reappears. And She-Hulk herself kinda carries on his whole legacy… so it fits? I guess? It’s moot, really, because despite She-Hulk (the show) being a really funny, fourth-wall-breaking meta-commentary on the MCU, sitcoms, TV, and all sorts of stuff too, it’s not really enough to lift The Incredible Hulk out of the doldrums. It’s fine, I guess, the movie; there’s some interesting stuff about Bruce trying to control his anger. But it’s never as exciting or interesting or amusing as, say, Iron Man or Captain America, and the big effects-driven monster-mash finale is a big damp gloomy squib. Overall, things are good – She-Hulk really is terrific – but sadly Incredible Hulk remains my least-favourite MCU movie. Never mind; he had a lot of development in other people’s movies, so it’s all good.

[perfeggso]

every fortress falls (AKIRA x NCT)

Please enjoy this anime-kpop crossover for the Lights, Camera, Fanfiction event hosted by @supermwritersnet​! I chose to write for Shotaro and one of my favorite fictional universes ever, Akira’s Neo-Tokyo. If you know Akira, my story will run parallel to the canon plot. If not, I hope you give this a try and enjoy anyway and I highly recommend the source material! <3

If you’re interested, here is my AKIRA playlist. 

Setting of Akira: It has been thirty years since the end of WWIII, begun due to the detonation of an unidentified superweapon known only as “Akira” over Tokyo. The incident and subsequent war decimated the city which was rebuilt into Neo-Tokyo, a corrupt and crime-ridden megalopolis centered on an artificial island in Tokyo Bay.

Characters: Shotaro, Sungchan, Yuta, Akira main characters, other NCT members upcoming. 

Genres: cyberpunk, sci-fi, action/adventure 

Warnings: drug use/abuse, gangs, some swearing, eventual graphic violence

Rating: mature but not explicit 

Chapter length: 1.3k

Chapter 1:

The capsule cradled in Shotaro’s palm is red and white and shiny, like the earrings that Noriko would wear and which, when Shotaro asked, he found out were supposed to look like “blood and come,” respectively. The drone of Tanaka-Sensei’s voice from the front of the classroom barely penetrates the cloak of sullen disruption shielding Shotaro’s wooden amphitheater seat in classroom 12 of the Eighth District Vocational Training School. Even though realistically no one is paying attention, Shotaro tries to hold the pill so that his hand is obscured by his row’s shared desk. He doesn’t know why he’s so nervous; Tanaka-Sensei is barely commanding control of the room as he attempts to explain how a carburetor works, the closest kid to Shotaro is reading a girly magazine, and everyone at the school is well aware that you can buy as many of these pills as any broke student could afford from the nurse’s office.

It’s just, Shotaro reasons as the patent-leather-like curves of the capsule glint in the jaundiced combination of natural and fluorescent light, he’s always been a good kid. He doesn’t do things like this – at least that’s what Yuta constantly tells him. He doesn’t buy drugs – no matter how cheap they are – from Kaneda’s girlfriend of all people, and he certainly doesn’t take them. Kaneda, Shotaro has always felt, is inextricably linked to him. For one, Shotaro Kaneda’s family name is the same as Shotaro’s given name (though they use slightly different kanji if anyone ever cared to notice). For another thing, the two boys have known of each other since early childhood, having come up in the same orphanage and school system for boys deemed by the state to be “lacking in future prospects.” (Shotaro doesn’t think this label really applies to him; it’s not his fault he doesn’t really like academics and the one activity he really enjoys – dancing – is far too expensive for him to pursue). For a final, crucial thing, Kaneda is the leader of the Capsules, the rival gang to Yuta’s Clowns. The fact that Kaneda could very literally kill Shotaro’s adoptive brother of sorts any day now understandably precludes him from feeling much of an affinity towards his classmate.

Shotaro has been taunted more times than he can remember for being the “boring” Shotaro. But if skating by under the radar to receive his vocational high school diploma, getting out, and not being sent to Jaws for discipline twice a week is boring to his classmates, Shotaro doesn’t really care.

Well, he didn’t care, until he had gotten to thinking one day last week. It started when he’d found Yuta’s stash of drugs. Yuta tries very hard to keep any evidence of his dependency from his little brother, but he’s not always great at it. Over the years, Shotaro couldn’t help but notice the blissful calm which comes over Yuta when Shotaro has caught him thinking he was taking the stuff in private. Nor could Shotaro help but register the ensuing boost in energy and motivation. It had always made him wonder even if Yuta categorically forbid it and he was good at smothering his curiosity. When Shotaro came to school the next day and mentioned finding Yuta’s pills offhand to Sungchan, the younger boy proved less adept at quashing his hunger for new experiences, and Shotaro had begun to truly let his imagination get the best of him.

“Hey!” The harsh whisper startles Shotaro out of his preoccupation with the look and feel of his capsule, to the extent that he almost blunders and drops it down the five graduated rows of seats below him. But fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, he holds on.

The voice is as familiar as the backseat of Yuta’s motorcycle and coming from the level of seats behind Shotaro, so he turns around. Class has devolved to the point that having a full conversation stage-whisper style is about the least disruptive thing occurring.

Sungchan’s oversized frame and comforting smile loom over Shotaro from above, like a benevolent version of the mechanical surveillance vultures Sungchan had once gushed in horror that the American government was trying to build.

“Did I scare you?” Sungchan asks.

Shotaro fakes a glare at his best friend, but only ends up chuckling.

“How could I be scared by a 185cm walking teddy-bear?”

Sungchan tries to look hurt but giggles right back.

“Did you get the stuff?”

Shotaro nods, angling his hand so Sungchan can see the pill.

“Why were you so late to class?” Shotaro asks, feeling irrational panic nipping at the edges of his mind for the first time all day to suggest that maybe Sungchan was held up because someone caught him with drugs. Shotaro wonders why this thought hadn’t occurred to him earlier, hoping that’s an indication of its ridiculousness.

“I got caught up talking to Sawako in the nurse’s office,” Sungchan explains, and Shotaro relaxes a little. “She was very chatty for some reason and I felt bad. I think she’s lonely. Did you know Kaneda got her pregnant?”

“No, what?” Shotaro makes a face as disapproving as he feels. “That asshole. Of course he wouldn’t use protection. Ugh, anyway. Did you get what you wanted? Everything go smoothly?”

Sungchan pulls a button-size plastic bag from his pocket and displays, not quite covertly enough for Shotaro’s liking but he’ll live, the identical red and white capsule within.

“Perfect.”

“I was thinking,” Sungchan continues, “Sawako said she thinks there’ll be a battle between the Capsules and the Clowns tonight. Should we try to catch some of it?”

Shotaro leans his elbows onto the desk in front of his friend and smiles, indulgent.

“While we’re high for the first time? Sounds like a shitty idea.” Sungchan pouts like Shotaro knew he would, so he adds a “we can feel it out in the moment, though,” because he is a weak man when it comes to Sungchan’s wants and needs. They are both that way towards each other, even when it gets them into trouble. But as Yuta always says, “memorable trouble is worth it”; i.e., if it makes a good story in the future, might as well go for it.

“Yuta would kill me if he found out though,” Shotaro wagers, “and I mean that literally.”

The last class of the day ends as he’s speaking and he and Sungchan make plans for meeting in the evening as they filter out of the musty, chipping paint, brutalist structure which is supposed to pass for a place of learning.

Shotaro finds Yuta where he always does after school: unsheathing his motorcycle in the back parking lot.

Yuta’s bike is a souped-up Honda painted to look like a 1940s bomber. Yuta wears a black leather biking suit he probably slipped on in the men’s room before heading out and pulls a helmet decorated with clown makeup over his black mullet as he greets his little brother, following the exchange by offering a similar helmet to Shotaro.

They hop on and head out onto the streets of Neo-Tokyo. Skyscrapers tower grey in the daytime light what feels like miles above the litter-strewn street and block out the sun. They’re so massive they could probably each hold an entire city’s worth of people, Shotaro reckons, and they move sluggishly in opposition to the trajectory of the bike, like cargo ships trudging against water.

“Good day?” Yuta asks when they stop at an intersection next to Flower Alley Mall.

“Yeah,” Shotaro assures. “Sungchan heard something about a battle tonight? What’s up with that?”

“I don’t want to get into it, but he’s right,” Yuta admits. “But don’t try to tag along or I’ll murder you.”

With that, the light turns and Shotaro grabs hold of Yuta, mumbling “I know” fondly into his shoulder. They zip away like that the rest of the way to their apartment, the capsule burning nuclear in Shotaro’s pocket as he’s left to ponder his next move.

[akindofmagictoo]

20 first lines tag game

this comes from @zmlorenz and also I think @amillionwips — thank you both!

rules: list the first lines of your last 20 stories (if you have less than 20 stories just list them all). see if there are any patterns. choose your favourite opening line. then tag others. 

(I will tag @writingbyjillian @pamsdrabbles @sleepyowlwrites and anyone who wants to play!) 

Hurricane 

Tempest stilled her bouncing leg, eyeing her sleeping husband. Had she woken him? She took a careful breath and didn’t let it go until he snored and rolled over, pulling the covers tighter around himself. Still she waited. One breath. Two breaths. When he still didn’t move, she stood up and grabbed her coat and sword belt, not even bothering to put them on. Because she had to leave, and she had to leave today. 

Theo x Aella Little Mermaid AU

Water closed over his head, tugged at his clothes. Tugged him down… down… 

He wanted to cry out for help, but the water filled up his mouth before he could make a sound. Cold stole into his limbs, heavy and dark, weighing him down. 

His chest ached, searching for air. Deep, cold darkness wrapped around him. Dragging, pressing, pulling down.

Down… down… down… 

When he’d hit the water, he’d panicked. That was gone now. All he felt was the cold, the deep dark cold.

a random post-canon Theo x Aella oneshot 

Thunder rumbled overhead, blending into the drumming of the rain on the roof. Aella tucked her blanket more tightly around herself, but it did no good. She couldn’t sleep. She couldn’t keep her mind off the locked front door, Alanna’s instruction to stay inside. It felt too much like other locked doors. Every time she closed her eyes, she was back there again and—

No. Sitting in this bed alone with her thoughts would do no good.

a post-canon Theo x Aella oneshot (sort of the former version of the one above)

“Read the mermaid one again.” Aella snuggled against Theo, pressed up between him and the arm of the big old armchair. 

a Theo x Aella modern AU 

Even with a map on his phone, Theo was impressed he’d made it to the small cafe on the main street. True, it was the main street, but his new house wasn’t, and directions weren’t his forte. Given how recently he’d moved, it was at least understandable. 

The cafe was small, but its list of drink options was larger than he’d expected. But it included several types of tea, so he ordered a familiar English Breakfast and sat down at the nearest table.

post-canon oneshot of the Hurricane women play ‘theatre’ 

“So, who’s up next?” Aria stretched out in her hammock. “As much as I enjoyed being the defence lawyer, I think it’s someone else’s turn.” 

“I’ll play the accused. I want to try my daring escape again,” Aella volunteered, sitting up. 

Theo grinned. “Because you got caught last time?” 

a crossover royalty AU with another project (Labyrinth) 

(this isn’t the first line, but it’s the first lines where Theo appears. also, you would be correct if you assume that the Spanish princess is not Aella. that is the complication.) 

“Spain confirmed the marriage alliance,” said Jared. “We still have to confirm it one last time, though.” 

Theo glanced up at his dad. “Hardly surprising, really. They offered it, after all.” 

Jared nodded. “Are you still alright with this? We can turn them down now, if you want.” 

“My calendar is free,” said Theo, straight-faced. “I mean, it’s not like I’ve got my eye on someone else or whatever. Just as long as I’m not expected to actually have a romantic relationship with the Spanish princess.” 

the below are all fanfictions. [ps my AO3 is @/ sidebysidewithafriend go check it out if any of these fics interest you] 

Shadow and Cottontail (Harry Potter: Marauders (OC insert)) 

(this is co-written, I’m posting the first part that I wrote) 

“Is there mail today?” Kai Lupin jumped the last step down to the dining room. This was the same question she’d been asking for five days, but she asked anyway. 

Her mother Hope was about to answer when an owl swooped through the open window, a parchment envelope clutched in its beak. 

“I think the answer is yes,” said Remus, descending the stairs behind her with a little more care than she’d taken. Kai rolled her eyes and crossed the room to see what the envelope contained.

Hope was already taking it from the owl. “It’s from Hogwarts,” Hope said, and Kai’s heart leapt, only to be dashed by her mother’s next words. “But there’s only one envelope. It’s addressed to you, Kai.” 

Told You You’d Kill It (Harry Potter: Romione) 

“Ugh.” Ron shoved his books to one side and ran a hand through his hair, making it stick up in all different directions. Hermione hid a smile as Ron drew his hands inside his jumper sleeves.

Through a yawn, he continued, “I’m done. I’m so tired.” Probably from his basketball training, but schoolwork was also a struggle for him, she knew. And they’d been studying in the library for several hours now. No wonder he was exhausted.

Thank You For Saving My Cat (Harry Potter: Jily) 

Lily pushed herself up to a sitting position and breathed a small sigh of relief. At least she was out. She turned back to the house, watching the orange flames that danced over the structure with her heart in her throat. Was it her imagination, or were they growing smaller?

Most of her stuff could be replaced. But she hoped nonetheless that she wouldn’t have to.

Then she remembered the one thing she’d left behind and couldn’t replace. Crookshanks. She stumbled to her feet. Legs shaking under her, she ran to the nearest firefighter and grabbed their sleeve. The firefighter gear covered its occupant’s face, but the voice sounded male. “Are you alright?” He took her arm gently, steadying her.

3AM (Harry Potter: Wolfstar) 

The beeping of the fire alarm filtered into Sirius’s sleeping brain, burrowing in until he couldn’t help but wake up. At which point he groaned and wrapped his pillow around his head, trying to block out the noise.

But this was a fire alarm, so really he had to get up. Grudgingly, he removed the pillow from his head and fumbled for his phone to check the time. The light from the screen was blinding in the darkness of his dorm room, but after a moment his eyes adjusted to see that it was 3:07 AM.

Give Him Back to Me (The Great Library: Wolfe x Santi) 

Day 1

“Nic?” Wolfe half-rose from the bed at the sound of knocking, leaving his Codex open beside him. Something was off, though. Nic wouldn’t knock. He had a key. Besides, Nic was away in Belgium, training a new company. He wasn’t due back for another day or two, and that was assuming everything went to plan.

Nevertheless, when the knock came again he got to his feet and headed for the door.

Death Is Not Fair (Shadowhunters: (very angsty) Malec) 

It wasn’t fair. Then again, life wasn’t fair.

And neither was death.

It shouldn’t have happened. It should have been a simple mission. The scans and all the reports had said there was just one demon in the area. It was a larger, stronger demon, and would’ve put up a good fight, but it was still practically nothing to a Shadowhunter like Alec.

Untitled (Shadowhunters: Sizzy) (unfinished and un-posted) 

Izzy was swearing off dating. She’d kind of thought about it before, but hearing about the amount of drama in Jace’s love life right now cemented the idea firmly in her mind. No more dating. Between that and the mess Alec had gone through a couple of months ago, she wasn’t sure she wanted any part of that. Not to mention that of all the boys she’d dated, none of the relationships had really been right. Did she believe in The One? She wasn’t sure. But none of her boyfriends had been it, that was for sure. So no more dating for her. She was here to study forensic chemistry, after all, and surely it was better to concentrate on that.

Moving Day (Riordanverse: Blitzstone) 

Last? signed Hearth. 

Blitz brushed a speck of dust from the shoulder of his shirt, studying Hearth’s face. He knew exactly how many boxes were left to move, and it was more than zero, but the elf was looking paler than usual. If that was possible. As he watched, Hearth swayed a little and put a hand on the wall for support. “No. But I’ll get the rest. You need a break.”

Untitled quarantine AU (Riordanverse: Percabeth) (unfinished and un-posted)

“Thanks for letting me stay over to finish this project,” said Annabeth, setting the last piece on the model Coliseum she’d made. They’d done most of it last night, and she was just adding the finishing touches now. Although that had been before school had been shut down; they’d been notified the night before, but since she was here she’d been determined to finish it.  

Untitled (The Hobbit) (I have a “better version of Tauriel’s arc” thing in the works, and this is an accompanying oneshot of how the Durins died in this version) (un-posted) 

“Where is he? It looks empty. I think Azog has fled.” Fili glanced around nervously, his breath steaming in the icy air. 

“I don’t think so,” said Thorin. 

Footsteps sounded on the ice, echoing in all directions. It was impossible to know their source. 

“We’ve got company,” Thorin growled. 

Kili readied his sword. 

This was practically everyday for them at this point. Every motion of his sword, every footstep, every bit of it was familiar. Fili hardly had to think. His sword flashed in the faint light. Droplets of blood and crystals of ice spattered his exposed skin, hot and cold. He was at home here; he might not have been on the ice before, but with a sword in his hand and Kili and Thorin at his back, he was content.

this is VERY long. if you read to here, thank you! and maybe consider reading some of them in full on my AO3? 

[jcmorrigan]

I saw the tag- I am gonna ask you about the crossover universe- (omg I’m literally gushing about this)

OH, IT IS TIME!

 So you can find a lot of this on the “What is the WHAM ARMY?” page on my blog – I’ll try to remember to link it; I’m drafting this in a word processor first so I don’t use it. Essentially, this is the universe I’ve created for my fanfic “Taking Back the Crown,” which is about…basically my favorite villains all moving into the same house and trying to take over the multiverse. And then it got lore. And more lore. Because I cannot write anything normal. The fic is nearing its 150th chapter and I’m nowhere NEAR exhausted of all the ideas I want to put in it – it’s just my big playground for hyperfixation fun. Anyway, here’s a rundown of the major points of it!

 THE CAST

 The main characters are the eight villains who are the founders of the WHAM ARMY. The faction name is an acronym of their first initials. They’re my ultrafaves, the villains I always get fluttery heart for, and probably the biggest collection of losers you can imagine. I’ll put them in order of the acronym and give you some background on how each entered the team.

Wuya (Xiaolin Showdown) – So the connecting factor between these people is that Mozenrath (his name is a few slots down) is their team leader and the one who decided to build a team in the first place. Wuya was recruited when Mozenrath found her puzzle box in an ancient vault. This is set post-series for XS (and Chronicles is not at all canon), so what had happened is in the big Showdown right after Raimundo was named team leader officially in the finale, the Xiaolin Monks won ALL the Shen Gong Wu to their side and stuffed Wuya in the box. So Mozenrath found her and let her out so they could be pals. A magic potion let her regain human form fairly early on, and her power isn’t even nerfed either the way Chase Young would’ve done.

Huntsman (American Dragon: Jake Long) – ADJL is also post-series in this timeline. Mozenrath has the power to resurrect people from the dead at will because he’s memorized an ancient and incredibly complex ritual that he can execute mentally (note that this means you can remove this ability from him by tampering with his memories). The Huntsman was resurrected so as to show Mozenrath around the old Huntsclan vault (which is where they found Wuya’s puzzle box). No other Huntsclan member survived the purge except Rose (and 88 and 89, but they don’t count and aren’t in this story), so the Huntsman is starting from square one.

Ayam Aghoul (Aladdin: The Animated Series): Basically just got sick of losing. He’d teamed up with a few other rando Aladdin rogues to try and pick a fight with Maleficent, and she sent him packing. So he ended up finding one of the few residents of the Seven Deserts who was powerful enough to match him AND had a similar grudge against Maleficent.

Mozenrath (Aladdin: The Animated Series): The man of the hour and the creator of the entire team. He starts the fic by crashing Maleficent’s KH Disney Villain alliance and trying to add himself to it, but…ends up being such a disrespectful nuisance that Hades just drags him straight down to the Underworld. That moment inspired him to get his OWN band of friends and start making a name for himself.

Archibald Snatcher (The Boxtrolls): Met Mozenrath in the Underworld after his death in film canon. Annoyed Hades one too many times by claiming that he wasn’t actually supposed to die, seeing as he isn’t allergic to dairy (he is), so Hades threw him in the same cell as Mozenrath and…

Roman Torchwick (RWBY): I started writing this fic in 2016, immediately post-V3, so it’s canon-divergent after the last episode of V3 (but I got all the later-game characters to show up eventually). Which means Roman is ALSO dead at the start of this fic. He ALSO comes storming up to Hades insisting he’s not even supposed to be dead. At the same time as Snatcher is already pestering him. Which is how Mozenrath, Snatcher, and Roman end up in the same jail cell in Tartarus and get the idea that maybe they should break back into the world of the living and try to build something BETTER than what any of the three had beforehand.

Mad Madam Mim (The Sword in the Stone): Mozenrath, immediately after breaking out of the Underworld, attempted to take over Arthur’s kingdom by just walking in and throwing magic around. It backfired horribly when Merlin showed up. But then Mim showed up to counter Merlin and realized that maybe she had a potential friend here who was as blackhearted as she.

Yzma (The Emperor’s New Groove): Post-TENG, no KNG or TENS (but I reference things from TENS every now and again). Merlin turned Mozenrath into a rat, so Mim brought him to Yzma’s Secret Lab to change him back. There, they found Yzma as a cat, and she so desperately wanted out of her living situation that she added herself to the team. She was also restored to human form shortly thereafter.

 There is a potential ninth member of the core in the form of Vexen (Kingdom Hearts). KH is canon-divergent after DDD and basically ignores almost every game that comes out after Fragmentary Passage. Vexen, as Even, was trying to integrate into life as a hero in Radiant Garden, except everyone annoyed him way too much, so he decided to go be with people that would give right back any insults he dished out. And then realized he was much happier being on the evil team and doing mad science with no ethics. However, he will not be promoted to the upper ranks because 1. it would spoil the acronym and 2. he is unanimously agreed-upon to be the biggest wet blanket of the group and nobody wants him at the founder parties.

(Imagine my disbelief when the actual canon arc for Vexen was THE REVERSE ONE IN WHICH HE JUST DECIDES TO GO LIVE AT RADIANT GARDEN AND NOT BE ANNOYED BY ANYTHING and that’s why JC doesn’t like Kingdom Hearts III)

 Anyway, this crew is a bunch of silly friends who enjoy partying, singing, dancing, drag, indulging in vices, causing mayhem, taking over cities, arranging for mass murder, piecing together smear campaigns…but they’re all pretty much ride or die for each other. And that goes double for the ships of the set: Mozenrath/Huntsman, Mim/Aghoul, Wuya/Yzma, and my favorite ship to end all favorites, Roman/Snatcher (RedHatBlackHat is the ship name).

From there, you have a B-Squad of, like, seventy other people based on my faves. Nonnie, I know you saw this because of Vincent Edgeworth, Victor Blake, and Albert Krueger, and they are three of COUNTLESS examples. It’s a found crime family that keeps getting bigger as I get more fave villains and there’s hardly a rhyme or a reason. Currently, they live in a floating fortress designed when they stole Terra Cyclonia (Storm Hawks) and hefted it out into the aether between worlds with crystal technology.

 They have a rival hero faction in the form of the Cinnamons: a gathering of people who they’ve wronged who turned out to make pretty good friends themselves. While the WHAM ARMY are the villain-protag team that you feel slightly bad loving the escapades of, the Cinnamons are the rainbows, fluff, sunshine, (secret crippling depression and anxiety), and pep-talkers of the multiverse. They’re the deuteragonist team as opposed to the “villains” of the story. They also have eight “leaders,” but they were picked up a little less quickly than the WHAM ARMY founders, instead coming together over the span of a much longer quest. These people are:

Sora (Kingdom Hearts): Heart of the team and the person who pulled them all together, because Sora loves everyone. He, Riku, and Kairi witnessed the WHAM ARMY wreaking destruction on both Radiant Garden and Disney Castle, and Sora decided no one gets to treat his homes-away-from-home like that and get away with it! Between Mozenrath and the still-looming threats of Maleficent and Xehanort, he’s now collecting pals from all worlds to fight against evil and do as much good as they can do! (While having sleepovers.)

Ruby Rose (RWBY): Before she, Nora, Ren, and Jaune could get into Mistral, Sora interrupted them on their path and directed them right back around to Vale with the news that Roman Torchwick was back in action. After an incident involving the Destiny Trio and Team RNJR having to team up and actually kill the massive Grimm unleashed in the V3 endgame, they all headed out to Radiant Garden together to continue their mission.

Papyrus (Undertale): Sora found him while exploring worlds and they clicked immediately as pals. Then the WHAM ARMY, who was living in Mt. Ebott at the time, sparked an anti-monster racist sentiment through the town, and Papyrus was advised to leave the world for his own safety, so he went traveling with Sora.

Stork (Storm Hawks): Maleficent, who is also an active player in this game, made a power play by destroying the Condor with the entire Storm Hawks team onboard while they were on the Far Side of Atmos (post-series). Stork, believing himself to be the only survivor, attempted to take his own life – only for Sora to show up just in time and offer him something better: hope that his friends survived, and new friends to tag along with until they could prove either way.

Jasmine (Aladdin): The Cinnamons came looking to Agrabah for more information on Mozenrath. When Jasmine heard he was causing chaos, she decided to get personally involved.

Katara (Avatar: The Last Airbender): Post-ATLA, no LoK. Sora made a trip to the Fire Nation to see if he could head off the WHAM ARMY’s latest scheme, and ran into the Gaang along the way. After helping Katara, Aang, and Zuko protect the Fire Nation from a very near miss, Sora invited them to come travel with him. Only Katara accepted at first, the other two wanting to clean things up on their homeworld.

Kazuichi Soda (DanganRonpa): Post-SDR2, no DR3. Xehanort requested Izuru Kamukura be used as a vessel, and Kazuichi went in Izuru/Hajime’s place so his buddy didn’t have to. But the first chance he got, Kazuichi turned and ran from the Castle That Never Was…where Sora had just crash-landed. Kazuichi patched up Sora’s ship, and immediately became part of his crew. (Worth noting: in this AU, the Remnants of Despair were never brainwashed and were completely aware of what they were doing. Kazuichi is basically a redemption story, trying to be a better person to make up for the hell he caused. Also, while on the Despair side, he’d hacked off his leg to sew Junko’s in its place, disabling himself – that leg goes through an arc regarding what prosthesis is in its place.)

Rapunzel (Tangled): After the Vardaros arc of S2 of Rapunzel’s Tangled Adventure. Rapunzel was targeted by the WHAM ARMY because she was essentially a living MacGuffin for one of their spells. Sora showed up, and Rapunzel decided to go along with him for safety AND fun, leaving Cassandra to continue the pilgrimage to the Dark Kingdom. (Wrote this before KHIII was out. And before the Evil Cass twist.)

 And just like the WHAM ARMY, these folks have a huge B-squad that lives in the Radiant Garden castle and helps them deal with the various tragedies they have to clean up after. Riku, Kairi, and Jaune Arc in particular get a decent amount of stage time.

 As you can see, Maleficent (Sleeping Beauty/Kingdom Hearts) and her forces are another big set of chess pieces on the board! After she sent Mozenrath to gay baby jail and it didn’t stick, she’s been trying to continue plans for domination as usual but ALSO wipe the WHAM ARMY off the face of the multiverse. She, Jafar (Aladdin), Ursula (The Little Mermaid), and Hades (Hercules) all came straight here from KH. But I’m working to model that team’s inner circle on the team in “Quite a Glittering Assemblage,” the sister fic by gavillain (it’s basically this premise but Maleficent gets a team to start instead, but similarities end there, his is a whole different, fresh, and fun flavor). I’ve just gotten all these characters intro’d instory, but the other biggies are Loki (Marvel – I based him in the Cinematic Universe but he’s kind of just an amalgamation of Lokis), Dr. Doom (Marvel), Captain Hook (Once Upon a Time), Russell Edgington (True Blood), and Fish Mooney (Gotham). Currently, they operate out of the Forbidden Mountain in the Enchanted Dominion.

 There’s also a very new addition as of the 140’s chapters: the Heathens. This is a squad of villains with moral lines in the sand (and some antiheroes or corrupted heroes). Basically, these aren’t your killers for fun. These are the people who steal candy from the gas station and think they’re slick, but the point is they’re enjoying themselves so just let it happen. The four founders of this one are Harley Quinn (DC – based on The Batman but an amalgamation of Harleys that leans sympathetic), Yang Xiao Long (RWBY), Giovanni Potage (Epithet Erased), and Velvet Crowe (Tales of Berseria). Currently, they operate out of the old mansion in Twilight Town.

 The Xehanorts are here, and that team is largely who you think it is – though I stripped away Vexen, Demyx, Marluxia, Larxene, and Luxord in order to replace them ALL with Xaldin. More crossover shenanigans to come on this front. This team isn’t very active – they’re waiting for the Keyblade War – but they’re operating out of the World That Never Was.

 There’s also another side villain faction: the Morbians, led by Mirage (Aladdin: The Animated Series). These are the demons of fear, the stuff that lurks in your nightmares, and…the villains I really like but who I don’t quite think fit in with the WHAM ARMY or any other more prominent group. But to give you an idea of what the flavor of this team is, she’s recruited not one but TWO Boogeymen – Pitch Black (Rise of the Guardians) and Oogie Boogie (The Nightmare Before Christmas).

 There will be more villain factions to come, and I kind of want to splinter the Cinnamons to multiple bases as well. Obviously it’s easier to split villains up because they’re fun to write at war with each other – when I have hero teams come up against each other, usually they end up becoming best buddies instead of fighting, and that’s how I like it, but that’s why there’s just ONE BIG HERO TEAM as opposed to the many villain squads rattling around.

 THE SETTING

 So as you have probably gleaned, the multiverse setup is largely based on Kingdom Hearts, which is one of my favorite things (in the KH1 through Fragmentary Passage era anyway). There are many worlds that can be visited either by Gummi Ship or Corridor of Darkness. Basically any evil-aligned sorcerer can use Corridors in this ‘verse – they’ve opened their souls to Darkness and have magic, so they can do so.

 The implication is that every world represents a separate “story” or part of one. As in if it’s a work of fiction HERE, it’s a world THERE. Some characters are actually savvy enough to know they’re fictional (e.g. Megavolt from Darkwing Duck, Xayide from The Neverending Story). Most of them aren’t built to handle the news, though, and just shrug it off if told. (No, really, the cosmic order prevents them from taking that news seriously if they’re not from something that regularly leans on the fourth wall anyway.)

