#as part of the escape room we had this funny lil picture of us where we all had to make “angry” faces

[omnic]

love having a fantastic outing and then u come home and that happiness is shattered within minutes of entering through the door 🙃

[user21340]

my only exception

(i don’t own this gif or any of the characters in this fic)

summary: you and nat are separated when in the Red Room. you both are reunited. after holding onto a couple things to give her for a couple years you both realize love is well and alive.

warnings: violence, abuse, swearing, lil angst, fluff

pairing: natasha romanoff x fem!reader

word count: nearly 1.8k

a/n: omg i don’t know what to say! thank you for all the support on the stuff i���ve released so far. it’s super crazy seeing some of my favorite writers following me. thank you so so much for 30 followers! much love 💕💕

(italics in dialogue mean the person is speaking russian)

sorry for any mistakes i wrote this at 3am and have to get up for school at 6 😪 no bueno

It was a cold and stormy night as the power in the Red Room continuously flickered on and off even with the help of a high powered generator.

You and Natalia had been waiting for an event like this to occur so you could break out. Even though both herself and you lived only a small bit of life outside in the real world before you were taken in and trained to become a weapon, both of your humanly morals knew right from wrong. The Red Room’s treatment definitely being a wrong.

Madame B and the other monstrous staff at this facility put all you girls to bed roughly an hour ago. Nat and yourself undid your cuffs connecting your wrist to the metal bedframe so you could pack the few things you both owned before you made your escape. Both of you had talked this plan over through and through so you both were on the same page as soon as you saw that flicker of a power outage surge though the site.

At the moment you both were eighteen years old meaning both of you had proven yourselves worthy enough to hone a spot at this academy and had graduated a couple months prior.

GAME PLAN

Some information you had gathered which the staff weren’t aware of was every time the power flickered off, it disarmed and unlocked the exit door/s for nearly five seconds. The weather has been dry but cold lately not making this discovery too useful. The plan was to sneak over to uncuff yourselves in the middle of the night when these brief power outages were occurring, pack your items, and as you were about to escape bang on the wall of the large room where the girls kept at the academy would sleep to create enough of a distraction before you were out and free for good. Easy right? How wrong you’d be.

When it was time for the distraction, Nat stood by the door waiting for the next surge of lightning of whatever broke the electricities stability as you walked to the far side of the sleeping quarters where you were sure you’d have enough time to bang on the walls and sprint out of that door.

You heard a crash of thunder so you knew your escape chance would be soon. As you were about to start banging on the walls you see a door knob parallel to Nat but far away none the less start turning.

BAM

Lightning strikes, what seems to be right outside of the building. You sprint for the door only to have your arm caught by one of Madame B’s henchmen.

Just like that the power flickers.

five.

Without much thought you break away from the man’s grasp lunge at Natalia who happened to be at the door.

four.

“We’ll meet again Natalia.” you speak softly

three.

You shove her out of the door with all of your might.

two.

You use all of your remaining strength that you can muster up to slam the heavy metal door closed.

one.

Click

The door locks once again.

“You stupid little bitch. Get over here NOW!” the man practically growls.

You slowly and steadily walk over to the man as he gruesomely pummels and kicks you.

Sure the beatings, mind torture and manipulation hurt, but you’ve never experienced any kind of pain on the same caliber to what being separated from Natalia feels like.

Madame B is more than disappointed, enraged and annoyed with one of her ‘star students’. You receive daily beatings and long, tiresome training hours for helping Natalia escape. Although everyone is ‘replaceable’ in the minds of the staff as well as Madame B, they just lost Natalia so they couldn’t afford to lose you as well.

Months later the beatings finally slow down to a couple a week which you are able to endure. Madame’s mission now is to make a monster out of you by pushing you to and past your limits when training.

One night you finally drift off to sleep. You hate sleeping. It’s a constant replay of your last night with Nat. Only hoping that she made it to civilization safe and sound and is living a normal teens life. However, tonight’s dream is different. In this dream you see yourself shoving your packed-escape bag between your mattress and bedframe as you are bleeding out on the ground from the beatings. You wake up in a cold sweat and manage to kneel on the ground and slowly lift up your mattress only to find that same, small bag filled with the few, but important belongings of yours and Nat’s. You open up the bag forgetting all about what you both had packed. The most important items you see is a picture of Natalia as a toddler with alongside her mother and father, a small metal ring which you had made for her after stealing a small teaspoon at dinner, banging it against the concrete floor with a rock to flatten it out as you’d continuously bend it back and fourth so only the thinnest part is of the spoon is left which you bend into a ring before surprising Nat with it after you know she had a pretty rough day training, and lastly Nat’s papers containing important info about her such as her full name, birthplace, parents names, and birthdate.

November 22, 1984

November 22, 1984

November 22, 1984

November 22, 1984

You make sure you have this date burned into your head, latching onto any important information about her you can learn.

You hang onto those three items keeping them hidden.

Two and a half years later...

It’s late at night when you hear gunshots and fights breaking out throughout the facility. You quickly get up out of bed (once again undoing your cuffs) and grab those three items from under your mattress. You place them in your pocket getting ready to make a break for the outside world. As you reach for the door you turn back taking one last look at the place you’ve been living for pretty much the entirety of your life, only before a man in a funny red, white, and blue costume enters your view.

You bring your hands up ready for a fight.

“Look kid, I’m not here to fight you. We are breaking you out.” the man ensures

“Who even are you?” you sternly question

“Steve Rogers. But the public calls me Captain America.” his gaze settles on your figure, “Mind telling me who you are?” he pushes

“Names y/n, but look I’ve got places to be ma-“ you are cut off when Captain America’s jaw drops.

“No, we both know you don’t. But, you ARE coming with me.” you know there isn’t much room for protest but that won’t stop you from trying. You lunge at him and push him to the ground as you wave a small goodbye and sprint towards the door only for your body to fall on the ground limp. Realizing you’ve been stunned by something temporarily.

“YOU MOTHERFUCKER!” you shriek, he only chuckles.

“God, Nat was right about you.” she shakes he head with a small grin on his face.

“N-nat?” you whisper as you vision fades black.

You regain consciousness and look around only to find yourself in a weird windowy, loud vehicle type thing. You see a group of people standing around you but you see one particular familiar face hovering directly over yours lightly combing through your hair with one one hand and gently outlining your jawline with the other.

“NAT!” you screech, your brain is feeling too many emotions to comprehend at the moment.

Once she sees and hears you are awake she pulls you into a bone crushing hug.

“Y/n/n I’m so sorry I left you and you had to stay in that hellhole for so long alone I don’t know how I would’ve help up it if that-“ you cut her off

“Natalia, all that matters is I’m here with you right now.” you reason.

After getting off of what you learned is a ‘plane’ you and Nat spend hours together clinging onto one another as if, as soon as you separate you will be absent in her life for another couple years, vice versa.

Months pass by. Even though you and Nat have yet to label yourselves as a couple your hearts belong to one another after being attached to the hip to one another for pretty much every activity or mission you both do. In this time you were also recruited as an Avenger due to your skillful hand to hand combat and your masterful types of fighting you have nearly perfected from your time in the room.

The date just happens to be November 22. You are pretty sure no one in the compound is aware of Natalia’s birthday, hell, you aren’t even sure if she’s aware.

Today is the day you decide to return the missing items from her bag that you recover after she left.

You wake up next to her and wake her up with a long, graceful, soft kiss on her lips to which she responds shortly after by kissing you back as you feel as tiny smirk against your own lips.

“Hey, what was that for?” she asks playfully

“Ohhh nothing. Just maybe it’s for my favorite girl’s special day today.” Nat blushes.

“H-how’d you know?”

“Oh honey, I know e v e r y t h i n g.” you reply

Before she can respond you pull her to sit up on your shared bed and hand her an envelope containing her papers as well as he one and only photo of herself and her family.

As soon as she sees both items she sobs into your chest. (more because of the picture, you really only included her papers so she too would know all the most crucial parts of her life pre-red room era.

“Uh, uh, uh’” you tut,”One more thing.” you reach for her hand slowly and tell her to shut her eyes. You slowly slide the makeshift ring on her finger.

“Open.” you instruct

To which she gasps at the sight and just like the day you both were reunited you hugged and kissed for hours on end.

“Nat, will you be my girlfriend?” you ask with a sheepish smile.

“Of course y/n/n, I thought you’d never ask.” she takes a breath,“I know love is for children, but you are my only exception.”

“Ditto.” Natalia chuckles, “That is what the Americans say, right?” you backtrack with flushed cheeks.

She holds you tighter and presses a soft kiss to your forehead.

“Sure.” she breathes out.

[dracowars]

i read your first request and it’s AMAZING!! i loved it soo much, so i was wondering if you could write smth where y/n is dracos gf - they meet in his dorm room after class, but one day she’s super late and acting really weird, draco doesn’t bother, tries to comfort her, and maybe get a lil steamy, but she doesn’t want to.. he then discovers scaring on her hand, and she tells him that crabble sent her to umbridge for doing smth bad.. you can decide on the plot, those are just some ideas! xx

engraved | draco malfoy

pairing: draco x slytherin!reader

word count: 3,0k

summary: where y/n's visit to the new headmistress leads to a heated argument with draco

a/n: thank you very much for your kind words and for requesting, i really hope that you like it <3

warnings: a little steamy, angst, mentions of blood

universe: harry potter

Trying to hold back the tears, you run down the sparse torch-lit corridors of Hogwarts, your footsteps echoing from the thick stone walls around you creating the only other sound besides your soft sobs. You press your left hand against your chest while you burst into the closest girls' bathroom, which is completely empty at this time, especially since Dolores Umbridge is in charge of the rules here.

It has been less than a month since she crept into school as the new headmistress and everything is already upside down. Students are allowed to walk around at a certain time only, detours between lessons are not acceptable at all, couples are almost no longer allowed to exist and actually, just all kind of fun and joy at Hogwarts has been extingusihed by her rules.

However, worst of all are the punishments for breaking any of Umbridge's thousand rules. Recently she has founded the so-called Inquisitorial Squad, a select group of students who help her to locate every kind of violations happening around the school. They sneak around the hallways on their hourly tours at night and report every so tiny thing to their new boss immediately. Most of these students are, of course, Slytherin's. Your boyfriend Draco was also offered to become a part of this squad, which he gladly accepted and was named its leader. You exactly know how perfect Draco fits into the role of the bad and ruthless leader, but still, you weren't very happy about it. After all, this woman is currently destroying your second home and he is helping her in a certain way.

Being the girlfriend of the Inquisitorial Squad's leader made you think that nothing can harm you, but oh, you were terribly wrong. Usually by this time in the early evening after your last course in Transfiguration you would already be in Draco's prefect dorm room, cuddling on his bed and just talking about your day. Because of the new established rules, you have to sneak into his room, trying to not get caught, but so far it has not been a very big problem. Even if someone of the other Slytherin's catches you, they will be far too scared of Draco to report it. But unfortunately everything took a different turn today.

During your Transfiguration lesson you had to admit that you forgot to do your homework, something that doesn't happen often but the current situation in Hogwarts burdens everyone, even the teachers, and on top of that you also came too late. Not that McGonagall was mad at you or anything, you are one of her best students after all, and a simple warning that it should not happen again was enough punishment in her opinion. Unluckily for you, Vincent Crabbe, one of your boyfriend's goons, is also in your class. And he definetely takes his job as an inquisitor a little too serious.

When you wanted to get out of the classroom, he suddenly got in your way and blocked it, waiting for everyone else to leave. At first you thought he was just trying to be funny again, you have never had a problem with each other in the first place. But apparently Crabbe prefers to receive an award from Umbridge to your friendship and the fact that you are in the same house didn't stop him in deducting twenty house points from his own house because you broke two rules. You never expected him to have a big brain, but that he even dragged you into Umbridge's office afterwards just because you forgot your homework in a class she is not even a part of, was even too stupid for a Vincent Crabbe.

And only then did it get really bad.

A tear has now found its way down your cheek, but you hastily wipe it away and run to the sinks in the girls' bathroom. You quickly turn on the faucet and hold your reddened, throbbing hand under the ice-cold water, your lips escapes a painful gasp. You squeeze your eyes shut at the pain and let the water run down your skin, hoping to soothen your aching flesh. What Umbridge did to you can no longer be considered a punishment, it was more of a torture.

As soon as Crabbe rudely pushed you into her disgusting pink office, he immediately received his desired reward and left you alone with this monster of a woman. This disgusting woman greeted you with a fake cunning smile and asked you to sit on one of the chairs at her table, the cats trapped in the pictures on every inch of the wall meowing in your ear. First you resisted against her request but soon realized that discussions with her are of no use and sat down after all.

With that peculiar high tone of hers, she handed you a black quill and then asked you to write 'I must not be late' onto the parchment until you memorize it. She also told you that you won't need any ink. With an annoyed roll of your eyes you straightend up your position, put the tip of the quill onto the paper and started writing. Not even spelling out the sentence one time, you felt a sharp pain on the back of your hand with every further letter you wrote down. As you took a look at your hand you noticed the exact words you just wrote were engraved on your skin.

Shocked, you glanced at Umbridge, but she just stood their with a smile on her face, shaking her head and shrugging. You figured out that the ink was made from your own blood and also that every word would only hurt more. And that is exactly what it did. She must have let you write that one single sentence down over fifthy times before she was sure you had learned your lesson.

You yourself didn't really care if you did, all you wanted to do was to get out of that hell as soon as possible. And now you are here, standing in absolute pain in front of an already broken mirror in a cold bathroom.

You have to blink a few times while looking up at the ceiling to hold back your tears and then you look at your injured hand again. You pull it out from under the running water for a moment, only to see that you are still able to perfectly read the words. The cold water did not really ease the pain, it almost feels like it has gotten worse. You lightly touch the reddend, blood smeared skin around the actual wound with your fingertip and just at the slightest touch you flinch and pull your hand back.

You don't know how long you stood there and held your hand under the water as suddenly a thought pops up in your mind: Draco. If he finds out about what happened, he will be furious. Also, he is probably already waiting for you for two hours, not that it is unusual for you to be late to your daily meetings with your boyfriend, you always get caught up by some work for school, but you never needed this long before. Is he already looking for you?

Without waisting another thought, you close the tap again, dry your hand very gently and then go out of the girls' bathroom, always careful not to run into the next squad member's arms and get sent back to the devil itself. Fortunately, you manage to find your way to the common room without getting caught, only once imagining that you heard Mrs. Norris. After you have said the password successfully, you enter the, luckily, empty room.

You quickly make your way to Draco's prefect dorm room, pulling the sleeve of your cloak - or as you have just noticed because of the large size, Draco's cloak - over your wounded hand so that it remains hidden. All you want is to be hugged now and comforted by him and not that he gets upset and angry and probably storm to Umbridge's office right away. Softly, you knock on the door and take in a deep breath, before it is opened vigorously.

Immediately you are pulled into the room, the door behind you is closed, even locked, and you get pressed against it with your back. In front of you is none other than your incredibly handsome boyfriend whose eyes seek eye contact with you in an instant. "Where were you?", Draco asks in a calm voice, gently stroking his fingertips over your cheeks to your chin, causing goosebumps to spread all over your body.