 But sometimes, things get AU’d in without their full worlds. I was inspired by how Final Fantasy is treated in canon KH, and once I started bringing in more FF stuff by the same method, I felt motivated to do that with MORE fandoms if I felt the characters could be divorced from their settings and histories easily. I’ve done it for most Disney Channel non-animated properties as well as Satellite City (ain’t that the worst combo you’ve ever looked at). I’m planning to do it for Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn because I’m coming up on a location I want to delve into the civilization of but don’t have many canon characters for, so guess what, you get the FE cast now.

 Major worlds or relevant locations in play are the Cyclonian warship, Radiant Garden, Twilight Town, and occasionally the Enchanted Dominion, but we move from plotline to plotline with journeys to many, many, MANY worlds of things I want to play with the settings and casts of. Also, the Cyclonian warship is about to get replaced with another WHAM ARMY base; we’ll get there.

 THE STORY

 For the first major “book” of TBTC, the WHAM ARMY has found a spell that they think will let them conquer the entire multiverse by giving them control over Kingdom Hearts itself. All they have do to is collect a bunch of MacGuffins that correspond to twelve elements: fire, water, earth, air, light, darkness, life, death, time, space, entropy, and aether. In order to do this, they visit the worlds of KH, RWBY, Avatar, Storm Hawks, Okami, Undertale, Wakfu, The Legend of Zelda, The Neverending Story, My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, and many many more. The Cinnamons catch wind of what they’re doing and start assembling. Meanwhile Maleficent is on the hunt for the Book of Prophecies and starts hiring villains on her team as well. After many madcap adventures and some devastating tragedies near endgame, the Cinnamons accidentally put the Book of Prophecies in Maleficent’s hands at the same time that Maleficent finally captures Mozenrath and gets him under heel. The WHAM ARMY and Cinnamons both launch attacks on Maleficent’s forces, and each walks away with what they came for. This is also the part where we slowburn up to the four major WHAM ARMY ships and many Cinnamon ships. In the end, the WHAM ARMY actually gets all the ingredients for their spell, but what they don’t know is it will actually cause the DESTRUCTION of the worlds. So an outside force intervenes (Discord from MLPFIM, who later joins the WHAM ARMY because he wants friends who actually appreciate him as a villain and won’t make him change) to stop them, and the next thing they know, they’re starting from square one.

 We’re now in the second “book” of this story. The Cinnamons are gathering up all lost friends – the rest of Team RWBY, the Gaang, the Storm Hawks (who did in fact survive the explosion), the lost KH characters. The WHAM ARMY, on the other hand, is gathering up more villains to bolster their forces for a new evil plan: to conquer the worlds one by one, starting with Atlantis (Disney’s Atlantis: The Lost Empire) and using portals to link to other territories of interest. While the WHAM ARMY is essentially working through a to-do list of what they need before they can launch such a massive invasion, the Cinnamons are finding strength in numbers because the writing’s on the wall that between Mozenrath, Maleficent, Mirage, and Xehanort, things are going to get worse before they get better, and as evil builds, good will need to rise to protect the innocent. As for Maleficent, she’s no longer able to chase the Book of Prophecies, and so, because she’s got Hades, Loki, and Salem (RWBY) there and they’re all like “Even though we’re pretty godlike, we are not that happy with how the gods we knew have run things,” Maleficent’s new goal is to slaughter the gods of all pantheons (minus those in her care) and replace them with her allies.

 Anyway, as I had said in the post you saw, Anon – I basically take everything fictional I love and shove it into this AU for daydreams because it lets me imagine my faves having CROSSOVER INTERACTIONS and doing cool epic stuff on a multi-world scale. (But as much as I’ve talked up the epic aspect, a lot of it is just…like…people fucking around and hosting karaoke nights.) Anyway, I hope this gave you a good sense of the madness, and I hope it serves as a reminder to everyone that they can and should just. Make a daydream and/or fanfic universe that’s indulgent as hell. Just do it.

[glorious-blackout]

Self-Indulgent Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino/Simulation Theory Crossover Fix-It Part Two:

@rock-n-roll-fantasy Turns out I can’t chastise you too much for not feeling satisfied with your own work because I’m not sure I’m ever going to be happy with this part 😅 Hopefully I’ve been able to (mostly) salvage it from its messy first draft form. I’ve been editing Part Three in tandem with this one so hopefully it won’t take me too long to finish that off as well. With all that preamble out of the way, I hope you enjoy this part 🥰

Part One

Original Fic

**********************************************************

Alex awoke to the sight of gentle sunbeams drifting through the window, highlighting floating dust motes as golden light cascaded towards the floorboards.  

It was as warm as the clear skies outside would suggest. The logs residing in the extinguished burner had been reduced to mere blackened husks surrounded by papery strips of ash. Judging by the growing discomfort caused by the many layers covering Alex’s frame, the warmth they once provided was no longer an urgent necessity.  

It took a couple of seconds for his surroundings to make sense. The unfamiliar sights and smells of the seaside cabin left him drifting in confusion, unable to remember how he wound up sleeping on the floor among a pile of sweaty bedsheets. It was only when his subconscious noted a rather significant absence that the events of yesterday resurfaced with a jolt, and he found himself torn between slipping back into a dreamless slumber and lurching to his feet in search of Matt.

Because Matt should have been there, shouldn’t he? A scattered mess of tangled bedsheets remained in the spot where he had been lying last night, but when Alex placed a hand upon their surface he found that they had grown cold. The cabin remained quiet with the exception of occasional footfalls as someone pottered about behind him, but they sounded far too heavy to belong to Matt. On top of that, Matt’s lurid jacket had been left in a heap atop the pile of sheets, the mass of LED panels dim and lifeless in the absence of power. Alex knew, or he assumed he did, that if Matt had any intention of leaving then he would have woken him first, but much as he tried, he could not remember any attempts to rouse him.

The growing heat was getting to him. Alex groaned in discomfort as he became acutely aware of the sweat gluing his jeans to his thighs, and he kicked wildly at the sheets which had entrapped him overnight. The downside of lying on a firm wooden surface with little padding made itself evident as he sat up, noting every new ache across his body with a groan as the room span in the wake of his sudden movements. Only when the world stilled and the nausea settled in his gut did he acknowledge that he appeared to be the last one up. The only person remaining in the cabin besides himself was a well-rested Jeremiah who - despite being at least two decades older than Alex - appeared to have more energy in that moment than the younger man could dream of having.  

Jeremiah had noticed his tortuous awakening, if the amusement glinting in his eyes was any indication. Alex’s discomfort must have been clear as day, for the older man immediately wandered towards the stockpile of water and freed one bottle before chucking it in Alex’s direction. The action was followed by the suggestive rise of a finger to Jeremiah’s lips, leaving Alex with the distinct impression that his partner would hardly appreciate this gratuitous sharing of supplies.  

Not that George appeared to be here either.  

Alex barely had time to be thankful for George’s absence, for his attention was immediately drawn to the precious bottle in his hands. It occurred to him that his sluggish, pseudo-hungover state could have more to do with the fact that his mouth was as dry as a desert than he’d previously appreciated. Without a second thought, he ripped the lid from the bottle and gulped as much of the lukewarm water as he could manage in one go. He could hear a distant chuckle over the sound of liquid cascading down his throat, but any self-consciousness over what he must look like left him in an instant. He was parched and sore and far too overheated for comfort, and he’d emerged less than twenty-four hours ago onto a planet that had been ruined beyond repair. Shame was hardly an emotion he had the energy to experience.

The bottle was completely drained in record time, and Alex closed his eyes in quiet satisfaction for a moment. Only upon opening them again did he remember what had roused him with such urgency, and he cast his eyes around the cabin as though Matt could somehow be concealed within its walls. The sheer impossibility of this notion became obvious quickly, given how small their living space was, but even the outside world seemed far too quiet for his liking.  

George’s absence was equally unexplained, and Alex started to wonder if the two were linked. Much as he liked and implicitly trusted Jeremiah, he couldn’t help but feel uneasy about George. The man had made no secret of his dislike for strangers the second he set eyes upon the pair of newcomers. At one point his manner had even evoked echoes of Murphy, which was hardly a marker of good character in Alex’s book. Admittedly, he knew that Matt had encountered and ultimately defeated worse foes than a grumpy middle-aged man, but it appeared that finding himself exposed to this unfamiliar world had taken hold of Alex’s nerves and dialled them up to eleven.

A fact which must have been blatantly obvious to anyone with eyes.  

“Yer boy’s alright, don’t you worry,” Jeremiah announced out of the blue, chuckling with mirth when Alex turned to him, wide-eyed and more than a little frazzled. Mornings had never been his strong suit, and this one was proving to be especially strenuous. Jeremiah, on the other hand, looked perfectly serene - or as serene as a grizzled survivor could look anyway. He had been in the process of strapping himself into a pair of thick walking boots before Alex’s panic had become too blatant to ignore.

“George was all fer kickin’ ya out, but yer friend made a case fer ya hangin’ around and earnin’ yer keep,” Jeremiah explained further, heaving a sigh at the mention of his partner’s lack of hospitality. Alex felt a sliver of fear creep up his spine at the prospect of having to leave their newfound shelter so soon, followed by a spark of gratitude over the fact that Matt had apparently wrangled his way out of an early eviction. “I woulda been happy with ya stayin’ regardless, but a little extra help would be nice I s’pose. They headed off about an hour ago. George always likes ta head out before the sun grows fierce.”

“Oh,” was all Alex could say, unsure whether he should feel reassured or not. At least he finally had an explanation for Matt’s whereabouts, though he imagined it would be easier to take comfort from that if he hadn’t been paired with the very man who’d wandered into the cabin wielding a shotgun last night.  

The unspoken implications of Matt’s bargaining tactics weren’t lost on him either. “Take it I’m joining you then?”

His phrasing made him come across as far more reluctant than intended, though if Jeremiah took any offence, he was gracious enough not to show it.  

“Only if ya fancy it,” the older man said with a bashful shrug. Alex couldn’t help but wonder if he could detect a trace of disappointment in the man’s otherwise cheerful tone, and an uncomfortable sense of guilt coiled in his gut. “Ya could always cook dinner or give the place a bit o’ a scrub if you’d prefer?”

The proposal was almost tempting. Casting a glance around the cabin was enough to assure Alex that the place was hardly in need of an intensive cleaning session, and no doubt he could whip up something edible from the extensive stockpile of canned goods their hosts had amassed. Staying here on his own would give him time to unwind. Time to breathe. He could take a stroll across the beach and let his body sink beneath the waves, just for a little while, until any trace of lingering doubt vanished from his mind and he allowed himself to accept the fact that he had made it home.  

Only, the longer he dwelled on it, the more obvious it became that spending the day alone would be a terrible idea. In Jeremiah’s company, he would at least be provided with a distraction. Someone to bounce conversation off of; someone who could offer valuable information about this world which had become so alien to him. The alternative would inevitably result in his mind subjecting him to cruel imaginings regarding the fates of his loved ones, and he knew full well that his sanity was hanging by a thread as it was. Subjecting himself to loneliness was not a good idea right now, no matter how enticing the notion may seem at first glance.

“Best not,” Alex conceded, masking his inner turmoil behind a weak smile. “Me mates always say I’m hopeless at cookin’. Doubt me mum ever rated my cleaning skills either, come to think of it.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Jeremiah said with a faint chuckle, wearing an expression so carefree that his eyes were practically twinkling. He broke eye contact for only a moment, as he gathered together an old hiking rucksack and a pair of ancient fishing rods, before turning his attention back to Alex. “You ever been crab-fishin', lad?”

He had. Bitter melancholy cascaded over him as the question transported him to seaside holidays from his youth; back to lazy afternoons sat by rocky piers as his dad patiently taught him the process of fishing for crabs. As he remembered it, he always found the venture exciting for a solid half-hour, before deciding that his bucket was better-suited to building sandcastles on the nearby beach. Of all the things to be consumed by nostalgia for, he’d hardly expected crab-fishing to be one of them, but he supposed in this day and age he was doomed to become wistful about every aspect of his former life.

“Once or twice,” Alex admitted eventually. “Not since I were a kid though.”

“That’s alright,” Jeremiah said, beaming. “I ain’t had the chance to show someone the ropes for a while. Could be fun.”

With that said, he gathered his equipment together and disappeared out the door, leaving Alex on the floor with sleep clinging to his eyes and what was likely a serious case of bed-head. It struck him that Jeremiah may have expected him to follow, and with some reluctance he rose to his feet, pointedly ignoring the growl emanating from his stomach. Some food would hardly go amiss before setting off on what promised to be an intensive trip, nor would the chance to shed his sweat-stained clothes. He would not be surprised if such luxuries were denied, however. Judging by the bright sunlight beyond the window, he had likely wasted a significant chunk of the morning already, and he would no doubt be pushing his luck if he attempted to bargain for more time.

Or so he thought. While in the process of shedding his cotton jacket, Alex started as Jeremiah popped his head in the door once again with a jovialness which seemed as instinctive to him as breathing.

“You grab some breakfast now,” he ordered. While Alex doubted the man had the ability to sound stern, his tone was firm enough to convey that the demand was far from optional. Jeremiah motioned towards the extensive food stockpile with a quirk of his head – the ‘take what you like’ remaining unspoken – before pointing towards a narrow cupboard which rested beside one of the neatly-made beds. “If yer wanting a change a’ clothes, there’ll be some in that cupboard there. Can’t promise we’ll have any in yer size, but maybe you’ll get lucky. Just grab me outside when yer ready and we’ll head out together, sound like a plan?”

Once again, Alex found himself struck dumb by the man’s generosity, and all he could offer in response was a single nod. This seemed to suffice, for Jeremiah returned the action with a cheerful grin before disappearing again, whistling a jaunty tune as he went. Alex’s eyes remained pinned to the door for only a moment, until he grew tired of standing awkwardly in the middle of the room like a startled deer. Feeling empowered by Jeremiah’s offer, he made quick work of filling his belly with leftover soup and rifling through the assorted mass of clothes which had been stored away, searching for something which didn’t carry an overpowering stench of sweat.  

The heat was already beginning to grow uncomfortable by the time they headed off. Alex had settled for a crumpled cotton shirt which felt more like a tunic on his slight frame, while choosing to keep his torn jeans in favour of the gaudy oversized shorts which served as his only alternative. Overhead, the sun gradually made her ascent as a colony of gulls circled the gentle waters below, squawking shrilly in vague perturbation. Treading along the sandy path towards town felt like wading through hot treacle; the air so stifling that only the breeze offered any reprieve.  

Alex was grateful for the bottles of water Jeremiah had packed in his rucksack, though he knew deep down that he wouldn’t be able to restrain himself once he took that initial desperate sip. Perhaps if the agenda for the day really did involve sitting by the shore fishing for crabs, he could fling himself into the cool waters once the heat became unbearable. It was already consuming all of his willpower to avoid sprinting towards the waves as they drew closer to the smoking remnants of an abandoned resort.

The trail eventually led onto a vast car-park which stemmed from what was once a rich seaside promenade. Only two vehicles remained, strewn haphazardly across fading white lines on the cracked tarmac. No doubt they had been rotting there for years, judging by the shattered windows and rust-eaten exteriors; any attempt to drive them now would be the ultimate exercise in futility.  

Jeremiah led him onwards, the route ahead seemingly memorised. Alex held his tongue as they wandered along a road lined with blackened, long-dead palm trees and gutted stores which sported naïve signs declaring a temporary closure. Though there was no sign of active fires, the smell of smoke lingered heavily in the air as they passed the ruins of what must once have been a bustling resort, accompanied by another, fouler stench which Alex could not place. Occasionally they would pass by abandoned cars or overturned buses, but no evidence of humanity remained even in the form of charred corpses. Alex had steeled himself to endure that much at least, but it would appear that fate had decided to spare him from that sight.  

Not that the remains of his old home were any better. Alex had known this walkway once. During their earlier trips to LA, he had strolled along the seafront with Jamie and Matt by his side, nibbling on ice-cream and joking that moving out here wouldn’t be such a bad idea after all. The city had seemed so exciting and untouchable then; an exaggerated form of reality which didn’t play by the same rules as the rest of the universe.  

Those qualities clearly hadn’t protected it from being reduced to a burning husk.

He was grateful when Jeremiah finally steered him away from the shattered resort, strolling towards the sandy beach instead. Their journey ultimately led them onto an elevated wooden pier which stretched beyond the shoreline and into the depths of the water. The structure creaked awkwardly with every footfall as they strolled towards the far end, and Alex allowed himself to breathe again as the thick stench of smoke made way for the tang of salt. The sun remained as punishing as ever but her effects were dulled, somewhat, by a cool sea breeze which ruffled his hair and kissed his sunburnt cheeks. As they approached the very end of the pier, Alex gazed into the lapping waves below and grinned as he envisioned himself diving beneath the surface and letting the cold seep into his bones.

His guide promptly got to work setting up their equipment, content to let Alex watch as he talked him through each step. A rudimentary fishing line was shoved into Alex’s hands with the hook dangling precariously from a flimsy piece of string, before Jeremiah dug through his rucksack and freed a partially squashed tin of sardines. Jeremiah wasted no time peeling the tin open and tearing one of the unfortunate sardines into two, skewering one half onto the hook of his own line before handing the other to Alex and informing him to do the same. Alex obeyed, managing not to screw up his face at the texture as he cracked a wistful joke over the days his dad would tell him to use bacon instead. Jeremiah simply guffawed, before informing him plainly that if - by some miracle - they ever stumbled upon edible bacon again, the crabs sure as hell weren’t getting a slice.

“Right, just pop the line in the water there,” Jeremiah ordered once they were ready, leaning over the wooden barrier to cast his line into the waters below. Alex did the same, keeping his distance so as not to get their lines caught in a tangle. The hook dipped beneath the surface with a subtle splash, the waters just murky enough to conceal it from view. “Crabs have a good sense a’ smell, they’ll latch on quick. Once ya feel ‘em tuggin’, ya pull ‘em up gently. Keep yer hand steady now, or the damn things’ll smash against the pier and escape.”

Alex nodded and turned his head towards the drifting line, waiting for evidence of a subtle tug. Memories of boyhood holidays by the seafront flooded back to him as his attention was consumed by the shifting waves. He recalled his father feeding him instructions in the same, easygoing manner that Jeremiah himself had adopted. He remembered the excitement of pulling on the line and spotting a crab dangling on the end. He remembered gathering his prizes in a bucket and carrying them from the pier to the shore, only to tip the bucket onto its side and watch as his crabs raced towards the waves; cheering on his favourites and ultimately chastising them when they dawdled. Alex doubted that any catches today would be so lucky. Childish games hardly had a place in the world anymore.

Soon enough, Alex began to experimentally raise his line only to find unlucky crabs nibbling at the remains embedded on the hook. Following Jeremiah’s guidance, he raised the line upwards with a gentle hand, wary of the slightest breeze which could dislodge his prey from their perch. Despite his best efforts, one or two did end up diving beneath the waves, having devoured the sardines and escaped for freedom, but for the most part he was able to ease his catches over the railing and dump the stunned crabs into the bucket Jeremiah had provided. Neither of them were particularly chatty while they worked, but Alex did catch sight of the other man’s lips curling upwards once or twice.

“Who knows?” Jeremiah said, shortly after Alex teased his third disgruntled catch of the day into the bucket. “If yer any good at this, I might take ya out on the boat one o’ these days. Haven’t had a good shipmate in a while.”

There was something wistful in the man’s tone, and Alex thought he could see a trace of sadness in his gentle blue eyes as they stretched across the waves. Alex followed his gaze and allowed himself to imagine a quiet trip on a fishing boat, with the shattered remains of LA so far behind him that he could pretend it no longer existed in that state. He imagined the crisp sea air washing over his skin and the tales Jeremiah would tell of his past life as a humble fisherman. Such a quiet fantasy to latch onto, and yet it made his heart ache all the same. The fact that it was even a possibility felt like a novelty after all those years stranded on the moon.  

“I think I’d like that,” Alex said, throwing Jeremiah a shy smile which the older man eagerly returned. A trace of sadness still remained and Alex could feel his own longing for a simpler past tugging at his heart, but he cast such feelings aside and turned his attention back to the task at hand.  

The sun grew hotter as the day wore on, but Alex found he no longer minded. The routine of fishing gave him something to focus on beyond the sweat trickling from his brow, and the occasional splashes from particularly vigorous waves provided ample relief. Jeremiah had finally relented and retrieved the bottles of water from his rucksack, and they cracked them open and said ‘cheers’ as though sharing a particularly cool beer. From the way their faces crumpled with relief, one could be forgiven for assuming they were enjoying something far more luxurious, though Alex had to concede that a couple of ice-cubes wouldn’t have gone amiss.

For the most part they remained quiet and focused, though after a couple of hours Alex decided to try his luck and threw some general questions in Jeremiah’s direction. Not enough to pry into the man’s private life – he doubted they were friendly enough for that – but enough to get a general gist of what life had been like in recent years. The events that transpired after his hand slipped from Miles’ grasp remained a complete mystery to him; a fact he had to be careful to conceal so as not to betray his overwhelming ignorance.  

Not that the older man seemed to notice. He was quite happy to chat away while Alex listened intently, gathering clues as the conversation went on. He learned that Jeremiah had always lived by the sea and that his earliest memories revolved around going out in fishing boats with his mother. He learned that he had known George for upwards of thirty years and that the pair’s fondness for each other had survived in spite of George’s hatred of the open water and Jeremiah’s general dislike of hiking.  

Perhaps most importantly, he learned that the world had started to fall apart only five years prior. Jeremiah and George had fled to the coast alongside thousands of other evacuees as wildfires tore through the forests before ultimately claiming every town and city in their path. The actual disintegration of humanity had stretched over several endless months, heralded by one disaster after another, but Jeremiah had stubbornly waited it out while the other evacuees fled towards hope which grew slimmer by the hour. At one point, he said, the beaches had been so overrun with desperate city folk that you could barely move without trampling on some poor sod who had stumbled to the ground. Many had fled as soon as hopeful stories cropped up from elsewhere, though Jeremiah could only conclude that the vast majority had wound up running to their deaths.

No doubt that knowledge had weighed heavily on Jeremiah’s mind once. Even now it appeared that he had little desire to dwell on it, for the conversation staggered to a halt and the older man simply returned to his task with a weary sigh. Alex was grateful for this, despite his curiosity. Had he pried any further, Jeremiah may have turned the tables on him and started demanding explanations he simply didn’t have. He doubted this world-weary survivor would appreciate being told that Alex had only lasted this long because his mind and body had been ensnared by a monster with the ability to create alternate realities at will. No doubt that if Alex - and by extension Matt – had been forced to experience the apocalypse at face value, they would have met the same unfortunate fate as the desperate souls who’d gathered on the beach to escape the rising flames.

On the other hand, Jeremiah seemed like the type of man who was always destined to survive such a disaster. Watching him go about his work in silent concentration gave Alex the distinct impression that, overall, his life had barely altered in the wake of the apocalypse. Perhaps certain aspects had even become easier. In many ways he seemed like a relic of a distant past, fixated only on surviving day to day while enjoying simple pleasures as and when he encountered them.  

Alex couldn’t help but wonder if he would be able to achieve that level of contentment too, many years down the line.  

By the time the sun began to dip, the bucket was threatening to overflow as their catches wrestled each other in a bid to reach the top. Alex carefully guided the line containing his last helping of sardines upward, watching as an unsuspecting crab latched onto its last meal with vigour. It had been several hours since he’d lost a catch to the waves below, and his patience served him well as he eased the line over the wooden barrier and roughly shook the crab free, clumps of meat still clenched in its jagged claws as it tumbled into the bucket. Despite the lack of facial expression, Alex got the dimpression that the creature was regarding him with a look of utmost betrayal once it had recovered from shock.

The heat had begun to settle, for which Alex was grateful. His bottle of water had long since been drained and he could easily envision the cherry-red hue his cheeks had acquired over the course of the afternoon. Goosebumps rose along his bare arms in the wake of a cool breeze and he found himself wiping sweat from his brow less frequently as the hours wore on. Concluding that his efforts for the day had been enough, he rested his back against the railing and let his eyes slip shut as an icy spray splashed across his back.  

Jeremiah too appeared to be winding down. The man had discarded the empty tin into the depths of the water once the last clump of meat had been salvaged, and was in the process of enticing a rather stubborn crab over the precipice. Alex watched intently as the creature twisted awkwardly on the line, claw caught on the dangling hook. Before it could plunge to the depths below, Jeremiah shot out an arm and caught it mid-fall, dumping the creature alongside its friends before it could nip at his hand. With their last victim finally ensnared, Jeremiah took a moment to assess their yield before securing the bucket with a plastic lid and collecting their equipment into a neat pile.

“Not bad!” he announced with a wide grin hiding beneath his bushy beard. The sun had darkened his cheeks to a fiery red and his wild locks had been flattened under the weight of damp sweat, but the discomfort did not seem to bother him in the slightest. “Not bad at all. Ya might survive the apocalypse yet.”

His words were followed by a wink which made Alex laugh despite himself. They took a moment to simply enjoy the cool sea air; the gentle rush of waves lapping beneath their feet as the first traces of orange and pink spread across the darkening sky. With this view stretched out before them, it was easy to pretend that everything was normal. Alex could almost convince himself that the world was truly as peaceful and unbroken as it appeared, and that his home was still waiting for him mere miles away. He knew it was dangerous to get lost in thoughts like that. He knew they would only bring further pain in the long run, and yet he couldn’t stop himself. If reality insisted on being awful then he felt he was owed time to indulge in fantasy.  

He’d become well-practiced in that particular art after all.

The moment passed. Jeremiah packed away the twin set of fishing lines and secured his rucksack before throwing it over his back, while Alex lifted the weighty bucket and set off in pursuit as the older man led the way.  

The trip back seemed considerably more bearable in spite of the exhaustion creeping into his bones. Perhaps seeing the devastated remains of civilisation had been like tearing off a plaster, to the point where even the foul smells lacked the ability to horrify him. The promenade seemed shorter than he remembered and evidence of ancient tourist traps soon dwindled to make way for the slender walkway which would lead them back to the cabins. By the time they were on the home-stretch, the sun was beginning to sink beneath the glittering blue waves and the sky was ablaze with tangerine streaks.  

It occurred to Alex that he had officially been back in the real world for over twenty-four hours. Long enough to convince himself that perhaps this wasn’t a cruelly elaborate dream after all.

George and Matthew were still nowhere to be seen by the time they reached the cabin. A sliver of discomfort eased its way into Alex’s gut at the pervasive quiet which greeted him. Jeremiah didn’t seem particularly bothered by their absence, however, and was quick to assure him that George rarely made it home before he did. This didn’t strike Alex as being particularly heartening, as surely having an extra pair of hands would have made George’s role considerably easier, but he elected not to mention it. Instead, he allowed Jeremiah to take the bucket from his hands and gladly agreed when the older man suggested he go outside and start a campfire, as it turned out he had little desire to watch the unfortunate crabs meet their fate once Jeremiah started preparing dinner.  

Starting a campfire was a considerably easier task than Alex had expected. The fact that George had amassed an impressive quantity of lighters and matches certainly helped, as did the abundance of brittle branches which lay scattered across the beach. George and Jeremiah had already created a tiny nook for such a purpose; the remains of previous campfires lay scorched and blackened within a ring of scattered logs which provided adequate seating. Childhood memories of countryside holidays once again proved fruitful as Alex got to work, and before long he found himself warming his hands above crackling flames as a mere spark succeeded in setting his collection of sticks alight. The sky above provided a similar fiery glow, with scattered grey clouds giving the impression of smoke drifting among orange embers. Content with his task, Alex settled against one of the fallen logs and simply gazed at the sky as exhaustion and hunger took hold and the fire bathed him in pleasant warmth.

It wasn’t long before an orange glow emanated from the cabin windows. Shadows were visible from within as Jeremiah set about preparing their evening meal, his large mass occasionally passing by the window and blocking the firelight from view. Bored of the sky, Alex directed his attention towards the resort, keeping his eyes peeled for a pair of returning travelers. He knew deep down that he should take comfort from Jeremiah’s lack of concern, yet anxiety clawed at his throat regardless. Matt and George had been gone far longer than Alex had even been awake. Given the late hour at which George had arrived home last night, his mind filled with images of Matt in nothing more than a t-shirt and jeans, slowly freezing as George plowed on in thermals and a snug jacket. The chill was nowhere near that fierce just yet – if anything the breeze was a pleasantly cool balm after the earlier scorch – but Alex knew from experience that it would not be long before the cold was creeping upon them like an icy specter.  

Such fears were unfounded of course, though that did little to calm the sense of relief which gripped him as a trio of shadows appeared on the horizon. Midnight’s slender form was unmistakable as she was led by the reins by a much smaller shadow, both of them tailing a hulking giant of a man. The leader plowed on with little regard for his companions, but seeing as Alex had envisioned Matt being left for dead in a ditch somewhere, he was willing to take the fact that all three had returned as a sign that George didn’t completely hate the idea of company.  

George appeared to change course as soon as he noted the smoking campfire, detouring away from the cabin towards the small nook where Alex had settled himself. As much as he knew his feelings were irrational, Alex couldn’t help but squirm as the older man approached with his lips set in a grim line and eyes narrowed to grey slits.

“Your friend’s an idiot,” he announced with zero preamble, before turning on his heel and storming off towards the cabin. His stuffed rucksack weighed him down as he went, giving him a hunchbacked appearance which Alex may have laughed at if he had the courage. He valued his life far too highly for that however, and settled instead for turning to the approaching figure of Matt in stunned silence, hoping that he may be able to provide some form of explanation for their host’s wrath.

In contrast to George’s simmering anger, Matt looked positively chuffed as he approached with a stoic Midnight in tow. It struck Alex then that this was the only time he had ever seen Matt wearing normal clothes. The bright red jeans still clung to his legs and no doubt his trainers were the same shiny monstrosities from before, albeit thick mud had since claimed every inch of their surface. Instead of shimmering neon decorating his torso there was only a white t-shirt, however. His face was faintly pink and his arms were tanned from the sun, a paler outline just visible beneath the fabric as he tethered Midnight to a log, but his ridiculous sunglasses were nowhere to be seen. One could almost mistake him for ordinary in this light.  

They would be wrong of course, but Alex wouldn’t blame anyone for thinking it.

The source of Matt’s joy and George’s displeasure became obvious soon enough. Once he’d overcome the distraction of Matt looking like a normal person rather than a reality-hopping outlaw, Alex’s eyes widened as he set his sights on the acoustic strapped precariously to Matt’s back. His excitement was clearly obvious, for Matt halted his delicate strokes of Midnight’s mane in order to flip the guitar round his torso until it was perfectly balanced in his hands, his long fingers resting over the delicate strings.  

The instrument had clearly seen better days. Its once sleek mahogany surface was tarnished by scuff marks and scratches, and the strings would ideally need changing before any attempts were made to play them, though that didn’t dissuade Matt from carefully tuning them as he came to sit by Alex’s side. The neck was intact at least, though Alex had heard enough rumours of Matt’s onstage antics to wonder just how long the poor thing would survive. Not that he could talk, considering how many roadies he had pissed off back in the day due to his flagrant abuse of microphone stands.  

“George thinks you’re an idiot for rescuing that thing, by the way,” Alex informed Matt with a playful smirk as the man started to play a classical melody. The tone was surprisingly pleasant given that the instrument likely hadn’t been touched in years, and Alex’s jibe did little to distract Matt from weaving a complex improvisation with ease.  

“Oh I know,” Matt shot back with a wicked grin, letting the melody fade out before amusing himself by strumming simple chords instead. “He wouldn’t shut up about it the whole way back. Kept going on about the fact that his excursions are about searching for food and medicine and stuff that’s actually ‘useful’. Don’t think he appreciated it when I told him that life without a guitar isn’t worth living.”

“He’s not a connoisseur of music then?” Alex remarked. “You know what, I’d never have guessed.”

“Nah, doubt he’s whimsical enough for any of that nonsense,” Matt agreed, his smile softening as he raised the ragged guitar-strap over his head and settled his new love gently by his feet. A small carrier bag joined it on the sand, in which Alex could see a collection of t-shirts and likely outdated packets of paracetamol, but it seemed Matt had spent more energy carting the guitar back than salvaging anything George would consider valuable. “He wasn’t so bad though. I mean, he clearly didn’t like the idea of me tagging along, but he started to open up a bit once we got going. Stopped treating me like I was invisible anyway. I bet he’s a real softie once you get to know him.”  

As much as Matt’s words dripped with sarcasm, something about his sincere smile implied that on some level, he believed what he was saying. Whether that was merely naïve optimism or an acute observation based on his time with George was unclear, but Alex was willing to take it as a somewhat reassuring sign. Perhaps their host really was a mere grump as opposed to the dangerous menace his imagination had concocted.

Any retort died on his tongue as he spotted Jeremiah and George approaching from the cabin, each sporting a pair of steaming bowls. The aroma of rich soup grew more enticing as they came closer, and by the time Jeremiah carefully eased one of the bowls into Alex’s waiting hands his mouth was watering as his stomach growled with hunger. The creamy soup closely resembled the seafood chowder from the night before, with the exception that this one had been created with crabmeat alone. Any guilt over the fate of his unfortunate catches vanished in an instant as Alex inhaled deeply before digging in with only slightly more tact than the night before.  

They ate in relative peace, the quiet broken only by the crackling fire and the hushed voices of Jeremiah and George as they compared notes from their day. Despite George’s intimidating approach upon returning to the cabin, he showed little animosity towards his guests as they sat by the campfire. Alex could even have sworn that he’d given Matt a friendly nod upon handing him his bowl. Jeremiah remained his usual jovial self - which was considerably less surprising - and even asked Alex if he wanted seconds once his bowl was empty, to which he politely declined. As delicious as the soup was, everyone seemed to agree that it was far too filling for the notion of second portions to be entertained, and so they simply sat back once all four bowls were polished off, feeling full and sated.

It wasn’t long before the sun finally dipped beneath the waves and deep blues permeated the sky. Any remaining streaks of tangerine were banished in favour of an ever-darkening canvas dotted with glowing stars. The breeze started to carry the threat of ice with it, sending a shiver through Alex’s frame whenever it beckoned, but the heat from the flickering flames provided ample protection for the moment.  

Without prompting, Matt lifted the rescued acoustic and started to strum absent-mindedly at the strings, frowning at every imperceptible error and twisting the tuning pegs until the rich sound satisfied him fully. He seemed entirely ignorant of his audience, closing his eyes and losing himself to the music once it overcame him. His fingers danced elegantly across the strings, unleashing a gorgeous Spanish-inspired piece as though he’d been performing onstage only yesterday. Perhaps Alex would have been slightly jealous once upon a time, but for now he was content to simply watch with a small smile tugging at his lips. The piece eventually faded into the distantly familiar chords of ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’,  and Alex spotted Matt opening his mouth a couple of times as though intending to sing before ultimately deciding against it.  

The final chords sounded abruptly as Matt opened his eyes and became aware of the three sets of eyes fixated on him. Nobody said a word, perhaps too enthralled to urge him to continue, but his eyes met Alex’s and he smiled before freeing himself from the strap and handing the guitar over. It lingered between them for several seconds as Alex gaped at it, torn between desperation to lay his hands on a real guitar and terror at the possibility that his skills may have left him. Even if his experiences in the hotel counted for anything, he still spent upwards of five years relying mostly on piano, with the guitar being reserved for special occasions or more energetic crowds.  

Ultimately, the itch to play again overcame any self-consciousness. He took the instrument in his hands with a degree of reverence before letting it rest in his lap. For a few moments his fingers merely ghosted over the frets as songs battled for dominance in his brain; everything from his own work to David Bowie screaming to be played while his hands remained stock-still. When he finally did begin to play, the song remained a mystery even to him. He took a moment to simply adapt to the instrument and the sensation of playing again, grateful that his muscle memory appeared to be serving him well, and a shy smile crept over his face as the familiar notes of Leonard Cohen washed over the small gathering.  

The urge to sing wrestled with him too, but he crushed it down and focused on the simple act of playing the chords to ‘Is This What You Wanted’. A sharp ache pierced his heart like an arrowhead as the music transported him to a summer he’d never wanted to end; to non-stop laughter and the sweet sensation of looking across the stage to find Miles smiling back at him. He imagined that even if he wanted to sing, he would find himself choking on the words and butchering the song in the process, so the stripped-down instrumental would have to suffice.  

Or so he thought, only to be proven wrong the instant a rich baritone voice joined the fray. Alex’s fingers stumbled for only a millisecond before he recovered himself. He looked up to watch as Jeremiah sang along with his eyes closed, a wistful smile playing across his lips as the music seemed to transport him back to a distant past.  

His voice could hardly be called perfect on a technical level, but that only made it more beautiful. His tone was rich – the imperfections adding more character than polish ever could – and his raspy vocals added a maturity that Alex doubted he would have been able to capture himself. He grinned when Jeremiah opened his eyes and winked at him, before turning his attention fully to the acoustic, ensuring that each note landed perfectly so as not to ruin the impromptu performance.  

The air was broken by an excitable whoop and applause from Matt once the final notes faded into nothingness, and Jeremiah chuckled before giving the gathering a little bow. Alex’s heart was so lifted that he thought nothing of shedding the acoustic and offering it over to George, who happened to be closest to him. In keeping with the man’s earlier attitude, he simply refused with a shake of his head, though in the flickering firelight his eyes appeared softer than Alex had ever seen them. Undeterred, Alex simply shrugged before handing the guitar back to Matt. His friend seemed to have been rejuvenated by his and Jeremiah’s unconventional duet, and once the guitar was back in his hands, he launched into an excitable interrogation of the older man, employing his usual scatter-gun delivery in the process.

The pair quickly bonded over a shared love of Nina Simone and especially Tom Waits. Before long, Matt was launching into the guitar chords of ‘Blue Valentine’ while Jeremiah effortlessly sang the vocal, capturing the precise gravitas that such a song demanded despite the smile lurking on his jolly face. Alex contented himself with simply sitting back and watching, before turning his eyes to George.  

The man had been conspicuously quiet all night. Alex wasn’t entirely sure what he expected to find on his face, though he would have bet money on detecting a certain degree of disapproval resting upon a deep frown. What he wasn’t expecting was the unmistakable fondness radiating from the man’s eyes as his gaze lingered heavily on Jeremiah, nor the gentle smile tugging at his lips as he fought to keep his expression neutral. Any tension which had gripped his bulky frame had melted away and he seemed positively relaxed, in sharp contrast to every interaction Alex had shared with him. The sight made him wonder if Matt’s earlier assessment could be closer to the truth than he had previously appreciated. At the very least, it appeared that Jeremiah was George’s sole weakness, and the sight tugged at Alex’s heart in a manner which forced him to avert his eyes.

They continued their back-and-forth with Matt and Alex taking turns on the guitar while Jeremiah took up vocal duties, until the fire started to die within its nest and the night’s chill chased them all back towards the cabin. Thankfully their temporary home had been gradually warmed by the log burner and Alex wasn’t forced to relive the bone-chilling sensations of the previous night. A strange wave of contentment gripped him by the hand and settled in his chest as he laid down and rested his head upon the folded jumper which served as his makeshift pillow. He was still exhausted from the day’s trek and a degree of uncertainty remained over how long he and Matt would be able to remain as guests, but none of that mattered.  

In contrast to the fear which had consumed him the night before, the pervading feeling which claimed him as Jeremiah bade them all a sleepy ‘goodnight’ was that, somehow, the future might not be entirely terrible.

[olivedoesmagic]

Journal 22: Another Lectures Notes

Journal 22: Another Lectures Notes

Source: Steller.Chaos: Army of Wax Discord Lecture on Reality Shifting.

Forgive these notes if they are hard to follow. It was fast paced and as fast as I am at typing without looking at the keyboard it was still an awful lot to type out about 3 pages worth and it was fast, but I did my best to type it up for you. Likewise these papers are all based on Steller’s knowledge based on his studies and first hand experience these are less academically sourced and more witchly sourced. Anyways I hope you can enjoy.

Realities bump into each other all the time. Mandela effect. Mandela effect is when people see into other realities unknowingly. It’s kind of like a collective falsehood unknowingly. It’s when realities collectively cross like that. There are places where relatives are permanently cross. One of these places are in brazile. There are multiple accounts of people in Brazil looking over a certain spot and seeing an apocalyptic wasteland and seeing this reality in the physical via stepping into it accidently. Realities can manifest in the physical like that. Theres tons of em. Theres a place in Florida or a state like there where realities are permanently crossed

Click for full lecture’s notes

Conscious shifting causes the most side effect and that is because you are attempting to be in two places at once. It effects not just you but the places around you when you shift in your room and so on. Theres also a way to shift that’s kept in the room. It’s an easier way to fully shift, and that’s kind of visualizing a tunnel, which will be explained in a minute. Also another thing that we’re gona touch on is alternate selves. They are alternate selves but the way people normally explain them is kind of inaccurate. The way that is often portraying this correctly is fictional universes like dc comics. Such as that kernel sanders comic with kernel sanders. It was a whole crossover comic, into the spiderverse like thing. Speaking of into the spider verse is also a great example.

The way reality shifting actually is, it’s a lot cooler then the way people “make it seem”. When it comes to alternate selves why they are you and you are able to understand them on a level others aren’t, you are not your alternate self, they have lived a completely different life to you, so theres going to be differences. They are different from you while they are you in a lot of ways and whatever they still lived a different life and they are still a person and you have to respect that. 

Another thing about reality shifting, all realities are intertwined and or connected in some way shape or from and all have relation. That’s how we are able to travel to them. Their are other multiverses, that unfortunately is impossible for us to travel to that’s some god level shiz. Have you ever thought about how you would of turned out if x, y, or z actions turned out a different way? That’s basically looking into a different reality already, whatever you’re thinking of that reality exists where that went differently and you turned out accordingly. That being said theirs no way to escape the multiverse point blank.

Time travel, the way people think time travel works is impossible. But you can go to another reality where it’s back in time because if you were to time travel you are creating a new dimension and a new reality. Time works differently in the multiverse. The thing about going to a universe you created, is that your going to a world you now no longer control. The important thing when it comes to different realities is that these things exist outside of this alternate reality, here they are fictional there they are real. So you have to understand while it’s very cool to go visit them that is an alternate world that is very different from your fictional one.

Another thing people saying can they create their own realities? Technically that would be a pocket dimension. 

Reality shifting is when you are taking your conciseness somewhere, its more of a scientific thing compared to astral projection which is a separation of self from fleshy meat suit. Your soul doesn’t come with you when you reality shift. There is a method of reality shifting while you astral project but Steller mentioned in the lecture he and I quote “WONT BE TEACHING ANY OF YOU” so that’s his stance on it. Theres another thing that’s weird, but it’s called merging, and it’s where you go to another reality and you merge with your alternate self. This can happen, it’s basically when you’re anexing, and when you’re first shifting it can happen alot especially if you don’t do anything to prevent it. It’s happening a lot with communities on amino and tick tock right now. But because their doing it and it’s so unexpected and there was no warning, when the alternate self doesn’t know whats going on they can’t really stop you, so it’s a very rude process.

Basically if you’re merging with an alternate self, you can prow easily and your other self won’t really know what’s happening, but if they do realize what’s happening, it can lead to shit. But it can lead to deep shit quite easily. You don’t always merge with your alternate self but for beginners merging with your alternate self is normal. The more you shift with intent and resisting the urge is how you stop this. It’s all about intent. If you don’t realize it’s happening like a lot of people on ticktock it will keep happening. Reminder that you’re alternate self is you.

When it comes down to the reality and how its runs it’s set in stone. It’s like a distant type memory thing when you go there. You won’t fuck anything up when you go to shifting realites, even with the warnings in place. Another good question somebody had are universes set in stone or are they changing? They are constantly changing all the time. If you shift respectfully and visit that universe you can explain and ask “do I have permission to vibe” basically and then you just “go”. You ask you just have to be polite.

Regarding shifting theirs a couple different methods. Conscious shifting is when your anexious with your other self. Theirs a couple of methods. Phony shifting where you project yourself into that other reality, it works like a glitch, where you have a physical form in this other reality and your body is seen here, you “glitch” one body there, and one body here. It’s very much you not an alternate self there. There’s that kind of fully shifting that is going separate from your alternate self. That is when you can speak and commune with others there, and kind of have repour for yourself. That’s a type of fully shifting. 

Then theirs another type of fully shifting where you don’t separate yourself. You sort of stitch realities together. Instead of seeing your room you see that other reality. Your physical self will be there, like you could be standing up or sitting down and you’ll be there essentially. Basically lets say your standing up in your room, you won’t be able to walk around and go and do and shit because you will be confined to the space of your room. When Steller first did this instead of walking around he would jump to different parts of the universe of the reality.

There are tons of different methods to achieve either of these. One of the ones Steller uses for conscious methods that can be used for fully shifting if you really want to that I use as well is the “Space Ship” method. Where you turn your room into a spaceship and bring it to this other reality and bring that reality forward as well. The way you do this method is preferably your sitting down like your controlling a spaceship, basically tw for derealization and unreality. The rest of your house does not exist, it is gone, your room is floating in space, you have to say this to yourself so your room feels like its floating up in the air. By itself up in the air separated.  You will still be able to see your room but in your minds eye you will be able to see your other reality. As you keep thinking about this the walls will look squigly or wavy or vibrating cus your hopping the whole room into another reality. A fair warning that reality shifting can make derealization issues work. Also the spaceship method is a nonsleep method. Since a lot of these methods involve going to sleep to working.

The next method is the tunnel shift. So I would suggest you sit or lay down, it comes easier conscious wise, it acts like its sucking your consciousness into another reality. It’s recommended to do it while sleeping to fully sleep. Imagine a net in the shape of tunnel or a tube pulling you through as it gets smaller. Imagine paper traps but net like and glowing. Basically it as bright blue to help, and basically this will stretch up above you and leap right above you and before you sleep get some binaural beats and imagine it above you sleep with the intent and your consciousness will go through said tunnel and to the other reality. Not just your consciousness this would also be like splitting yourself it’s weird, it can be awake or sleeping but the sleeping method is an example here. So you imagine the tunnel and think about it as you go to sleep and the vibrations raise and the tunnel acts like its pulling you through it, and that sort of deal.

Lastly eleven has some promising shit, and alice in wonderland. White noise is not just static, there can be some lofi and beat in the background or talking. Alice in wonderland is basically you imagine your falling down a rabbit hole as you go to sleep. I mean you could also imagine the feeling of falling down a rabbit hole. Imagination isn’t only visual. It can also be about feeling. Eleven is blindfolding yourself in a blackroom while listening to lofi or white noise anything like that. Technically you can use any of these methods while your awake. The elven method is great for fully shifting and being awake. Reality shifting can happen unintentionally mind you.

Theirs lots of ways to come back. One big one, is the conscious one, and mind that you can become coconsious when you fully shift, you can have something like an anchor like a heavy object or a large object, that you hold while your shifting that you know while your shifting that you feel while your shifting drop it, on the floor next to you while your shifting, and this acts as your anchor when you do this the metaphysical chain or line will connect you to this thing, when your shifting you latch on to this thing to pull you back. Anchors won’t be effective while your sleeping. When you want to come back pull on your imaginary line that is the anchor, to pull yourself back to this reality.

Safewords can also work if you put enough intent into the word. Regarding conscious shifting an anchor is recommended by Steller over a safeword, but safewords do work. Here’s the thing that when it comes to shifting, a lot of people don’t know the difference between reality shifting and astral projecting. If you want to go to France, you don’t need to shift to do that. Just astral project to France.

So how to make pocket dimensions. Take your hand, hands out. It’s gona be as big as a beach ball. Focus on, creating a sort of ball of energy. Like an electrical type current. Colors of purple, blue, and it will kind of like -plasma ball- with like electrical currents and shiz, and turn your hands to further this feeling. It will feel staticky, you may even feel shit. So, it will feel really weird, and also if you move your hands really closer to each other you will feel currents. Begin to make this and sculpt it, it might feel heavy some of them are heavy. After a certain amount of time put stuff in it, a lake, a building, just don’t do it to fast, take your time, sculpt it, whatever. It will get easier and easier as you keep making it. Now you’ll have an energy ball. Think of a place, any place. It can be any place you want even a copy of hogwarts if you want. Just kind of put it in this pocket dimension. Put it there. There, you have the pocket dimension. YOu know why its called a pocket dimension? Because its small. Now get a bag, think of a container, any container you want, a dresser, filecabinet, a box. Put it down in it, put it in the pocket. Just make sure you put it in the pocket. By the way your pocket dimension will be summoned whenever you need them because you have to take care of them. You have to take care of them. You can bring other people into them. You can bring other people in to them, you can shrink them and put them into your shoulder if you want. You can put it in a drawer, just make sure your taking care of it, you know it’s your little dimensions. They are like babies so you do have to check up on them.

So how you enter these dimensions is kind of a similar way. You can enter them in your dreams. You can mental project into your pocket dimensions. You can kind of put it on like a fuking space helmet. When you put it on, and you can kind of see it in your minds eye you’ll be able to see it in your minds eye and see its energy.  But those are pocket dimensions little tiny pocket dimensions you have to understand that they are small (insert plankton meme) you can only put so much in them, think of like a town or a farm, a mile and a half. If you want more you make it bigger.

That’s the end of the notes. Sorry again for the incoherency. It was again from another lecture. There are no sources for this other than Stellers experience and information as a reality shifter so take that as you will but he is a good source of information and pretty knowledgeable on this subject matter. Anyways it’s getting late and I’m getting tired so goodnight.

-Olive Brimstone

10:44 PM

10/9/2020

[davidmann95]

Comics this week (1/27/2021)?

X-Men #17: I guess Hickman told his editors “yeah this issue’s relatively filler and is pretty much here to set up a single straightforward Checkov’s Gun for later, so I guess you can put whoever needs to work on it” so that’s how that happened.

Shang-Chi #5: A nice little mini, but I’m happy Yang’s moving on to my boys.

Avengers #41 (got this late from last week): That patented Aaron-brand Avengers nonsense I love, how I missed you.

Daredevil #26: ...huh. Don’t take that as a condemnation on my part, that’s simply my plain reaction to the developments of an issue of comics I enjoyed. Huh.

Stillwater #5 (ditto): SO THERE’S SOME REAL SHIT FOR OUR TIMES

The Department of Truth #5: Love me that looooore, baybeeeee

We Only Find Them When They’re Dead #5: I did have to stop a few pages in to refresh myself on a few names, but gosh can I not wait for acts two and three.

Future State: Aquaman #1: I figured this one could go either way since I’ve read some work by Brandon Thomas I vibed with and one or two that baffled me, so happy to say this one worked out really well. And very happy to be getting Sampere on Action soon.

Future State: Batman/Superman #1: I’ve seen folks unsurprisingly let down by this as a pretty straightforward World’s Finest teamup for Yang’s debut that for the most part could have just as easily taken place now, but the more I sit on this one the more it grows on me. There’s a sense of melancholy knowing this is probably Clark and Bruce’s last adventure together like this before what’s about to happen to each of them in this timeline, a tension they don’t know exists even as we can see their friendship start to fray that crucial bit - not because they’re at moral loggerheads, but because the changes in their lives are driving them in such different directions. I like the idea of a little slice of a ‘future’ event like this having a chapter set just long enough from now that the changes in motion are irreversible, but not far enough out yet to have visibly shaken things up permanently, and how that changes the tone of the characters’ adventures at the unknowing last point where they’re still recognizable. Anyway, high-falutin’ aside, it’s Yang and Oliver, of course it’s a very readable superhero comic even sans context.

Future State: Dark Detective #2: Very much enjoyed the fleshing-out here of Bruce’s new means and methods of operation, and the Red Hood backup works surprisingly well too (between this and DCeased, is DC making Jason Todd and Rose Wilson a thing?). My confidence in the upcoming Tamaki Detective increases accordingly.

Future State: Superman vs. Imperious Lex #1: This is gonna disappoint a lot of folks, not because it’s anything less than really good, but because it’s ‘merely’ really good when it’s the Flintstones team reuniting for their big, basically continuity-free crack at Superman. Probably that’s in no small part because it feels like Russell modulating his voice a bit to prove he can play nice with the other books in the same way as his Sinestro one-shot awhile back. Still fine with me and still one of Future State’s better offerings, but not the clear home run it seemed at announcement.

Future State: Legion of Superheroes #1: Well THAT’S not who I was expecting the much-advertised traitor to be. Lots of cool details here I’m looking forward to seeing play out when the book proper returns.

Strange Adventures #8: I want Gerads on a Flash book and Shaner drawing as many forest landscapes as possible going forward.

Batman: The Adventures Continue #8: Pretty standalone after how #1-7 formed a loose arc, but this taps the best of BTAS’s treatment of its villains and is a nice little epilogue.

Batman: Black and White #2: 

* The King/Gerads Batman story is an extremely King/Gerads Batman story, in the best way.

* The Campbell Batman and Catwoman story plays with the format, such as it is, in the most amusing way of this mini so far or any of the preceding Batman: Black and White books I recall.

* The Hardman/Bechko joint is pretty and perfectly serviceable.

* The Weaver story I don’t even kind of get but it sure is lovely.

* The Aja story doesn’t live up to its art or its unique format, but it’s still David Aja drawing Batman so it’s fine.

* Love the Villalobos pinup, glad he’s still got the occasional DC gig even if he’s making his main comics home elsewhere these days.

The Other History of the DC Universe #2: It doesn’t blow the doors down in the same way as #1, but I don’t know that it could - it isn’t introducing the concept, and it’s juggling two characters with I believe much less defining history than the singular lead of the debut. Still a great comic, and it’s with this issue it hits me that in following B- and C-list characters specifically rather than your Green Lanterns or Cyborgs, the book gets to have its cake and eat it too by conveying a superheroic POV while still making them spectators to the biggest developments both world-shaking and culturally significant. And yes, very much looking forward to what Ridley will do with Superman in Red and Blue after the balancing act he continues to strike here, I feel like he could be to All-Star Superman what Snyder was to Morrison’s Batman in presenting what those books were getting at in a way the general audience can latch onto this time (though in this case probably with something a little more on the prestige side rather than a summer crossover).

[lunar-system]

Making of Fortuna

This is an ungodly long ramble about my Good Omens fanfic series Fortuna. I don’t expect many will find this interesting, but I had fun while writing it (both the fanfics and this monstrosity) so here you have it! A fake interview from me to me. 

What is Fortuna anyway?

Fortuna was my sanity project during 2020. I started to write it to escape all the anxiety that lock-downs caused, and never stopped.

Actually, in a way Fortuna is also a reaction to the Good Omens lockdown video. I wrote 100k about Aziraphale breaking some rules because I got pissed at him insisting he can’t see Crowley because of the rules. (Though, of course, he was only hinting that Crowley should break them for him.)

But literally Fortuna is the love story of Scrooge McDuck and Goldie O’Gilt with a Good Omens paintover. Just the narrative structure is from the Scrooge comics, and everything else is Good Omens.

Where did the crossover idea come from?

I loved the idea of combining two great love stories written by my childhood favourites. Neil Gaiman was a newer name for me, but Terry Pratchett and Don Rosa have always been in my life. I grew up together with Terry’s Tiffany Aching. 

The fantasy element of Good Omens is what I think made the combination work. Many aspects of the comic are fantastical, and it would have been hard to bend it into a realistic narrative. But with Crowley and Aziraphale I could skirt away from realism as much as I wanted! Aziraphale could absolutely beat up a saloon-full of people and ask a moose to give him a ride. It lined up perfectly with the kind of absurd action and humor that Don Rosa filled his comics with.

The very first thing I wrote was the little scene where Aziraphale saves Crowley from the bear and clips a part of her hair. For some reason I was very concerned of whether or not that scene could be pulled off in a convincing way. It is a very visual little scene and works well in a comic format. When it seemed like it could work in writing, I greenlit the fic for myself.

One big inspiration for the series was the song Last Sled by Tuomas Holopainen. He wrote it to match Scrooge’s and Goldie’s story, and I decided to match my fic to it as well. I loved the idea of writing a fic that would match the songs so well that the songs became its soundtrack!

The songs affected the fics in many ways. I picked the name of Crowley’s saloon (and the name of the fic series) just because the song Last Sled has that saying in there, Fortuna Favet Fortibus. I kept the name White Agony Creek because the name got mentioned in the song. I made drinking coffee a recurring thing because it’s mentioned once, and added rainbows as a conversation point. And, ultimately, the last part of my series began because I needed to match the fics to the song: “Can’t leave behind what’s in this sled.” (Part 3 was meant to be just a short fix-it. Ha ha.)

I do wonder whether or not the Disney Ducks tag makes people skeptical to begin the story. To me the story of Scrooge and Goldie is simply a really good romance in a unique setting, and I loved the idea of putting Crowley and Aziraphale in their story. 

Conflict & characterisation

One of the first things I wrote was for the series was the ending of part 2: the scene where Aziraphale abandons Crowley's letter in the snow. The rest of the series more or less happened because I needed to find out what could drive Aziraphale and Crowley to a point of such hurt and distrust. 

The ending of part 1 was an important puzzle piece for that. Crowley and Aziraphale had enjoyed their time together at the claim. Why would they fall apart so badly? Both needed believable motivations for why they were so hurt and why they acted in so hurtful ways. I didn’t want to make either the bad guy.

What came up was queer people in different stages of their journeys. Those stages might not always be compatible with each other, even though both are as valid. But different stages mean very different needs. 

At that point of the story, Aziraphale is still firmly in the closet. He has only begun experimenting. He needs the safety of hiding who he is, and cannot be forced out of the closet if he is not ready for it. So for Aziraphale closet means safety.

But for Crowley it means prison. Crowley is already out and cannot let Aziraphale drag her back into the closet with him. What she needs instead is validation and acknowledgement of her choice of being out. 

This is why they clash. Crowley cannot give Aziraphale the safety of the closet, and Aziraphale cannot give Crowley the freedom of being out of it. But – and this is what I was balancing with a lot – neither of them are wrong. They just have different needs. This would not necessarily mean conflict, but without proper communication can lead to it. And it does.

I was often a bit worried on my portrayal of Crowley in part 1. She seems very confident, a bit cocky, and sometimes even bit disregarding towards both of their safety. I love reading about protective, nervous and floundering Crowley. But it turned out that I was making the origin story of that Crowley – the person Crowley ends up becoming in part 3 is very nervous and uncertain. It started to seem like when part 1 seemed to be about Aziraphale's anxieties, the whole time it was an elaborate setup for Crowley's character development. Or, in other words, breaking Crowley apart and then putting him back together.

I wish there would have been more time to see how Aziraphale overcame his anxieties. I kinda skip over that part. It happens here: "When Aziraphale's worst fears came true, he went to Hell and asked for a rubber duck." But on the other hand I like to think that that is what the canon itself is about. It's Aziraphale taking a stand. And that's where his character development happens. Once he is free of Heaven, he has the freedom to become truly himself. 

And that's also where the tragedy of part 3 comes from: once Aziraphale is ready to be out and proud, Crowley is scared shitless by him. Aziraphale never meant it, but the way he treated Crowley was truly hurtful to him. Crowley was not seen as himself when he needed it the most. Instead he kept being pushed back into the label of "demon", until he too accepted it to some extend and stopped dreaming of being seen as himself.

And even so I did not want to paint Aziraphale as the bad guy either. It really was a tricky balance. They both hurt each other. They both got hurt by the other. Neither of them was to blame, and both of them were.

One challenge for writing part 3 was to show that even though they both have been hurt, they still do actually enjoy each others company. They want to work to preserve their relationship. The same way that in part 1 I had showed that they actually enjoy living together, I tried to bring up those lighter moments in part 3 to balance Crowley's eternal misery. The short argument about whether or not to fly trans-atlantic is one of my favourites.

One smaller notion: While it’s obvious that Aziraphale has anxiety and Crowley helps him calm down from it, I like to also think that Crowley symbolises depression to some extent. At the very start life feels meaningless to him, even if he still goes through the motions of his work. Aziraphale is an anti-depressant to him and helps him find a sense of purpose. A joy to life.