"I-I was held in Transfiguration. I had to catch up on some tasks and I forgot the time. I'm sorry, Draco", you lie into his face, really not wanting to tell him anything about what happend. "You made me wait a long time for you today, are you aware of that, darling?", he reminds you with a cheeky grin, his face slowly coming closer to yours. You know exactly what that look, that expression in his suddenly darker eyes means. He moves the hand that is not under your chin over your side and lets it stay on your hip. "But that is no problem, love. We still have enough time.."

With these words he then connects your lips into a hungry kiss, pressing you more against the door to his room. His hand on your hip squeezes you harder and he runs his other hand down to your neck. His firm grip makes you gasp, only earning a deep chuckle from the platinum haired boy.

For this brief moment in which he caught you off guard by slamming his lips onto yours, you had forgotten everything around you, but it did not last long and suddenly all the experiences come back into your head. Not wanting to continue this, you put your hands on his chest, trying to push him away from you but you only manage to break the kiss, which does not please him at all.

"I'm really not in the mood today, Draco", you explain, hoping that he will understand, like he usually does. "You will be, just wait and see", he winks playfully, absolutely not noticing the seriousness in your voice. Before you can say anything you only see the corners of his mouth curl up and next thing you know is he's attacking your neck, sucking and nibbling at that specific spot behind your ear.

Because of the actually pleasing feeling, you put more pressure on Draco's upper arms, which you are now unintentionally holding onto. "D-Draco", you softly whimper as he takes off your green tie and starts unbuttoning your white blouse, his rough kisses slowly wandering to your collarbone. "Please, Draco, stop", you manage to bring out, clearer than previously, but he ignores your request and just continues with what he is doing.

"We both know that you don't want me to stop", Draco whispers in your ear and connects your lips again, this time even rougher, not giving you the opportunity to say anything. It takes you a few seconds until you, in fact, try to relax under his touch and let yourself go, tilting your head to one side so he has even more access to the sensitive skin on your neck, which is already bluish.

But you just can't. You can't force yourself to do this after the horrifying encounter with Umbridge.

With a strong, forceful push you manage to shove Draco away from you ungently, a shocked and kind of annoyed expression plastered upon his face. "I said stop, Draco!", you practically scream at him, his forehead furrowed as the tears well back into your eyes. You want to pass him and go to his bed, but he quickly grabs your wrist and stops you. Immediately you harshly swat your hand away.

"Let me go and just leave me alone! You are always so insensitive!", you yell at him again, the emotions taking over your actions, but this time the tears find their way down your cheeks and only now Draco notices your change of appearance, how puffy your cheeks are and how your eyes are swollen and bloodshot, as if you had already cried before coming to his room.

Crying, you lie down on his bed, facing the wall so that your back is facing him. Draco frowns for a moment when he sees your devastated figure trembling from your heavy sobs. You cover your mouth with your hand to stifle your crying, but that only makes it worse. You can feel the mattress sink down beneath you as Draco lies down beside you, not touching you in the slightest.

A few minutes pass in which noone speaks, only your crying can be heard throughout the silence of the room. Your desperate attempts to calm yourself down and wipe away your recurring tears fails dramatically. Draco, on the other hand, lies next to you motionless, his head propped up on his elbow. If there is one thing in this entire traumatic enough world that he hates the most, it definetely is seeing you, the love of his life, his soulmate, cry. He would love to punch himself for not noticing how bad you are feeling sooner. Feelings of guilt start to plague him and he doesn't know what to do, if you even want to be touched by him anymore, especially in this fragile state.

Nevertheless, Draco finally decides to approach you slowly by stroking your hair gently and carefully to not scare you. He just wants to show you that he is here for you, that he is by your side, even if you may not feel like talking right now. When he notices that you are not resisting his touch, he runs his fingertips over your arm, trying to comfort you somehow without it being too much. And when you don't fight against that either, Draco suddenly wraps his arms around your still shaking body from behind and presses you tightly against him.

"Please don't cry, sweetheart", he softly whispers into your ear, lifting his head so he gets a glimpse of your face from the side. "Please stop..", he almost begs and feels tears pricking in his own eyes now as well. He has seen you cry a few times already, but never this much. It breaks his heart. "I'm here for you, angel."

In his strong and protective arms, tightly secured around your waist, you finally manage to calm down at least a little bit and turn around to face him. You don't dare to look at him with your probably disfigured face from all the crying, but Draco has other plans. He puts a hand on your cheek, guiding your face up to make you look at him. In your shiny, pain-ridden eyes, he is trying to find an answer to your condition, not wanting to pressure you to tell him if you don't want to.

"D-Draco", you stutter out between your sobs. "Shh..", he hushs you softly, his left hand stroking up and down your side in order to comfort you. "Take it easy, okay? Breathe in deeply. Whatever happened, I'm here for you. I protect you. Always."

Knowingly, you nod and wipe away some tears again, Draco helping you with his thumb. When you let your hand drop again, he catches your hand in his gently and wants to intertwine your fingers as his gaze falls on the still reddened wound on the back of your hand. His eyes widen as he sees the wound consisting of words painfully engraved into your skin. His mouth opens in pure shock. "What is that? Who did this to you, Y/N?!"

With a sad gasp you quickly pull your hand away, the expression on his face immediately falling since you are avoiding his touch and don't trust him with this. Only at seeing your scared face Draco notices that his last words became a bit louder and he is quick to pull you into a comforting hug again. "I'm sorry.. I didn't mean to scare you", he apologizes and places a kiss on your hair. "You know that you can tell me everything, Y/N. But if you don't want to, then at least show me your injury again please."

Silently, you escape his grip and lift your hand for him to see. He carefully examines the back of your hand, looking into your eyes here and then to see if his touch hurts. "U-Umbridge", you sob while he is still busy viewing your wound. At your words he raises an eyebrow in surprise.

"I-I was late for class and forgot my homework and then.. and then Crabbe sent me to her office. She.. She did-", you try to explain, but just can't find the right words. Draco caresses your cheek gently, apparently understanding what happened.

"I will kill her", Draco grinds his teeth, obviously fighting himself to hold back the anger that is currently raising inside of him like a burning flame. This woman dared to lay a hand on you and put you in such a state. And Crabbe won't get away with this either. Because of the tremendous anger, Draco is already getting up from the soft mattress, ready to fight.

"Please s-stay with me, Draco", you entreat him, not wanting to loose the warmth of his body next to you that manages to calm you down. At your words, his tense body relaxes and the boiling fire inside of him diminishes, but only slightly. Just because of you he's not already on his way to her office and give her hell.

"I'm so sorry I wasn't there. I'm sorry you had to go through this alone and I'm sorry for my behavior earlier", Draco starts to ramble, feeling guilty for not being able to protect you.

"You couldn't know. I-I really don't want to talk about it anymore.. Can you please just hold me, Draco?", you sob and he does what you asked him to do right away. His arms pull you closer to him and the delicate, fragrant scent that emenates from him calms you down, lowering your cries.

"I will never let you go", Draco whispers quietly, reassuring you that he will defintely never let you get hurt again. Not on his watch even if that means that he has to stick to you every second from now on, then so it will be.

[wienerbarnes]

A Certain Romance (2/6)

Pairing: Bucky x Reader

Word Count: 1,685

Warnings: not rlly anything

A/N: a lil bit of a deeper dive for these two’s relationship👀... enjoy!

MAIN MASTERLIST | A CERTAIN ROMANCE MASTERLIST

Your apartment is nice. Very you.

Sam invited him out to some restaurant, but after the last one he suggested, he decided to pass. And when Sam asked him what he was doing instead, if he was seeing you, Bucky lied and said yes. It made Sam happy and got him out of going to another ridiculous restaurant, so he saw it as a win-win.

Once Sam left, though, his thoughts did drift to what you were doing.

You two exchanged numbers at the pizza place after your date, but you two haven’t texted much. He texted you making sure you got home safe, which you did, and a day or so after, you texted him a picture of some advertisement with an awfully cheesy pick-up line written on it, which even he agreed was awful.

But that’s about it. So, he texts you.

Hey. What are u doing?

About to make dinner. Y?

Told Sam I was seeing u. Wanna hang out?

Come over.

Simple enough, he thinks.

You two haven’t had the most meaningful text conversations, clearly, but it’s still nice. No flirting, no typing and retyping messages in order to hook, line, and sinker, no ghosting. No relationship texting.

It was a dream for him. To have a new friend. He’s made plenty of friends, both in New York and in Wakanda. But it’s all under the same… umbrella. Always an agent, a fighter, an analyst of some sort. Someone to train with, to fight with, to fight for. Never someone like you. Someone that works a mundane job and lives in a mundane part of New York where her weekends are filled with going on mundane blind dates or otherwise cooking dinner for one.

It’s a breath of fresh air to not talk about fighting or missions or press or media or anything else he has to hear about at work. The only connection you have with Sam is that you met in a coffee shop a few years ago that has since closed down. He was one of your first friends here.

You could care less about Captain America, too. Which hurts Sam’s ego, and in turn, makes Bucky smile.

So, he goes over to yours.

He’s not sure what you’re making, but he brings a bottle of red wine as a courtesy. You are making dinner after all. Besides, women love wine, right?

Your apartment is nice. Very you.

Enough going on to show that someone does indeed live here, but also enough to show that you’re not exactly swimming in riches, like most people that live in this city.

The place smells like garlic and basil, and he’s glad that he brought the wine.

Shoes discarded at the door, he helps chop up the rest of the ingredients while you put a pot of water to boil. He chops up mushrooms, onion, pancetta, eyeing the bottle of vodka out on the table and tube of tomato paste next to his hand.

It's an understatement to say he’s excited. Most of the pasta he makes is from a bag of precooked noodles and a jar of tomato sauce.

Basic small talk floats through the air as the two of you dance around one another in the kitchen. Even though you’re “dating”, you don’t know much about each other. This isn’t too uncommon from how dating was for Bucky when he was a teenager; you’d marry women knowing very little about them.

Your favorite color is orange. You played violin in grade school. You had a childhood dog named Chowder. Bucky tells you his favorite color is green. He played a little bit of piano when he was younger, but did boxing in his late teens and early twenties before the war. You poke fun at him when he can’t remember the name of his own childhood dog.

“He’s probably rolling over in dog-heaven.”

“Good boy; he’d deserve a treat.”

You laugh.

Easy conversation continues on the couch as bowl after bowl of pasta is eaten and replenished. As fun and seemingly simple questions are asked, like each of your favorite movies or whether or not you pour the milk before the cereal, the room that’s left is used for deeper questions.

“What’s your most embarrassing moment?” You ask him.

He thinks for a moment before opening his mouth, only to close it again. “One time when Princess Shuri was fixing my arm it wasn’t secure completely, so it flew off while I was playing with some of the children.”

“That’s not your most embarrassing moment. I know it’s not, now you have to tell me what it really is.” You tease him.

He’s never been the best liar.

“You’re right, it’s not my most embarrassing moment. My actual most embarrassing moment is just kind of… sad. And I didn’t want to ruin the mood or anything.” He explains, hoping you’ll accept that but instead you give him an encouraging smile to hopefully give him some comfort that whatever it is he wants to tell you is safe in your apartment.

“Okay, uhm. So, in the 40’s, after I was rescued by Steve, but before we shipped out again where I was recaptured for the second and final time. We were all holed up in this little dance club, all the soldiers and their gals. And in walks Peggy Carter in a pretty red dress,” He begins, only glancing at your eyes periodically as if to make sure you’re still there.

“I know she’s Steve’s gal, he told me all about her. I wasn’t flirting with her because I wanted her, I was flirting with her… to make sure I still could. I mean, after being held in that… place… they injected me with stuff, told me things that weren’t true, I mean Steve told me I was repeating my number over and over again when he found me, I didn’t even remember doing that. I felt… violated, used, not like myself. I felt like I wasn’t me anymore.

“So, when Peggy walked in, I thought about how everyone always called me a ladies man, how good I was with women, I mean, I’d take girls out about every damn weekend, you know? I wanted to feel normal, so I flirted with her, tried to get her to dance with me. And she completely ignored me. She never even took her eyes off of Steve. It’s like I was invisible. And it just sort of felt like the nail in the coffin for whoever James Barnes was before the war. It was a realization that I’m never going to be that person again. And it was embarrassing for me.” He explains.

He hasn’t looked up at you again, but he heard your fork stop moving around your bowl a minute or so ago. He feels a lump in his throat thinking about that time, how he knew he’d never get back the man he was, even before knowing what was in store for him after falling off that train. How he used to be this man that wanted a long, happy marriage, six or seven kids running around a big backyard, a white picket fence surrounding a big two-story house in a neighborhood of identical homes. He wanted the cheesy life, at one point. But the same man that wanted that life died falling off a train many years ago.

All of that’s forgotten, though, when you open your mouth, and seem to say the perfect thing to make him feel better.

“One time in the third grade, this girl pulled my skirt down in front of my crush, and I wasn’t wearing any undies.”

A snort escapes his throat as you, somehow, after he’s shared something so deeply personal, something he never even told Steve or Sam about, still found a way to make him laugh. Which is what he wanted, he realizes. The comfort of moving on from that confession and not having to wallow in it like other people would try to. His hand leaves his fork to cover his face as tears threaten to leak out from how hard he’s laughing.

He took that secret to the grave, even if it wasn’t his own. He told himself he’d never tell Steve about how he felt in that situation, and he never did. He never told Steve that he didn’t enlist, either. He couldn’t imagine how Steve would’ve felt knowing that the army would’ve rather taken men that didn’t want to go to war, men who were terrified to go to war, had too much to lose and wanted to be selfish and stay home, than men like Steve who would do anything to enlist. Including lying on the damn enlistment form.

He wonders if Steve is looking at him now. Watching over him as he shares something that he never did with his best friend, with you, a girl he’s met barely a week ago, on your couch over bowls of pasta while he points out leftover sauce on the corner of your lip.

“What’s your greatest fear?” He asks you next.

“Dying alone. Actually, no. Getting kidnapped, probably.”

“Oh, mine’s spiders.” He shares.

It’s so easy to laugh with you, he finds. He jokes with Sam a lot, all the bickering and teasing all in good fun at the end of the day, and it’s mostly pretty funny. But laughing with you. He feels like a teenager again. Somehow, everything is funny; he doesn’t remember the last time he’s laughed so much, especially about things that aren’t even that funny.

It’s raining at the end of the night. Early morning, rather.

“You can take the couch, if you’d like.”

“Nah, I don't mind a little rain, and I like the ride home.” He fed Alpine before he left, but he imagines his cat misses him, even if she’s probably busy licking herself to even notice he’s left.

“Suit yourself.”

You don’t push him. A simple pleasure that’s more of a luxury for him. There’s no pushing or convincing or Are you sure’s with you.

Certainly a luxury, you are.

[galaxysessions]

You two are dancing in a snow globe round & round / and he keeps a picture of you in his office downtown…

Amanda looked at her reflection in the cloudy mirror hanging from the interior of her locker door. The pads of her fingers swiped expertly beneath blue eyes, hoping to catch any mascara that had strayed through out her day. She fluffed the hair at the crown of her head, wanting to bring life back to her blonde waves, and in a brief moment of psychosis she contemplated running to Duane Reade to purchase a spray or even a hot tool that could save her. Amanda let out an audible groan - at the horrifying fact that she was becoming her mother, at her disappointment in her subpar hair - and slammed her locker door shut. At least the outfit she had tossed together after her shift was cute: dark jeans and a black top with fluttering sleeves that was just sheer enough to hint at what was underneath. 

She was due at One Hogan Place in 20 minutes.

Sonny had insisted that he owed her dinner. How many dinners had he made for her and the girls? Hundreds, it felt like. How many times had they sat around at bars together after cases? Too many to count. How many empty take-out boxes had they shared? A lifetime’s worth. But this, this was different.

This was a date.

Familiar with the DA’s office, Amanda hoped she wouldn’t run into anyone she knew there. She didn’t want to answer questions about why she was hanging out so late and she was too nervous for small talk. Most of all she didn’t want to have to lie, not tonight. Keeping her head down, she flitted up staircases and down hallways until she was in front of Sonny’s office. She pulled in a deep breath, reminded herself that this man had seen her at her very worst, so her flat hair wouldn’t be the end of the world, then gently knocked on the door. It was cracked open, so she waited a beat before she slipped inside.

Sonny was sitting at his desk, leaned over some paperwork. For the brief moment she was able to, she admired the stretch of his shoulders. When he heard her enter, he looked up. The smile that immediately tugged at his mouth when he met her eyes made Amanda’s heart squeeze in her chest out of overwhelming adoration. “Hi,” she exhaled, somehow both more and less anxious at the sight of him. 

“‘Manda, hey,” Sonny greeted her. He stood up and waved her further into his office, coming out from behind his desk. “Come in, come in.”

“You still working?”

He heaved a sigh, returning a file to its rightful cabinet before turning back to her. “It never ends.”

She perched herself on the edge of his desk as she so often did, setting her purse down on the surface beside her. “Hey, c’mere,” she said when she noticed something: his tie was crooked, collar rumpled, his hair out of place. He had probably had a long day. She reached out a hand to him, nose scrunched as she smiled. “Your tie, you… well, like my grandma used to tell me and Kim after a long day of school, when we’d come home all roughed up: ‘you look like you’ve been shot out of a cannon.’”

Another grin broke across his face as he took a step forward, then stood in front of her, still, obedient. Amanda could feel his warm gaze looking down at her while her manicured fingers reached up to adjust the knot of his tie. “Well, you look beautiful.”

She knew her cheeks were turning pink; God, she hated that. What happened to her poker face? Her eyes flickered up to meet his as her hands drifted up toward his collar. Then she was smiling like a lovestruck teenager, as if no man had ever complimented her before this exact moment. Maybe she just needed to hear it from the right one. “Thanks,” she murmured as she smoothed the fabric of his shirt. She didn’t try to fix his hair - she liked the little strand that had escaped its style.

Sonny was standing so close to her that his legs bumped hers, silently asking her to make room for him. So she did: she parted her knees so she could playfully trap him, lower limbs snaking around his tall figure until her feet hooked loosely around the other side. A huff of laughter escaped Sonny as she felt his warm palms slide up the sides of her thighs to find her waist. Through the thin fabric of her shirt she could feel his thumbs moving back and forth, back and forth, and Amanda suddenly no longer cared about their dinner reservations.

Amanda carefully set the heels of her palms back on the edge of the desk, fingertips dangling. Collarbone prominently displayed, she gave her head a languid shake to move her hair away from her face. She gazed up at Sonny, still caught between her legs, playing against her side. Anticipation was beginning to simmer in the pit of her stomach. “Anything else I can help you with, Counselor?” 

Desire had darkened Sonny’s features and now he appeared mischievous as his eyes flickered over her thighs, her chest, her mouth. “Ah…” he started to answer her, but then he leaned in and kissed her instead of completing his thought. There was nothing gentle or cautious about the way his lips found hers: it stole the air from her lungs and his mouth felt searing hot. Her hands lifted from the desk, one cradling his elbow, another reaching up to his jaw. She loved the prickly feeling of newly formed stubble on his face, a sharp contrast to the softness of his tongue. The long line of his body angled itself closer to hers, and as she leaned back, she felt him let out a rough exhale at the way their forms aligned. 

Amanda had sworn to herself that she would not fuck this up - whatever this was that she was doing with Sonny - by having sex with him too soon, but in that moment she was so dizzy with want that his incredibly nerdy desk blotter was looking hotter and hotter. The hand at his elbow dropped blindly to the shiny metal of his belt buckle. Like a moth drawn to a flame, she couldn’t help but toy with it even though she knew it was a bad idea for more than one reason.

“‘Manda…” Sonny growled her name against her mouth, half in a warning, half in encouragement. One of his hands had wandered up the front of her shirt to ghost over her breast, so whatever he was trying to get her to stop doing, he had rendered his own message ineffective. 

“I won’t,” she breathed against his lips insincerely, fingertips trailing down the line of his fly, teasing, testing, “we won’t…” 

“Mr. Carisi, sorry I’m so late. I’ve got those -“ The voice of a young girl accompanied by the office door swinging open broke them both violently from their heated reveries. They separated from one another like they had been electrocuted: Sonny launched himself backward into his file cabinet, appearing to slam his funny bone in the process. Amanda scrambled off of the desk and on to her two feet, loose paperwork flying, hastily wiping off her mouth with the back of her hand as she stood at attention. The girl looked to be in her early twenties, with unruly curly hair wearing an ill-fitting sweater, but most importantly her eyes were wide in complete confusion. A large manila folder hung from her fingers.

“Lindsey!” Sonny yelped, carding his fingers through his hair. “Lindsey, hi. Hey. I just, you can put those on my desk,” he went on, pointing to the space he and Amanda were just occupying. “Thank you.”

Lindsey cautiously, wordlessly, placed the folder where she was told, then stepped back toward the doorway.

“This is, uh… do you know Rollins? Amanda? Detective Rollins?” Sonny asked Lindsey awkwardly, unnecessarily. His eyes shifted over to Amanda as he explained, “Lindsey is a law school intern here.”

“Nice to meet you,” Amanda offered, arms crossed over her chest to indicate that she was not interested in prolonging this painful interaction.

“Nice to meet you,” the student echoed, tone hollow. Turning away from them both, she let her hand linger on the door handle as she asked, “should I close this?”

“Yeah, please,” Sonny mumbled before his intern disappeared into the hallway.

Alone again in the office, Amanda raised both of her eyebrows and shot him a pointed look.  “Real smooth, Carisi.” Her heart was still pounding against her ribcage, partly because they were almost caught, partly because she didn’t know how Sonny was going to handle something like this. He was so nervous about keeping secrets, whereas Amanda felt like her life had been a series of little untruths for as long as she could remember. She kept her arms crossed like she was protecting herself.

Sonny leaned back against the file cabinet as if he was deflating. After what seemed like forever, he let out an exhale, then reached out a hand to her. “So… how about that dinner?”

note - idk just a lil one shot xoxox

[katnissmellarkkk]

Okayyyy chappy seven 🤩 Here we goooo 🥳

Lord, Katniss always had nightmares 😭 even before the games, between her father’s death, her mother’s abandonment and the other traumatizing things she saw in her life, my girl never slept peacefully a day in her life 🥺.

She even indicates that she sometimes has nightmares about past hunger games 😭😭😭. Someone protect my smol child. Please. Someone.... Someone? Anyone? No? Okay 🥺

“I bolt up screaming for my father to run as the mine explodes into a million deadly bits of light.” This is such a powerful image and it really does show that Katniss has literally envisioned all the gory details of her father’s death for the last four years. This is so sad 😞

Also though. Katniss really doesn’t talk much about her father’s death after the first book and definitely doesn’t describe nightmares about it. So .... like basically, the games traumatized her so badly that, her father failing to escape the mines as the collapsed in on him, crushing him into the pits of despair, the possibility of rescuing his corpse deemed unimaginable, pales in comparison? Yes I just tried and failed to phrase that long run on sentence the way Katniss phrases her nightmares about her dad dying, yes that was over the top but you know what? So. Is. Katniss.

“Dawn is breaking through the windows” Twilight reference 😬😬😬. I couldn’t stop myself, y’all. Forgive for please.

“The Capitol has a misty, haunted air.” Katniss, you’re from the butthole of Kentucky, the air you’re used to is probably humid as all get out 😓😓💦😅😅

“I must have bitten into the side of my cheek in the night. My tongue probes the ragged flesh and I taste blood.” 😒😒😒😒 this feeling ..... is .... v v v .... distinct .... and .... familiar 😕🙁☹️

“I end up hopping from foot to foot as alternating jets of icy cold and steaming hot water assault me.” Why is this so funny omg 😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂😂😅😅😅😅😅 Katniss is just like pressing buttons like, “Ah! Too cold! 🥶 Ah! Too hot! 🥵 Ah!!!!!” All while jumping like a .... cat 🐱🥁

Lemon foam? 🍋 Whatever. I guess there’s weirder flavors of soap we have today but like where’s the Philosophy flavors that give recipes on the bottles??? Surely they’d survive an apocalypse??? Everyone uses those???

I’m so glad Katniss didn’t forget to moisturize, even as she prepares for a death match 😅😅😅😅 even if it’s just as simple as pressing a single button, why is she even taking the time to press it?

I know, I know. She just wants to make sure her skin is so smooth for the arena that the knives and arrows just slide right off 🤣🤣🤣🤣

“This is the first time since the morning of the reaping that I resemble myself.” Lolololol which means Mr. Romantic is gonna be even more turned on by the sight of ya, since he’s crushed on you looking like this for the last decade of his life 🥳😎🤗💁🏼‍♀️. Peeta ain’t even here yet and I’m already making the shipper comments Samantha calm down 🙄😶😑🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐🤐

Seriously there where is Peeta? Did he also have to figure out the temperature controls in the shower? Did he also moisturize? I miss him I wanna know about his morning too 😔. Katty, is it too much to ask for you to go take a lil ... sneak peek into his room for me? 😏😏😏

Twenty dishes seems like a lot for like four people eating? Eh, maybe six people, if we count the stylists who magically pick and choose when they’re coming to a meal... Hmm, I’ll calculate just so no one else has to. 🤓😬🤗 No one else cares, Samantha. 🤐🥱😴😶 Twenty dishes amounts out to about five plates without the stylists and three and a half-ish with so.... idk it’s not that much food I guess but it seems like a lot for one meal, esp if people in the Capitol intend to keep their trim figures. This is why that one prep team girl is chubby. 🤐🤐🤐

Awww Katniss copying Peeta’s weird lil eating quirks 🤗😎🥳. She’s already taking interest in him, she just don’t realize it yet 💁🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️ shipper comment alert 🚨🚨

But also has anyone actually tried dipping bread on hot chocolate and was it good or does it taste as repulsive as it sounds to me? I hate it when my food even so much as dares to touch though 🤢😡😤😓

Oooo I always forget Prim has to be utilizing her goat, milking the thing every day until it’s dry I’m not a farmer idk how milking animals works ... so she contributes more than I give her credit I suppose.... I’m making an effort for you, Primmers. You seem useless and immature but I’m trying. 😪😶 Taylor Swift voice 🎶 *this is me trying* 🎶

Oh wow it was only two mornings ago? Man. The first book is slow moving. 😅😭 six chapters in and we’ve gotten through one point five days 🤣

“It makes me irritated that Peeta is wearing exactly the same outfit I am.” “Listen, Peeta, one of us has to change, this is getting embarrassing, you have to stop borrowing my clothes!”

“This twins act is going to blow up in out faces once the Games begin.” Ahhaahahahaha blow up 💥 💣 🔥. Get it, get it. 🥁 Because she represents fire. And she also blows things up in Every. Single. Book.

But seriously, did Cinna and Portia and Haymitch all plan on presenting Katniss and Peeta are like, tight friends or whatever, and then Peeta is like “oh b-tee-dubs, I have a massive crush on K-dog” and they just decided it perfectly fit into their plans?

I’m so jealous that their breakfast has bread baskets 😩😩😩 I know they’re headed to the slaughter but still. Bread.

if you like, I'll coach you separately. Decide now." "Why would you coach us separately?" In case one of you ... not naming names .... Peeta .... wants to reveal your lifelong crush on live television 😎😎😎

Also Haymitch is like “make an important decision but take zero time to consider it, I’m tired and hungover, kids, idc for your drama 😒”

Which as an auntie to a wonderful little two year old ... is v relatable 😅🥲🙃🤭

“And I already know what yours is, right? I mean, I've eaten enough of your squirrels." I wanna make a dirty joke here so badly but the lord himself is saying no.

“Town families usually eat expensive butcher meat. Beef and chicken and horse.” Ohhh this is interesting. Katniss believing Peeta and the other merchants live high on the hog while Peeta is later is like “I eat expired bread for every meal, Katniss” I mean, better than starving like her, but also not how she’s painting the picture in her mind. 😶😭

Also Katniss never mentions horses in Twelve, where’s the butcher getting horses from to slaughter and sell? That’s why Katniss never sees them, Samantha, duh 🙄

“I can't do anything. Unless you count baking bread.” "Sorry, I don't.” This was such a quick and matter of fact brush off, poor Peeta 😭😭😭 my baby I’m still rooting for you don’t worry you got this

Also. Lowkey, highkey, that tiny exchange triggered me. 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭. Those awkward moments where people brush me off or glance over me live in my head. Rent free. For life.

I wonder sometimes often times if Katniss’ father and Gale’s father knew each other? Both hunted and worked in the mines. Just a random sidebar 😅🤭🤐🙃

“She’s excellent” He’s so proud of his wife 🤧🤧🤧🤧🤧

So uh.... is it safe to say Mr. Mellark is an Everlark fan? If he likes and admires Katniss and Peeta and him apparently have some kind of close-ish bond (okay, maybe not but maybe) then perhaps he is carrying the shipper banner back in Twelve for them 🥳🥳😎😎

Katniss, you dingaling, of course he noticed you 🙄🙄🙄

Peeta compliments her and her instant reaction is “what are you doing, weirdo?” 😅😭

“Don’t underrate yourself” Peeta, love of my life, take your own advise. Stupid. 😪😪😪

“I've seen you in the market. You can lift hundred-pound bags of flour” Katniss in the market, staring across the way at Peeta, 👁👄👁, watching him lift flour over his shoulder.

“He came in second in our school competition last year, only after his brother." This is criminally undiscussed. Peeta being a wrestler alone is undiscussed but also.... did you go to his matches, Katniss? Miss Anti-Social, Hunting-First-Everything-Else-Later? 😏😏😏 If this ain’t proof of her lil crush idk what is

“All you need is to come up with a knife, and you'll at least stand a chance.” “You'll be living up in some tree eating raw squirrels and picking off people with arrows.” Does no one else realize that Katniss and Peeta literally took the other’s advise for the first part of the games? How did Peeta get in with the Careers? The way she just said. Where is Katniss when Peeta and the Careers discover her? High up in a tree. Okay, this maybe didn’t compute right but I had a thought here so I said it

Peeta’s mother is just a monster. Who says that crap? 😔😔😔 don’t worry, baby, I’m rooting for you

“She said, 'She's a survivor, that one.' She is” Yeah, she is, no thanks to you, Mrs. Mellark 😤. Stingy ho.

Peeta’s got pain in his eyes 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

Awww, Katniss accrediting her survival to Peeta’s help 😭😭😭😭. This is so pure. Also kiss now, you little freaks.

“She has no idea. The effect she can have.” This is such an iconic line... but the can has always had me laughing. She can have an effect, if she really wants to. Or not, depending on the day.

Katniss is so stupid, how did she construe that as an insult??? 🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️ y’all ever just wanna smack her into a wall?