Research

I did more research than I would have ever expected. I got swept into it. I listened to a Klondike Gold Rush podcast. I read Jack London's A call to the wild, the book Aziraphale reads in the final part. Most of the things I tell about prospecting is accurate (as far as I know), and there are some real historical details scattered here and there. For example, whiskey was not legally allowed in Klondike for other than medical purposes. An awful amount of horses died during the gold rush. Dawson city did burn down, and the people of it were struggling with pestilence and famine. The tower of London did not function as a prison at the time of the Gold Rush. 

One important thing was to note that the Rosa comics were not at all sensitive to the First Nation's perspective of the gold rush. I mean. It really romanticises colonialism. All that “conquering untamed wilderness” talk is there unironically. 

At one point I started to question if I was even allowed to write this story. I didn't want to make Crowley and Aziraphale into British saviours who solve everything with miracles. Racism solved with a snap of fingers! Yikes. I decided to keep them quite detached from the situation, sticking to their own worries of Heaven and Hell and let the humans figure out their own struggles. It is an extremely privileged position for them to be in. Whether or not it was a tactful thing to write, I’m still not sure. 

Character descriptions

I challenged myself to describe the appearances of Aziraphale and Crowley as little as I could. In a way it was to pay homage to the book. I do lean a bit to the TV-versions, though. Aziraphale is said to be "heavy" and "built like an ox" with "wide thighs", while Crowley is described as tall, lean, and thin. I also could not let go of Crowley’s red hair. 

One thing I spent way too much thinking about was them blushing. If I wanted the reader to be able to imagine them in any way they liked, and not only white like in the show, I couldn’t have them visibly blushing. I liked that challenge. I think often in fanfiction the “blush mechanics” are a bit overdone, though I understand that it can be used as a lovely tell-tale to someone’s emotions. But it wasn’t working for me, so I just opted out of it completely. Well, there is ONE mention in part 3 of Crowley turning "a nice shade of red." But I’m pretty sure Aziraphale does not visibly blush at all during the whole 100k!

Gender

Other omissions on character's looks are mostly things about gender. I don't describe their chests, partly for dysphoria reasons, partly so that the gender-presentations of the characters are open for interpretation. I did leave some masculine indications for Miss Crowley: broad shoulders and an Adam's apple come to mind. 

Crowley switches pronouns in the last part of the series. Especially the use of they/them in the third part was done partly just because I wanted to learn to use they/them pronouns better. There isn't a very strong narrative reason for it, other than to maybe mark a new chapter in Crowley's life. Crowley is Miss Crowley until the heartbreak, Mr Crowley while he mourns, and finally Mx Crowley once they can relax. And it is very handy that most of my smut happens when Aziraphale and Crowley have different pronouns.

I actually discovered that writing smut can be very difficult for me. I suppose I'm a bit of a prude – that's where the decision to omit all the words for genitals in the first part comes from. On the other hand, I liked that their bodies were just bodies, with some more or less strongly implied parts. It lines up nicely with their general gender presentations being left quite vague. But on the other hand it dulled the trans representation, when I couldn’t use phases like “her cock” and “his vulva.”

At some point I was quite worried about making Crowley a seductive woman and Aziraphale the brooding man. I had seen a post somewhere saying that it's boring to always see Crowley as the femme. It kinda stuck with me. I'm nonbinary and bisexual myself, and I would hate it if my story was seen as me forcing them in a hetero narrative. Well, Scrooge and Goldie was a story about straight ducks (???), so maybe there is something to say about that. But I did my best to queer up everything I could. I wanted people to be able to see Crowley with masculine features even if she went with she/her pronouns. There should be nothing in the story that would contradict Aziraphale being a he/him lesbian, if the reader wanted to see it so. Writing Good Omens fic has been an excercise of deconstructing gender for me, and it goes hand in hand with my own coming out story as well. 

Homages

There are nods to Terry Pratchett's writing here and there in the text. Some metaphors of wordings I've straight out borrowed ("a clang well done" and the silence that follows birdsong that was always there are straight from The Wee Free Men, my favourite book always forever). 

There was originally meant to be more foot notes, but I had to admit they tended to distrupt the pacing more than add to the story. So now there are three.

It was a happy accident that I ended up quoting the book word to word when Fortuna burned down. Crowley in a burning building that was important to one of the main characters, mourning the loss of Aziraphale in some way? It was too good of a coincidence. And at the same time, even though I quote the book word by word, that scene is also taken picture by picture from the comic. It's the scene were I merge two works merge into one the clearest. 

And, this is no news for the ones who are familiar with the comic, but did you notice that in part 2 Crowley and Aziraphale literally do not interact? They just spend the whole part thinking about each other obsessively and manage to avoid each other the whole time. It's ridiculous, I love it.

The parts that just happened

The action plot with Ligur and Hastur wrote itself. There are some aspects that are recycled from the comic – like the three heroic humans coming to rescue and their "local" guides who are actually the bad guys. But Crowley's near-death just HAPPENED. And the fact that she was a snake and could brumate! And that Aziraphale could literally warm her back to life! I didn’t do it, it wrote itself.

Another thing that just clicked was Aziraphale’s assignment. For the longest time I had no clue why Aziraphale would have been ordered to dig gold the human way. I figured the joke would have been that I just never explain in. It's a fanfic after all. It can be "just an assignment." But when I realised that Heaven actually HAD GOLD IN THEIR FACE, it suddenly clicked into place. How horribly insulting to order Aziraphale dig it up for them! He's treated like an errand boy, with no respect to his rank or abilities. And he is so ashamed of it that he doesn't even want to tell Crowley the reason for the assignment.

Them sensing each other started because I needed a plot reason for Aziraphale to know that Crowley was hurt when she got frozen. The mechanic of how it all works is very vague, and I kinda only use it when it's useful for the plot, which is not a super solid thing to do. I also say that Azi can sense the viles of Dawson. It makes more sense to me that he would sense that nasty stuff rather than love, cause that's the stuff he should focus on fixing.

Btw, at the very beginning of the story, Crowley totally had sensed that Aziraphale was coming to the saloon. She had forbid all the waiters from serving him, only to seem cooler when she herself stepped in.

Side characters

I loved writing the occasional other perspectives than Aziraphale's and Crowley's. Eben, Tim, Jack, Ligur, Steele, and eventually Alice. It gives a chance to point out the strangeness of our protagonists. But, outch, writing that lists shows that it's a bit of a sausage fest. Damn. I do my best to queer up Azi and Crowley, and then end up writing most of my side characters stereotypical men. I blame partly the heritage of the Disney Ducks comics, which are unbelievably male-centric.

There is the background plot of the women of Saloon Fortuna. I am very fond of the scene where Crowley's legacy is revealed in the modern day. Her work at Saloon Fortuna was never in focus during the story, only implied. Maybe it was because she didn't think it was anything special. Or maybe because it is just the way she lived her life, helping people off-handedly, not drawing attention to herself. But the trouble of being immortal is that you will leave traces of you behind. And it will bite your butt if you show your face around again.

I had Ligur be in charge for no other reason than the George & Fred effect. When I first started reading GO fanfics, I often accidentally mixed Ligur and Hastur up. I think it helps to switch them up. Also it is nice to give a darker skinned character a bit more screen time, if you can call it screen time. 

I loved to bring in Famine and Pestilence in part 2. I also loved to purposefully leave Gabriel out from the whole series. Funnily enough there was never a moment for Beelzebub to even be mentioned, even though I'm very fond of them.

And I loved to include some fanon favourites, such as Oscar Wilde, Freddie Mercury and Jane Austen!

Other curiosities

It was an inside joke of mine that I never specify what it means that Crowley is a showgirl. In another version of this story there would definitely have been a scene where Aziraphale sees Crowley perform and realises he's in love because of that. But there just was no fitting place for that scene here. I also felt like it would have rocked the balance of the two of them. They are equals. Aziraphale seeing Crowley perform might have made Crowley into object to be gazed at. But yes, maybe she is a stripper. Maybe she is a sex worker. I like to think that Aziraphale never found out what the exact job description was. And Crowley never thought there was anything to clarify, because it was literally just a job like any other.

The nicknames, Cat's-eye and Knockout, were quite a late addition. Klondike Gold Rush podcast told me that everyone there had an outlandish nickname, so I added them. And I liked it! Crowley felt like a part of the community when she had a name given by the crew of her saloon. It also made Crowley's eyes part of the story more than I thought they would be. She always has to hide them, and in the end it does turn out she was a bit insecure of them. And Aziraphale's name, well, that's just a joke on what a bastard he actually is, even if he doesn’t want to think of himself that way. 

The smut in part 1 and part 3 are meant to mirror each other. In part 1 Crowley is in charge, helping Aziraphale along. In part 3 Aziraphale is in charge, helping Crowley along. The shared thing is that Aziraphale sucks Crowley off in both of the fics. I have no other reason than that he loves doing it. He does. Very much. From my notes app: “have aziraphale's pov of him savouring and devouring crowley's dick, because HELL YEAH”

There is also nice symmetry that in part 1 Crowley freezes and Aziraphale saves her, and in part 2 Aziraphale freezes and Crowley saves her. Or did she? She didn't really tell me.

Accuracy

Any mentions of moon phases are astronomically accurate. Crescent moon setting soon after sunset in the Northern hemisphere? Waxing crescent. Almost full moon rising late in the winter night long after sunset? Waning gibbous. My biggest pet peeve is the moon done wrong. It has rules! You wouldn’t have two sunsets in a row without a sunrise in the middle just cause it fits the mood!! 

Also, I couldn't just have them have midnight sun because Dawson is not that far in the North. And northern lights are quite rare at that height. Literally no-one cares about whether or not I portray moon and midnight sun or the northern lights accurately in some obscure crossover fanfic, except that I myself very much do. I have waited my school bus in -30 celcius too many times. It is personal!

I am also very sorry that I have presented a Wrong Moose Fact in this work of fiction. Aziraphale rides a moose, it is spring, and that moose is told to have gigantic antlers. But mooses don’t have antlers in the spring. They grow them during the summer, have them biggest during the autumn, and they fall during the winter. This is my biggest crime. A Wrong Moose Fact. I did it for the drama. 

[bitchbrisket]

First Lines Tag

Tagged by @slightlyintimidating

Rules: List the first lines of your last 20 stories (if you have less than 20, just list them all!). See if there are any patterns. Choose your favourite opening line. Then tag 10 authors!

As all my mutuals have been tagged already, I’ll just tag a couple of people, @tara-stofse and @rapidashpatronus

I’m also going to cheat and give you a favourite line from each one, simply because the first line is rarely the best and why not be a big fat show off where your writing is concerned? Didn’t link because I am a lazy cow but my AO3 profile is at the top of my page.

1.       (The Worst Witch 2017) A friend like you – 'Get in loser, we're going shopping!'

Sometimes I come up with good titles and sometimes I desperately flail around and this was the best I could do. Most people should know what the opening line is a reference to and it was the first thing I thought of when the idea of this fic materialised.

  ·         'I know you think you're hot stuff, but Dimity can run rings around you. You have the acting skills of a potato' she icily informed a miffed Arabella.’

  2.       (Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries) An education - 'I confess, I fail to understand the point of most of them.'

Again, another crappy title but for some reason, no song lyric or poem came to me on the subject of policemen raiding a Chinese brothel in the 1920s and confiscating vibrators because they look like suspicious instruments. I did lift the first line from the script because that is partly what I based the fic on. 0/10 for originality there.

  ·         ‘The benefit of having so many deities, Lin reflected, was that there was always someone in, should you knock on the door of their shrines.’

  3.       (The Worst Witch 2017) Poker – ‘Miss Bat scuttled along to the staffroom after her date and walked in, only to halt in surprise.’

Good Lord, I’m really not selling it to you with these boring titles am I? I’ve done the strip poker storyline with the hairpins in another fandom and couldn’t think up a clever title for that either.

  ·         ‘Clothes were strewn everywhere but in front of Hecate, there was a small pile of hairpins and nothing else.’

  4.       (The Worst Witch 2017) Which witch is which? – ‘Wychwood forest was a mysterious place, full of wrackspurts and helipoaths and blibbering humdingers. Sometimes you'd even see a crumple horned snorcack galloping along.’

Yes, alright I borrowed something off the world of Harry Potter. A fic based off a post off of a popular post on Tumblr and title borrowed off Dianna Wynne Jones I think.

  ·         'Watch out for the blibbering humdingers!' she shouted vengefully after the troublesome tourists.’

  5.       (The Worst Witch 2017) They do it with mirrors - 'I've missed you.'

Very general, basic bitch kind of starter. Dial up the smut o’metre because witches are having the equivalent of webcam sex. Written for the Hackle Lemonade Challenge, prompt kink. Wasn’t one of my favourites to write but it does have one of my favourite paragraphs in a smutty fic. Beats the first line anyway.

  ·         ‘She groaned and panted as her climax finally overtook her, glad of the extra support from the solid oak furniture. None of this modern rubbish that couldn't withstand a good hard fuck. There was a time and a place for IKEA but this was not it.’

  6.       (The Worst Witch 2017) Every inch of you – ‘Ada loved it when Hecate lightly raked her nails down her back.’

Diving straight into the smut for this other Hackle Lemonade Challenge, prompt kink fic. Title entirely appropriate.

  ·         ‘While many people over the years could make it happen, it was a secret delight to know that nobody did it better than her.’

  7.       (The Worst Witch 2017) The hum of your desire – ‘Ada woke up to an empty bed.’

At least it’s promising. The story can go anywhere when you start off with an empty bed. The bed is irrelevant anyway. They end up on the sofa.

  ·         ‘Hecate Hardbroom was nothing but a meticulous over achiever.’

  8.       (The Worst Witch 2017) You’re the night sky, trying to make me see your stars – ‘Hecate had been afraid to touch.’

Throws you right into the scene and lets you know there’s going to be a bit of angst in there. I love the song I took the title from (night sky – Leonell Cassio & Julia Mihevc) and I waited for a fic idea to materialise so I could use it.

  ·         ‘Ada could feel her breathing, steady and true, vibrating through to her heart.’

  9.       (Ghosts) Hide & seek – ‘Giggling madly, she galloped up the stairs to seek out the best hiding place ever.’

With several of the ghosts with backstories we have yet to uncover, the possibilities are endless. Poor Kitty had to die young so I gave her a death loosely based on an English ghost story, using all the unsavoury incidents involving her sister. Title needs no explanation.

  ·         ‘And shimmering obliquely in the corner of the landing, was the answer. The wooden chest. The one from the latest sailing ship that had brought back all that sugar and tea and rum.’

  10.   (The Worst Witch 2017) When breathing sounds like your song – ‘She hadn't let herself enjoy it at first.’

Luckily the only way from there is forward. For the Hackle Lemonade Challenge 2021, prompt firsts. Not sure where I got the title from, it’s possible I melded a couple of song lyrics together for it.

  ·         ‘I always feel thirsty after a pleasurable experience' she said cheerfully.’

  11.   (Holby City) There is no goat that foolish – ‘Serena patted down her wide brimmed hat and set off for a walk.’

It’s an ok start to the fic. The title is terrible but honestly, its just hard to find references to goats in general.

  ·         ‘She only just realised that they were conversing in English, not French. The other woman had a London accent. Good. She could shout at her more expressively in English.’

  12.   (The Worst Witch 2017) Sugar mouse – ‘What is it?’

So many possibilities here. The title does give it away, but still.

  ·         ‘In her nightmares, her grandfather had chased her around with an eyeball on a fork.’

  13.   (Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries) Stitch up - ‘I’d like to see you operate my sewing machine, Hugh Collins.’

Another shameless ripping off from the script. But nothing else can sum up this fic so perfectly. Title self-explanatory.

  ·         ‘Were sewing machines like dogs? He wondered. Did they take on the personalities of their owners?’

    14.   (Pushing Daisies) Girls don’t want boys, girls want damn respect – ‘Her boy always had an eye for the ladies.’

What a ridiculously clunky title. But apparently I couldn’t think of anything better. The opening line is much better.

  ·         ‘Calista was reminded of the principal at school that Emerson had crushed on so hard that he'd broken every fire alarm in the school over the course of several months just to get her attention. Some things never changed.’

  15.   (Holby City) Tell us the tale of a goat – ‘Did I ever tell you about how Serena and I met?’

A solid opening there, full of potential. The title is a bit crap. No, I have no idea why or how Serena would be working on the Italian railway either.

  ·         ‘You dressed one up in a poncho and called it aunt Gertrude?’ Fleur asked eventually. She really couldn’t think of anything better to say.’

  16.   (Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries) In the gracious light – ‘Jack tried not to let their questioning stares get to him.’

Based partly on the MFMM books, I’m happy with the opening line, it sets the tone. The title comes from Shakespeare’s Sonnet VII. ‘Lo! in the orient when the gracious light.’ With that, it ties in Jack and Lin quite nicely.

  ·         ‘After all, grandmama had warned him enough about the distraction of white girls. She had said nothing about white boys.’

    17.   (Holby City) Not yet – ‘Bernie wouldn't describe herself as an avid reader these days.’

Title taken from a line in the book Wicked. Opening line is pretty generic. I basically wrote this fic because Elphaba reminds me of Bernie in some respects. Also, premonition, sorry about that.

  ·         ‘In her mind, it was Serena in that cell, stretching out her hand to Bernie and chiding her affectionately for her delay.’

    18.   (Ghosts) Filth – ‘The Captain paid no attention to Lady Button's shrewish tone two rooms away.’

Simple title, simple opening line. Very direct. It’s the ‘why didn’t the Captain and Lady Button bond over the hot gardener in Lady Chatterly’s Lover together’ fic.

  ·         ‘The Captain sighed. That husband of hers had a lot to answer for. Bastard. He couldn't have killed her by poison or anything, no, he had to push her out of the damn window.’

  19.   (Ghosts & Holby City crossover) Over the top we go – ‘He couldn't believe it.’

So many things one couldn’t believe, a pretty generic opening. The title is a WW1 reference so not the correct war for the Captain but I used it anyway. Bernie is Haver’s niece.

  ·         ‘The Captain looked pleased but there was an expression in his eyes that Alison thought hid a sob in his heart.’

    20.   (Holby City) Boobs – ‘Arthur Digby was having a terrible day.’

Title, utterly crap, I know you’ll agree. Opening line, sums it up really. I like it.

  ·         'Well, call me Da Vinci and I'll paint you like one of those French girls.'

Art wasn't Fleur's strong point.’

So what did I learn about my opening lines? It does reflect my writing style, snappy and concise. I rarely ramble for long. Are they thrilling opening lines? Not usually. Do they set the scene or the tone? Much of the time. They are certainly not the best ones I’ve ever written. Considering that I don’t love most of these last lot of opening lines, I’m going to go with which witch is which? It’s the best one of the bunch, I think. 

[buzzdixonwriter]

My Five Most Influential

Someone asked:   Who are the most influential writers in your life?

Good question.

The broad answer is that one gets influenced many different ways by many different sources.  I enjoy poetry and song lyrics because they find ways of conveying the strongest emotional content in the most concise manner, music brings a sense of dramatic rhythm and fulfillment, the visual arts suggest ways of subtly adding many insights to a single strong idea, etc., etc., and of course, etc. (and that is also an example of a creative influence in my work).

But…to boil it down to those whom I most consciously made an effort to emulate, we find ourselves facing five creators that primed the pump.

This is not to say others whom I began following after them didn’t wield a lot of influence (thanx, Ernie, Bert, Jack, Bob, and Hank!) but these are the foundation of everything I’ve done in my career.

(And to those who notice a lack of diversity, I know, I know…but to be honest I have to acknowledge the truth, and the truth is for whatever reason, by chance or by choice, by fate or by fortune, these five dominated my sensibilities.  I trust that I’ve grown and expanded my horizons since then, but they’re the hand I got dealt.)

. . . 

Carl Barks

I loved ducks as a kid and my grandmother and aunt would always bring me a passel of duck-related comics when they came to visit.

There were some Daffy Duck comics mixed in there but while I know I looked at and enjoyed them, none of them stick in my mind like the Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge stories of Carl Barks.

Typically my grandmother would read these comics to me and I’d imprint the dialog and captions in my brain, replaying them as I looked at the pictures over and over again.

Barks never wrote down to his audience, and his stories covered a vast array of genres, everything from straight domestic comedy to oddball adventures to screwy crime stories.

Donald and his nephews encountered dinosaurs more than once (another big favorite of mine), and Uncle Scrooge setting out to explore the asteroid belt in order to find a new home for his fabulous money bin was another tale I loved literally to pieces, but A Christmas For Shacktown remains my all time favorite graphic novel.

I’ll concede there are better graphic novels, but none of them warm my heart the way that Christmas story does.

Barks showed it’s possible to combine heart (not to be confused with sentimentality or =yuch!= schmaltz), vivid characters, and strong, intricate narrative.  His plots where typically filled with unexpected twists and turns but his characters were always deeply involved in them, not just along for the ride.

He’s one of the greatest storytellers in the 20th century, and his work remains timeless enough to last for several centuries to come.

. . . 

Ray Bradbury

The first Ray Bradbury story I remember encountering was “Switch On The Night” in its 1955 edition, read to my kindergarten class towards the end of the school year.

This would place the event sometime in the spring of 1959.

“Switch On The Night” captivated me because it was the first story I’d ever heard that showed what could be seen in the dark that couldn’t be seen in the day.

Even as a child, it made me realize the night wasn’t scary, but contained wonders and insights we miss in the harsh glare of day.

I don’t recall if the kindergarten teacher told us the name of the author, and if she did it didn’t stick, but boy howdy, the story sure did!  Did it open the doors of the night for me, or was I already inclined to be a night person and it simply confirmed that as a valid identity?

I dunno, but I’m typing this right now at 12:24am.

And the thoughts Bradbury planted in little Buzzy boy’s brain stayed and grew and flowered, as you can read in my poem, “The Magic Hours Of The Night”.

The next time I encountered Ray Bradbury’s writing was in grammar school, certainly no later than junior high.  I was already interested in science fiction by that point, and had read “The Pedestrian” in one of my school English books (we weren’t taught the story in class; the teacher skipped over it for whatever reason but I read it anyway then re-read it and read it again and again).

Anthony Boucher’s ubiquitous 2-volume A Treasury Of Great Science Fiction was in my grammar school library and in it was Bradbury’s “Pillar Of Fire” (which I would later learn was one of his alternate Martian Chronicles and a crossover with Fahrenheit 451) and in that story he offered up a veritable laundry list of outré and outlandish fiction to be tracked down and read, authors to dig up and devour.

Oh, man, I was hooked.

So of course I began looking for all the stories and writers Bradbury listed in his short story but I also began looking for Bradbury’s own work and before you could say, “Mom, can I get a subscription to the Science Fiction Book Club?” I’d read The Golden Apples Of The Sun and A Medicine For Melancholy and R is For Rocket never once dreaming that at some point in the future the roadmap Ray plopped down in my lap would eventually lead to us being co-workers (separate projects, but the same studio at the same time) and friends.

There is a beautiful yet deceptive simplicity to Ray’s work, and even though he wrote his own book on writing (The Zen Of Writing) that has lots of good insights and professional tricks & tips, he himself wasn’t able to explain how he did it.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a good Ray Bradbury parody.

I’ve seen parodies that clearly are intended to evoke Ray Bradbury, but only in the same way a clumsy older relative might evoke Michael Jackson with a spasmodic movement one vaguely recognizes as a failed attempt at a moonwalk.

But, lordie, don’t think we didn’t try to emulate him, and while none of us fanboys ever came close, I think a lot of us did learn that less is more, that the right word carries more impact than a dozen paragraphs, and that there’s magic in even the most ordinary of things.

And of course I discovered the film and TV adaptations of his work, and in discovering them I also discovered that there are some things that just can’t be translated from one media to another, and that the light, effortless appeal of Ray’s work on the page (paper or pixel) can at best be recaptured with a good audio book reader but even the best dramatic adaptions -- even those by Ray himself -- are cold dead iron butterflies compared to the light and lively creatures flying about.

So eventually I stopped trying to write like him, and instead picked up the valuable lessons of mood and emotion making an impact on a story even if the plot didn’t make much logical sense.

Decades later I would become a fan of opera, and would learn the philosophy of all opera lovers:  Opera doesn’t have to make logical sense, it just has to make emotional sense.

Ray Bradbury, opera meister.

. . . 

H.P. Lovecraft

As noted above, Bradbury’s “Pillar Of Fire” tipped me to numerous other writers, first and foremost of which turned out to be Howard Phillips Lovecraft.

Okay, before we get any further into this, let’s acknowledge the woolly mammoth in the room:  H.P. Lovecraft was a colossal asshat racist.

He was a lot of other terrible things, too, but racist is far and ahead of the rest of the pack.

It’s a disillusioning thing to find people one admired as a youngster or a teen later prove to have not just quirks and eccentricities and personal flaws, but genuinely destructive, harmful, and offensive characters.

I’ve posted on that before, too.

How I wish it were possible to retroactively scale back that hurtfulness, to make them more empathetic, less egregiously offensive (in the military sense of the word), but that ain’t so.

We have to acknowledge evil when we see it, and we have to call it out, and we have to shun it.

Which is hard when one of its practitioners provides a major influence in our creative lives.

Here’s what I liked about Lovecraft as a kid:  He was the complete opposite of Ray Bradbury.

Bradbury’s instinctive genius was in finding the right word, the simple word that conveyed great impact on the story, drawing the reader into the most fantastic situations by making them seem more familiar on a visceral level.

Lovecraft achieved the exact opposite effect by finding the most arcane, bedizened, baroque, florid, grandiloquent, overwrought, rococo verbiage possible and slapping the reader repeatedly in the face with it.

If Bradbury made the unreal real, Lovecraft made the weird even more weirder.

And let’s give this devil his due:  The Strange Case Of Charles Dexter Ward and The Dunwich Horror are two masterpieces of horror and serve as the bridge between Edgar Allen Poe and Stephen King, not to mention his creation of Cthulhu and other ancient entities existing beyond the ken of human knowledge…

…oh, wait, that’s where the story simultaneously gets messy yet provides a convenient escape hatch for fans.

While Lovecraft created Cthulhu, he did not create the Cthulhu Mythos.

That was primarily the invention August Derleth, a writer / editor / agent and H.P. Lovecraft’s #1 fanboy.

Lovecraft had some loosely related ideas in his stories and several themes he revisited repeatedly (in addition to racism).

He also had a circle of fellow writers -- including such heavy hitters as Robert “Psycho” Bloch and Robert E. “Conan” Howard -- who picked up on his ideas and, as way of a tribute, incorporated them in some of their stories.

Derleth took all this and Lovecraft’s unfinished manuscripts and short ideas he jotted down and turned it into a whole post-mortem industry, linking all of Lovecraft and other writers’ tales.

And he did a damn fine job of it, too.

So much so that the Cthulhu Mythos has taken on a life of its own, and pretty much anybody can play in that cosmic sandbox now (including Big Steve King and a ton of Japanese anime) and so Lovecraft’s works have an enormous influence on pop culture…

,,,but Howard hizzowndamsef can be -- and is -- cancelled.

Derleth and various biographers downplayed Lovecraft’s virulent racism for decades, and I don’t think Ray Bradbury was ever aware of the scope and tenor of Lovecraft’s bigotry when he name checked him in “Pillar Of Fire” and other stories.

In a similar vein Bradbury didn’t know -- because thanks again to overly protective literary executors, nobody knew -- just how big a racist asshat Walt Whitman was, either.  It is one thing to call shenanigans on a Bill Cosby or a Harvey Weinstein or a Donald Trump because their egregious behaviors were noted long before they were held accountable, but quite another to do so on a creator who died while hiding their most awful behavior from thousands if not millions of fans who felt inspired and uplifted by their work.

It’s one thing to call out a contemporary bigot and not support them by not buying their work, it’s quite another when their bigotry has been shielded from view and fair minded, decent people have used their work to draw inspiration into their own creativity.

Of course, I had no way of knowing all this when I was in junior high and seriously began tracking down Lovecraft’s work.  

He possessed a flair of the horrific and unearthly that to this day is hard to match (but easier to parody).  He was a tremendous influence on my early writing (truth be told, I zigzagged between Bradbury’s stark simplicity and Lovecraft’s overarching verbosity, giving my early oeuvre a rather schizophrenic style) and the ideas he sparked still reverberate to this day.

If only he hadn’t been such a giant %#@&ing asshat racist …

. . . 

Harlan Ellison

In a way, I’m glad neither Harlan nor his widow Susan are alive to read this.

I cherished Harlan as a friend and greatly admired his qualities as a writer.

But damn, by his own admission he should have been thrown in prison for aggravated assault on numerous occasions (he was courts martialed three times while in the Army).

We’re not talking about arguments that spiraled out of control until a few wild punches were thrown, we’re talking about Harlan by his own admission stalking and ambushing people, knocking them unconscious or causing grievous bodily harm.

We’re talking about sexual abuse and humiliation.

We’re talking about incidents he admitted to which if true put people in life threatening situations.

And yet ironically, in a certain sense Harlan (a bona fide Army Ranger, BTW) was like the U.S. Marine Corps:  You’d never have a greater friend or a worse enemy.

I became dimly aware of Harlan in the late 1960s as I started diving deeper into literary sci-fi, transitioning from monster kid fandom to digests and paperbacks.  Harlan first caught my attention with his macho prose (years later a similar style also drew me to Charles Bukowski) in stories like “Along the Scenic Route” (a.k.a. “Dogfight on 101”) in which Los Angelinos engaged in Mad Max motor mayhem but soon it became apparent the macho posturing was just a patina, that the heart and soul of much of the work reflected great sensitivity and often profound melancholy (ditto Bukowski).

Harlan was a fighter, and again by his own admission, he acknowledged in his later years that he was not a fighter because his cause was just, but rather sought out just causes because he knew he would be fighting regardless of his position, yet possessed a strong enough moral compass to point himself in the direction of a worthy enemy…

…most of the time.

He hurt and offended a large number of innocent and some not-so-innocent-but-certainly-not-evil people.

He also helped and encouraged a large number of others, people who had no idea who he was, people who had no way of adequately reciprocating his kindness and generosity.

He defended a lot of defenseless people.

He also mistakenly defended a lot of terrible people.

If someone tells me Harlan was a monster, I’ll agree:  Monstre sacré.

What made his writing sacred was that no matter how outlandish the situation, Harlan dredged up from the depths emotions so strong as to be frightening in their depiction.