“In public, I want you by each other's side every minute” If Peeta didn’t have a long life crush, what was the ultimate plan with all this friendship act they’re being forced into? 🤔🤔🤔

Even Peeta’s trying to object to it 😭😭😭😭

“You will be together, you will appear amiable to each other.” You will fall in love. 🤩🥳😎

“I bite my lip and stalk back to my room, making sure Peeta can hear the door slam.” Okay, now imagine how much she’s hurting his feelings right now 😖😣 what a little brat

“But that didn't mean I wanted to do everything with Peeta. Who, by the way, clearly doesn't want to be partnering up with me, either.” Lolololololololol this is so funny in hindsight 🤣🤣🤣. Also if you showed a little enthusiasm, Peeta would probably be happy to partner with you.

“But a tiny part of me wonders if this was a compliment. That he meant I was appealing in some way.” No, really, Katniss? A compliment? Who’d give you one of those? 🙄🙄🙄

“It's weird, how much he's noticed me. Like the attention he's paid to my hunting.” A normal person at this point would put together a crush 😅

“And apparently, I have not been as oblivious to him as I imagined, either. [...] I have kept track of the boy with the bread.” Anddd a normal person would figure out their own crush at this point 😅😅.

“I do a quick assessment. Peeta and I are the only two dressed alike.” We stan a matching couple in this house 😎😏

“Almost all of the boys and at least half of the girls are bigger than I am” That means 18 out of 24 tributes tower over my girl here. Smol Katniss. The movies did such erasure on this front I’m still bitter 🤐😒😤😩

“I may be smaller naturally, but overall my family's resourcefulness has given me an edge in that area.” Just a tiny muscular thing standing next to a bunch of tall, lanky kids. 🥰🥰🥰🥰

Awww “Each [Career tribute] must have fifty to a hundred pounds on me.” I mean ... let’s calculate. A muscular girl would probably weigh like 150 pounds... so basically Katniss is at most, 100 pounds. Tiny Katty.

“I'm thinking that it's lucky I'm a fast runner when Peeta nudges my arm and I jump.” This is a random, cute interaction 😍😍😍. Shipper blinders are on and tight.

“Suppose we tie some knots.” “Right you are.” I legitimately just scratched my face, who says right you are? An 87 year old man, that’s who 😅😅😅. Not turning your girl on very well, Peeta baby.

Although it does sound a bit like a backwoods southern thing soooo.... hillbilly Everlark nation rise. 🙋🏼‍♀️🙋🏼‍♀️🙋🏼‍♀️🙋🏼‍♀️

“We concentrate on this one skill for an hour until both of us have mastered it.” Awww, so Peeta knows how to tie a snare? He’s not as clueless as half the fandom acts.

How exactly is frosting cakes equating to amazing camouflager in a death match? Books crack me up with these connections. “I’m an amazing artist because I write birthday cards!”

Lolololol Prim admiring her future brother-in-law’s handiwork 🥰🥰🥰🥰 too bad she dies before they can get together for real for real.

“Somehow the whole thing - his skill, those inaccessible cakes, the praise of the camouflage expert - annoys me.” Dude, you get praised by everyone and their brother while Peeta gets overlooked, give him a moment to shine. 😑🙄 jealous wife much?

Also she’s already picking up on Peeta’s eye for beauty 😅😅😅

“It's lovely. If only you could frost someone to death.” "Don't be so superior. You can never tell what you'll find in the arena. Say it's actually a gigantic cake-“ "Say we move on.” She’s such a little snot. 😒😒😒

But also I love that already in this point of their relationship, Peeta is noticing when she’s being a brat 😭😂😅. “Don’t be so superior.”

“Despite Haymitch's order to appear mediocre, Peeta excels in hand-to-hand combat, and I sweep the edible plants test without blinking an eye.” Lolololol their mentor’s advise went into one ear and right out the other 😂😅🤣.

But also why did the movie make a point in adding an extra scene of Peeta looking weak and the Careers staring at him? That literally took up time and served no purpose at all. 😤😤😤 I’m coming for you, Gary Ross

Awww, everyone but the careers eat alone. But Katniss and Peeta eat together 🥺🥺🥺. It’s like a forced first date 🥳🥳🥳

I like how Katniss says they include bread from every district but she then proceeds to only mention the two districts that later have relevant tributes. 😅😅😅

Lolololol their fake friendship “laugh ... now! Okay, I’ll smile, try to say something interesting”

“Ever since I slammed my door, there's been a chill in the air between us.” Well yeah, you probably hurt his feelings 🥺🥺🥺

Umm, Katniss just casually drops that she was chased by a bear.... how did homegirl live? 😬😳

Peeta knowing Rue’s name and being the one to take notice of her first 🥺🥺🥺. If the games had come down to Katniss, Peeta and Rue, y’all know Everlark would have swallowed the berries and gotten Rue home. 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

“Don't. Don't let's pretend when there's no one around.” "All right, Katniss.” He made a single comment to you, ding dong. He didn’t ask for a goodnight kiss 🙄🙄🙄.

Also anyone ever think of how lonely Peeta’s life must be? He’s not close to his family that we can see, Delly’s his only real friend, after he wins he lives in that huge house all alone... I feel sad now. I did this to myself. 😬😭🥺

Katniss’ “Oh! The weapons!” When she sees the bows and arrows is so cute 🥰🥰🥰

Katniss has such a rage built up inside of her. Let it out, girlfriend

See, I’d have done this too but in my rage, I’d probably have shot a real person and not the pig ... goodbye, Plutarch 👋🏻

Andddd I think that’s all for this chapter! Sorry my comments weren’t as interesting as usual 😬.

[v-hope]

His fans love you

Pairings: OT7 x Reader

Genre: Fluff, is it even surprising anymore. Mayyyyybe a lil bit of crack?

Request: “Alright alright hear me out. Everyone knows the typical "angst / breaking up because of hate" fics. But what about a reaction where you and your relationship is actually really supported and well-liked by fans? Like you get your own memes and fan accounts and stuff? Just pure crack material right here 💥”

A/N: This was such a nice change tbh, so thank you so much for requesting it! It also reminded me I still haven’t made a second part for the break up reaction regarding this same topic lmao. I hope you guys like it 💞

Kim Seokjin

“What’s so funny?” you peeked your head inside the living room when you could no longer ignore your boyfriend’s signature windshield laugh.

Snapping his head in your direction, he smiled wholeheartedly, motioning with three pats to the spot next to him on the couch for you to go sit next to him.

“My fans are the best” he voiced out as you obeyed, taking a seat by his side.

“What’d they do?” you asked with a smile — his own being way too contagious to fight it.

“There’s this contest for the most attractive idol couple going on and they made sure we made it to the list”.

“But I’m not an idol?” your previous smile was replaced with a confused frown.

One that only grew more prominent when he amusedly threw his arms up and exclaimed:

“Yet we still won!”

With that said, Jin threw his head back to let a throaty laugh that sounded just like victory escape his mouth.

On your end, still being too stunned and not really believing his words, you snatched his phone away from him — seeing right then with your own two eyes that the both of you had indeed won such title.

“Is that even allowed?” you worried.

“Who cares” he shrugged, taking his phone back in his hands to excitedly check it one more time — eyes glowing at the sight of the number one right next to your ship’s name. “Ah, our power” a pleased sigh came out of his mouth, resting his head on your shoulder, “I love it”.

And well, not to be smug or anything but, in all honesty, so did you.

Min Yoongi

“How’d the fansign go?” you wondered after having opened the door to your place for your boyfriend, allowing him to press a chaste kiss to your lips before he made his way to your kitchen.

“It was good” he kept it simple, going to grab a glass of water. “A lot of people asked me about you”.

Well, that sure did catch your attention. “They did?”

Yoongi nodded his head. “Some of them even asked me to do a Vlive with you, but I’m pretty sure they only said that so they could see you”.

You couldn’t help but let out a little laugh at both his statement and the bitter tone he had said it with; later taking a few steps towards him. “Maybe I should do a live by myself”.

“Pft, please” he laughed tauntingly, putting the glass down on the table, “you wouldn’t even know what to talk about”.

“Oh, I already know what I’d name it”.

“Please enlighten me” Yoongi said with the same previous tone and a teasing smirk.

A smirk that was instantly mirrored by you before you said: “Spilling Yoongi’s most embarrassing moments”.

That was all it took for his smug smile to be erased.

“You wouldn’t”.

“Oh, I would” you affirmed, “starting with the time we went to that music shop you—”

“Yah” he cut you off in a scolding tone, yet the pink colour covering his cheeks let you know how embarrassed he was at the mere memory. “Now I get why my fans like your evil ass so much”.

And although he knew you would never actually do such thing to him, maybe he could comply to those people’s wishes and do a cheesy couple Vlive with you… you know, just to be safe you wouldn’t drag him too much.

Jung Hoseok

Being an idol’s girlfriend, you knew you wouldn’t really get full privacy whenever you decided to go out, and you had already managed to deal with that.

That’s why, when Hobi and you were walking around the streets during a date night and a couple of fans approached the two of you asking for pictures, you squeezed his hand to let him know it was alright for him to accept.

Getting an apologetic glance from your boyfriend, you smiled sweetly, moving aside so that they could all have their pictures — that being the exact moment one particular girl called your name.

“Wait, no” she put her phone down when you stared at her, “I um, actually wanted a picture with the two of you…” at that, your heart jumped and Hobi smiled the brightest, “is that possible?”

“Of course it is!” Hoseok confirmed with no hesitation.

Letting out a blissful giggle, he wasted no time in grabbing your hand to pull you towards his body like it was all too familiar by now.

And after taking more than one picture, since the rest of the people present also wanted a picture with the two of you, and, even more, after getting complimented on your beautiful relationship, Hoseok wrapped his arm securely over your shoulders as you resumed on your walking.

“You have now become my designated picture buddy whenever someone wants to take one with me” he giddily spoke after a while.

You shook your head in amusement, staring fondly at him. “Don’t expect everyone to like me, Hoseok”.

“I don’t” he confessed, pulling you even closer and pressing a tender kiss to your temple, “but I will take every single chance I get to have more pictures of your beautiful face”.

And as the time went on and more people started asking for pictures of the two of you and you would find your boyfriend gushing over them whenever he found them on Twitter, you knew he had truly meant it.

Kim Namjoon

“Oh my God”.

After hearing what was a mixture in between a groan and a whine come out of your boyfriend’s lips, you put your phone down, placing your eyes on his tall figure lying down on the other end of the bed.

“Something wrong?” you wondered.

Namjoon shook his head, putting his phone down as well before his eyes fixed on yours — not even a second later crawling to go lay down next to you.

“My fans are saying we are, and I quote: the clumsiest, most adorable couple there is”.

Now, the clumsy bit was no news at all, yet you still found yourself defensively saying: “I am not clumsy”.

“You sure?” he taunted you; a smirk beginning to take over his face. “Because they started this thing to keep track on every single dumb thing we’ve done and see who’s the clumsiest—”

Oh.

“—and it’s almost a tie”.

You rested your weight on your elbows, lifting your body slightly up from the mattress so you could take a better look at him.

“And who’s winning?” your voice came out uncertain.

All it took for you to know the answer was watching the way his head hung low.

Nevertheless, a triumphant smile curved up your lips when Joon confirmed through gritted teeth: “Me”.

With that, you let your head fall back down on the pillow, feeling your body relax as you sighed in content.

“I love your fans”.

And they loved you. Totally a win-win situation.

Park Jimin

Your eyes remained focused on the multiple papers scattered around Jimin’s bed, studying in absolute silence as you kept him company while he chatted with his fans on Vlive — smiling from time to time at certain things he would say or just the sound of his laugh.

He had answered a couple of questions regarding either you or your relationship, for he absolutely loved gushing about you, and you were actually pretty alright with that; even with him informing his wide audience about you being right behind him studying for one of your tests.

What you were most certainly not expecting, however, was for your boyfriend to turn around in the middle of his live and call for you to come over.

You shook your head no immediately, silently motioning to your books as an excuse not to go.

“Please, baby” he pouted, being too focused on you to notice the madness his pet name for you had just unleashed in the comments. “They want the two of us”.

And, you see, saying no to that cute little pout taking over his pretty plump was not really an option to you.

So, falling for it, you stood up from his bed and made your way over to him, feeling the heat reach your face when he gently grabbed your wrist and pulled you down on his lap, later wrapping his arms around your waist and resting his chin on your shoulder as you awkwardly waved into the camera.

Yes, maybe you had yet to get used to being so constantly put under the public eye, but, in all honesty, if you were getting all this attention nevertheless, you were grateful it was the good kind of it.

And Jimin? God, he was thriving to show you off to the entire world.

Kim Taehyung

“Can you believe people think I’m breaking up with you?”

Your heart jumped at your boyfriend’s sudden comment, feeling it drop for a second there before your eyes caught his — that being the only confirmation you needed to know he was indeed not breaking up with you.

“W-what?”

“Yeah” Taehyung snorted, moving closer to you on your bed and showing you his phone, “this delusional magazine made an article about me apparently wanting to break up with you” he explained, focusing back on his mobile and not being able to contain a giggle when he later added: “And we’re trending topic now on Twitter and my fans have started this petition for us not to split up”.

“They what now?” you asked again, this time feeling a smile of your own take over your factions.

“Yeah, see?” he practically shoved his phone in your face after having searched for the page. “So many people have signed it, it’s insane”.

A chuckle left your mouth as you shook your head in amusement; as if that would save your relationship if that was the case.

“I’m signing it” he stated before you could even speak up your mind, already starting to type on his phone.

You couldn’t stop a throaty laugh to escape your mouth as you threw your head back, biting down on your lower lip to help you stop it.

“Or you could just, you know…” you drew his attention, “not break up with me”.

Tae smiled sweetly — his eyes softening right before he leaned in to press a tender kiss to your lips. “I would never even dream of it”.

Jeon Jeongguk

“Jeongguk, are you… are you crying?” you worried as soon as you found him lying down on his bed with his eyes fixed to his phone as a couple of tears made their way down his cheeks.

Rushing to his side, you slumped down next to him, making him take his attention away from his mobile by gently yet securely cupping his face.

“What happened?” you softly wiped his tears.

“Nothing bad” he reassured you, allowing your heart to feel more at ease. “I just… there was this video linked to me…”

You waited a few seconds for him to go on, yet the only thing you got from him were his cheeks turning slightly red — biting down on his lower lip as he was clearly ashamed of the reason he had been crying for.

“Okay… so…” you tried to get something else out of him.

Jeongguk sighed, knowing well enough you would not let this go.

“It was a fanmade video about us” he finally explained, causing your heart to jump, “it was like, a compilation of cute moments of us and this stupid love song was playing in the background and the editing was just so beautiful and I—”

He shrugged, staring down as he did not really know how to end his small ramble.

You laughed under your breath out of pure affection, pressing a kiss to the tip of his red nose.

“Will you let me watch it so we can cry together now?”

Funny how you had said that to mock him, yet ten seconds into the video and with Guk’s body comfortably resting on top of yours as you watched it together, you were already crying, too.

[mulletcal]

flowers, maybe daisies, might relieve the gloom. - an a.i blurb

a/n: i lowkey blame @sexgodashton​ for starting this whole mini series of boomer!ash things, but i also adore this because boomer!ash is soft as hell.  and also a lil d*ddy but we don’t need to talk about that.  title is from wait by sweeney todd bc i love it.  alternative title was gonna be from L.G. FUAD by motion city soundtrack

word count: 

warnings: ashton irwin being a thirst trapping, lemon stealing whore. i’m kidding it’s just a solo ash fic w no smut but some mild ash thirst trapping.