Skilled enough not to lose sight of humanity, outlandish enough to conjure up ideas and emotions most people would shy away from, Harlan hit adolescent Buzzy boy like an incendiary grenade.

Unlike my first three literary influences, Harlan was and remained active in the fannish circles where I was circulating at the time.  He regularly wrote letters and columns for various fanzines, including a few I subscribed to.

In a literary sense he stood, naked and unashamed, in full view of the world, and that willingness to go beyond mundane sensibilities is what made his work so compelling.

He certainly fired me up as an adolescent writer, and proved an amalgam of Bradbury and Lovecraft that got my creative juices flowing in a coherent direction.

I don’t think I ever consciously tried to imitate him in my writing, but I sure learned from him, both in how to charge a story with emotion and how to fight for what’s right regardless of the blow back.

I loved him as a friend.

But, damn, Harlan…you could act so ugly...

. . .

H. Allen Smith

Who?

Most of you have never heard of H. Allen Smith, and that’s a damn shame.

I’d never heard of him either until I stumbled across a coverless remaindered copy of Poor H. Allen Smith’s Almanac in a Dollar General Store bin in Tennessee in the late 1960s (it was a memorable shopping expedition:  I also purchased Thomas Heggen’s Mister Roberts and Let’s Kill Uncle by Rohan O'Grady [pen name of June Margaret O'Grady Skinner]).

Reading Smith’s editorial comments (in addition to his own essays and fiction he edited numerous humor anthologies) I realized I’d found a kindred soul.

Smith had a very conversational tone as a writer; his prose seemed off the cuff and unstructured, but he slyly used that style to hide the very peculiar (and often perverse) path he led readers down.

He sounded / read like a garrulous guy at the bar, one with a huge number of charming, witty (and delightfully inebriated) friends in addition to his own bottomless well of tall tales, pointed observations, and rude jokes.

Of all the writers mentioned above, that style is the one I most consciously tried to emulate, and one I seem to have been able to find my own voice in (several people have told me I write the same way I talk, a rarity among writers).

Smith was hilarious whether wearing an editor’s visor or a freelancer’s fool’s cap.  If you know who H. L. Mencken was, think of Smith as a benign, better tempered version of that infamous curmudgeon (and if you don’t know, hie thee hence to Google and find out).

Compared to my other four influences, Smith didn’t need to add the fantastic to his fiction:  The real world was weird and wacky and whimsical enough.

A newspaper man turned best selling author, Smith became among the most popular humorists of the 1940s-50s-60s…

…and then he died and everybody forgot him.

Part of the reason they forgot is that he wrote about things that no longer seem relevant (TV cowboys of the early television era, f’r instance, in Mr. Zip) or are today looked upon askance (and with justifiable reason; the ethnic humor in many of his anthologies may not have been intended as mean spirited, but it sure doesn’t read as a celebration of other cultures, viz his succinct account of an argument following a traffic accident between two native Honolulu cabbies rendered in pidgin:  “Wassamatta you?”  “’Wassmatta me’?!?!?  Wassamatta you ‘Wassamatta me’?  You wassamatta!”).

I’m sure I picked up a great many faults from Smith, but Smith also had the virtue of being willing and able to learn and to make an effort to be a better person today than he was yesterday, and better still tomorrow.

I’ve certainly tried applying that to my life.

Smith’s style was also invoked -- consciously or not -- by other writers and editors, notably Richard E. Geis, the editor of the legendary sci-fi semi-prozone, Science Fiction Review (among other titles).  Smith died before I could meet him, but while I never met Dick Geis face to face we were pen pals for over 40 years.

Geis certainly sharpened specific aspects of my writing style, but the real underlying structure came from H. Allen Smith.

Smith’s work is hard to find today (in no small part because whenever I encounter one in the wild I snap it up) but I urge you to give him a try.

Just brace yourself for things we might consider incorrect today.

. . . 

So there’s my top five. 

With the exception of Carl Barks and Ray Bradbury, none of them are without serious flaw or blemish (though Smith seems like a decent enough sort despite his fondness for X-rated and ethnic humor).

In my defense as an impressionable child / teen, I was not aware of these flaws and blemishes when I first encountered their writing (primarily because in many cases efforts were made to hide or downplay those aspects).

The positive things I gleaned from them are not negated by the negative personal information that came out later.

I can, for the most part re the more problematic of them, appreciate their work while not endorsing their behavior.

Ellison can only be described in extremes, but his fire and passion -- when directed in a positive direction -- served as a torch to light new paths (his two original anthologies, Dangerous Visions and Again, Dangerous Visions, pretty much blew the doors off old school sci-fi and belatedly dragged the genre kicking and screaming into the 20th century).

Lovecraft I can effectively ignore while finding entertainment value in the Cthulhu Mythos.

But I must acknowledge this isn’t the same for everyone.

For example, as innocuous as I find H. Allen Smith, if a woman or a member of a minority group said, “I found this in particular to be offensive” I’d probably have to say, yeah, you’re right.

But I can still admire the way he did it, even if I can no longer fully support what he did.

. . . 

By the time I reached high school, I’d acquired enough savvy to regard to literary finds a bit more dispassionately, appreciating what they did without trying to literally absorb it into my own writing.

I discovered for myself the Beat generation of writers and poets, the underground cartoonists of the late 60s and 70s, Ken Kesey, Joseph Heller, Philip K. Dick, Ursula K. LeGuin, and a host of others, some already alluded to.

Some, such as the Beats and Bukowski, I could enjoy for their warts and all honest self-reflection.

Yes, they were terrible people, but they knew they were terrible people, and they also knew there had to be something better, and while they may never have found the nirvana they sought, they at least sent back accurate reports of where they were in their journeys of exploration.

By my late teens, I’d become aware enough of human foibles and weaknesses -- every human’s foibles and weaknesses, including my own -- to be very, very cautious in regarding an individual as admirable.

While I will never accept creativity as an excuse for bad behavior, if a creator is honest enough and self-introspective enough to recognize and acknowledge their own failings, it goes a long way towards my being willing to enjoy their work without feeling I’m endorsing them as individuals.

It’s not my place to pass judgment or exoneration on others bad behavior.

It is my place to see that I don’t emulate others’ bad behavior.

Every creator is connected to their art, even if it’s by-the-numbers for-hire hack work.

Every creator puts something of themselves into the final product.

And every member of the audience must decide for themselves if that renders the final product too toxic to be enjoyed. 

    © Buzz Dixon

[leavyes-a]

meta on media consumption as beholding, and the creation of the conservator role, based on conversations with @hdtvtits​. content warning, as always, for addiction, compulsive / obsessive behavior, aggressive hoarding, and implied terminal illness, all of the eldritch variety. also allusions to real-life hollywood dramas, though nothing remotely specific is discussed in this post.

foreword: this is just the first part of a bunch of meta i’ll likely end up posting on why levi is what they are and why their beholding manifests the way it does, because like... for secrets and the underbelly of film production i have a lot to say but a lot to source as well. but there are a few things i want to address in this post, namely: what the eye feeds off of, whether or not levi is feeding the eye in their media consumption ( and how ), and how it ultimately serves the eye’s purposes to have this be levi’s method of feeding. this probably won’t even be my last post on the subject as i keep sort of logicking out the way that beholding works and how it can manifest. it’s important to me though that it exist and function outside of just what happens in the institute ( which is proven in the statements ), mostly because fear entities are global and primal and jonny said that the story really is britain-centric. now, media consumption isn’t particularly groundbreaking; it addresses a more american culture, but that’s still western-centric and sort of ‘typical’ of europe and america, though i will say that european filmmaking as an institution is... different. it has its own history and quirks. hollywood is its own beast. someday i’ll make a post on levi’s judaism and how that interacts with beholding and manifests as more than their aesthetic, because they haven’t even used their ayin hara on this blog yet though it’s a ( minor ) power they possess, but that deserves its own post. ANYWAYS. with that said.

what does the eye feed off of? the eye doesn’t just function based off a primal fear, it has a drive that it imbues its servants with: “it is the manifestation of the fear of being watched, exposed, followed, of having secrets known, but also the drive to know and understand, even if your discoveries might destroy you.” i think that most of the entities function in a similar way, with the things they inspire and feed off of on the one hand, and avatars with a desire to evoke that fear in the other; i.e., avatars create food to feed their entity, and if they don’t, the entity devours them instead. that’s pretty basic knowledge. ( i also have stuff to say about entities consuming themselves because every time claire says autocannibalism i go absolutely hog wild about it but that’s for another day. ) there are, then, multiple ways that an avatar can go about gathering fear for its entity, but what sets the eye apart from others, i believe, is that it doesn’t need to directly cause the fear it consumes -- though i think that it finds the fear of being watched more filling than just watching other people be afraid, it can still ‘survive’ off of that. this is where eye shit starts to get confusing and it’s why these posts are so longwinded and involve me talking myself in circles, because the eye both has a specific fear that it’s linked to and can devour other people’s experiences of fear that it did not cause, yes even before the apocalypse. that’s just how jon feeds for the majority of the series. for a good long while, he’s not going out and getting statements himself; and even when he does, he’s double dipping on both the fear they convey to him about their experiences ( knowledge gained ) and the fear that this man is pulling information out of them ( secrets exposed ). 

but that’s jon and we’re not talking about jon, we’re talking about levi, and my ever-evolving thesis on voyeurism in / and media. 

so what does an eye avatar need to do, exactly, to eat? it needs to accumulate knowledge, that’s the baseline that it can survive off of -- knowledge of the other entities is best, but i don’t know that it’s a requirement... and i don’t know if it’s not! i am going to make the call that eye avatars can survive off of just hoarding information because the eye isn’t super picky and wants to know everything anyways, but not feeding off of fear for a long time is going to leave the avatar really weak. and for an eye avatar to develop its powers and grow, it needs to take statements directly, or else give other people the distinct feeling of being observed against their will. the more people it feeds off of as a result of its own actions, the more powerful it becomes. that said, i don’t think this is common, which is why watchers ( heads of institutes ) have set up these systems where they’re generating food for themselves on two axes simultaneously: fear of people who give statements, and fear of people who have to work at their institutes ( either taking statements or working directly under the eye ). that just sort of accumulates power upwards within eye bureaucracies, though the archivists who take and sort the statements are also going to become remarkably powerful if they lean into their role.

( also side note: these systems work for the english, american, and chinese institutes, but there are ways for beholding avatars to thrive outside of them, and again someday i’m going to post about oral traditions and the ability to craft stories in different regions of beholding that feed the eye. but i need to do research first and we’re talking about levi! )

here’s the thing... levi is not an archivist. levi is not powerful. levi does not have a strong connection to beholding. they worship it, but fanaticism does not equal feeding, sadly, and the role they’ve been given is not one that pushes them to go and gather statements for themselves. they have taken read and statements at afi, because wyatt was raising them into an avatar, but, though conservators and archivists can overlap in the real world, they ( in my word of god for this blog’s canon and the monster i made up ) are two very different things under the eye. essentially, conservators serve archivists ( and watchers ) by witnessing, recording, and playing back statements that archivists can then maneuver through. the more experienced the conservator, the more they can shift the camera, allowing the archivist to comb through statements in detail and pull the knowledge that they want from them. remember that the beholding grants knowledge, not understanding, and while that may be fine for the eye, sometimes its ‘human’ servants need to put the pieces together in order to advance its plans.

the conservator is a relatively new position within beholding, because it does function like a film camera. i think that, in other times, places, and cultures, there were similar avatars who filled a similar role, but it wasn’t the same. the conservator really is a miskatonic / american experiment to help the institute delve into the information it already possessed. for one example of how conservators are useful, consider what happened with sasha: the archivist had his voice recordings of her, because it can’t effect magnetic tape, but jon the person still had her wiped completely from his memory. that wouldn’t happen to a conservator, because all of their memories are converted into (meta)physical tape stock. they are a lockbox that cannot be opened or altered unless you’re a more powerful beholding avatar. ( the limitation here is that they only have so much storage space, they will need to expunge some memories to store more; though those memories can be kept in physical containers, film stock obviously degrades and is a very unstable and extremely flammable medium; their body will also internally decompose to make room for more data and that is a painful process that eventually renders the conservator just a storage without any ability to function beyond sitting still and replaying witnessed / read events. )

we’ve established that levi feeds normally. they take statements, they are present in an archive, they’re hearing the scary stories. finally, finally on to why levi consumes media and how levi consumes media, because the one is intrinsically linked to the other. let me start by saying that just watching television or films does not a beholding avatar make. yes you are watching, but the distinction is in whether you are passively or actively viewing. and the power that is drawn from someone zoning out and being addicted to passively consuming media does not go to the eye. that is neither a fear of being observed ( for the one watching or for the actors / writers, because nobody is going to care about an audience that doesn’t form an opinion at all beyond basic emotional reactions; uncritical consumers are milk and honey to them ) nor a pursuit of knowledge ( passively accepting knowledge is, according to elias, far less effective in raising up eye avatars than letting them learn to ‘see’ on their own ). all that power goes to mx media ( @hdtvtits​ ) or, if you don’t like crossovers, Just Definitely Not the Eye. it’s when you start performing analysis that the eye takes interest -- which is why the eye continues to thrive in academia ( au where i write meta on just how bad that gets, historically, but again there are things we don’t get into until we research thoroughly ). the more you lose yourself in compiling information, to the exclusion of everything else, the more you appeal to beholding. and when you start unveiling secrets, which there are plenty of in film and film production, things kept private from the audience, ‘movie magic’, then feeding can begin.

this may come as a surprise, but levi does not have a response to whether or not they ‘like’ movies. if you ask them, ‘did you enjoy that movie?’ they will not say ‘yes’ or ‘no’, they will just start launching into ripping it apart. levi probably started out enjoying movies recreationally, but at some point, they became not just unwilling to but incapable of watching films without analyzing -- and what separates this from normal people who are conscientious and engaged viewers is that this is a mania that spans hours. their ‘digestion’ of a film is obsessive and has a physical component because it is eldritch in nature. i can’t stress enough that levi isn’t just a pretentious film buff who says ‘oh i can’t consume media for pleasure or uncritically’, though they may have been at some point in their college career! they have a physical and metaphysical makeup that drives them to frenzy over what they watch. the instant they finish a film, they’ll begin a rapid accumulation of knowledge of anything they can dig up: the who, what, when, where, why, how. if they do have an emotional response, it’s incredibly removed, and their way of processing it is to drill into how and why the film made them feel that way. 

if they try to avoid this step in the process -- if they just watch a movie, turn it off, and attempt to go to bed -- they will start to weaken immediately. watching the movie isn’t enough for feeding. if it was, the eye wouldn’t take any interest at all. it’s the genuinely out-of-control driving impulse to keep researching and researching until there is nothing left about a piece of media that isn’t known, shredding through academic papers and script drafts and director’s notes and interviews and everything they can get their hands on, that stems from and feeds beholding. they do not settle for what is put on the screen. they will even cold call creators in a fit and try to get them to talk about the production ( which is, yes, invasive -- beholding is an eldritch entity, it is not healthy or good and does not inspire healthy or good habits! ). 

they may not even be capable of enjoying a piece on its own merits; it’s all about the world it opens up to them, it’s about stuffing themselves with information until they can’t breathe and overstimulate and pass out. then recovery from that can take days as they process what they learned and sort it all out in their mind. they don’t really do much with this information; just knowing it is enough. if an archivist or watcher wants to take action about it, they can ask levi to spit it back up for them. but ultimately, despite the impact that this has on their health, this is still low-level feeding for a low-level avatar. unless it’s a truly gruesome movie or has an exceptionally shady production background, it’s not really the fear that the eye is looking for. levi is feeding one half of beholding, the half that wants them to consume knowledge and secrets. if levi didn’t take / read statements as well, or go out and witness live horrific events, they would probably starve -- their body would eat itself processing knowledge.

and i will talk about the component of parasocial relationships, anxiety that stems from being an actor / director / content creator in general and having your work and your image spiral out of control as it’s ripped apart and dissected by consumers, because that is beholding territory as well. it’s just not actually what levi does, but because it relates to the media-beholding relationship, i’ll have it on this blog.

[bigskydreaming]

Dropping off another commission which means okay NOW I only have one to finish. This one is a throwback to that time I was talking Marvel/DC crossover ships, and I said okay but what about Dick/Wanda because yeah, like two of the only Rom heroes in anywhere being a thing would be pretty cool, but also like.

Batfam + Magnetfam holiday dinner gatherings.

Someone agreed, and asked for more along those lines and asked that I not worry about the crack potential but feel free to embrace it instead, citing that Batboys adopted by Zatanna AU I wrote as a tone they’d enjoyed. Their only other requests were they wanted to see if I could include Luna and Crystal in any ways, and that I give Stephanie some time in the spotlight. I warned them that my usual take on Stephanie is ADHD as hell, but that apparently was not a problem, so uh...hang on when it gets to Steph or be prepared for her to leave you in the dust. She doesn’t slow down for stragglers.

There were a ton of characters to juggle in this so not everyone gets the same degree of focus, but I did my best to work everyone relevant to the scenario in as best I could. Also, I don’t actually know where a couple of these particular takes came from - I’ve never ever written Lorna anything remotely like this in my life, but I kinda just let the crack do what it wanted to do. *Shrugs* I have no defense, only oops.

Anyway, without further ado, I give you 15K, yes you heard that right, 15K of crossover crack that puts the Batfamily and the Magnetfamily at the same dinner table, lights the match and then runs for cover.

************************

We enter unobtrusively through the dining room’s lone doorway. Our awkward approach is that of the mockumentary style; our hushed atmosphere is that of taking ourselves very seriously, because if we don’t, who will? 

Said dining room’s doorway is perfectly situated so as to allow only one point of entrance and exit. Also: maximum drama while doing so. The architecture of Wayne Manor was designed with a clear set of priorities in mind. We invite you to picture the airs of Downtown Abbey, but  as if skewing less towards the egalitarian passive aggressive stylings associated with British High Drama, and more towards the rather more direct passive aggressive stylings of American High Drama. 

As an example...where a British soap opera might depict someone dramatically gasping “Why, I never!” and clutching symbolically at their heart in order to convey they’re mere insults away from having a myocardial infarction, an American soap opera might instead depict someone dramatically yelling “Bleep you!” and then vaulting across the table to punch someone in the face in order to convey they’re really quite angry and the only way to fully express that is by starting a feud that will last 72 episodes and only end when one of them is murdered and replaced by their evil twin.

That sort of thing. 

We return to unobtrusively entering through the doorway whose very singular purpose in the narrative is as a conveyance that this is the House That Drama Built. 

It should be added as an afterthought that only just occurred to us but is no less important because of its poor punctuality: the House That Drama Built also exists as a kind of metaphysical Drama vampire that cultivates an atmosphere of Drama whilst simultaneously feasting on the Drama it creates just to harvest as its crop of choice.

Quite nasty and shiver-inducing, to be sure, but let it serve as a good rule of thumb: Don’t trust centuries old rich people houses. There’s always something messed up about those places. Seriously. You know its true.

Proceeding onward, and despite having explicitly mapped out why its impossible to do so, we nevertheless manage to sidle into prime vantage points without being noticed. Look, we can do stuff like that because we’re magic, okay? Also fictional, and really just a tonal framing device introduced as a thin coat of varnish overlaying everything with the glistening sheen of crack fiction. Now shush and pretend we’re not here, which should be easy because we’re not.

The two family patriarchs, Erik Lehnsherr and Bruce Wayne, each sit at opposing heads of the excessively long dining room table that is almost certainly an indication one of Bruce’s direct ancestors felt a clear and urgent need to overcompensate for something.

Locked in an epic battle of wills that looks remarkably similar to the staring contest perfected by kindergartners everywhere, though that’s undoubtedly just a coincidence,the two titans of temperament face off in a face-off for the ages. 

Both steel-faced and with backs so straight the sight would make any right angle weak in the knees, these bastions of brooding are equally infamous for their rigidity and refusal to bend, even when they probably should - because sometimes its a battle over the fate of the world and a fight for the very heart and soul of humanity, yes, absolutely true, but other times their children just asked if they could have pizza tonight instead of meatloaf and it really didn’t need to escalate that quickly, but oh well.

Heedless of the judgment of fictional narrators as well as every person to ever suggest to them that their sphincters might actually benefit from the occasional attempt to unclench, the Master of Magnetism is an irresistible force while channeling the unleashed totality of his willpower through his steady gaze, as fixed and unwavering as the North Star itself. At the same time, his counterpart is an equally immovable object while planted firm and steady in his convictions, the imposing edifice of his impassive expression not likely to be eroded by the mere disdain of another mortal. Not when the Man of Bats has stubbornly stared down gods. 

Admittedly, the last one used the opportunity to blast him through time and space instead, but that’s the kind of risk one takes when matching an ageless deity ego for ego. It should not be viewed as an indication as to whom among these two mighty mortals might appear the victor when engaged in similar combat. Especially as neither is in possession of magic eye beams which technically should count as cheating, if you really think about it.

They match each other fractional eye squint for fractional eye squint. Both lost in the intensity of each other’s gaze in a way that regardless of tropes is less enemies to lovers and more enemies to psych, we’re still enemies and if our kids do tie the knot, I’m totally going to insist on hosting the wedding at my big-ass mansion and you can call that a power move if you want because it totally is, what about it?

In response to the challenge that’s conveyed with crystal clarity thanks to the power of crack, Erik’s own gaze narrows fractionally further as he reaches down with his mutant abilities until they chance upon a vein of iron miles deep. He then proceeds to push and pull on it in such a way as to make the earth shift beneath their feet.

He is not subtle about being the cause. That sort of thing isn’t really in his wheelhouse.

However, in the name of defending Erik from his children’s exasperated glares, it should be pointed out here that Bruce did in fact ask, what about it, and Erik did in his own fashion simply indicate what about it indeed.

Well. Sorta.

The initial clash of wills meeting wills subsides and assures both men that their opponent will be no easy pushover. With that, the concrete aspiring contenders retreat once more to their far sides. They proceed to keep eyes locked and faces solemn and still, neither taking their gaze off the other even while eating or responding to some conversation piece directed at them by another denizen of the dining room.

“This is quite the meal, Mr. Pennyworth. You are to be commended,” Erik says sincerely. His face is still as smooth as Lake Placid, with nary a Syfy Original killer crocodile lurking dangerously beneath the surface.

“Yes, truly some of your best work, Alfred, thank you,” Bruce adds completely deadpan, not to be outdone.

Eternally placing his professionalism above all else, Alfred waits until he’s out of the room and halfway to the kitchen before venting an exasperated exhalation of his own.

Of course, Wayne Manor does have excellent acoustics.

Elsewhere along the table’s lengths, Pietro and Damian also keep their stares deadlocked from across each other, never deviating throughout the entirety of their meal. Their detente, however, is more accurately termed an ‘arrogance-off,’ with each refusing to give way before a lesser opponent. If Pietro is remotely bothered that he’s deeply invested in establishing his superiority over a twelve year old, it doesn’t show.

Look, if he starts making allowances for age, where would it end? With him letting toddlers walk all over him simply because they managed not to blink first? Don’t be absurd.

On the other side of Pietro, Jason is gleefully lobbing conversational grenades down the length of the table. Seizing advantage of even the slightest lull, he packs every sparse moment of silence full of yet another philosophical hot take he’s strategically brainstormed to cause maximum conscience carnage. 

Each carelessly uttered but carefully aimed moral dilemma-turned-mortar fire is tactically engineered towards setting each and every highly opinionated diner to warring over the higher ground. There are always holdouts of course, those who instead hunker deeper down in their trenches in an attempt to wait out the bombardment without engaging. Persistence has never been something Jay lacks, however, so even the few duds that fail to properly detonate only end up followed by a rapid-fire encore the first chance he has to reload.

Meanwhile, Lorna downs a glass of wine like its a shot of tequila and she’s a veteran of the collegiate drinking experience. Then again, she actually is, even if most tend to forget that. It doesn’t quite lend the same weight to her resume as actual freaking superhero, you’re welcome for the planet’s continued state of existence does, so she doesn’t tend to lead with it. 

But that doesn’t mean that even this dubiously termed ‘skill’ lacks a time to shine. One does what one has to in order to make it through family gatherings when the family in question is hers, the mistress of magnetism maintains. Be sure to note both lower case m’s in the script of her full title, because sharing a powerset with her father doesn’t mean she actually has to indulge in silly shows of power with the sole purpose of establishing one’s right to self-brand with fully capitalized letters. 

She finds such things exhaustively tedious, as dull as they are droll, and as much as she loves her father, she could really stand to see him embarrass himself less in public, with his ridiculous insistence on those farces.

In his defense, the enemies that flee in terror upon such displays, wetting themselves all the while...well, clearly they’re suitably impressed. But that doesn’t mean Lorna can’t still be embarrassed for him. Honestly, would it really kill him to act his actual age of....

Oh hell. She’s not nearly drunk enough yet to try and make sense of her father’s age. 

Full disclosure, and also full awareness that her brother will never fail to bring up her own recorded instances of ridiculous grandstanding whenever its remotely relevant, and most other opportunities as well - yes, those happened, yes, she agrees they were ridiculous and necessary, but she also requests it be on the record that in all such instances she was either very young, very possessed, or very both.

Probably.

Look, the possessed thing happens often enough its not like even she can keep track of it. If she wants to squeeze a few perks out of that particular trend towards things that are obnoxious and unnecessary for five hundred, Alex, she’s damn well entitled.

And why, in the name of all the gods she hasn’t been teammates with and seen drunkenly stumbling around in their underwear at some point, is she picturing her ex Alex’s face when whimsically thinking of the Jeopardy host? Better question, why is she still not drunk enough to not give a shit if she does?

Ugh, if this leads to her having to admit Betsy was right and she’s begun indulging in her family’s tendency towards being excessive about anything and everything that keeps their minds off boringly pedestrian events like a break-up, well. That would really suck. 

Mostly because Betsy is unbearable when she’s right about anything.

Driven to extreme measures by the fact that her thoughts are being rude and contentious and mean to her, Lorna trades introspection for the potential hazards of engaging directly with her dinner companions. Risky as that may be. They could be more unbearable than Betsy, for all she knows. And bad things tend to happen when she gives strangers the benefit of the doubt. She usually ends up disappointed, or bored.

Also, possessed.

Girding herself with jaded detachment, Lorna resigns herself to the mortifying ordeal of having to know other people - people who when taking into account her sister’s track record with such matters, could easily turn out to be serial killers or even worse, annoying robots. 

Shuddering at the memory of the Pencil Sharpener That Walks Like A Man, she surveys the chaos she’d mistaken for white noise when still busy being her own entertainment. Its slightly livelier than she’d assumed it would be.

Lorna’s never lacked her father’s eye for tactical analysis and strategic scheming, to be clear. Its more that she’s absent his desire to see her molded into any kind of mini-me that could potentially carry on where he leaves off when he dies, as if no interruption has taken place.

But never mind her issues with her father, that she steadfastly refuses to refer to as Daddy issues. Coolly assessing the commotion around her, she decides the only role worth adopting here is that of the official fanner of flames. The only side worth taking is of course the only side ever worth taking: hers, obviously.

She wades in without any warning beyond a green-lipped smile that toes the line between bearing just enough menace to act as a threat, but never so much as to warn people to take sufficient precautions when facing her.

It’s been said that the difference between her and her father is that Magneto causes natural disasters.

Lorna is one.

Wasting no time before establishing herself as an enemy to all and a friend to none, as if she needs any, she sets up shop as a random sequencer with no allegiance or agenda other than making everyone regret insisting on her attendance. 

She deftly diverts Jason’s verbal volleys off their intended course with dry, sardonic wit and she wields sly insinuations like a racket with which she redirects grenades of great ethical weight at whomever strikes her fancy. She is whimsy: watch her do whatever the hell she wants. Object, and catch hellfire.

Rather than take offense at her interference, Jason tips his head to her in appreciation of her craft. Like calls to like, after all. Lorna decides in a burst of decisiveness that she likes this one, at least. 

She tilts her glass to him with a smirk and refills, topping off Kate Kane’s glass as well when the older woman holds hers out with a look that leapfrogs right over seduction and practically all the way to the morning after. She decides then and there that she likes this one as well. Two for two, look at that. And people say she’s anti-social. Distinctly recalling she’d taken a second look at Kate’s legs before sitting down, and adding in those eyelashes....

Well. Lorna’s never seriously considered taking another woman up on one of these looks before, but it wouldn’t wholly be accurate to claim she’s never thought of sending one to say...Ororo or Betsy a time or two herself. 

Or even a little accurate, actually, but that is neither here nor there.

Lorna thinks, though, that if she were to take up this particular woman up on this particular offer on this particular night - there might at some point be explosions. 

This is not a dealbreaker.

Look, she didn’t get her degree in geology because she held any particular interest in literally dull as dirt sandstone. Pyroclastic igneous rock formations, on the other hand...now that’s a different matter entirely. Fire pretty. Batwoman pretty. 

Okay, she might be a little tipsy at this point. She looks at her wine glass accusingly; she shouldn’t have to find these things out on her own. It neither confirms nor denies. 

Bitch.

Still further down the table, Dick's usual charming composure has been knocked out and left tied up in a coat closet somewhere. With the anthropomorphic embodiment of the emotion Frazzled then stepping in to take his place, and not at all very obviously acting out of sorts, if the amused but completely unhelpful smirks of his siblings are anything to go by. 

The Dick-shaped entity seated in his place makes occasional token attempts to direct the flow of conversation like the maestro he’s usually known to be in such settings. In this particular setting and time, however, he mostly just manages to exist as a sentient display of the condition or state of being I Have Regrets. 

His attention flits from one person to the next as he periodically tries to distract everybody from plotting the murders of everyone else at the table. Or covering up the murder of someone else, as committed by one of their family members. Or from plotting to frame someone else at the table for murder. Or from broadcasting that they’d absolutely get to the bottom of any frame job and prove their relative’s innocence and see the real culprit behind bars. 

Also, he may or may not have to every so often stop and distract himself from plotting murders of his own.

Dick lands briefly on Jason every now and again with an “I know what you’re doing and would greatly appreciate it if you’d stop” glare. 

Its met each time by his little brother’s “I have no idea what you’re talking about, this is just how I partake in family gatherings, isn’t that what you want or should I just go home” mask of blatantly transparent faux-innocence. 

Jay’s expressions are practically close captioned, that’s how far he is from even attempting to bother with the whole thing.