-----

‘ashtonirwin started a live video.’

Ashton didn’t often go live on Instagram, but this shelter in place order had left him ultimately bored - writing a song every day before noon, sure, but anything after that was a blur.  Occasionally he would have interviews or live-streams with the band, but on days without that he was left alone with his thoughts, and his thoughts weren’t always the safest place to be; so talking to fans it was. 

It was going well so far, simply asking fans how their quarantine was going - bringing some of them into the livestream so he could talk to some face to face.  One girl in particular had caught his attention when they began to discuss hobbies she had picked up during the time she’d spent at home.

“Yeah, I’m learning to garden.  I have a tomato plant that is just starting to sprout actual tomatoes, so that’s kind of exciting,” She had said, a nervous laugh escaping.

“Well, I would hope that your tomato plant is sprouting tomatoes, it would be a little concerning if it was growing something else,” Ashton replied with a chuckle, the girl giving a small shrug but still laughing along with him.

“You should look into it if you’ve got the room at your house, I bet it would feel rather rewarding to be able to cook something with your own fresh vegetables.”

“Would save me quite a bit of money too.  Can I grow yeast? I’d like to learn how to make my own bread but here in L.A. you can’t find yeast anywhere.”

The conversation continued like that for a few minutes more, Ashton taking only a couple more fans into the livestream after that to talk to before he decided he should probably do something else productive with his day.  Something like learning to garden. 

It surprised Ashton the things you were able to order online during this time - soil being the main thing.  He also read that saving coffee grounds would help, and he was excited at the idea of his insane coffee habit wouldn’t be completely useless.  He ended up buying seeds for tomatoes, mint, sunflowers, lemongrass, and zucchini.  The lemongrass and mint was specifically for Calum, realizing he would be able to dry the plants out once he had harvested them so he could make the man his very own tea.

When his package finally arrived, Ashton spread the packages out, sliding them across the table as though he was some card dealer in Las Vegas.  Thinking the fans would find it amusing, he took a picture of the spread and added it to his story with the caption of ‘pick a card, any card…’.  Maybe it would only be funny to him, but it did prompt a fire reaction from Michael.

It seemed as though the reaction from fans were positive though, them taking to Twitter to let him know their excitement about his new endeavour.  That’s where his weekly livestreams began.  He would show everyone the progress he was making with his plants, and just in general him chatting with fans.  Ashton never really thought of how refreshing it could be to just talk to the fans, without the worry of time restrictions or anyone’s personal safety in the way; in fact, it left him rather inspired, loving their fans even more if it were at all possible.

A particularly warm day in L.A. left Ashton wondering if he should go out to the garden that day - but it was the day he would normally livestream, and he was excited to show what he was up to that day.  Ashton wanted to plant another tomato plant, and also the lemons on his infamous tree had enough for him to make some lemonade so he was going to go through that as well.

Clad in some cut off jeans, or as Calum so affectionately called them his jorts, and a white tank top, he pulled up the live option on Instagram and waited for the people to begin to filter in before he started to speak.

“Hey guys! Just gonna wait for more of you to filter in before I actually head outside, but I thought that since you guys love my lemon tree so much, I’d make some lemonade.  Fuck, I sound like a YouTuber.  Is that gonna be my next career, is just YouTube tutorials on how to make shitty lemonade?” Ashton laughed to himself, slicing the lemon so he could juice it, ignoring the comments he saw about murdering his lemon children.

It didn’t take him long to make the lemonade, making mild conversation with the fans while he stirred in a little bit of sugar and some cheat mint he had ordered while waiting for his own to grow.

“Alright, now that I’m waiting for that to cool, probably best we go outside and check on those tomatoes, hm?” 

It had been weird at first, talking to himself; but he quickly realized that he talked to himself anyways, even without the phone in front of him, so it couldn’t have been too weird for anyone who could overhear him.

“So I wanted to plant another tomato plant today, because everyone can use a friend right now, you know?” He looked into the camera, a smile spreading across his face when he saw the flood of cute little emojis that followed.  “M’gonna be like the Bob Ross of gardening. No mistakes, only happy accidents or whatever it was he said.”

Ashton began to work away at his garden, building up a sweat in the process.  It wasn’t until he leaned back, glancing at his phone did he see a text from Michael flash across the top.

‘Mate, Crystal said stop thirst trapping the fans.’

Ashton’s brow furrowed, unsure of what the text was saying, “Okay so I just got a text from Michael - what’s thirst trapping? And am I currently doing it?”

Of all the comments that followed, he noticed one that said ‘I mean… I’m not gonna say either way but take a look at yourself and get back to us’.  Another one told him that it was when someone wears something in order to provoke risque texts, or gain attention from someone.

Ashton pouted, looking down at his appearance.  He was kind of sweaty, but he didn’t think that the fans would mind him being covered in dirt and sweat, it’s not as though they had to smell him.  Though, he would admit that he needed a shower. 

“Well, since my tomato plant has been… planted next to its’ friend, and I’m apparently thirst trapping you all, I should probably go shower and clean up.  Is me mentioning a shower thirst trapping as well?” Ashton rubbed his face over his hands, a small huff leaving his lips, “I don’t know… Fellow youths, tweet me and lemme know.  Also, may hold a poll later on what to name these guys.” He flipped the camera around, struggling for a moment, to show the sunflowers that were starting to sprout, “M’thinking of naming one Denise.  Just seems like a Denise.”

After his small speech was over, he ended the stream, grinning to himself.  He hadn’t meant to show off his body in such a way, but it was funny to know that even with him hardly doing anything but be himself they still lost their shit.

Glancing around at his garden, he felt himself swell with a mild sense of pride.  He was still a ways off from seeing any fruits of his labour (literally), but it made him feel good knowing he did something with his time at home, instead of slipping further into his mind which wasn’t always the kindest to him.

Ashton realized that when he was gardening, it was similar to songwriting in a way where all of his self doubts and fears went away and he could just pour himself into it - the reward being well worth the risk in the end.

Once his shower was done, he sat outside in his backyard, sipping his lemonade and enjoying the sunshine - realizing that having to stay home wasn’t all too bad, if it meant he could reset his mind, and do some small part to help how he could during that time.

tag list:  @haikucal​ @talkfastromance4​ @softbabiestan​ @boyfriend-cal​ @calum-uncrowned​ @wildflowerirwin​ @irwindoll​ @gosh-im-short​  @thesubtweeter​ @heavenisapeach​ @ridingcthood​ @loveroflrh​ @mantlereid​ @inlovehoodx​ @irwinkitten​ @n-ctarinenga​​ @g-l-pierce​ @thecurlsofgod​

[dastardlydandelion]

Max Mayfield and Tory Nichols in a horror film, what would be the plot/monster and would they survive?

this is it. this is the tumblr ask. the ask i've been waiting for my whole life. my time to shine, here we go!

filming begins under the cut:

tried and true creature feature, this is a werewolf movie. let's go with a werewolf between the van helsing (2004) and trick r treat (2007) variety. the beast once transformed is fucking huge, clearly both lupine and human, head almost entirely wolf, body primarily bipedal in shape, but robust, sinew shredding claws and big ass bone tearing teeth. also tails!! bc tails are cute!!! powers include monstrous strength, accelerated speed, healing factor. weaknesses silver and decapitation.

okay, so van helsing (2004) werewolves are mindless rage monsters and trick r treat (2007) werewolves are cognizant. for our max & tory creature feature, they're gonna of the in between variety. i chose a werewolf movie for these two specifically bc they both have their anger problems and the werewolf has long been a symbol of anger unleashed in the horror genre, even tho common gray wolves are just like. i mean, yk, animals, they hunt and howl and pee on trees and most of the time would rather avoid humans. but obvi horror genre werewolves are not common gray wolves, they need to be scary, and like, the remnants of traditional folklore influenced by rabies and discourse in the middle ages...wait, where was i going with this? anger, yes, max and tory both have anger problems and i think this works for what i'm gonna do with this theoretical movie.

who's the werewolf in town? terry fucking silver. bc terry is evil and dramatic and also, i think it's rly funny for a werewolf to have silver as a surname. he's fully cognizant in his transformation and he's purposefully biting kids and teenagers bc he wants more talented karate students. and like. yk, with the enhanced strength, speed, and regenerative recovery of lycanthropy, well. there u have it, more talented karate students.

do max and tory know each other, if so, how? okay, so in this 'verse tory is a lil older than max. that reflects their canon ages, i think. let's say max is 13 and tory is 16. billy has tory in some of his classes and he more or less makes a deal to spilt his allowance with her if she'll babysit max bc he's tired of neil riding his ass to babysit max. tory needs money so she's like, 'sure, why not.' max finds it rly stupid that she's 13 and neil thinks she needs a fucking babysitter but as far as babysitters go, tory is fun. she likes to show max what she's learning in cobra kai and they spar together a lot. max would actually like to join cobra kai but 1) neil would throw a fit on various fronts and 2) lucas is in miyagi-do. max knows there's some rly intense beef between cobra kai and miyagi-do. ofc tory's filled her in on the karate war, how could she not?

well one day tory takes max to the playground to watch a plane fly like she does with miggy in ck, and it's nighttime, ofc, and lo, the full moon is out. shining up in the sky. they hear a howl. they both look at each other. max is kinda curious but tory's like nah, nah, we gotta go. she grabs her, starts pulling her along. but the next howl is a lot closer and they can hear smth running and it just sounds fuckin big. they're running too now, legs pumping hard, but there's no escape once the beast is right behind them, hot, rancid breath blasting the backs of their necks and harvest gold eyes glowing in the dark.

max gets bitten first. tory tries to kick the big ass beast off of her and then it rounds and bites her too. the terror is real now. and then shockingly, as fast as it'd come, it leaves. neither girl has an explanation for wtaf just happened but tory takes max home. billy gripes at her for being out late but helps her patch up. when susan learns what happens she decides to take max to get rabies shots right away. loads her up in the car, runs her off to the emergency room-- but when the bandages come off, they are no wounds.

tory's bby bro tries to help patch her up too. but he's like 4 yrs old and his idea of "help" is sticking bandaids with cartoon characters up and down the wounds in haphazard fashion. tory plans to redo it all properly once she's put him to bed. sure enough after he's asleep, and she peels the bandaids off from every open mouthed pac-man to every green teenage mutant ninja turtle, the wounds are gone.

meanwhile there's missing ppl err day on the news. terry turns kids and teens but kills adults for the lulz.

tory and max know what happened to them was an event that tangibly, definitely happened but neither have any explanation for their wounds just disappearing. max, our resident horror fan, is the first to propose a real life werewolf as an explanation. she cites the missing ppl on the news. tory thinks she's tripping balls but reluctantly gives an inch when she acknowledges no, she can't think of any other explanation.

life goes on. max tells lucas what happened only she leaves out the part abt tory bc she's not gonna tell a miyagi-do student she's kickin it w the enemy. he doesn't rly believe her, like how she didn't rly believe him about the upside-down in their canon. he thinks the horror movies are rotting her brain.

tory almost tells her dojo but she gets distracted being pissed off by sam and that should be her priority, right? sensei kreese is always going on abt getting back at the enemy. she spends her shifts daydreaming abt revenge bc it's more comforting than worrying abt past due bills and her mother looking paler by the day.

full moon next month comes around. neither tory nor max are cognizant of or during their first respective transformations. max's first kill is neil. she's seven feet of fur and fury, tears his ribcage open with claws like daggers and sinks her teeth into his putrid, maggoty heart. susan isn't home. billy is, but he doesn't hear any of the fracas. he's unconscious on the living room floor, crisscrossing impressions of neil's belt buckle blaring red on his back.

tory's first kill is sam. sam larusso wants to think she's a bully?? fine, tory will show her a bully. she hops the miyagi-do fence after hours. she just wants a fight. just a fight, they always fight. but then she's sprouting fur and tory as tory gives way to smth else. she'd not aware of being a person when she doesn't have fur. not really, all she knows is rage and ravenousness and the morsel below her has bunny rabbit wide eyes.

neither of them remember what they did the next day. not vividly, anyway. it's there but it's cloudy and hard to discern, like a groggy fever dream more than a memory. but max burps up neil's wedding band and tory finds señor octopus (sam's stuffed animal) bloodied in her bed. it's apparent what happened. max accepts this more easily than tory bc 1) she always kind of suspected she'd turn, since she sincerely considered what attacked them was a werewolf and 2) max isn't terribly upset abt killing neil while tory is acutely horrified she killed sam.

max kinda had some smidgen of attachment to neil bc like, he's the only father figure in her life and here and there they've had their moments. but his abuse (psychological/physical toward billy, sexual/financial/psychological/emotional toward susan, psychological/emotional toward herself) outweighed any and all of those moments. she is genuinely concerned that she tore a human being to pieces and only vaguely remembers it but like, if she had to kill anyone, she figures neil was the best to kill. max is mostly concerned bc she can't kill neil a second time. she's worried the next time she turns it could be an innocent person, or one of her friends, or her mom, or billy.

tory is blindsided and scarcely able to comprehend the reality, holy shit, max was right, she's a fuckin werewolf. and she's sick to her stomach bc she hated sam but she never wanted to do anything like that. she didn't want to kill, she just wanted to break her face. scare her. rough her up. she didn't want to eat her. she just killed someone. she's a literal horror movie monster and she just killed sam. what's miguel going to think?

tory and max talk. they decide they need to find the werewolf who turned them. we get montages of them going over the news articles with a fine-toothed *ba dum tss* comb and searching areas where it seems like a werewolf would be. the woods. some caves. max all of a sudden has a freakishly tall man constantly hounding her to join cobra kai. neil's gone but she still hesitates bc of lucas being in miyagi-do. also he believes max now and with the proff, she's decided to let the rest of the party in as well. they also exist in this 'verse. she showed them the crime scene and the wedding band she burped up. billy isn't a roid rage racist in this 'verse bc that would be a giant buzzkill. he doesn't believe the werewolf shit either. he thinks max saw neil get attacked by some animal and that the carnage was so traumatizing for her, she subconsciously created a werewolf fantasy to cope.

tory meanwhile spirals downward. bc she passes sam's memorialized locker in the hall everyday. her memorial table in the other hall, full of sticky note condolences and mournful teddy bears, and a picture of sam right in the center always, always accusing her. miggy is heartbroken and distraught. hawk didn't care for sam but even he's freaked out by what happened, how the news said there were only torn up chunks and bones picked clean found in her bedroom. tory is terrified of herself. she's desperate to find whoever did this bc she wants to make them pay. if sensei silver has been asking her extra questions lately and presenting her performance to the class more than normal, she doesn't notice at all. aisha notices tory's fucked up but tory can't exactly tell aisha that she *ate* sam. aisha is also mourning, she and sam used to be bffs. so she doesn't say a word.

max has a theory that if u can learn to control ur anger, u can learn to control urself when u shift. she is, after all, v familiar with angry horror movie werewolves. and she's savvy enough to know it's smth she and tory have in common. neil is dead but that doesn't mean max isn't angry anymore. she's still angry at the damage already done and tbh also angry that there's some werewolf around turning ppl willy nilly bc she recognizes the danger in that and it wasn't smth she consented to. but controlling ur anger is an easier feat for max than tory insofar that max has a support system w her friends, and better relationships with the remainder of her fam. tory has two mentors actively, adamantly teaching her and her friends to be ruthless, view the world as ur enemy, use violence as ur go-to solution, and that mercy is weakness not to be tolerated.

when the next full moon rolls around, they decide to spend it together under the correct inference that they will transform. they think it's better to be together. they're hoping they'll be able to control each other, if not themselves. or that if they are both mindless rage monsters again, that rage will be turned on each other. this would be a better outcome operating on the presumption that one werewolf will be able to take what another can dish out, at the v least more so than a regular human being.

max is successfully able to maintain enough of her consciousness to control her actions once transformed. she feels aggressive and hungry, but not enraged and ravenous. she can keep it in check. tory, on the other hand, uh...tory can't do it. she throws her wolf head back in the most bloodcurdling howl ever and takes off like a bat outta hell. max goes loping after her. they can't speak like human speak in this form, but max tries to communicate with her. whimpers plaintively. tackles tory at one point, not out of anger but just tryna subdue her, licks at her ears and tries to get her to settle. tory bucks her off.

tory runs off again, max in pursuit. they wind up at the skate park where billy n robby are prolly up to some fuckery or another. i could easily see pre miyagi-do robby n billy getting up to all kinds of mischief. ooh, actually, they're prolly arguing abt that. now that robby's in miyagi-do he has another outlet for all his energy and he's getting the positive attention he craves so he's not participating in hooligan activity or shenanigans w billy anymore and billy is like. offended. except suddenly there's werewolves. fucking. snarling, gigantic, toothy, hairy ass werewolves.

let's say robby kicked miguel down two stories in this 'verse too and tory recognizes him in her werewolf form even if she isn't exactly cognizant of herself. she tears straight for him, jaws open. billy doesn't exactly *mean* to protect him but it's kinda an automatic reaction from putting himself in between whenever he thought neil was getting too aggressive w susan or max. and like, sure, robby's the better fighter (not that billy would ever acknowledge this) but it's not like he's gonna karate kick the motherfuckin werewolf anyway-- billy is bigger, he's bigger and it's instinct and the next thing he knows, he's in between robby and the thing w sharp teeth (tory).

and that's when max gets serious. she bowls tory over, away from billy before she can bite. they're rolling, tearing at each other with teeth and claws. lo and behold, terry silver is lurking in the background like the evil mastermind he is, just watching them shred each other and evaluating his experiment. it's a p close match and tory is the more aggressive of the two but she's also been going, going, going since she shifted and she's burning herself out. she's also fighting with the blind instinct of a threatened animal while max maintains more precision bc she has better control of herself. max also isn't wasting energy unnecessarily. max gets her jaws around tory's throat and tory just goes slack. but she can think and she doesn't want to hurt tory, so she opens her mouth and relaxes her maw, teeth grazing harmlessly thru tory's fur.

tory's being shown mercy. possibly for the first time. it's so unlike her conception of others' ruthlessness, so unlike the worldview that's been instilled into her that it startles her enough to crack thru to her cognizance. she does the wolfy deference thing where they tuck their tails and lick at the dominant pack member's muzzle. max responds in kind and lets tory up.

this is when they notice terry lurking (billy's already worked out the werewolf that came to his defense is max so he's just dumbfounded watching all this shit, and robby's not abt to leave someone who just saved his ass, so he's stuck unsuccessfully tryna pull billy away and inevitably watching too). terry calmly slinks over, sizing up his charges. he's pleased with the performance. but tory and max are anything but, another werewolf fight ensues.

so while they all get huge after transforming sheerly on the basis of being werewolves, i'm gonna guess the size is proportionate to their human forms. so tory is a little larger than max and terry significantly outsizes them both. terry is also the more experienced werewolf. it's two against one but it's not the curbstop it would be if this was some weaksauce werewolf, it's dramatic evil karate werewolf terry fuckin silver. terry's shredding tf outta these two. their healing factor can't keep up, he's dishing out faster than either of them can recover and tbh they were already winded from fighting each other first.

but it'd be a major buzzkill if our movie had a downer ending. and also, the power of determination and friendship and shit. terry's got his jaws around max's throat now. he's a millisecond away from tearing it open. tory's pinned under him but she thinks fast, frees a hind leg, and rips her claws down his soft underbelly as deep as she can and doesn't stop ripping, like pedal kicking almost for a human, but with her hind claws. his intestines shoot out like paper snakes from a gag candy can!! okay, well, maybe they don't shoot out w that much gusto, but still. the bowels are free, the bowels are hanging low and tory's tearing 'em tf up, fluids n fecal matter errywhere. on tory. i'm sorry tory. ur under him, that's just how gravity works.

terry dies. healing factor can't keep up with the damage done, it's too critical. but nobody knows it's terry until the dawn breaks and he reverts back to his human shape.

max is v much 'i told u so,' in billy's face. robby promises not to tell. he doesn't want to get mauled or killed or anything. tory's able to cope better with what she did to sam knowing that it won't happen again, that she won't hurt anyone else she doesn't want to be she can control herself now. tory believes in mercy now bc max spared her, she trashes kreese's philosophy and joins eagle fang when johnny and daniel join forces in this 'verse too. max also joins eagle fang, takes her place in the front row right between tory and lucas at her v first practice.

credits roll.

after the credits we see tory considering turning her mother in the hopes that having the healing factor would help her mom's condition improve.

is that a teaser for the sequel?

idfk.

[everyhowlmarksthedead]

@rebelwrites ✨

When I opened this blog, I would never thought I could find someone like you. You're the most kind, lovely, funny and badass person ever. We started talking because of our language problems, sharing spanish-english translations, and you have become an important person to me. We're talking the whole damn day, about writings, about Mayans, about SOA, making jokes and having fun. You have helped me whenever I had a mental breakdown, giving me all the support on the world, and I couldn't be more proud of calling you my friend. Sending you a big hug with a lot of love from Spain, I will let you read why I wrote for you. And I just hope you have the best birthday ever surrounded by your friends, family and Kiwi. I love you, my lil slut ❤✨

When Heather wakes up lonely on her birthday morning, she's confused. And a little bit pissed, waiting to do it surrounded by Jax arms. She palms his side of the mattress to check that it's cold, so he probably had to leave the house for some club shit. Putting on her glasses and stepping out from the bed, she walks out of their shared room wearing nothing but one of his large black shirts. Grabbing the fabric in a fist, she takes a deep breath feeling less lonely as Jax's scent fills up his lungs. But some strange noises inside the kitchen push her out of his bubble.

Arching a brown eyebrow over the glasses, pulling the blonde locks of hair to a side, she sticks out her head off the frame to find Happy fighting with the coffeemaker.

“Son of a bitch… I'm going to fucking ki—”.

“Open the lash on the top and put the capsule inside”.

The man stares at her in silence, as if she talked to him in another language. Rolling her eyes, Heather takes some steps closer to follow the same instructions she had given him literally two seconds ago. He is fascinated.

“So, what are you doing here?”

“Birthday”. He replies, as he points himself.

Squinting until she gets the joke, she can't help but break into loud laughs, scaring Happy for a moment because he wasn't expecting. Scaring. Happy.

“Jax asked me to pick you up”.

“No, thanks. I don't wanna die”.

“But you have to come with me”.

“For what?”

Nothing. Not a single word. He has already met his quota of conversation for the rest of the day. When the coffee is ready and the man is going to take the mug, Heather is fast clicking her tongue repeatedly.

“Make yours, grown man”.

A growl escapes from his mouth, watching him close his hands in two fists.

After a warm shower fantasizing about what her husband has prepared for today, she is ready to wear some clothes before leaving. Excited and with a bunch of ideas running through his head, she puts on a pair of ripped jeans with a comfy white shirt under a black squared franel shirt and her favorite jacket leather. Sitting on the edge of the bed, she finishes the outfit with her favorite pair of camel Timberland boots. Jax has tried a thousand times to convince her of changing them for a new pair, but she refuses, keeping that pair because it was the first gift that he made her.

Getting out from her room, tying up her hair on a messy bun and grabbing her bag, she follows Happy to the outside. Putting on the helmet, knowing that she will have to re-make her hairstyle, Heather sits behind the man not sure if it's a good idea; questioning herself why she can't simply drive her red Ford Fiesta to wherever they're going.

And she is starting to understand it after reaching the racing circuit in the surroundings of Charming. Jackson is already there, resting his body against a long car covered by a black sleeve. The smile on his face grows a little more when the president can make eye-contact with her. Jumping out from Happy's bike and giving him back the helmet, they meet halfway. Jax doesn't doubt, welcoming her between his arms and filling up her face with a bunch of tender kisses.

“Happy birthday, wifey”. His tone of voice is full of happiness and love, placing an arm over Heather's shoulders. “Ready to open your present?”

“Isn't this place too public to take off your jeans?”

The loud laughter that Jax utters makes her giggle. It's not like she can avoid these kinds of comments with someone like her husband.

“C'mon, lil slut”. He hums leading her to the car.

With nervous fingers, she pulls the cover out to the floor. Her heart races too fast, alternating her attention between the present and the man proudly smiling by her side. An immaculate red Mustang Shelby GT500 of '65, with two white strips crossing the whole body. Freshly restored just for her. Her dream car. Heather has talked about it like a hundred times with Jax, but she would never have thought that his husband could find one and all the pieces and original spare parts to tune it up.

She wants to say something, but her vocal cords look like they are freezed right now. Turning at the blonde man, starting to worry just in case she doesn't like the present, she practically jumps onto him. He can't help but cry. Since the first moment they two meet, the only thing that Jax has wanted is to make her happy. To make her laugh. To make her feel loved. To make her feel the most important person in his life. She is. For him, there's no one else but his amazing wife.

“Do you wanna ride it?” He murmurs into her ear, holding her tightly against his body. She nods in silence, she can't talk yet.

When the grip loosens, she takes off her glasses to clean the tears in her eyes, using the fist of the sleeve as her steps continue to her new stunning car. The smell of gingerbread fills her lungs, as soon as she opens the driver door, focusing her eyes on the air-freshener hanging from the rear view mirror. Jax can't help but break into loud laughter, as he sees her face looking at the item with a picture of him. Shirtless. The kinds of ideas that only he could have, obviously.

And it's like a damn fantasy. Not seeing her husband terrified on the copilot seat, but how fast her Mustang rides. Taking the curves like in a damn Daqar, almost putting it onto two wheels and speeding up on the long straight. The engine roars like a furious lion, vibrating the road under it. She loves the velocity. It makes her feel like the freedom after a lockdown. Heather has no words to explain it. But the happiness that runs her body is like touching the sky, with Eminem playing through the speakers just like in a dream.

And even if she thinks that the day wouldn't be better, her mind changes as soon as she reaches the yard of the clubhouse, driving her Mustang with Jax riding his bike by her side. A big birthday's banner welcomes her at Teller-Morrow. There are white balloons all around, the crew cheering her up with claps and whistles, before starting to sing to her.

Jax has been preparing it since a month ago, wanting it to be the perfect day just for his wifey. He would give her the moon, if she asks for it. Layla is the first one on hugging her, tightly and transmitting her all the love in the world; before being interrupted by the high-pitched barks of Kiwi. Of course, she should have been there too. Taking her best friend into her arms, receiving a bunch of dearly licks all around, Heather goes straight to Chibs and Opie to melt themselves into a big warm hug.

“Happe' berday', lass”.

“Hope you like what we did. We put on it our best”. Opie says about crying, seeing her so happy, aware that she deserves only good things in life.

“Yeah, but where's the pizza?” She asks with some chuckles, making them laugh.

“Next to the coffee, darling”.

Jackson takes her wife into his arms, leaving the poor Kiwi between their bodies not knowing who she has to lick now.

“Thank you for that, husby”. Heather pouts at him, looking at his god-damn-hot man through her eyelashes.

“You don't have to, my love. You know I would give my life for you, for seeing you smile. That's the only thing I want”. He replies, showing her that charming grin that makes her shake. “I love you more than anything, Heather. I can't imagine a day without making you happy. I can't imagine a fucking day without you”.

[homespork-review]

Homespork Act 2: The Racism of the Conductor’s Baton (Part 2)

FAILURE ARTIST: We don’t get much time to mourn with Dave because the comic flashes to a weird wizard statue. This statue is ZAZZERPAN THE LEARNED. Wizards are another recurring theme in Homestuck. Andrew Hussie once artfully defaced this cheesy book called Wizardology (warning: lots of really offensive humor). Anyway, Rose hates the giant statue and the other wizard paraphernalia her mother collects and believes her mother does this only to spite her. On a platform is a bronzed vacuum (with a place to put alcoholic beverages) that Rose gave her as an ironic present. On the couch there’s a life-sized princess doll that Rose has attached a Cthulhu-type head to. All these things set up Rose’s troubled relationship with her mother. Rose believes her mother is taunting her and Rose taunts her back.

BRIGHT: This scene also establishes that some things (the Cthulhu doll for one) are too big to be captchalogued.

CHEL: Actually, that was noted with the harlequin doll earlier but we forgot to mention that.

FAILURE ARTIST: Rose goes to the kitchen. On the fridge is a crude picture of her late cat Jaspers, who turns out to be more than a family pet. There’s more signs of this cold war between mother and daughter on the fridge.

CHEL: Also, numerous liquor bottles in the kitchen and comically exaggerated displays of wealth, such as a fifteen-thousand-dollar picture frame.

FAILURE ARTIST: After fussing with the fridge, Rose tries to leave the kitchen only to run into her mother. She tries escaping but lands comically in some wizard statuettes.

CHEL: Mom Lalonde is mopping the floor, with no water in the bucket, holding a martini in her other hand. The woman clearly has a problem. Again, this is an issue with the portrayal of the parents; this is pretty funny, but were a real mother behaving this way, it would seriously mess up the kid, and whether we’re supposed to take it as Rule of Funny or not later becomes inconsistent.

BRIGHT: I think a lot of the humour here is supposed to come from the implication that Mom Lalonde actually is a loving if clueless (and drunk) parent, and Rose is reading her badly. On the other hand, something is clearly very wrong, and while Mom Lalonde may indeed be loving the situation is definitely having an impact on Rose.

TIER: Say whatever you want, but when putting on the late game Cerebus Retcon goggles there are probably non-humorous questions to be asked about how screwy Mom Lalonde is as a parental unit if her daughter has ended up interpreting most of her actions as mocking or backhanded towards herself. Like, kids don't just decide that.

ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 3

CHEL: Back to Dave, he’s chatting with GG and they’re being adorable. GG comments about her birthday present to John, the green box we saw in the car earlier, and…

GG: no!!!!!!! GG: he will not open it GG: he will lose it!!! TG: oh TG: uh TG: wow sorry to hear that i guess? GG: no its good actually! GG: because he will find it again later when he really needs it GG: which of course is why i sent it in the first place! TG: see like TG: i never get how you know these things GG: i dont know GG: i just know that i know!

I think here is when we start to get inklings of the kids’ unusual abilities - I mean, unusual in the context of the weird world they live in. A bit more is established about GG’s home life and Dave’s attitudes, too:

GG: i have to feed bec which is always a bit of an undertaking TG: man TG: if i were you i would just take that fucking devilbeast out behind the woodshed and blow its head off GG: heheheh! GG: i dont think i could if i tried!!! TG: yeah TG: say hi to your grand dad for me too ok GG: ._. GG: yes i guess an encounter with him is almost certain GG: it is usually........ GG: intense!!! TG: well yeah isnt it always with family TG: but he sounds like a total badass

“Intense” in a world where attacking your father with a hammer isn’t worthy of comment sounds worrying. We’ll see how that goes.