Dick returns fire with a narrowing of the eyebrows that screams: “I’ll get you for this, and your little dog too.” 

Jason’s lip only upticks at one corner, his otherwise studied indifference sending back his crystal clear response: “Bitch, I died. What’re you gonna to do, threaten to go a week without trying to ambush me with hugs?” 

Dick’s jaw shifts like a tectonic plate movement, teeth grinding as he holds the glare. “You’re the worst.” 

Jason beams and tilts his head, eyes drifting upwards in silent contemplation, as if to say, “Well, we all aspire to great heights in our own unique ways.” 

“Allow me to congratulate you on your successful achievements then.” Dick’s now puckered expression fires barbs from a blowgun.

“If you really cared, you’d show me with a trophy. What’s a guy gotta do to get his brother to try and buy his love and affection,” said little brother lofts at him by way of an obnoxiously exaggerated batting of his eyelashes.

Next to Dick, Wanda has her elbow on the table, propping up her head in one hand as she lazily pokes at her food with her fork. She’s not even trying to hide how much she regrets every decision that led to this. She likes Dick, quite a lot, but clearly, neither of their families are fit for conjoined festivities. Lesson learned. 

Duke is shoving dinner roll after dinner roll into his mouth, as if afraid to risk missing out on anything by attempting more focus-intensive food handling than that. His eyes are feverishly bright as they dart from one length of the table to the other and back again. This is the best day ever. 

Tim and Cass are seated side by side and occasionally dip their heads together in hushed conversation. At other times they flick their fingers at each other in sign language just below the surface of the table. 

Periodically, Tim will then wade into one conversation or another, never staying focused for long on any one single conversation partner before moving on. 

If one were to view this whole....event...as an exercise in conversational warfare, one might be tempted to view Tim’s patterns of discussion as somewhat akin to guerilla warfare. Brief engagements not aimed at achieving any kind of victory so much as feeling out the oppositions’ defenses and tactics before withdrawing to form more firmed out plans based off the gathered intel. 

Dick closes his eyes and sighs as he sees Tim and Cass dip their heads together again. Right after Cass’ eagle-eyed gaze spent a few moments lingering on the wake of Tim’s latest ‘tactical retreat,’ which was plenty of time for their sister to soak in a fair amount of everyone's reactions and responses.

Dick coughs into his hand. When Tim looks his way and meets Dick’s stern gaze with an inquiring eyebrow, Dick reaches a hand to the side of his head as if to smooth back a lock of hair. Instead he then signs with grimly dancing fingers, “Please tell me you and Cass aren’t using a holiday dinner together as a chance to develop contingency plans for taking down members of my girlfriend’s family.”

Tim cocks his head slightly and frowns. The only indication that his fingers are once again busy at work beneath the table is the slight ripple of movement along his upper arms. A few moments later, Dick’s phone vibrates with a notification. He slides it into his lap and reads Tim’s text.

“I’m sorry, I have no idea what you just said. I don’t speak ASL.”

Dick tilts his own head and fires an unimpressed look across the table. “Seriously?”

Cassandra pokes Tim in the side, sending him an inquiring look of her own. No doubt curious what he’d texted Dick to elicit such a response. Tim grins and answers her in swift, practiced gestures the little twerp makes no attempt to hide this time. Blatant ASL, just one of the several different sign languages they were all fluent in. Cass raises a hand to her face and hides her giggle behind the back of it, just as Tim finishes. Dick darts his sour face at her, texting her phone in turn.

“Et tu, Cass?”

She glances down at her own phone and then just shrugs at him, utterly unrepentant. Dick pinches the bridge of his nose. Okay then.

Pietro’s daughter Luna had long since retreated to one of the Wayne family dens to watch movies, citing a headache. No one doubted that the precocious young empath was just entirely uninterested in being in the vicinity of all their entangled and extremely loud emotions. 

Her father had briefly attempted to impress upon her the importance of being present with the rest of them for at least some of the dinner. His daughter had simply met his token effort at imparting politeness protocols with a pointed look first at him and then at Damian, who was at most two years older than her. 

Pietro had grimaced. In an ideal world, caving to her demands would not be easier than him just conducting himself like a mature adult for the duration of a single dinner gathering. But then, none of them came from an ideal world, and he suffered no illusions about being an ideal parent. And more importantly, in the grand scheme of things it was hardly like this was one of the really important battles, the ones that needed to be picked carefully. 

That was his excuse and he was sticking to it. And thus Luna had been excused to entertain herself with the Waynes’ vast video library.

Wanda’s twin sons thus far seem content to keep themselves busy with their own back-and-forth in the private ‘twin language’ they’d crafted over the years - more due to cheating than the existence of some preternatural twin understanding of each other. Neither boy pretends to have a clue how the other’s mind works. 

Essentially, Tommy just talks to his brother at full superspeed, while Billy has a spell in place that allows him to keep up and understand his twin no matter what speed his ramblings take. No one seems entirely sure what mechanism they have for Billy to speak back to Tommy in a way no one else ever picks up on, or even if such a mechanism exists at all. It's entirely possible that due to the nature of their dynamic, they’d never found creating one to be at all necessary. 

That isn’t to suggest that Billy is a follower in temperament or by nature. Its more just that when dealing with Tommy, one either follows (or tries to play catch up slash does damage control) or else one waits until Tommy races off to do what he wants, for however long it takes for him to eventually figure out that nobody has followed or is even going to. Then finally racing back and submitting to following someone else’s lead, sulking all the while about how nobody ever listens to him about anything. 

Basically, letting Tommy take the lead in the more low-stakes engagements is just being efficient, in Billy’s opinion. The alternative takes way too long and his twin is a pain to deal with when in a heightened state of Sulk.

However, as to just how low-stakes or not this dinner actually is, well, that seems to be a matter of some debate between the twins, and not something Billy himself has even settled his opinion on. 

Frequent high-pitched squeaks occasionally sound out from their corner of the table, most too quick to even register for anyone other than their uncle Pietro, who currently is still preoccupied with his extended staring contest against his diminutive rival in all things pertaining to ego and attempted sovereignty

If anyone else were even to register their existence or frequency, the combination of squeaks and Tommy’s repeated glares at his brother might lead to the conclusion that Billy is repeatedly poking or jabbing his twin in order to rein Tommy in from leaping into some fray or another and escalating the already existing tension to biblical proportions. As is his wont. 

And Billy, at least, is enjoying his meal.

Well, he’s trying to, anyway.

But the closer he gets to completely clearing his plate, the more frequent Billy’s longing glances in the direction Luna had vanished become. Clearly, the teen is debating the merits of faking some ailment of his own and following his cousin’s example all the way to blessed, blessed relief from the chore of being the only one capable of saying “Tommy no” and actually producing an end result that isn’t just an accelerated timetable.

It’s not hard to tell when Billy’s inner war of his self-preserving tendencies vs his self-sacrificing tendencies is ultimately decided with a final score of Sanity: 1, Pointless and Unappreciated Gestures of Nobility: 0.

The seventeen year old sighs loudly and slumps back against his chair, his entire demeanor broadcasting an aura of “I give up” on so many clear wavelengths, it interrupts every skirmish currently in progress and results in every adult at the table sending concerned looks towards the twins’ corner of it. 

Billy’s crossed arms and the empty space his gaze is determinedly fixed on combine to clearly convey he has nothing to do with whatever has happened or is about to happen. 

Leading to every scrap of attention thus trekking further down the table to his twin, where Tommy is beaming with the brightness of a thousand supergiant stars about to go supernova and make a mess that will span galaxies and last for ten thousand years. 

His Aunt Lorna’s own penchant for pretty explosions and fireworks has nothing on his, other than seniority.

Tommy’s own family knows that gleam in his eyes well enough to be aware their own immediate reactions should be duck and cover. Unfortunately, the Waynes’ dining room affords few actual defensive positions, all of which are already occupied by members of the Family Batshit. Resigning themselves to the inevitable, the Family Maximumoff Damage brace for impact.

Not being familiar with the gleam in Tommy’s eyes themselves, but more than observant (and paranoid) enough to recognize the braced positions of the other family and adapt accordingly, the members of the Family Batshit are all quick to follow suit.

Wanda meanwhile takes the scant seconds before collision to close her eyes and try to recall why she ever wanted children so desperately she literally wished them into existence.

She’s got nothing. 

Dick uses the same time to gulp and take a deep breath, frantically trying to fortify himself with everything he knows of Wanda’s more....mayhem-inclined child. Hopefully he can use that intel to prepare contingencies for whatever fallout may follow in the next few seconds.

Ever the optimist, that one.

Into a silence stretching longer than a speedster in the spotlight has ever before allowed silence to linger - with Tommy clearly savoring the focused attention and abundant awareness of his Impact™ and reputation - the silver-haired teen grins with teeth bright enough to ignite the ensuing firestorm all on their own. The fateful words he finally utters almost seem overkill. At least until he finishes saying them and everything else ceases to matter, because boom.

Ignition.

“Hey Dick, if you end up marrying our mom, does that mean we can call you Dad?”

The silence that follows that particular detonation is akin to the death-knell of the dinosaurs, in the moments immediately after a giant asteroid wiped out 80% of life on the planet.

Then: anarchy.

“How dare you!” Damian launches himself out of his seat with what would normally be described as a hiss, were it not uttered at a decibel closer to being an actual sonic boom.

Jason looks like he can’t decide if he wants to fall to the ground laughing or fall to the ground tucking and rolling. To avoid having to make a decision, he grabs his until now untouched wine and guzzles it like a man who just found the only oasis in a hundred mile wide desert.

Lorna uncorks another bottle of wine and raises the whole thing like she’s toasting existence itself, on her way out the mortal coil’s exit-marked door. Kate thrusts her glass in front of Lorna for another refill. 

“I know many lesbians can and do have kids in any number of ways, but do you think its okay if I cite this as proof we’re the highest evolved life form and if I was meant to have kids of my own, God wouldn’t have given me such an obvious hint as to the opposite?” 

Kate absently muses to Lorna under her breath and out of the corner of her mouth, both of them still fixed on viewing the various diners turned statue-still by the Medusa like turn of the table’s conversations. 

“It feels like that’s one of those things people tell me I should keep in my head and just gets me in trouble when I decide to share it instead, but honestly, I can never tell.”

“You’re asking the wrong person,” Lorna whispers back. “I get possessed by this one psychic ghost enough that one of the few perks is I don’t have to worry about ticking people off anymore. Nowadays if I piss someone off, all I have to do is wait a couple of days and then say I was possessed again at the time. Then I just ask why the hell did nobody notice and dramatically make a lot of noise about that until everybody forgets what the hell they were even ticked at me for in the first place.”

“Ugh. Lucky bitch.” 

Lorna shrugs with the faintest of smirks. “It’s all about just working with what you’ve got.”

Elsewhere at the table, Duke is frozen with his mouth still stuffed so full his cheeks are puffed out like a cartoon chipmunk’s. The only movements coming from his direction at all are the twin orbs that are his eyes, currently imitating tennis balls being rocketed back and forth across the court by pro players who never miss a swing.

Tim and Cass are clutching each others’ forearms, the closest either has come to displaying a panic reaction in literal years. In Cassandra’s case, more like in her entire lifetime.

But the title of ultimate attention draw is for the moment a dubious honor bestowed upon the Wayne patriarch himself. 

Bruce leaps from his seat like an Olympic sprinter off the starting block, managing to catch up to his youngest before Damian plus Damian’s butter knife make it more than a foot towards Tommy. He snatches the twelve year old up by his waist, smoothly disarming his son and spinning around to plant himself between the boy and his target with the practiced and precise moves of the bedlam ballerina that he is.

“Umm,” Dick utters at last. His eyes fly wildly around the room as if seeking permission to land. They settle on making repeated loops of a race track that runs from Tommy’s smile of success to Damian’s enraged expression, and then to his own father’s attempt at a poker face: normally flawless, but now only warranting such acclaim if Bruce’s intention actually was to mimick the poker face of someone steadily ingesting lemons and nothing else throughout the course of a game. 

Its not Dick’s finest work, obviously, but to be fair he’s also quite busy,trying to will himself through the floor. Possibly the Earth’s core while he’s at it. Results are still pending.

Meanwhile, unnoticed by the inhabitants of the dining room, Pietro’s ex Crystal has arrived as previously agreed, so she can pick up Luna and their daughter can spend the back half of the holiday with her mother and the latter’s teammates. 

They were on their way to the dining room so Luna could say her goodbyes to her father, aunts, cousins and grandfather, when the current chaos had erupted.

Her own heroic impulses instinctively compelling her to charge in and attempt to help, Crystal’s tugged back by her daughter’s hand in hers. Knowing full well that Luna’s empathy-fueled instincts are superior to just about anyone else’s, Crystal halts and takes in the scene before them again, still with caution but with slightly less urgency.

“I suppose you have some idea what’s going on in there?”

Luna just smiles softly at her mother, as if shyly amused by the situation they’re witnessing.

“Did you hear how just when we were coming down the hall, Tommy said something about calling Wanda’s boyfriend ‘Dad’ if they get married?”

Crystal furrows her brow and nods; she hadn’t been paying that much attention, but one didn’t engage in superheroics (let alone marry and live with a hyper-active speedster) if one had poor situational awareness. Well one did, theoretically, but in such instances, one usually just died before gaining any kind of reputation or relevance.

“Well see, that set off Damian, Mr. Wayne’s youngest son and Dick’s baby brother - he was the one shouting ‘How dare you’ - “

“Don’t tell me this family has some kind of superiority complex about the twins or Wanda not being good enough for one of their own,” Crystal interrupted. The air around them crisped and heated even as a stray wind arose inside the manor and teased the ends of her hair into furious activity. 

She and Pietro might not be together anymore, but her fondness for him and certain other members of his family hadn’t ceased to exist simply because their marriage no longer did. Wanda had been her friend for years before she and Pietro even began to date, and her twins were still Luna’s cousins. All of which made them still family as far as Crystal was concerned. 

And she’d certainly put up with enough of her own family’s nonsense about nobody being good enough for one of them...more than she should have, to be honest, even if that was still ultimately the reason she’d cut ties with them and made her teammates her and her daughter’s true family. Crystal wasn’t about to stand idly by while strangers subjected her daughter’s cousins and aunt to more of that bullshit, even if they were hugely respected heroes of this universe’s Earth.

But Luna just shakes her head swiftly and decisively, and Crystal forces her metaphorical hackles to subside at her daughter’s apparent lack of concern. 

“No, its nothing like that. Well, Damian’s kind of a brat sometimes, but it feels like he only acts out like that when he doesn’t have instincts about how to react to a given situation and he’s embarrassed about that. He had some kind of messed up childhood none of them like to talk about too much. But honestly, he feels more jealous right now than he does anything else. Aunt Wanda gave us all a rundown before we got here, about Dick’s family and things to not ask them about or bring up, and what kind of stuff they’d been told about us for similar reasons. Anyway, she told us Damian didn’t even live with their family until a few years ago, and when he first came to live with them there was a year when Mr. Wayne was missing and most of them thought he was dead....and so Dick was basically Damian’s first real kinda dad even before Mr. Wayne got a chance to be, and even though he’s been the one raising Damian ever since he got back, it sounded like there’s a lot of mixed feelings and confusion and tension between him, Mr. Wayne and Dick ever since.”

“And of course your cousin just couldn’t resist poking the elephant in the room, once he’d been made aware of its existence, if only to see what would happen,” Crystal sighs. That boy....

Not for the first time when around her ex’s family, she finds herself reminded to be grateful for the relationship she and her daughter share, mostly due to her daughter’s willingness to be understanding of others’ flaws, her own included. Crystal makes sure to will forth a wish for fortitude in Wanda’s direction while she’s at it. Couldn’t hurt.

And of course, speaking of Luna’s ability to be understanding....

“Tommy was just trying to have a little fun, he honestly didn’t mean any harm by it,” her daughter defends the cousin in question. “I know he didn’t really have any idea how much of a reaction he’d get, and just how deep and strongly they had about this. And I know it probably sounds like I’m just trying to make excuses for Tommy to keep him out of trouble, but maybe this is a good thing, that he made this happen? Because I can tell they definitely don’t talk a lot about these things or let them out in the open instead of trying to shove them down all the time. So Damian feels jealous, probably because he still has feelings of seeing Dick as a father that he feels he can’t act on because he doesn’t want to upset their actual dad or cause fights between them.”

"And I can feel Mr. Wayne feels jealous too, but of how Damian feels and the fact that he acted on what was so clearly jealousy to everyone else, but also he’s upset at himself, probably because he thinks its not right for him to feel jealous towards his own son and specifically because he and his brother have such a strong relationship and Dick did such a good job taking care of him when Mr. Wayne couldn’t. And then Dick feels guilty but also a little upset at himself as well, maybe because he knows he has nothing to feel guilty for? I’m not sure about that part, I haven’t totally gotten a feel for their usual emotional dynamics. But also he feels jealous too, and of Mr. Wayne, most likely because he gets to be Damian’s father and on some level Dick wishes that was still him occupying that role.”

“Maybe you should be explaining all of this to them instead of me,” Crystal concludes when her daughter finishes her run-through in a rush of hastily accelerated words. Luna is leaning to the side, as if trying to be subtle about craning to look around her at the drama on the other side. 

“I will if they ask me to,” her daughter says, now sounding somewhat defensive of herself. “I don’t think they would have liked it much if I just tried to talk to them about all their feelings that they refuse to acknowledge or act upon, even just with each other in private.”

“Hmm,” Crystal just hums thoughtfully. Luna rushes to present the rest of her case, though Crystal still lacks a clear picture of just what the specific endgame is that her little schemer simply can’t resist trying to nudge things towards.

“Besides, like I said, maybe this was a good thing, Tommy got it out in the open where now they have to talk about it with each other, since its pretty undeniable to everyone. I mean everyone else in their family definitely feels kinda satisfied I think? No, vindicated. That’s it. I think they’ll be fine on their own. They all definitely love each other and if anything, the jealous feelings are all just from loving each other more than they feel they should or have a right to, because they don’t want to make one of their other family question whether they love them too. None of them have done anything bad or wants anything bad, they just need to talk it through.”

“Well that’s all good to hear, but it still sounds to me like there’s no real reason for us not to interrupt, and every possibility it might defuse some tension and give them all a little time to cool down before talking about things.” Crystal crosses her arms and looks down at Luna knowingly. 

She might be the best daughter Crystal could have ever wished for, and light years more mature than anyone else her age, but she’s still only ten and every ten year old has room for more maturing.

Sure enough, her daughter squirms guiltily. 

“I guess. But I still think its better to let things just happen on their own. You’re always telling me that my power isn’t permission to insert myself into the problems of everyone I meet. And that assuming otherwise can be bad for me too.”

“That’s true,” Crystal nods. All the same, her left eyebrow starts to climb. “However, another truth I’ve heard told to you by your father is if you ever feel guilty and are put on the spot for something, have two truths and a lie ready to explain yourself. And always lead with the lie.”

She loves Pietro still, she does, and she's at times even painfully aware of just how much she always will. But their vastly different ideas about parenting were just one of the reasons they hadn’t been able to make things work. She vividly recalls the time she’s referring to...and the argument she and her husband had immediately following it.

Pietro’s stance had always been that children were just little versions of who they’d grow up to be, and didn’t need to be taught dumbed down versions of the advice no one would a problem giving to the grown up versions of them.

“I see nothing inappropriate in teaching her that,” Pietro had said stubbornly at the time. “I do the same thing all the time and I’ve never attempted to pretend otherwise. In fact, I clearly remember explicitly describing that as my life philosophy on one of our earlier dates, and if I recall correctly, you laughed and called me a charming knave at the time. And I am of course remembering it correctly, as I have perfect recall listed among my numerous attributes.”

They never did reach an understanding about that particular bit of parenting. Probably because that argument had ended up seguing into the make-up sex that had kept them married far longer than they probably should have been.

Not that the latter detail is of any relevance at the moment. She coughs awkwardly.

In the here and now, their daughter continues to fidget beneath her mother’s now imperious gaze and newfound resolution to not allow her semi-fond nostalgia to cause her emotions to waver.

“Fine!” Luna groans at last, throwing up her hands in as explosive manner as the usually contemplative girl ever does anything. “I also don’t want to interrupt or go yet because I still have some of the popcorn Mr. Alfred made me and its really good and also if you had to have dinner with some of the most tense and repressed people on two different Earths, and feel everything they were trying to pretend they didn’t feel, you would want to at least get to enjoy the part where they finally stop doing that and get all dramatic and dumb. Are you happy now?”

“Ecstatic,” Crystal says primly, fighting a smile at her daughter’s rare display of immaturity before remembering who she was talking to and ceasing to bother with the pretense. Besides, its not like she doesn’t have a point.

“But I believe we’ve also talked about people not being your personal entertainment,” she adds. It just feels like the kind of moment where she's supposed to say something along those lines. Even half-heartedly. 

“But is it really my fault if people are being entertaining through no fault of my own, and I just happen to be nearby and have every right to just stay put until being right where I am stops being entertaining?” Her daughter counters.

The glint in her eye and the wry smile that says she knows she’s scented a moment of weakness and has no shame about pouncing on it - those are wholly among Pietro’s contribution to their child, and not anything Crystal can truly fault him for, at the end of the day. He is who he is, and part of that is who their daughter is, just as much as she is part of Crystal. She sighs and relents.

“If one of the Waynes catches us treating their conflict like a reality show and feels the slightest upset about it, it is your responsibility to either justify yourself to them too, or acknowledge responsibility for their upset. Whichever it takes to reverse the negativity you contributed. Understood?”

"Promise,” Luna says, bobbing her head repeatedly as she holds forth her hands, unprompted, to demonstrate that she has no fingers crossed as she did so. A follow up that has been normalized for years, given that crossing fingers behind one’s back is another one of the bits of parental wisdom Pietro had imparted upon their precocious daughter when she was younger.

Crystal just sighs once more and shakes her head fondly as she steps to the side and provides an unobstructed view through the open doorway across the room.

Back in the dining room, heedless of having garnered spectators to their spectacle, as well as equally heedless of the passage of time, the room’s inhabitants exist in a state of suspended animation. 

Everyone knows a reaction to what just happened is required. That the pregnant pause persisting since then demands a clear follow up to the blatant display of certain emotions from certain parties. All of whom are usually quite certain they’d rather witness the end of the world than see those specific feelings slip out into the open where anyone could see them and from that, draw certain conclusions.

Nobody is confused on that front. Not even their guests from an entirely separate universe.

But the unthinkable has happened nevertheless, and as it has been neither preceded nor succeeded by any hint of an apocalypse, there is no alternative. The naked display of previously avoided topics can not in any way be avoided at this point. What was done was done and now things have to be said or done as a result.

The problem lies in the fact that not a single person present has the faintest idea of what those specific things were. And thus no one seems interested in showing any initiative in ending the stalemate that has been forged from the uncommon uncertainty that was their only commonality.

 The rise and fall of chests are the only movements betraying that the tableau they set exists in all three dimensions, rather as a static snapshot someone had taken in commemoration.

And even breathing seems done reluctantly.

If cosmic entities such as Uatu the Watcher were prone to hyperbole, as the only other witnesses to the unprecedented anomaly, they might narrate that for a time it seems as though two of the most powerful and influential families of two different universes are fated to spend the rest of eternity existing in this rare moment. This endless moment where some of the most reckless, impulsive, tactical, analytical, insightful and decisive heroes to ever exist on two separate Earths......are all equally stricken with indecision and uncertainty as to what course of action to take next.

Who could even imagine what kind of consequences that might result in, for two entirely different multiverses? What deviations from intricately plotted grand designs that could cause, what opportunities might be missed, from the most potentially fortunate events that otherwise might stem from these various heroes’ heroics?

How far might the ripple effects of this seemingly innocuous moment in space and time reach? How many worlds might rise and fall, universes live and die, all because this one singular family, this comparatively tiny collection of dissonant souls who regardless of their frequent discord still manage to come together in harmony often enough to chart the course of cosmic events....

These unlikely conductors who at separate times are both the voices of the people, and the music of the spheres themselves? Their choices often doing more to directly affect various celestial bodies than the choices of entire civilizations added up across countless millennia?

Regardless of the degree of potential calamity, that remains a fate both universes will be spared their discovery of. For in this hour of need, where some of the prime movers and shakers of worlds sit motionless whilst hardly daring to breathe, all mutually frozen in their seats, all seemingly powerless to act or speak until someone releases them from this spell that has been cast upon the room and all within it....

Well, unto this unlikely conundrum, there arises an unlikely hero.

Not the hero anyone present deserves, perhaps, but certainly the hero they need.

And so it is that with great daring - and dare we say, even panache - a voice rings out loud and clear. One overflowing with bountiful mirth and a zest and zeal for life. Not to mention one brimming with reckless disregard for any potential consequences, even those not very dissimilar to the kind that have in years past made even the hardiest villains quail in fear...

And all at the same time, all undeniable, all contributing to the sudden spasm that erupts along the fault line that is Bruce Wayne’s entire face - that treacherous, forbidding chasm that exists at the edges of the two tectonic masses that are on one side his disapproval, and on the other side, the muscles that control his expressions...

Into that momentous stillness lands the only response truly appropriate, given the root cause of all of this.

“Awkwaaaaaaard,” Stephanie Brown sings out, half standing out of her chair to stretch across the table in front of Wanda and Duke in order to retrieve the gravy boat. She returns to her seated position and proceeds to slather her mashed potatoes with its contents, blithely paying no attention to the fact that all other faces in the room have swiveled to face her with stunned disbelief. “Seriously, I haven’t felt this uncomfortable since I farted in front of Superman.”

“When did you even get here?” Bruce frowns at her, exasperated enough that Damian is able to use his distraction to slip free of him and slink back to his own seat.

No one else has ever managed to achieve the depths of distraction Stephanie and Stephanie alone can push the usually unflappable Bat to. Or is it heights, and the joys of alliteration might need to be sacrificed upon the altar of accuracy? Whatever.

She pretty much considers it her superpower, though. She's still working out how to weaponize it for use on other targets. Or even better, how to capitalize on it for use when living Whilst Reluctantly Capitalist. Currently, she’s testing market research along the veins of blackmailing Bruce into paying her a monthly allowance in exchange for her keeping her levels of Intentionally Irritating him to below a Level Four on a ten point scale. Its her own custom model in the fashion of the ‘rate the pain with a number from one to ten’ scale, but she’s taken the liberty of specifically tailoring it to Bruce’s condition of Suffering Stephanie the Supreme’s Presence. She's pretty sure she’d ultimately settled on the title: “How much is my chewing gum while I’m supposed to be being sneaky causing you actual physical pain?”

There’s an itty bitty chance she actually picked something totally else on account of how she’d been super drunk at the time and she’s crap at reading her own handwriting so deciphering the notes she’d made while especially inspired were like....seventy percent guesswork.

But close enough, anyway, and also like, shut up and stuff. Wait. But is that really considered blackmail, technically speaking, or is it more like bribery? Not that it really makes a difference, but she does prefer being as precise as possible when listing her crimes slash achievements. It’s like. The principle. Or maybe the aesthetic? Whatever.

Really, though, this is just her and the Big Guy’s thing. Its just what they do. Their dynamo depiction of a duo doing things after their first take on being a Dynamic Duo detonated so disastrously. Yeah, she could never bear to part with her precious alliteration merely for the sake of precision. Its important to have clear priorities after all, and if it for whatever reason that probably will involve fifth dimensional imps, like, some nefarious ne’er-do-well demands she make a choice between alliteration and precision, well, she’s as of right now making an official ruling on which darling she’d kill first. 

Sorry, precision, but you just haven’t done for me lately what alliteration has brought me in joy and also usefulness.

“Wait, my bad,” she realizes suddenly, on account of how everyone is staring at her when all she’s doing currently is stuffing her face like a pro. And as hype as she is on her ability to make anything she does look like a Feat™, she’s pretty sure she doesn’t make it look that good. “What was the question again?”

Bruce faces her fully, arms crossed in an attempt to restore himself and his dominion to some semblance of its usual order, his face schooled back in his usual Mona Lisa smile aka stone cold impassivity. Which nobody here was buying, for the record. Big faker.

“How long have you been here?” Asks Stone Cold Steve Austin, wait no, the Stone Cold Steve Faker. Faker Austin? Ugh, this is gonna bug her.

Also, nobody here is buying his voice as being Forbidding right now so much as just Deeply Embarrassed Because I Had Feelings And They Distracted Me. Honestly, she should start keeping a tally. For what, she’s not sure, but you never know what might come in handy some day. There’s a whole TV show about hoarders to back her up on that supposition. See? Science, suckers.

“I dunno. Since way before dinner even started though. Dude, I’m literally on my thirds.” 

As if making a show of evidence, Steph shovels more meat in her mouth. She’s not entirely sure what they're even having, like it could be veal or lamb or turkey for all she knows - look, she never got around to mastering “How To Solve the Mystery of Mystery Meat” or whatever. She’d been busy learning how to tell the difference in blood spatters, because like, meat may be murder sometimes but murder is always murder and thus takes priority. Soooorry. 

Point is, who knows what the fuck kind of meat it is, but its damn good and just further proof that Alfred is probably secretly God in disguise or maybe just a lower case g kinda one, but whichever, he and his culinary arts are definitely proof she’s too weak to ever walk the Way of the Vegan.

She finishes chewing fully before continuing. Because she’s a proper lady, obvy.

“And way to make with the Rudeness, B. I know I can pull off pretty much any look, but Fly On The Wall is not one of them. How dare you come for my self-esteem like this. I’ll sue you and get all your billions and use them to make a swimming pool of gold coins all Scrooge McDuck style, because its like, the one thing you could never and thus the perfect way to establish my dominance and stuff.”

“Has she seriously been here this whole time?” One of Dick’s girlfriend’s twin kids stage-whispers from the other length of the table. “How did we not notice before? Not exactly flying under the radar there.”

“I’m a goddamn social chameleon, that’s how, Cloud.” Stephanie jabs another meat-laden forkful in his direction for emphasis, on its way to her food hole. Ugh, bliss. “Also, I would be like, a kick-ass spy. But nobody ever gives me the spy jobs because everyone’s always like, you can’t be quiet or still or even serious for longer than five minutes, Stephanie, and I’m always like, umm, just because I choose not to doesn’t mean I can’t, but do they ever listen? Of course not.” 