FAILURE ARTIST: Dave has the tiniest of smiles here and in Hussie’s annotation he says that one pixel created Dave/GG. Whether or not their connection is romantic, Dave obviously feels great affection for her.

CHEL: Interactions between all four of the kids are really sweet, honestly. Dialogue and character interactions are one of the strongest points of the comic overall. Personally I have a soft spot for the OT4.

TIER: In my unprofessional opinion, the beta humans are by far the most functioning and tight knit group of the various groups within the comic, for what that's worth considering the overall dysfunction junction. They're sweet to one another is what I'm saying.

CHEL: Dave talks to John, who mentions the creepy trails around his house and how he thinks he’s seen monsters, which we the audience have definitely seen; creepy little black imps with fangs and, oddly, jester outfits. They bear a striking resemblance to the Wayward Vagabond, in fact. Dave makes fun, but at least pretends not to disbelieve him, and urges him to keep his hammer at the ready. Dave can’t find his Bro, but can find “Lil Cal”, implying Bro is nearby.

TG: lil cal is the shit EB: that's fine, you are entitled to your opinion, i am just saying that being a white guy who is a rapper with a ventriloquist doll is not cool by any stretch of the imagination or by any definition of word cool, ironic or otherwise. that's all i'm saying. WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 5

Would a non-white rapping ventriloquist be any cooler? I’m struggling to see how. Ventriloquism, by definition, sucks the cool out of any other aspect of the thing. And now I’m picturing Carlton from Fresh Prince trying to rap with a ventriloquist’s doll.

BRIGHT: Back at the Lalonde residence, Rose attempts to ‘Youth Roll’ out of the front door, but her escape route is blocked by her mother, who appears with martini glass in hand. Time for our second Strife of the comic! (And can I say that I really like the music for this one?)

As with John’s strife with his dad, this strife tells us a lot about Rose’s relationship with her mother. John had the AGGRIEVE and ABJURE options; Rose also gets AGGRESS (PASSIVE) and ABSTAIN. It’s pretty telling that one of these options is an EMPTY SUICIDE THREAT, and ‘Abstain’ has Rose fending off her mother’s insistent offer of the martini glass.

FAILURE ARTIST: I liked the EMPTY SUICIDE THREAT at the time but now I think it deserves an ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?

BRIGHT: Mom Lalonde may be intended as loving-but-clueless, but she’s offering her thirteen year old daughter alcohol, over Rose’s protests, and something is clearly very wrong if suicide threats are a normal part of life. (Something similar will come up in the future, but in that context it isn’t played for laughs.)

ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 4

On a lighter note, ‘Abjure’ has her mother offering her A BEAUTIFUL PONY. Rose reacts in the moment like this is terrible, but does later pat the pony’s nose.

At any rate, the strife ends when Mom Lalonde apparently gets bored and decides to do some dusting. This takes all the fun out of using the front door, so Rose goes around the back to make her break for the generator.

Meanwhile, John is trying to read up on weaponizing sylladexes (sylladices?), but is being nagged by a voice to turn around — which he finally does, just in time for a monster to ram into him so hard it turns the panel pixelated. Strife time!

John’s bout with the Shale Imp kicks off with the monster threatening the Con Air bunny. John’s efforts to defend it are intercut with Rose’s progress out of the house and through the rain to the mausoleum. I think this interplay works quite nicely — it keeps both things moving without letting the reader get impatient -- but your mileage may vary.

The imp aggravates John by punching the bunny in the belly and waving it at him. John attacks the imp and breaks his hammer, then attacks it with the handle and gets knocked flat. Finally he weaponises his sylladex and chucks his inventory at it until it explodes into a shower of grist.

PUT THE BUNNY BACK IN THE BOX!!!!!! Now why couldn’t he put the bunny back in the box?

Because he’d set it as his strifekind, it turns out.

In true video game style, defeating the imp causes John to level up! In Homestuck, this is done by ascending one’s echeladder, a series of player levels with whimsical, old-fashioned names. John climbs two rungs, from Greentike to Plucky Tot, and earns 125 Boondollars.

Note how efficient this is: In one panel we can see that the echeladder is a levelling system, that Boondollars are in-Game currency, and that levelling up has increased John’s amount of grist and how much of it he can carry. He’s also got a new kind of grist called ‘Shale’. Hussie does take an extra panel to clarify the grist capacity expansion, but that makes sense as it’s a small part of the original panel. Compare this to the dozens of panels we’ve had laying out how sylladexes work. These panels are much more information-dense, and the comic flows better for it.

CHEL: Exactly what “grist” is and what it does beyond allowing changes to the house, why those changes are needed, and what “boondollars” are for hasn’t been explained yet, but will be soon, and it’s clear they’re something to do with the game so it’s not outright confusing.

BRIGHT: John spends the next few panels sorting his strife specibus out, and stashes the bunny in there for safekeeping. There’s something amiss, but he can’t quite put his finger on it...

Meanwhile, Rose has reached the mausoleum and prepares to activate the generator. The taxidermied corpse of her beloved pet lies in state, dressed in a tiny suit. A sad fate for an animal who should have peacefully decomposed in a flowerbed. Rose kicks it off the pedestal to make room for the laptop.

John discovers what’s wrong when a bucket of water perched atop his door lands on his head. The culprit behind this sudden dousing?

"[S] WHAT THIS IS SO OUTRAGEOUS (HD)" (Watch on YouTube)

Apparently the sprite has a sense of humour.

Next up is a pesterlog between Rose and Dave. There are hints that all is not well in the Strider residence.

TG: hey TG: dont tell john this but i think he might have been right about the puppets TG: theyre sort of starting to freak me out a little TT: You're referring to your brother's collection? TG: i mean dont get me wrong i think its cool and all TG: the semi-ironic puppet thing or whatever TG: or semi-semi ironic TG: man i dont even know TG: im just starting to think some of this shit is going a little far and its kind of fucked up TT: I've seen his websites. TT: I like them. TG: haha yeah well YOU WOULD TG: oh man i wish lil cal wouldnt look at me like that TG: with those dead eyes jesus TG: sometimes i dream that hes real and hes talking to me and i wake up in a cold sweat and basically flip the fuck out

Well, not so much hints as flashing neon signs. Dave’s gone very quickly from insisting that everything his brother does is cool and Lil Cal is awesome, to admitting that he has nightmares about Lil Cal and is freaked out by his brother’s ‘semi-ironic puppet thing’. We don’t know much about Bro’s websites yet, but we do know that Rose has a morbid streak, and Dave is clearly disturbed by the content.

Dave leaves to find his brother’s copy of the game, and we return to John, who, to quote Rose, has ‘just had a bucket of water dumped on his head by the ghost of his dead grandmother, who also happens to be dressed like a clown.’

And yes, that is indeed John’s dead Nanna, returned to help him on his journey through The Medium and beyond -- or at least, she claims she is. John has to take her word for it, as he doesn’t remember her at all. According to his Dad, John was pretty young when she died. Speaking of his Dad, he’s been kidnapped by the forces invading John’s home.

Nannasprite gives John the background of the game and what’s going on. His house is now in the Medium. This place was created by the game software, but is physically independent of it -- and no, he’s not inside a computer. The Medium floats in the Incipisphere, a place outside the normal flow of time in the kids’ universe. Above the Medium is the realm of Skaia.

According to Nannasprite:

Legend holds that Skaia exists as a dormant crucible of unlimited creative potential. What does this mean, you ask? I'm afraid my lips are sealed about that, dear! Hoo hoo!

Nannasprite is somewhat like a tutorial assistant for the game -- she helps guide John and provides information, although she’s somewhat cryptic.

We are getting a lot of new words here, but Hussie is defining them pretty well as we go, so I don’t think it merits a point.

At any rate, Skaia is defended by the forces of light, while forces of darkness plot its destruction. These two forces exist in an endless stalemate on a stage at the centre of Skaia until a player with a prototyped Kernelsprite enters the Medium. Then the prototyped Kernelsprite splits, with one Kernel carrying the prototyping information up to a kingdom basked in light, and another Kernel carrying it down to the kingdom of darkness. Each kingdom has four Spires, and when the Kernel reaches one, it propagates the prototyping information to the kingdom’s forces.

This is why the imps were dressed as jesters: John prototyped his Kernel with the harlequin doll, and whatever the other players prototype with will influence what forms the soldiers take. When the first Kernels reach the spires, the battlefield gets bigger and the war begins for real.

Oh, right -- and the forces of light are always destined to lose.

So what’s the point? Apparently, that’s for John to find out. For now, though, he needs to head towards Skaia, going through the first of seven Gates. The first Gate is situated directly above John’s house, but the others are going to be harder to reach. We now find out what all that Build Grist is for: To get to the Gate, they need to build the house higher to reach it. And then they can rescue John’s Dad, solve the ultimate riddle, and save the Earth from destruction!

...or not.

Nope, according to Nannasprite, Earth is doomed. Done for. Kaput. There is nothing they can do to save it.

John is pretty bummed about this. He isn’t cheered by Nanna’s assurance that he has a much more important purpose than saving the planet, although she fails to elaborate on that point and instead floats off to make cookies.

CHEL: I think here we earn another couple of points.

HURRY UP AND DO NOTHING: 2 HOW NOT TO WRITE A WEBCOMIC: 11 Failing the Turing Test - wherein the character has no reactions whatsoever While the emotional lives of characters should not be described in their every tiny wrinkle, characters must have emotional lives. When someone boos them off a stage, they should experience chagrin. When they fall from a tenth-storey window, they should feel alarm. The writer should not count on dialogue like “Yikes!” to get the point across.

Brief confusion and feeling “bummed out” by the news that one’s entire planet is doomed does not count as an adequate reaction. I’d expect more fear, more concern. As pointed out before, doesn’t John have any friends other than Dave, Rose, and GG? His Dad has friends, wouldn’t he be concerned for them on Dad’s behalf? If nothing else, more curiosity about this “more important” business?

BRIGHT: Now, I could actually buy this in some circumstances — John is a teenager, doesn’t seem to have close connections outside those we see on screen, and he’s been having one hell of a weird day. I wouldn’t be surprised if grasping the scope of destruction was simply beyond him at this point. It’s a lot to take in, and it’s only been a few hours since life went to hell in a handbasket — not to mention, he’s in an active combat zone. There’s a lot going on, and if he was to shove it out of his mind while he dealt with the immediate crisis, I could see that as pretty realistic.

Of course, that would depend on him actually reacting at some later point, when he had a chance to slow down and it could sink in. As it stands...well, if that does happen, we never see it.

CHEL: Does this also count as “Oh, Don’t Mind Him” for the How Not To score?

BRIGHT: I think so, yes.

CHEL: Then here it goes!

HOW NOT TO WRITE A WEBCOMIC: 12 Oh, Don’t Mind Him - where a character’s problems remain unexplored In real life, people are riddled with chronic problems that are not addressed for long periods of time, if ever. But in fiction, all problems are just the opening chords of a song. If there is a brother who has a problem with alcohol, a child who has lost her dog, or even someone whose car has simply broken down, the reader will worry about those people and expect the author to do something about it.

Technically, this could count for seven billion or so points, minus any people who successfully entered their own game sessions, but we don’t want to get out of hand here and it really only counts as one big problem.

However! I am very fond of this idea in theory. The obvious option would be that the purpose of the game is to save the player’s homeworld. We’ve all seen the “save the homeworld” idea in scifi and fantasy before. Here, the homeworld is beyond saving, but there is another option, and exploring that is the storyline. The forces of light cannot have a traditional victory; the protagonists must find a victory on the terms they have. It’s not a theme one sees often, and I like it.

FAILURE ARTIST: John and the other Beta Kids’ lack of angst of the destruction of their planet doesn’t stick out as much here as it will later when almost everything else is milked for angst.

CHEL: I’m not really sure the planet being destroyed is a great basis for a Rule-of-Funny-based story if that was what he was going for, to be honest. “Billions died, lol!”

[bladekindeyewear]

Boots Reads Homestuck Epilogue(s) Part 11 - Candy Page 12

==>

Alright, looks like Jake and Jane had an active night and now Jake’s going to distance himself again.

Yeah you’re pretty afraid of closing this distance with Jane.  You REALLY don’t want it, do you?

JANE: Lighten up Jake! The election’s off! The economy is stable! Dirk is probably never going to talk to us ever again! And we just... we finally fucked. Hoo hoo hoo!

Okay seeing that “Hoo hoo hoo!” at the end of the sentence makes it really fucking uncomfortable somehow.

Something catches the corner of his eye, and he swivels his head around to see the Trickster Lollipop on his bedside table.

JANE I THOUGHT YOU WEREN’T GOING TO BE SUCH A SCUMBAG THIS TIME AROUND WHAT DID YOU FUCKING DO????

far more sets of underwear than the number of people accounted for in the room.

Yeah that sounds about like what might happen with the lollipop thrown in.

Okay at least it was Jake’s idea??? that makes it... ALMOST... better... but not really..??

Oh God, and Jake just does the pushover thing and rolls with it only because he thinks he SHOULD, not because he wants to.  Fuck.

==>

Mhmm.  There’s always a thick sense that “what would Bro tell me to do” was thick in everything Dave did hanging over him like a shadow.  Interesting that here it manifests as that Meta voice he was using in Meat or whatever.

Is Dirk even going to be there, or has he fled entirely?

Gamzee, what the fuck are you doing.  Forceful character arc intervention?  Is that what you did with Roxy somehow?

...is Gamzee toying with the narrative now that Dirk has fled or something??

...okay there’s some author worship going on or some such?

Dave how do you even know who Pagliacci is.

Okay there’s the Rose bot, and an ominous note.  Suicide note? Self-Decapitation note, again?  Hm.

==>

Epilogue Three

Okay, that’s some startlingly abrupt pathmaking toward suicide.  I was warned that there was a vivid description of the leadup to suicide in Candy somewhere, so I’ll try to talk only lightly about it as I read.

Your legs feel impressively powerful as you begin to climb the staircase

Nice Meat callback at least.

A flip of the cosmic coin has rendered your entire life completely inessential. What could you accomplish in a dead-end existence like this? There are no stakes. No meaningful challenges. No structures or themes—only residual chemical reactions in a dying brain, a physical system’s obligate compulsion to exhaust its own lingering momentum. A cockroach with its head cut off, waiting to die of thirst.

Wow, yeah, you REALLY can’t stand living in a world where you don’t hold some sort of Light-y relevance, can you?  So much so that you were willing to steal Light away from the story entirely just to have more to carry with you in the flipside.  Is this supposed to sort of embody the comeuppance you didn’t get in the other half, the way you’re offing yourself here?  Weird.

Your friends might derive some sense of fulfillment from satisfying the elementary obligations of self-preservation and self-propagation, but there’s nothing here for you. It doesn’t matter anymore.

HOW ABOUT LIVING HAPPY LIVES AND NOT GETTING STUCK IN COMAS YOU ASSHOLE

Seriously, that whole Meat part, the... the four things I really couldn’t stand being left with were Jane’s fate, Jade’s situation, ROSE’s unenviable situation, and Dirk being allowed to escape without consequence.  Three of my favorite characters left on doomed paths or basically IN COMAS, constantly having their agency quashed by others or forced away from anything that could have corrected their disastrous path (Jane’s) by Dirk’s meddling.  A line being drawn in the sand that clearly stated CANON ENDS HERE, before any of them could wake up or stop FUCKING SUFFERING.  Jesus Christ.  I just wanted some loose ends tied up by this epilogue, I didn’t need the characters’ POSSIBLE HAPPINESS to be left unresolved with a likely “NO” as the answer??!???  THEY DIDN’T COME ALL THIS WAY AND SACRIFICE AND WIN FOR JUST THAT!  DIRK STOLE THE FUCKING ULTIMATE REWARD FROM THEM OUT OF NOWHERE!