The kid wrinkles his nose at her. “Why did you call me Cloud?”

“Isn’t that the name of the Final Fantasy guy whose hair you ripped off?”

“Is it? I don’t know, I’ve never played. And maybe he ripped me off, you don’t know,” Not-Cloud says, looking suddenly intrigued, though who knows by which part. 

Stephanie swivels towards Tim for confirmation. He looks back, vaguely irritated. 

“Why does everyone always look at me for stuff like that? I have no idea. When exactly would I have time to be a gamer in the first place? And for the record, back when I had actual hobbies, I used to skateboard.”

“Jeez, sorry, Tony Hawk. I didn’t recogize you cuz I was too busy giving you mad props for that sick wicked half pipe ollie oopsie.” Steph rolls her eyes. Then she cocks her head to scrutinize him more fully and maybe give him a serious answer. She settles for flapping a hand at him vaguely as she says, “And you just have like, a certain Quality about you or whatever. I don’t know what it is.”

“She doesn’t even live here,” Bruce says, almost plaintively. Y’know. If he were someone who does anything plaintively ever.

“She’s our guest,” Cass says, almost primly. Y’know. If she were someone who does anything primly ever. “You’re being rude.”

Steph plasters on her most injured expression, the better to make like Exhibit A when Cass sweeps an arm towards her for demonstration. 

Also though, oh shit, oh shit, look whose internal monologue stumble-stepped into a motif. She’s Emily Dickenson-ing this place up tonight. Finally, someone bringing a little class into the House of Ass. You’re welcome, all the ghosts of Bruce’s equally gloomy ancestors who definitely haunt this place on the regular.

“Yeah, Alfred has always impressed upon us that there are certain protocols for how we’re supposed to treat guests in our home, Bruce,” Tim adds in a tone that was equal parts thoughtful musing and suppressed merriment. 

He slides a smirk down the table to Steph. His own irritation of 7.5 seconds prior has completely evaporated into the ether, because that’s just how they roll. Look at them, making with the maturity like they’re just a couple of motherfucking bosses. She’s seriously so impressed with the both of them on their own behalves.

“If I were a betting man,” Tim continues nonchalantly, “I’d put down money that hanging on to guest privileges is one of the main reasons she turned down that adoption offer we all pretend we don’t know B’s definitely given her at some point.”

“Or maybe that’s just what you tell yourself, being the one whose dating history with Steph makes adopted siblinghood seem weird and icky and stuff,” Duke suggests from further down the table. He smirks, lounging in a way that looks lazy and careless to those uninitiated in the sacred Bat arts of being anal about everything at all times, like literally even when just looking at things. Because B-Man’s secret superpower is how to make anything boring, even things that are literally just using your eyes.

Though in defense of B but also like, the years of their lives they’ve all committed to obsessively training themselves according to his fucking anal doctrines anyway, like a bunch of absolute suckers, there is an upside to all that anal retention. Such as how people who make healthy but boring life choices would look at Duke right now and be like oh shit, that kid’s about two seconds from falling asleep like he’s a cat and that’s a super inconvenient place for him to fall asleep, which everyone knows is basically the same thing as Kitty Nirvana.

But meanwhile, the other teen still clearly shows all the checked boxes that spell out hey this dude could be ready to kick your ass in 2.5 seconds, like just give him a reason punk, he’s ready to go. Or at least, that’s how he registers to those of them with Bat-supersenses that aren’t actually super but really just the end result of lots of boring training exercises that honestly don’t sound anywhere near as cool so just let them have this.

Point is she totally lost track of her point, but then Duke follows up with an accusing pointer finger aimed at Tim, one appropriately dramatic and just like, making her so gosh darn proud of the latest castaway to wash ashore on their weird ass little Island Of Misfit Toys. Kids. They grow up so fast.

“Of course you wanna distract everyone from how you’re a Sister Depriver,” Duke intones, putting some super thematic bass into his boom. That right there, that little something extra...that’s how you make fucking art. Hot damn. “And as a result, poor Cass has to bear the weight of being the only girl in the Wayne clan all by herself. For shame, Timothy.”

“Yeah, Timothy,” Cass echoes smugly. “For shame.”

Tim shoots betrayed eyes at her, but its his own fault for forgetting the Cardinal Rule Of Cass: her allegiances are fickle and prone to shifting in the direction of greatest potential drama. Cass loves drama. Lives for it. Something about how refreshing it is to be able to immerse herself in the movements of people who are actively trying to speak or act in contradiction to what their body really wants to say, instead of just being lying douchebags who necessitate caution when they do anything similar.

The rest of them are split 50/50 as to whether that’s true and heartwrenching, or whether its well-played Cass bullshit aimed at distracting them from what a gossip-loving drama queen she really is.

“Whatever,” Jason says dismissively as he chimes in. He swipes the last few exchanges out of the way like they’re open apps he’s not using at the moment and he’s all uh, you can go now, losers. “The real issue here is that obviously the Old Man has never figured out how to interact with a teenager or young adult he hasn’t adopted or can’t adopt. Middle D over there is proof that even B’s vaunted no meta rule isn’t really a dealbreaker, so betcha the real reason Dickie and Tim’s Titan friends never come over is because their parentals are worried about B trying to snatch them up too. And since B adopts, fosters or otherwise absorbs via osmosis every other kid or teen he comes across, there’s never been a control group for him to practice his non-adoption-intending behavior on other kids. And no practice means no way of being perfect at that, and we all know how not being perfect at something makes B cranky as fuck.”

Duke takes a beat to contort his face into a Rubik’s Cube of half-formed and hastily discarded expressions. Most likely trying to work through whether Middle D counts as a weird-ass endearment for this particular family, or something he’s gonna be endlessly annoyed by if it happens to catch on. Its a process, especially considering it has to be filtered through the Jason to English dictionary first.

Finally he just shrugs in a lazy non-reaction that in Batspeak manages to count as a challenge. Basically a ‘try and guess what I decided if you can, chump.’ 

Jason’s face morphs Terminator style. The later ones, not the Governator model. He ends up displaying a mash-up: the smirk of inevitable victory meets the narrowed eyebrows of intent focus as bestowed upon a worthy foe. 

Then the whole piece makes like an Etch-a-Sketch and is wiped completely away before being replaced with an annoyed jaw clench. 

“Jay’s theory game is strong,” is the route Duke ends up taking though. “And here we thought the reason Bruce always says no about Superboy coming over is to prevent him from being a Brother Defiler. But all along it was just the insidious work of a Brother Depriver, with Superman himself being the culprit who told B hands off, this one’s mine. It all makes sense now! Superboy even fits the standard issue black hair and blue eyed, in store model.”

He tips his head towards the older boy in a gesture of appreciation for Jay’s detective work and connect the dots high score. Jason scowls back. By the standards of the Family Batshit, he’s clearly been caught off guard. With him so readily taking up the implied but not outright stated challenge teased by the younger boy, he’d completely failed to prepare for the compliments Duke then followed up with instead.

His siblings hide snickers behind faked coughs and gratuitous napkin usage. He’s netted himself an undeniable loss, according to the intricate rules and traditions of their family - ironically, many of which had been laid down by Jason himself when first established back in the misty years of yore. That mysterious, little spoken of era of legend and mystery, one that is nevertheless oft whispered of in hushed rumors and hearsay. The time before time, better known to the Bats and Birds as The Age of The First Two Robins.

If it had just been the family present, it might have been a different matter, but the presence of others changed things. Cuz see, in the eyes of anyone who isn’t a member of their observation obsessed and perpetually paranoid family, the relatively minute exchange between the two boys no doubt looked like Jason had been needlessly aggressive while the younger boy was just trying to pay him a compliment.

In a nutshell, Duke goaded Jason with what seemed like a challenge but didn’t technically count, so Jason’s attempt at responding to Duke’s not-challenge actually counted as the first actual sign of aggression, which Duke neatly side-stepped by already being in the process of paying Jay a compliment between the time Jay actually launched his challenge but before it actually landed.

Ergo, Duke wins. 

Look, if its hard to follow, that’s probably for the best. They’re all pretty sure stuff like that isn’t supposed to make as much sense as it does to them.

Jason huffs but then finally heaves a sigh and tosses a tight-lipped and grudging but genuine nod of acknowledgment down the table to Duke. Despite himself, he can’t help but be a little impressed by the kid, having already picked up on even the more minute ins and outs of their family’s complicated interactions. But then, of course the younger boy is as precocious as the rest of them. Their family could single-handedly keep the nature vs nurture debate going for centuries.

Duke beams back before licking the tip of a finger and painting a single stroke in the air in front of him. A clear declaration that this round of the Batkids’ never-ending game goes to him. Jason rolls his eyes but can’t exactly begrudge him his endzone dance. Its not like he’s known for being graceful and gracious in victory either.

Come to think of it, none of them are. Huh. That explains a lot, probably.

Its at this moment that Dick finally regains enough composure to make his presence felt again. 

Its understandable, really, the others acknowledge via conspiratorial looks of sibling solidarity that bounce their way rapidly across the table by way of their patented younger sibling network.

Anyone would have trouble juggling the combined stressors of introducing the girlfriend’s family, mediating their own eternal family mayhem, and on top of all that, seeing shoved into the spotlight his ‘shh, we don’t talk about that, what are you, new,” tendencies towards acting parentally protective and possessive of Damian, even with (and at times especially with) Bruce himself. 

Not to mention the occasional clashes over the parenting strategy, or lack thereof, that Bruce still manages at times to bumble like the perfect dope that he is. Because if anyone has super strong feelings about Bruce’s parenting and no patience whatsoever for watching their father repeatedly fail to learn from his mistakes, well. That’s all Dick’s territory.

So with all of that kept firmly in mind like the efficient little multi-taskers they all know how to be (when they feel like it), they’re all poised to lend Dick a certain amount of leeway in how much amusement they enjoy at his expense today.

In all fairness to them, its not like he makes it easy. They had perhaps overestimated just how well Dick was juggling the various stressors in play today. After all, you can take the acrobat out of the circus, but that doesn’t mean jack shit about whether or not he can juggle because that’s an entirely different skillset, duh.

Hindsight’s not just sometimes a bitch. Its sometimes quite bitchy as well. Ugh, their subconscious minds could be such brats, honestly.

Look, the point is, even as they all patiently watch their eldest brother struggle his way back to a state of coherency and and managing to be present in the actual present, they’re still expecting him to pop out the other side with something at least approaching poise.

Instead, they get an encore.

“Umm,” Dick utters at last. 

Tim buries his face in his hands. Duke tilts his head back and mutters prayers to some higher power. Cass closes her eyes and shakes her head slowly and sorrowfully. Lorna reaches across the table with her wine bottle and refreshes her sister’s glass. Wanda looks like she needs it.

Damian sits with arms crossed over his chest and scowl firmly directed at the table top, Judging Everything. Then again, that is still his default setting and pretty much what he’s been doing all night anyway. Say whatever else you want to about the kid, Steph reflects, but when he commits to a theme, hoo boy. 

Jason, meanwhile, has thrown himself bodily at his brother, clamping a hand over the older man’s mouth and stage-whispering with exaggerated emphasis: “Careful! You could set off the exact same chain of events and we’ll all end up trapped in an eternal time loop we can never break free of! I mean, its practically a guarantee, if you combine my knack for being in the worst place at the worst possible time, Tim’s shitty spleen-phobic luck, Cass’ destined to someday prove ironically prophetic name, and your own lightning rod-esque ability to attract cosmic-level catastrophes to you like you’re catnip and they’re really just a cute little furball named Fluffy McWhiskerson.”

“Must you always insist on going the extra mile when being ridiculous, Todd?” Damian cuts in testily. Also, cuttingly. 

“Shut the fuck up. It’s my coping mechanism for being part of a family that goes that extra ridiculous mile every damn day.” 

“And people wonder what possible reasons I could have for not wanting to be adopted into this family and instead hanging onto a golden parachute option?” 

Steph wonders aloud (and loudly) as she maneuvers the side of her fork around her plate like its a zamboni hard at work on an ice rink. Really, she just refuses to let a single scrape of Alfred’s home-made mashed potatoes go to waste. She’s not some heathen.

“You. You seem pretty smart.” That loaded statement and the finger pointed in her direction come courtesy of the Final Fantasy kid whose name may or may not be Cloud but probably isn’t, which is a shame, because Cloud is a pretty kick-ass name in Steph’s estimation. Not that anyone asks. Typical.

Also, where did they end up landing on the subject of what his name should be? Or is? Whatever? Was there a flowchart passed out at some point and she just missed it while busy being fabulous, or was this an actual oversight on B’s part and thus something they should all bring up as often as possible from now until the end of time?

No doubt spurred by a desire to be absent from whatever follows his twin’s newest train of thought, Billy raises his hand half-heartedly. No one bothers to point out the absurdity of raising his hand like he’s in school. He just seems like its a thing with him. He has that certain Quality, Steph decides.

“Can I be excused?”

Nobody seems sure who he’s asking, so its probably okay that nobody responds to grant permission. Besides, suffering through the awkwardness and drama like the rest of them is probably like, good for building character or something.

After about half a minute, Billy nods to himself as if that’s about what he’d expected. He lowers his hand again and uses it to prop up his head as he slumps over the table and idly sketches patterns atop the antique oak surface.

“I’m a galaxy-brain level intellect, you little Silver Whatever-the-Adorable-Baby version of a Fox is called,” Steph declares at last, jabbing her finger right back at the apparent Greater of Twin Evils. Y’know. To see how much he likes it. But also just because its fun to make like a drama queen in a place like Wayne Manor. Ambiance really is everything. “I even took my SATs and correctly informed the moderator that I was in fact there for the SATs and hadn’t gotten them mixed up with my ACTs.” 

“Hmm,” the twerp says then, not at all appearing to be taught a lesson by her dramatic finger pointing reversal. He sweeps his eyes over her, assessing. Given that she hasn’t decided yet if she even likes the little twerp, let alone what he’s trying to assess and also if she even gives a shit on account of she might not even like the little twerp, Stephanie splits the difference and settles for combining bitch face with her best “How you like me now,” pose. Let him make of it what he will. ‘Snot like she knows what she’s going for there.

Also, its probably rendered slightly less effective due to her forgetting to factor in that she’s sitting and not standing, but whatever, she commits like a champ. Also, she’s still at most 60/40 on the liking of the twerp, so who even cares, honestly.

“I used to be able to count on my own smarts,” Platinum Punk says, seemingly settled on an opinion at last. “But I naively gambled that away in the name of wishing upon a star for family or what the frick ever, and I forgot to set wish parameters for ‘and also please let them all not be completely nuts.’”

“Watch the ableism please, sweetheart,” Wanda says with a long-suffering sigh.

“Sorry, Mom,” he says with an eye roll that nevertheless seems to somehow satisfy her. “But see? I’ll get a lecture about my language, but I skip school with my friends to fight giant robots in Times Square and she doesn’t bat an eye. My family’s priorities are not like your Earth’s priorities.”

“Or my Earth’s priorities,” he adds as an afterthought. “Or any Earth’s, probably. Maybe not some really weird and out there Earth, but they don’t count, probably.”

“Well I don’t like it, certainly, but I don’t want to be a hypocrite,” Wanda says defensively. “When I was your age, I was on the FBI’s Most Wanted list for being a mutant terrorist. All things considered, I have relatively few objections about how you and your brother spend your time.” 

Several members of the Family Batshit direct eyes that are ever so slightly on the wide side. She meets them with an unapologetic shrug.

“I had a complicated childhood. I got over it.”

Lorna snorts into her wineglass. Wanda shoots her sister an annoyed glare, but still amends her statement.

“Mostly, anyway.”

Lorna smirks and waves her glass in some attempt at a meaningful gesture. Who knows what its actually meant to be. She seems to accept the amendment, at least.

“Please excuse our dear little sis her porcine displays of condescension,” Pietro interjects in silky smooth tones that do nothing to hide the sharp edges thinly veiled underneath. “She didn’t grow up with us and our dear, doting daddy, yet has never lacked for opinions on what superior choices she would have made in our positions. The fact that she’s still made plenty terrible choices of her own, is apparently quite irrelevant.”

His green-haired sister opens her eyes artfully wide and projects feigned innocence. “None of those were my fault. I was possessed a lot by a very evil psychic. Who, if you recall, actually called herself Malice. The evil was right there in her name. Advertised. I was innocent. She was evil.”

Pietro swirls his own wineglass, unimpressed. The other set of siblings have clearly been down this road a time or two themselves. 

“I was primarily referring to your romantic history with a Summers. And not even the competent or aesthetically pleasing one, at that,” he drawls.

“She also had terrible taste.”

“Anyway, not to tear focus away from discussion of my dear auntie’s romantic selection process, as she and Uncle Pietro both lack the shame gene and they absolutely can and will traumatize all present via a thorough analysis of each other’s past partners in the most bizarre game of sexual chicken you will ever have the misfortune to witness...”

“Bold of him to make that claim when he’s never seen Dick and Jason do the exact same thing for the exact same reasons,” Tim mutters. Cass and Duke both nod. Jason glares, but seems stuck at the ‘come up with actual proof that he’s actually wrong’ stage of the rebuttal process. Dick has by now returned to the land of the living, but seems to have along the way decided discretion is the better part of valor as best guess is he’s currently preoccupied weighing the pros and cons of potential escape routes.

“Hey, Shiny Pokemon version of Sonic the Hedgehog,” Stephanie snaps her fingers and hopskips the focus back on the speedster in question. She waves her hand at the rest of the sound and fury occupying the table with them, as if to express just how much it all signifies nothing. “Just get to the point already and leave out anything else that these vile miscreants could possibly hijack and turn into tangents. You’ll never make it through a conversation in this house otherwise. Everyone here is expertly trained and practiced in the art of derailing the most obstinate and tunnel-visioned man in history from reaching his point whenever that point is deemed destined to make our day end poorly.”

“Some of us just happen to be better at that than others,” Jason says with smug confidence, twirling his butter knife lazily.

“Ironic, coming from the one trick pony,” Tim says dryly. Jason leans forward and raises his knife-wielding hand and Tim quickly raises his hands in a defensive gesture that’s clearly not meant to indicate he sees an actual threat, more just aimed at beating his brother to the punch with the rest of his punchline. “Sorry, I miscounted. I mean the one and a half trick pony.”

Steph clears her throat pointedly and looks back at Platinum Ken Doll. He just sighs in full gloom and slumps down in eerie symmetry with his twin. He definitely is the superior practitioner of the Sulk.

“Never mind,” he says melodramatically. “It wasn’t even a big deal anyway, just stuff I was trying to be like, snarky about or whatever, but the moment’s passed and it’s just kinda dumb and pointless without feeling like, natural or whatever.”

“Probably,” Stephanie agrees unsympathetically, because hey, when you’re right, you’re right. She doesn’t believe in coddling the youths, especially not the ones who are realistically only two years younger than herself at the most. “But you’ve managed to pique my interest enough that not knowing what you were going to say is randomly gonna bug me at 2 am or something obnoxious like that. Also, you started to praise my intellect and I don’t let things like that go unfinished. It sets a bad precedent. Now c’mon. Speak up. Praise me. Enunciate, so Damian can’t pretend he doesn’t hear you just because he’s trying to set the table on fire with just the searing intensity of his disdain.”

Damian responds with a gesture that he definitely didn’t learn from Dick, but on second thought, he probably did.

“That’s the spirit,” she said. “Keep on keeping on, slugger. If anyone can develop the ability to cause spontaneous combustion with nothing but willpower and spite, its Angst in the key of D Minor himself. I believe in you, kiddo!”

If she weren’t actually being full of shit about that, she might be in trouble from the glare Damian follows that with. Ashes to ashes and all that good stuff. But as rage-vision still refuses to make an appearance, the baby of the family in age and irony only retreats to the support of his high-backed chair. 

Looking more adorable than he’d hopefully ever comprehend, lest he attempt to weaponize that as an addition to his armory, he slouches down and mutters something that makes Jason’s eyebrows climb his skull like they’re trying to set a speed record for making it all the way to the top.

It’d been in one of the languages that Damian knew and that her own circle of languages learned share no overlap with, but she mentally repeats it sound for sound in her head until she locks it in. Anything that can make Jason look that impressed is worth knowing, and translating something phonetically from an unknown language is nothing Google can’t handle.

And by Google she meant Tim, but that’s what ex-boyfriends are for, right? She’s fairly certain she saw that on a T-shirt somewhere, which is basically the same thing as true.

Anyway. Back to the praises that are supposed to be being sung, and yet weirdly, she still hears no singing. Steph boomerangs her focus back down the table to Smugness in Silver, and oozes impatience and expectations out her pores at him like emotions are contagious and she’s a cooties hotspot.

Fumbling from a clear unease with this particular kind of spotlight, and also how it’d admittedly been a weird fucking night for everyone concerned, the younger teen at last manages to self-consciously eke out: “Look, I said it was dumb now. I seriously was just gonna make a joke about you being too smart to get sucked into a weird ass family with endless drama without having an escape clause, and I was just gonna be like, teach me your ways or y’know. Whatever.”

“Wait!” Stephanie stops him right there with a palm outstretched in the universal sign for hold the fucking fuck the fuck up. She leans towards him, and in a voice pitched low and even but vibrating with barely leashed intensity, she asks him the only question that could possibly matter now:

“Was that last bit actually part of the joke you were going to make? The thing you were trying to say from the get go, not just something you said right now because you got confidence diarrhea and stopped using the words good?”

“Uh, yeah?” He says warily.

Stephanie slaps both her hands on the table’s surface, loudly enough to make most everyone jump a little in their seats, and forcefully enough to rattle some dishware and make her inner monologue hiss oww and yell at her for unnecessary roughness. She ignores herself, on account of having much more important things to deal with. 

Launching herself to her feet, she leans into her palms where they press down on the table, giving herself a little bit of Loom to go with the gravity she forces onto her face. Glee is waging a valiant effort at retaking the lost ground, but she’s always insisted that she has excellent self-control, dagnabbit, and Stephanie Brown is many, many things, but she’s no liar.

Well, except for the times she is. But there are always reasons or like, extenuating circumstances for those.

Usually.

“I accept the honor and responsibility of being your Family Drama Sensei, and I shall teach you everything I know and also some stuff I make up just to fuck with you, because I’m not like Other Mentors. I demand and expect some giggles to go with the shits, or what’s even the point, y’know? First lesson: that was rhetorical! I say y’know a lot and when I actually expect an answer I’ll also be like omg hurry up, I aged 84 years waiting for you to say something already. Got it?”

The Twin That Could Have Probably Starred In Twilight blinks dazedly at her. He then turns to look at the rest of the table.

“Is she serious?”

“Deadly,” Steph intones, before one of these naysayers could nay on her say and potentially undercut her authority with her new minion. Uh, she means, like, henchkid. Sorry, sidekick. Shit. Crap - protege! That was what she has, a protege! Hah!

“For real?” He asks, doubtfully. She frowns. Is she stuttering?

“So real I make reality look fake,” she assures him gravely. He blinks some more. He does that a lot, she notes, like a Good Mentor who notices stuff about her mentee.

“Okay, see, because that wasn’t really what I was going for?” He says cautiously. 

She rolls her eyes. C’mon kid, she doesn’t bite, except for like, sexy stuff and eww no, he’s like twelve. Well sixteen probably, but that’s basically the same thing as twelve. Also they had a lot of work to do on the spine-having thing because this sorta bit right here is totally gonna make her look bad in front of all the other mentors, if it doesn’t exit stage right, like post haste. And what not.

She doesn’t say any of that that out loud though. She’s not sure they’re there yet.

“Like, I was aiming more for just....a...I don’t know, a hah-hah?” 

He leans back slightly, adding a little distance as he looks at her like she’s part of the craziness he needs help surviving instead of his sensei in all things suited to surviving the craziness. Ugh, she has so much work to do with this one. Its a good thing she’s always been pretty sure she’d make an excellent mentor, so like, qualifications. She has them. Obvy.

“La la la, I can’t hear you but also no take-backsies. You’re part of a legacy now. Or lineage. Or whatever the word is that’s not actually about dog family trees. Look, the point is by virtue of being my first ever protege and also the first protege of anyone who isn’t Dick or Babs who both don’t even count anyway because Reasons, you are now part of the grand tradition that is being a Bats and Birds person...partner...sidekick...thingie. Look, we don’t have the terminology all worked out yet. Like I said this is basically new territory except for Dick and Babs who don’t count and also Bruce, but he mostly communicates via grunts and scowls anyway, rendering most terminology moot.”

“What’s happening right now?” Her protege asks to no one in particular. Ugh. Unacceptable. She’s taking twenty points from House Twilight whenever she finishes reading those damn books and figures out just how that whole thing works.

“Okay, so the big takeaway from your first lesson here, because fuck that being cryptic noise, mentors who are always like ‘you have to figure out what you’re supposed to be learning here and then also learn it’ like, ugh, no. The worst, seriously.” 

Look, occasionally detours are probably inevitable, but the important part is that she remain strong when doggy-paddling determinedly towards her point, because good mentors can handle occasional detours and don’t treat them like Kryptonite that’s gonna kill them all when they’re literally just sparring in the Cave, like, perspective, have some, y’know? 

And also they don’t need to stop every couple hours into training so they can have temper tantrums because their kids are like, no dad, we can’t hang out today because that’s a thing that kinda happens when little kid people turn into bigger people people, like oh noes, gasp, horror. And then they have to go stomp around and make that everyone else’s problem because no matter how much they insist they’re loners, they actually really suck at being alone. Even though you’d think that mastering that particular skill would logically come first before you get around to training to say shit like “I am the Night, my dude,” with a straight face.

Its faintly occurring to her that she might actually have unresolved issues about Bruce and her brief apprentice-ship thingie with him. And also maybe its not super awesome conclusion and also the follow-up to all that bit of bother, all of which gargled a fair amount of donkey balls.

Ugh. Epiphanies are such losers. Literally who asked.

“Ahem. Anyway. Big takeaway. Teachable moment. Right. So yeah, first big thing is commitment. You start something, you see it through, got it? In this family and otherwise vaguely affiliated network of mentors and mentees, we don’t do take-backsies, okay? Its a matter of pride. Principle. Also, maybe brain damage. Like I said, this all really started with Dick, and he does get hit and shot in the head a whole lot, so admittedly, the rest of us do have some. Y’know. Questions. Now you sit there and absorb all that for a second. Like a sponge. See yourself as a sponge. Be the sponge. Good sponge.” 

Wisdom having been successfully imparted, Steph nods in satisfaction and then spins to take in the rest of the room, hands planted on her hips Wonder Woman style, because power poses are totally gonna be lesson two.

Her eyes find their way to Bruce easily enough, which makes sense seeing as how his scowl takes up half the room. Any room. Okay, at this point she's willing to jot that whole might have issues thing down as okay so maybe she definitely has unresolved issues with Bruce. So what? She also has a protege, albeit one who probably does need some more convincing to fully be on board, but the point remains that like. Whatever. Suck her entire ass.

“Well,” she declares loftily, as if she’s not just talking directly to the B-Man. Plausible deniability, yo. Just because she’s willing to admit to herself that she maybe definitely has issues to still sort through, that doesn’t mean she has to like. Go around admitting that to other people. She’s not some kind of heathen. “I trust that we’ll all remember where we were when it was undeniably revealed that I, Stephanie Brown, do in fact have Wisdom and Experiences to share with the youths of tomorrow. As that is a thing that just happened. Lo!”

“I have witnesses,” Steph declares with the dial set all the way to Peak Drama, because look, if you can’t lean into the drama in Wayne Freaking Manor, life is empty and meaningless and that’s gonna be her supervillain origin story, probably. She throws out an arm towards the rest of the table, encompassing the dual rows of expressions that could best be described as bemused - if she were being generous and also lying out her freaking ass.

Still, she stands firm in the silence that follows her ringing proclamation, allowing not the slightest hint of self-consciousness slip free of her self control, because she’d literally just made a big deal about how it was all about committing, and Stephanie Brown might be many things, but a hypocrite is not one of them.

Well, other than - nope. Not doing that again. Upon reflection and careful examination of what really matters, accuracy also can be invited to suck the proverbial it.

Besides, there’s too much at stake for her to allow any weakness to betray her now. This is a momentous moment. Clash of the Stubbornness kinda stuff. She’s facing down Punky Brucester himself, and on his own turf of all places. Things like principles....and...and being right, all hang in the balance.

And yes, Stephanie is well aware that she has left even Peak Drama in the dust aeons ago, and they’re deep in uncharted waters now, with like, here there be dragons, lurking dramatically. So what if she’s being ridiculous? She maintains that he had started it, she’s like 99% she is being not at all irrational and unreasonable about that, and by God, she will have her vindication or she will have....whatever the tail end of that cliche goes like. Unless its death, because she kinda sorta already did that, and as far as she’s concerned it counted, and either way, she’s way over it and not looking for reruns.

All the while, Bruce stares her down with his face doing that resting I’m Judging You Face thing that nobody can be that oblivious to walking around with all the time, no matter what they may claim in liar-esque fashion. 

Though, for all her various unresolved issues with him or whatever, she can admit to herself that the man is a goddamn master of conveying a bitch could care less. She’d sat on gargoyles that had served more face than Mr. I Could Be Listening To You Right Now or I Could Actually Be Thinking Boring Rich Asshole Stuff Like Whats Up With the Stock Market Today, LOL You’ll Never Know.

She upgrades her ‘Think About Issues’ notification to a maybe consider talking to someone about some of this stuff level.

When Bruce’s carefully placid facade finally breaks, then, it doesn’t break so much as it freaking shatters. Further evidence of this definitely being her superpower, which means time to move on to asking like, ugh why such an obnoxiously specific superpower, tho.

“She doesn’t even live here!” Bruce thunders again. Or some synonym that still means loud and forceful but also being desperate and totes whining. The Big Guy turns to face his children imploringly. He throws an arm in Steph’s direction for accusatory emphasis. Y’know. All dramatic like.

Oh shit. Maybe she did pick up some things from him after all.

Ugh. Okay, never mind, its definitely epiphanies that are gonna be her supervillain origin story. Seriously.

Fuck those guys.

[allimariexf]

Friends. I am so unable to have coherent thoughts about Arrow at this point. I wanted to do a little 7x19 review (not much to say, tbh fuck I lied), but then again I also wanted to do a 7x18 review, and a 7x17 review, and...also talk about Arrow ending and EBR leaving. Yeah, ‘cause I still haven’t managed to do those things.

I keep thinking I have to have all my thoughts in order and arranged before I can say anything valuable, but the problem is my thoughts won’t comply. They refuse to be orderly and arrangeable. (Also I’ve tried just typing whatever is in my brain, too, but all I have to show for it is about 10,000 words of semi-coherent babbling hanging out in my Drafts. Probably never to see the light of day.)

So anyway 7x19 (🤞 that I stay on track here - update: I fucking failed! 😱😱😱): it was okay I guess.

As we draw to the end of the season - of the show, really - a few things keep bothering me, and unfortunately they’re coloring any and all enjoyment I may be able to squeeze out of the episodes so I have to just get them off my chest:

1. I keep getting stuck on the terrible production value. I can’t help it! It’s gotten to the point where I cannot help but see the production as much as I see the story, and it’s so jarring. I see the sets, the stage, where I only used to see the setting. It’s the (lack of) camera angles, the lighting, and the very obvious reliance on sets, rather than location shoots. 

And I can’t help but think: it didn’t used to be like this. Seasons 1-3 were so immersive, so atmospheric. Stylized? Yes, but in a way that was purposeful and enhanced the story. 

The most recent seasons make production feel only like a means to an end.

I think the production budget got cut a little after season 3, but seasons 4 and 5 still felt epic and captivating enough. But season 6′s production values were abysmal. And I thought it would finally improve in season 7 with the new showrunner, but instead it has only gotten worse and I realize now that it must have everything to do with budget. (And maybe this is my bitterness talking, but I can’t help but suspect that part of it is that increasingly, more and more of each year’s budget is being used to fund the crossovers. 😠)

The EPs seem to have forgotten something critical about filmmaking - production is always going to be a crucial aspect of story-telling, whether it’s intentional or not. There’s no such thing as an “objective” camera angle or edit. Every non-decision has as much an impact on the story as a decision would have, and by forgetting that, they have vastly reduced the overall quality of the show.

Anyway, I feel like I have to make one thing clear, since after all, I WAS ON THE SET and I MET THE CREW - literally shook hands with and spoke to camera operators, lighting people, and all other sorts of production people: they work hard and take their jobs seriously and in no way am I trying to suggest that any of them are bad at their jobs. They were truly lovely and professional and I was so impressed by them. I truly think the lapse in production values is entirely due to decisions made at the very top about money. It just has a very unfortunate, very obvious impact on the quality of the show they’re making. 

2. I can’t help but see and lament the effect of OVERPLOTTING and a lack of emotional foregrounding.

I comment all the time about how tight the story was in seasons 1-3:

Big Bads who had a personal connection to Oliver

seamless interweaving of the Flashbacks and the present

a clear, consistent, well-paced evolution of Oliver’s character that paralleled the action/plot

excellently-plotted storylines where all the characters were relevant to the plot - so that we had a reason to care, and focus on character actually forwarded the plot.

a good mixture of villains of the week that were both interesting unto themselves, and provided much-needed wins/breaks in the overarching plot, and allowed for plenty of character moments

generally, because of all of the above, a perfect sense of pacing and an excellent balance between plot and character, where plenty of time was given to dialogue and quiet character moments - which only served to enhance the plot

But then season 4 came along and things went south quickly, mainly due (in my opinion) to writing decisions that put plot over character, resulting in some seriously out-of-character stories that unfortunately had a huge impact on the show going forward. But even aside from Oliver’s uncharacteristic lying and Felicity’s unlikely decision to call the whole thing off, season 4 was already suffering from a clear lack of the things (above) that made seasons 1-3 so good.

It was the first time the BB had no real connection to Oliver’s past, which meant that suddenly the villain arc had to pull double-duty - drive the present-day plot and also somehow establish an emotional reason for us to care. Unfortunately, rather than pulling those two threads together into a tight, single focus, the writers created a sprawling story - a messy, confusing present-day arc and the absolute worst flashbacks of the entire show.

And it also saw the deliberate introduction of more comic-book elements to the show, with Damien Darhk’s (and Constantine’s) magic, which was a wrenching change in tone from the first three season’s grittiness. (I know a lot of the haters like to blame this shift in tone on Olicity - and even I will admit that the suddenly happy-go-lucky Oliver was a little too heavy-handed - but I fully believe the tonal shift has everything to do with the introduction of magic. And, of course, the horrible, clunky, meta-heavy crossover, which for the first time was used as a vehicle, rather than a chance for us to enjoy interactions between characters we loved.)

Then there was season 5. Lots of people love season 5, and I agree there were good elements, but for me it still suffers from a lack of those things that made seasons 1-3 so great:

most of all, with NTA there were suddenly too many characters - and they didn’t have a legitimate reason to be there. Their stories were arbitrary, inconsistently explored (or, more accurately, not explored), and had nothing to do with Oliver. And (maybe worst of all), their backstories/stories had nothing to do with the overarching plot of the season. So, again, the show’s focus was pulled in a million different directions, rather than the earlier brilliance of plot and character working together to drive the narrative. 

the introduction of metas as major characters in Arrow (rather than only being used in the crossovers) continued the cartoonish atmosphere which, in my opinion, made the consequences of all actions feel slightly less real, less impactful. To me it felt like a betrayal of Arrow, at its core. Because Arrow was solidly gritty for the first 3 years - even the League of Assassins storylines of season 3 felt grounded and real. Even The Count, Cupid, the Clock King - comic book villains to the core - still felt gritty and real within the universe. But (for me at least) the casual reliance on metahuman abilities let the writers be sloppy and careless with their plots, their resolutions, and their consequences. 

and I know most people love Prometheus, but I never loved him for two main reasons. First, while I appreciate the fact that they tied Prometheus’s origin to Oliver, the personal connection just felt forced to me. Prometheus, Talia, all of it felt untethered and hasty. I think they could have done a much better job grounding the story, planting the seeds earlier, but they didn’t. Second, Prometheus just won too much. The show had spent 5 years making us believe in Oliver’s abilities - as a fighter, an archer, and a strategist - and it was suddenly as if he were a bumbling idiot. The show made him seem incompetent in order to make Prometheus be always 10 steps ahead, and it was not only disheartening, it was unbelievable. Because not only did Oliver have 5 years more training than Prometheus did, he also had a team behind him.

Season 6 failed spectacularly in all ways, in my opinion. It was the ultimate example of overplotting, where the writers basically took everything that was so great about seasons 1-3 and did the opposite. Too many characters, uneven pacing, a sprawling, unfocused villain arc, and a lack of any given reason to care about any of it. And of course, everyone acting counter to their long-established characteristics.

I was really, really hoping that Beth and the new writers would use season 6 as a counterexample: what not to do in season 7. But (and again, I am not trying to place blame - I have no idea who is really in charge of these decisions, plus at this point there are already so many balls in the air that a lot of it is probably out of the writers’ hands anyway) as season 7 winds to a close, it’s clear to me that they’ve basically repeated a lot of the same plotting problems of season 6. 

Which brings me to 7x19. (And all of 7b actually, if I’m honest.)

Because this was supposedly a JOHN DIGGLE-centric episode, but it was way too little, way too late. (Setting aside the absolute tragedy that it’s been 7 years and this is the first chance we’ve gotten to look in-depth into John’s backstory beyond Andy.) Like others have mentioned, the focus on John felt superficial at best. We have a character with 7 years of characterization to explore, but the episode hardly touched on John’s character, his emotions, at all. And the little we got felt superficial. 

Instead, the episode was plot-heavy, convoluted, and tried to accomplish too many things. Things that, for the most part, had not been adequately emotionally foregrounded. By that I mean:

John’s story with his stepfather could have been awesome, except we’ve never fucking heard John even mention his parents before this episode. They planted and harvested those seeds all within a single episode.

Felicity’s struggle with her legacy...WOW. That was the first time we’ve ever heard her specifically say that she wanted her own legacy more than as Overwatch. Yeah, we have the “beacon of hope” stuff from 4x17, and some references here and there this season - and I don’t mean to be ungrateful - but I feel like there were ample opportunities to do a better job foregrounding Felicity’s struggle, yet they just haven’t.

Emiko and Dante. Yawn. Too little, too late - both in the season and in the series. 

Emiko and Oliver. Same.  

I have strong feelings about why it’s all going wrong, and for the most part I think it’s this: the writers aren’t trying to tell a complete, emotionally fulfilling story in season 7. Rather, season 7 seems to be divided into two discrete storylines:

7a, the prison arc, was pretty much its own thing. Sure, the writers attempted to establish a connection to 7b through the flash forwards, but it’s a very weak connection that relies on illusions and attempts to obscure the audience’s perception of events (mainly to do with the attempt to make us believe that Oliver’s prison stint caused a fundamental change in Felicity, making her become a villain in the future). But in reality, the 7a arc was pretty much self-contained - and, in hindsight, all the better for it.

7b, on the other hand, has lacked focus and direction, and as the season has worn on it’s become increasingly clear that rather than having purpose and emotional fulfillment of its own, it’s being used as a vehicle:

to drive the flash forward story, and/or

to drive next year’s crossover storyline, and/or

to drive season 8′s storyline.

(I’m using and/or there because I pretty much suspect all of those things are one in the same.) 

Seasons 1-3 (and even 4 and 5, to some extent) built upon each other. The writers planted seeds in seasons 1 and 2 that didn’t pay off until much, much later, meaning that we were invested in that payoff. We were adequately prepared, through plot and character, for those stories. But rather than continue to reinvest and build on elements of the earlier seasons, the latter seasons - especially 6 and 7 - have gone off in completely unprecedented directions. And for season 7, this means they’re trying to do accomplish too much at the very end. Too much plot, too late in the game, with too little emotional foregrounding.

We have THREE EPISODES LEFT after this - only THREE EPISODES left with Felicity - and there are still so many unanswered questions. Not only for the season, but for the show. And somehow each episode still manages to feel stagnant, refusing to answer our pressing questions, or worse - introducing new ones. 

And I guess that’s what’s really getting to me now. Because did I hate 7x19? No, not really. Aside from the general decline in quality discussed above, it was fine. I like the Team Arrow moments, I liked Olicity in the bunker, the team within the team. This is the sort of action and stories I wanted more of last season, and all this season too. It’s nice to finally have it again. 

But it’s time for resolutions now, and we’re not getting them. It’s time they start answering our questions about the flash forwards, time they start resolving the Emiko storyline - or at least building up to that resolution. (Remember how tight 1x19 through 1x23 are? The threads unraveling, the ever-heightening intensity?? Nothing like the plodding, disconnected feel of these late-season 7 episodes.)  

All of which makes me think they’re not really intending to resolve these questions this season at all. Rather than giving us a satisfying, complete story, they’re just rushing to the next thing - the next crossover, the next season. 

And it just bothers me, because this is the end for Felicity. We deserve character moments, goddammit. 

The showrunners seem to have forgotten that it was always character that made this show great. And it just makes me sad that it seems they won’t remember it in time to give us the proper ending that Felicity (and Oliver, and John) deserve. 

[imagineredwood]

Request: “TWD crossover where after the Sons are brought by Jesus as allies and becoming friends with her for saving Bobby, Jax helps the reader kill Negan after he killed her best friend Glenn and shot her sister Rosita”

Pairing: Reader x everyone lol Mainly, Jax, a little Bobby, and Jesus

Warnings: Death, blood, emotional hurt, all types of feels, slight mention of PTSD symptoms 

Word count: 4,322

***Varies from the original storyline of the show since obviously so there’s some overlap but its mostly AU. I wrote the interactions between the reader and everyone including Jax platonically but there is a moment of friendly affection between them that I guess could be seen as romanic if you squint want to***

“Woah!” 

There was an overlapping sound of guns being drawn and cocked, from both sides all at once. Jesus quickly put his hands up, placing his body in front of your line of fire, trying to lock his eyes with yours. You weren’t focused on him though. Your eyes were trained on the men behind him. 

“Hey, hey. Chill.” 

You lowered your gun, shifting to the side and aiming it away from him and back towards the group of men standing behind him, their guns drawn and aimed at you as well. Your people aimed at them and theirs aimed at you, but you and the blonde with a beard in the front were gunning for each other, your eyes locked with his as his top lip pulled into a snarl. He growled out to Jesus, his blue eyes never leaving yours.  

“I thought you said you were bringing us to good people? That we wouldn’t have anything to worry about?” 

Jesus nodded quickly, pulling his gaze away from you and putting it on Jax, his hands still up trying to pacify everyone. 

“They are. I promise you. They’re just on edge. We haven’t had it very easy lately, everyone is on high alert. You’re new and they weren’t expecting you. Please, just put the guns down. You guys too.”

He looked back over towards you and the group pointing, everyone waiting to see what you and Rick would do. They all looked towards you as you and Rick glanced at each other. Jesus meanwhile kept quietly pleading to you.

“Please Y/N. I brought them here as allies. They can help us. There’s strength in numbers. I would not have brought them here and put everyone at risk if I didn’t think we could trust them. They’re willing to work with us. I know you’ve been through a lot lately, I know. I know. Just please put it down. Lets all just talk. Hear them out.” 

You winced, internally struggling with if it was a good idea or not. Rick relented beside you and lowered his gun, reaching over and placing his hand on your wrist, pushing you to lower yours as well. 

“It’s ok.”

You still didn’t think it was a good idea but out of respect, you agreed, keeping your gun down and aimed at the floor as the other group slowly did the same. Jesus blew out a harsh breath and ran his hand over his beard, willing down his nerves that had resulted from the near shootout in front of him. He looked back over at Jax to see his reaction, thankful to see some of the aggression from earlier gone, though he knew it wasn’t unwarranted. 

“I’m sorry, Jax.” 

The blonde said nothing, eyes still traveling over to you and he rolled his shoulders. 

“Yeah.” 

Rick stepped forward and pulled you along too, Jesus standing between the two groups still. 

“I brought them as allies. It’s just them, they’ve stuck to themselves for the most part since all of this. They were all together before it happened. They trust each other, love each other. Their loyalty to each other stretches far beyond the outbreak. They know loyalty and they’re willing to work with us. They don’t have a secure location to stay so figured we can create an allyship here. They have somewhere secure to call home with us and we have more people to strengthen us. More muscle. More people to stay on watch, no more hours upon hours for one person. More backup for runs. I did this for us. For all of us, them too. Just...talk with them. I know that we can work something out. I know we can.” 

Everyone stared at Jesus in silence, both you and Rick eyeing the other group. You spoke first.

“How do you know you can trust them, Paul? You said it yourself, they’ve been together since before. Their loyalty is to each other, not us. How can we be sure that this won't come to bite us in the ass? I’ve about had it with making stupid mistakes and watching people I love die because of it.” 

The Sons didn’t miss the edge your voice took on towards the end of your sentence. The sound of pain, the anguish that was laced in. Your brows were knitted, the sorrow you felt in your chest manifesting itself on your face. Jax extended the olive branch, taking a careful step forward. 

“I know you don’t trust us. That’s a given. We don’t trust you. Neither of us trusts the other, yet. We gotta work up to that. But Paul sold us. You’re normal people, so are we. We’re all just lookin’ to survive. We stick to ourselves because trusting other people and letting them in is dangerous. We know that as well as you do. We’re not saying that we have to become some family, holding hand and singing kumbaya. We just wanna settle and if what he’s told us is true, you’re some of the only good people left around. We just want to make this work. The good gotta stick together. There’s enough bad and evil out in this world already. I see that you have a child with you.” 

He looked over at your sister Rosita as she held Judith in her good arm, the same take-no-shit, protective look that you wore on her face as well. Jax took another step forward before motioning to the older man with long curly hair behind him. He made a motion with his finger and the man stepped to the side, revealing a little blonde boy no more than 5 standing behind him. 

“Abel, come here.”  

The boy walked forward and you instinctively hid the gun behind your back as he came to stand beside the blonde leader, reaching up to grab onto his hand. Seeing them side by side now, it was obvious who the child was. He verbalized it anyways. 

“This is my son. I just want the best for him. I want him to be safe. To have as normal of a life as he can possibly have in a world like this. A steady home would be a start.” 

You nodded slowly, understanding. You knew he hadn’t used his child as a pawn. He was showing that he had just as much to lose as your group did. He was bearing himself and his weakness, and that counted for something in your book. With a single nod, you holstered your weapon and looked over at Rick, who then asked his three questions. 

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

“Take some more beans, Daryl. You had a rough run today.” 

You put an extra scoop on beans in Daryl's plate and he nodded, placing his hand on your shoulder and squeezing softly. 

“Thanks, darlin’.”

He left towards the dinner table with his plate and you looked over ready to serve the next person waiting. You smile was less than faint as you locked eyes with the blonde form the new group. 

“Jackson, right?” 

He nodded and returned your smile a bit less tightly. 

“Call me Jax.”

“Jax. Got it. Do you want anything specific or just a little bit of everything?”

You motioned to the food on the counter and Jax smiled again. 

“I’m a simple man. Just gimme a bit of everything.” 

You both stood in silence as you served his plate, handing him a bottle of water. 

“Thank you.” 

You managed to smile regularly this time, though it was slightly forced. 

“You’re welcome. Enjoy it.” 

As he walked away, Paul came up beside you, his smile mirroring yours. He reached over and grabbed the serving spoon you were holding, serving another plate in silence before handing it over to you. 

“Go eat. I’ll serve the last couple of people.”

Taking the plate from his hands, you turned to go and sit but his hand made its way to your elbow, grasping it softly. You turned.

“Thank you for trying. I know you’ve been through a lot. I know its hard to trust new people, especially after...everything. But thank you for giving them a chance.”

For the first time in a while, your smile was genuine and you nodded once in acknowledgment.  

“I’m trying.”

With that, you turned and headed over to where your sister was sitting, her patting the seat next to her as you got closer. Sitting down, you put the first spoon into your mouth and looked around, your eyes falling on Jax as he sat with his son in his lap, the both of them laughing, talking and eating together. You watched as Abel held a slice of apple out to Jax, him taking a bite of the fruit and playfully nipping the tip of his finger as well. The boy laughed, the sound warming your heart, and you looked back down at your plate figuring that maybe these people weren’t so bad after all. 

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

“They’re coming around from the back! We got a couple minutes tops before we get flanked by both those people and the walkers. We need to head back.”

Jax nodded in agreement with your statement, knowing that putting up a fight here was not smart. Sure you hadn’t gotten all the supplies you’d come out on this run for, but what difference did it make if none of you got to make it back for the group to receive them. 

“She’s right. There’s too many, it’s not worth it. Let's just circle around back the way we came. We go out a little further, lose them and then we’ll head back to the compound.” 

Chibs and Tig agreed, as did Daryl and Michonne. 

You were all on the same page. Now you just had to get the hell out of there. You all spun around and started heading back in the direction you had came from, planning to wrap around the building and head back into the forest where you’d left the truck hidden. Everything seemed to be going smoothly, everyone moving in unison quietly. Somewhere off in the distance to the right the crunching of branches could be heard, but the setting darkness of a run lasting too long was leaving the group with low visibility. You all instinctively closed the gaps between you, closing in together. You and Jax focused you gaze and rifles in the direction of the sound while the rest of the group watched your backs. Jax whispered quietly beside you. 

“Walkers?” 

Shaking your head, you kept your eyes peeled. 

“No. They would’ve made more noise already. It’s that group.”

He nodded and squared his shouldered, bracing the butt of the riffle against himself, ready for the kickback. You tapped his arm softly though, nodding forward with your head.  

“Let’s keep moving. We don’t know how many there and are a firefight this close to walkers isn’t smart. Let’s just try and get back home.” 

Everyone silently agreed and you continued your way through the trees, this time a bit more urgency in your steps as you tried to get out without a problem. You’d made it good couple yards before you heard the cracking of branches again, this time from two separate directions. You didn’t have much time to react as the two men from the store came into view, guns raised. They were yelling something as they walked forward but whatever it was got lost in the sound of bullets raining down, Tig, Daryl, and Chibs wasting no time in putting them down. Shouts could be heard from further back in the forest and it was clear from the sound that you would be outnumbered. They had more people and were now fueled by the anger that their scouts had been put down. There was no discussion within the group as you all took off running now, not bothering with trying to stay quiet. Chibs and Daryl took the back, laying down small waves of cover fire to keep them back far enough while you and Jax lead the way back to the truck. You knew it wasn’t that far away, you could see the road through the trees, but there was still a ways to go. Jax pulled the walkie talkie from his side and phoned in to Bobby who was waiting in the truck, just in case a situation like this had arose. 

“Get the truck started, we’ve got company!”

The engine roared to life ahead of you and came fully into view now, all of you piling into the vehicle. Tig, Chibs, Daryl and Jax jumped into the bed of the truck, aimed and ready to take down whoever came out to follow while you and Michonne dove into the cab beside Bobby. 

“Everybody in?” 

You nodded quickly, trying to catch your breath as Bobby looked over at you. It all seemed to happen in slow motion as someone came out of the forest on the other side, parallel to the driver side window, aimed directly at Bobby through the window. It was a tactic that always worked, one that you and the group had used yourself a number of times. Take out the driver and everything turns to chaos with everyone now a sitting duck. There was no hesitation as you brought your side arm up and aimed at the person, firing through the window. The sound of both the glass shattering and the round firing off in the closed cab was deafening, and your ears rung as your round hit them dead center in the chest. They’d fired a round off as well albeit a second too late and had missed as their body fell, the bullet imbedded in the top of the door, thankfully not in Bobby. 

The two of you shared a quick glance, Bobby’s eyes wide as he nodded at you once. There were no words exchanged between you and he quickly took off the emergency brake and floored it. You hadn’t noticed Jax watching from the back. 

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

You watched as Chibs pulled the last, particularly stubborn piece of glass from Bobby’s arm before cleaning it and getting started with a dressing. You felt a presence behind you and looked over to see Jax to your left, stopping as he came to stand right beside you. There was a good moment of silence as you both watched Chibs slather on antibiotic ointment on the wound and cover it with gauze, until Jax spoke. 

“I know Bobby already did, but I wanted to thank you. Him and i go way back and I don’t know what I would’ve done if I lost him. I saw it happening and I couldn’t get a shot fast enough. But you did, and you saved him. That means a lot to me.” 

You nodded and softly pushed your shoulder into his. 

“Don’t worry about it. We’re partners right? Gotta look out for each other.” 

Jax nodded and threw you a smile which you returned. Turning away, he stopped and placed a hand on your shoulder. 

“I’d say we’re a little passed the partner thing now. We may even be considered friends at this point.”

He gave his crooked smirk and raised eyebrows look, pulling a soft laugh from you as you agreed. 

“Yeah. I guess you could say we’re friends.” 

“Well come walk with me then. As friends.” 

With a playful roll of your eyes, you turned and followed him, walking alongside him slowly. You figured that there was something he maybe wanted to say, something he wanted to discuss, but he stayed quiet for the most part as you both took in the fresh air and looked around the Hilltop. Eventually his stride slowed some and he looked over at you. 

“I know I already said thank you for saving Bobby like that, but I just wanted to say it again. We really do appreciate what you did, both today and since we got to the group. I know you didn’t trust us at first. Hell, people didn’t trust us easily even before the outbreak. I know it was hard on you, to let us in and live alongside us. I can imagine that it isn’t easy to build a family with the people of your group and worry if you’re making the wrong decision when you let someone else in. You gave us a chance through and all of us are thankful for that. If you ever need anything, know that we’re here, right alongside you. We’ll have your back through anything. Know that. We’re here.”

You nodded slowly, looking down at a random rock that was laying at your feet to try and will the brewing tears down. After losing Glenn and damn near losing Rosita, you vowed that you wouldn’t trust anyone else. You wouldn’t let anyone new in. You wouldn’t care for anyone else. It was just becoming to painful to keep losing people that you had grown to love and that was exactly what you were trying to avoid when it came to these Sons as they called themselves. You didn’t want to become emotionally invested in anyone else that could die at any seconds and widen the hole that was already present in your heart. As he spoke though, you realized that maybe it was already too late. 

They’d been around for a good 2 months now and while that wouldn’t be long in the world before, you’d been through more than enough in this dystopia to come to not only trust them, but care for them. You’d grown used to them, used to their presence. Used to Juice and Chibs bickering, used to Bobby’s pacification when things got tense, Tig’s odd yet sometimes endearing nature. You had grown accustomed to all of them by now and you figured you were already in too deep. You cared, and if this conversation meant anything, you were willing to bet Jax and his cared as well.

With a rough sniffle, you nodded and looked up at Jax who’s eyebrows were knitted in sympathy as he watched you. He reached forward and wiped away a lone tear that had escaped with his thumb. You smiled at the action and reached forward to pat his chest softly before taking a step to keep walking. Jax followed suit.

“I had a, uh, friend. He was my best friend. His name was Glenn. He was the sweetest thing. He was strong, don’t get me wrong, but he had a heart of gold. He cared so deeply for us, always did whatever he had to do to get us by. He was with Maggie. He was gonna be a dad.” 

As you walked, Jax silently reached over and linked his arm with yours, supporting you as you opened up to him.

“We loved him and he loved us. He was with us since forever. Shit he was a part of the group way before I was. Even in that time though we just clicked. He was the best friend I’ve ever heard, even before the outbreak.”

You voice trailed off slightly as you reminisced, thinking back to his bright smile. Then your thoughts shifted to the sound of his voice as he told Maggie he would find her, his face so battered and unrecognizable, you’d looked away immediately. Those last words and view had haunted you since it happened. Anytime you thought about him, no matter how happy the memory that triggered the thought, it never failed that that night would flash and consume your thoughts. Jax could feel you tense beside him. Your voice had taken an almost unrecognizable tone to it when you spoke again.

“That bastard Negan killed him. Right in front of Maggie. In front of all of us. He had us all kneeling on a group like some fucked up game of duck duck goose. he picked him at random. None of us were expecting it and that’s why he enjoyed it. He got off on it. He’s so sick he even joked about that fucking bat of his doing such a good job. He terrorized everyone. Takes shit that doesn’t belong to him, kills people for any reason he sees fit. Maims them and thinks he’s being kind for taking it easy on them. He shot Rosita, almost killed her but let her live in return for a bigger cut of our stuff. He’s already caused enough damage. He needs to be taken out.”

Though he had yet to actually meet or come into contact with Negan yet, Jax already knew that he was the type of man that thrived in these conditions. The type of man that was beyond redemption, beyond talking to. He wasn’t the type of man that could be changed and made to see the error in his ways by appealing to his better nature. He wasn’t a man that had one. He trusted your judgement and he had already spoken to Rick and gotten the quick story of how he was your biggest threat at the moment. Hearing you speak though and give the details, Jax knew now that this was personal. Negan was going to keep coming at the group harder and harder every time until he broke you all and that wasn’t something that Jax was prepared to let happen. Not to his knew family he wasn’t. You’With a deep breath, Jax nodded and tugged your arm back some. d helped his group and he was going to help you. He didn’t know when or how just yet, but he wouldmake sure that you got your retribution.

“It’s getting late. Lets get back to the group, see how Bobby’s holding up.” 

With a smile, you nodded and turned with him, both of you walking back in a comfortable silence. 

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

“You good?”

You nodded but kept your eyes trained on Negan as he knelt in front of you. Jax stood a couple paces away but still close. He was going to let you have this kill. 

He and the Sons had managed to bump into a couple saviors while out on a run and had killed the first before they cornered the second that was no more than 19. He was wimpy, jittery and quick to throw both his partner and the saviors under the bus, begging for his life in exchange of information before they’d even done anything to him. Jax had recognized right away that he wasn’t a natural born killer, not even a good killer after all this time. In the midst of begging for his life, he had asked if he could join your group instead. Neither Jax nor Chibs had failed to notice the three fingers missing from his right hand. Upon asking, the kid had told them that his fingers had been taken as punishment for stealing three cans of food, orders from none other than Negan. The kid was scared shitless but had nowhere else to go. He had seen the confrontation as a way out though and Jax had struck a deal with the seven fingered boy; if he could sneak them into the compound, they would give him a chance to join them. 

Tig had been against it from the beginning and so had you, prefering to just kill him and be done with it and the threat, but Jax wasn’t going to let go of the opportunity to kill Negan without a fight. It was the opportunity of a lifetime and Jax reminded you that it wasn’t only about you getting revenge, but neutralizing a threat that had been around for far too long. You and the others had been convinced after that and had stuck by Jax’s plan as the boy drew up a map of the compound and worked out a plan. 

Now here you were, Negan at your feet as you stood with the barrel of you gun pressed firmly to his forehead. 

His eyes held no fear as he looked up at you, a faint smirk tugging at his lips. 

“You think this will fix things? You think this will make a fucking difference? Everyone is gonna know it was you and when they get their hands on you, you all are gonna have a lot more to worry about than just a little brain matter splattered on he ground. What happened to the asian and the redhead is gonna look like a papercut when my saviors get done with you.”

He gave a hearty laugh, eyes closed and head thrown back as he did and you could hear your own heartbeat pounding in your ears as your anger took over. Pulling your gun down and holstering it, you didn’t miss the flash of confusion that crossed his eyes. It didn’t last for long though as your fingers curled around the handle of your hunting knife and pulled it from its sheath plunging it down into the center of his head, down to the hilt. You didn’t watch as you did it, your eyes looking straight forward passed him. The squelching was enough to tell you that you had done your job, but you twisted the blade just to be certain. You took a deep breath and closed your eyes, Jax’s hand coming to rest on top of yours and squeeze gently. 

“We gotta get out of here, darlin’,” 

With a nod, you pulled the knife from his head and let his body fall forward with a soft thud. Jax took you by the elbow and began pulling you from the room, your mind in somewhat of a haze as you came to terms with what had just happened and that you had done what needed to be done to ensure that at least Negan himself wouldn’t be able to ever bring harm to someone that you loved every again. The saviors may try in the future but you would be ready then. You’d done this for Glenn, for Rosita and for the rest of the group that was your family, Sons included. It had been a long time coming and it would be a lie to say you didn’t feel some relief now knowing he was gone. Following Jax and the rest of the boys out, you silently snuck out of the compound as quickly as you had gotten in and escpaed, heading back to the Hilltop to see if maybe now you could get some peace.