*breathes*

FUCK.  So, yeah, on to seeing Dirk either die or get stopped by Dave somehow because he still needs him or whatever.

Ew, self-decapitation indeed.  You narcissistic fuck.

When you think so little of yourself as a moral character, any act of self-termination will result in a death that is Just.

Huh.  So that influences the way the clock judges you, hm?

==>

A damn funeral, huh.

He looks at Roxy, who is staring at the floor, rather beside herself in grief.

Oh thank goodness, a glimpse at her line to Gamz had me thinking she was in weird happy-stuck Candy mode still, that would have fucked this scene a bunch.

...IS Dave really more eloquent than you, though?

Dave’s long speech--

Oh my gosh I just realized during this speech how UTTERLY FUCKED of Andrew people must have thought this Dirk suicide section was if they chose Candy FIRST.  Jesus dick.

End of speech.  Jane, stop being so remarkably fucking composed.  Unless Dirk’s plans and machinations really hurt you as much as you let on when you expressed seemingly-mock excitement that you’d “never hear from him again”.

Fuck you Gamzee.

ROXY: BRAVO!!! DAMN I FEEL LIKE IF I NEVER HEARD ANOTHER WORD THIS GUY EVER SAID THATD BE FINE BECAUSE THAT WAS ALL JUST SO *PERFECT*

Thanks for coming to your senses Roxy, better late than never I guess.

Dave dips down so that their noses are bumping. Karkat’s eyes are so wide it’s amazing they don’t pop out. For a moment, it looks like they’re going to...

John sneezes.

Oh COME ON, John.  :(

JOHN: i have no idea why i did that. now i have this whole memory in my head that i could have definitely lived without.

Me after reading the Meat epilogue.

Huh, offering to undo the death.  That IS potentially a little bit insensitive, as obvious and necessary a question it is to ask, even if the answer is no.

DAVE: dirk was a complicated guy DAVE: dude obviously had reasons for doing what he did DAVE: if you go back and just rewrite his decision DAVE: thats like denying him his personal autonomy

Exactly.

A courtesy that Dirk, funny enough, wouldn’t have given anyone else.  The fucking prick.

--Yep, they’re too far outside of canon for his retcon powers to work anymore.  Rose told him on the last day he could.

Roxy what the hell are you doing.

ROXY: we should get hitched

No, you should ANSWER WHY YOU LEFT CALLIOPE HANGING and THEN decide LIKE ADULTS to do whatever you all feel like doing.  This isn’t legitimate if you’re HIDING most of the situation in Voidy shadow!  If you really DO want this, then do it properly and HONESTLY!!!!

JOHN: you... JOHN: LOVE me?? ROXY: yea john i love you ROXY: wanna marry u and spend the rest of my life with u and pop out a bunch of cute lil buck toothed babies with you JOHN: oh, uh. haha, wow. roxy that’s um. JOHN: that’s a LOT.

Yeah, this isn’t how it should go.  WOULD go.  Something’s seriously wrong with Roxy right now and I hope John figures out how to bring them to the forefront so they can come to an honest decision.

Just a few weeks ago, Roxy was happy with Calliope, and now she wants to have his babies? John feels like he’s missing something important here, like he went for a bathroom break during the part of the movie where the plot twist happens.

Exactly.  And you haven’t even had time to process how you feel about HER again.  If something’s off, make it NOT off before you say yes.

Roxy practically attacks John’s mouth, she’s so excited. John shuts his eyes and kisses her back, still giddy and laughing against her lips. She kisses him until they’re both breathless, then pulls back so that she can gaze at him with glittering eyes.

ROXY: omg ROXY: were gonna be SO freakin happy!

Yyyyeah, THAT was ominous.  Someone’s definitely fucking with this situation behind the scenes.  ...Maybe Roxy’s been hitting the Lollipop too when the camera’s away from her?

==>

Dammit, we skipped to the wedding without resolving ANY of their fucking issues first.  This is bad.

--oh my god we skipped to months PAST the wedding too.

JOHN: jane and jake are kinda, um, together now. TEREZI: OH GOD JOHN: and she basically ordered jake to catch the bouquet “or else.” JOHN: i was seriously afraid for him. and then he didn’t even catch it!

Jane.  Jane, come the fuck on.

Can’t we get ONE TIMELINE where Jane doesn’t end up terrible????  D:

JOHN: yeah. they’re all dating. JOHN: or rather... jade is dating them both. JOHN: dave and karkat haven’t... exactly figured things out yet. JOHN: and as much as i love jade, i don’t actually think she’s helped matters by putting herself in the middle of it. TEREZI: HMM >:[ TEREZI: SOM3HOW TH4T DO3SNT S33M R1GHT JOHN: i know.

Jade, you can’t force these things!!!

Can’t we get ONE TIMELINE where Jade doesn’t end up unhappy???? D:

JOHN: now i have to pretend to laugh and think it’s funny when she makes jokes about being the next to “tie the knot.” TEREZI: WOW D1D SH3 R34LLY GO FOR TH4T DOUBL3 3NT3NDR3 JOHN: what? TEREZI: WH4T JOHN: what do you mean? TEREZI: N3V3R M1ND

Jegus Christ.  Terezi, WHY did you have to go there.  I’ve seen enough nsfw RP to know exactly the fuckery you’re alluding to with Jade, NO.

JOHN: things’ll probably work out with those three anyway. things always work out between old friends. JOHN: we’ve all known each other for too long for anything to cause a permanent rift.

Fucking allusions to the Meat section...  D:

...okay, babies time.  There are babies.  Or at least one Roxy pregnancy and that earlier Vriskgrub.

TEREZI: 1T JUST S33MS... K1ND4 F4ST

YES, YES IT DOES.

TEREZI: 1 4LR34DY H34RD 4BOUT HOW J4N3 1S D4T1NG BOTH J4K3 *4ND* G4MZ33 4ND UNFORTUN4T3LY 1 DO B3L13V3 1T

What the FUCK is going on.  Who’s manipulating everyone.  Gamzee maybe??

TEREZI: H4H4H4 1 HOP3 YOU H4V3NT S33N TH3 P1CTUR3 D4V3 TOOK JOHN: dave has a picture?! JOHN: wait, never mind. i don’t want to know, and i definitely don’t want to see it.

Yeah that’s a cursed image if I ever heard of one

JOHN: so, what did you think, talking to dave and karkat? JOHN: did they seem... happy? TEREZI: NOP3 JOHN: oh my god, i KNOW, right? JOHN: the whole thing is such a mess, it’s hard to be in the same room with them these days. JOHN: i don’t even know the full story because dave won’t talk to me about it anymore, and jade seems to think that everything’s going just fine.

Dammit Jade, you forced your way in too early!!!  D:

And why can’t Andrew at least PRETEND to give us a slight, fishing-line-thin possibility that Jade might POSSIBLY have any sort of chance at an endgame workable romance with ANY OF HER GOSH DARN FRIENDS AT ALL???????

>:(

I just want Jade to be happy okay jegus

TEREZI: 4 TRU3 K1SM3S1S 1S JUST 4S MUCH YOUR L1F3 P4RTN3R 4S YOUR M4T3SPR1T 1S

Interesting quadrant talk

TEREZI: TH3 PO1NT OF 4 K1SM3S1S 1S NOT JUST TO M4K3 YOU 4NNOY3D OR 3V3N 4NGRY TEREZI: TH3Y SHOULD PUSH YOU TO B3TT3R YOURS3LF TEREZI: TH3Y SHOULD SH1N3 4 L1GHT ON TH1NGS 4BOUT YOURS3LF YOU WOULD OTH3RW1S3 1GNOR3 OR D3NY

EXACTLY.  I’ve been saying that about good black relationships for years.  And Jade’s plowing in and fucking things up without really making things ANY better AT ALL for anyone but herself, and only temporarily and in her own head at that.  :(

TEREZI: 1F 1 W3R3 3V3R TO DO BL4CKROM 4G41N, 1T WOULD H4V3 TO B3 LOW K3Y

Yeah, really pushing at what happens in Meat and stuff.

I love Terezi’s text-emote faces.

==>

Page 17... Someone told me to watch out for “Candy 18″ without any elaboration or context, so maybe I’ll split the post after this page so I can get to that one fresh? Hm!

My stomach is down to a low anxious simmer, so that’s good compared to before.  Maybe reading this whole Candy thing isn’t going to be so bad.  I can’t believe I’m not even halfway through.

He’s not sure why he feels the need to hide the fact that he’s talking to her.

Dammit, John.

It should be a beautiful image, but something about it roils John’s gut.

???

Is he catching on to some weird manipulation going on behind the scenes with his own metatextual awareness or?

Yep, Harry Anderson, heh.

He was. What’s bugging him about it is that Roxy didn’t seem to have any suggestions of her own.

YEAH THAT’S A HUGE GODDAMN RED FLAG RIGHT THERE.  WHAT IS HAPPENING TO EVERYONE.

...Oh, huh.  Now John’s having a bit of panic about how everyone suddenly feels like things are completely resolved with Lord English when they aren’t.  And how Rose seems almost HYPNOTIZED into not worrying about it, along with many of the rest of them.

The three gals in the room exchange a series of concerned glances. Do they truly think he’s crazy? Are they hiding something from him? John can feel himself trembling. It’s not possible that he’s remembering this wrong, is it? It can’t be. If he presses his eyes shut, he can still see the lines of the black hole cracking space apart around him. It seemed like such a big deal at the time, and then suddenly it felt like nothing at all. Why?

Are they, though?  Do they know they’re in a split timeline of sorts, or...?

You’re the ones not doing okay, he nearly shouts, but then realizes it’s just going to make him sound crazier than he already looks.

Yeah this is all cracking at the seams.

ROXY: oh of course that makes sense

ROXY YOU’RE NOT THIS BRAINLESS WAKE THE FUCK UP

Hm, looks like John’s not as comfortable on the placid planet as he is with someone giving him SOME sort of broader purpose.  A lot like Dirk, but LESS FUCKED.

JOHN: i’ve got a beautiful wife who loves me, but it’s not enough. i can’t even talk to her about what we’re going to name our stupid kid without it turning into some weird thing where she just goes along with whatever i want. JOHN: even when all i want is for her to want something different than what i want!!!

It’s like Steven stuck in Rose’s Room with that Connie clone, SU-ways.

Alright, clicking the next button and starting page 18 in the next post.

[scarlettlawyer]

Part 8 of my reaction/commentary to the Phantoms & Mirages fanfic series by @renegadewangs

(Chasing Phantoms): Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

(Haunted Specters): Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6

(Vanquishing Mirages): Part 7

Vanquishing Mirages, Chapter 11

“Phwwh- that’s kind of hypocritical, you know. You aren’t following your own advice either! Can’t you at least pretend to be a nice guy?” “… Like this?” He allowed a smile of his own to dawn on his face. The most genuine smile he could produce, because he knew exactly which muscles to use for it. It put an odd pressure on the corners of his mouth, on his cheeks, on his eyebrows. His features weren’t used to showing emotion and struggled against it.

Okay anyway, wow… The Phantom and Mirage flashback scenes are affecting me way more than I think they did the first time around? I’m actually getting so upset. They’re making me so sad, which they DIDN’T on 1st readthrough. Because Mirage really cares and the phantom just – arrrgh. I just want Mirage to be happy. I just want her to be happy.

I think because the first time around I’d read the phantom’s lines flatly, seeing and expecting nothing, as is the reality – with the full knowledge that him saying things like “how are you feeling?” contain no real substance. And then when Mirage would jump to interpret them positively it would just make me adore Mirage and go “aww cute!”

But this time around I’m somehow a damn fool stupidly falling for the same trap? I’m suddenly eager to read SOMETHING into what the phantom says only to be nastily swatted away, not remembering the exact contents of their conversations. So when he said “how are you feeling” this time I was like AWWW HE’S ASKING THAT MEANS SOMETHING RIGHT?! (And expecting it to be not commented on, as a nice subtle little narrative touch that he cares MAYBE A LITTLE? JUST A LITTLE? CAN WE HAVE THAT but no, we can’t.) Only to read on and find Mirage asking after just that. And getting SHOT DOWN. Ouch. I WILL SIT HERE AND FEEL A LIL SAD AND STUPID NOW. For once, Past Me had things more correct than Current Me.

“I think… maybe I’ll volunteer for a mission in America too. If the superiors will let me go.”

I think this line even caught ME on the first time around. (And moreso on this time around because I just HAPPENED to be in a sentimental state when reading it). IT’S THE ELLIPSIS. THAT DAMN ELLIPSIS. If it weren’t for that I would have read it as flatly as intended I just. HNNNNGH.

“Right, right. Then… Maybe I’ll see you later, Teach.” “Good luck, Calisto.”

Couldn’t find a picture of a crying cat to properly suit my emotions. You are spared from crying cat for now.

Then again… Perhaps she had no idea what she was doing. Perhaps desperation was driving her to reckless behavior and she could no longer apply proper logic. How shameful.

This man still sees fit to sit up on his little high horse…

He allowed the other Interpol agents to grab him and lead him from the room. At the moment, there was nothing he could do to stop Mirage. Her eyes were on him, after all. They followed him until he moved through the doorway and rounded the corner.

AAAAA

Only got eyes for you, phantom.

But bro for him to know this he was looking at her too. He has more reason to be looking at her of course. But this is just an extended few moments of them staring at each other sdkndsknldslk ~They locked eyes with each other from across the courtroom…~

Imagining this is just…!

“Whoever said anything like that? Just because I pin a murder on a guy and get him the death sentence doesn’t mean I want to kill him.”

xDDDD

I’m HOLLERING at how great this is. How WILD it sounds. You better believe I took this part of the sentence and sent it to one of my friends without context on first readthrough, it’s just too good not to

“Agent Shi-Long Lang holds the keys to my handcuffs, isn’t that right?”

[…]

“Uh… Yeah, he does. If you need more freedom to use your hands, I could go ask him to unlock them for minute.” “There’s no need. I can make do with this.”

When I read this I was SUSPICIOUS. I was like. No. He asked for a reason. He wouldn’t just dismiss it like that would he. It’s BECAUSE Lang has them that he brushes it off. He wanted to see if he could get them off Bobby without fuss. I WAS RIGHT.

A few more clicks and turns of the watch’s dials, then the Phantom halted his actions. “Bobby Fulbright, for what it’s worth coming from my mouth, I apologize.”

FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH

I APOLOGISE

!!!

Him apologising in and of itself is kinda huge though.

Bobby didn’t understand what the Phantom would need to apologize for. Not until a small needle popped out of the watch’s face. He didn’t have time to move out of the way. There wasn’t even any room to dodge in such a confined space. The watch was thrust towards him and the needle pierced two layers of fabric to touch his shoulder.  He wasn’t sure what happened next- what exactly it’d done. An electric jolt, maybe. Something strong enough to knock a person out cold instantly, because the next thing he knew, a pair of hands was shaking him back into awareness.

THIS WAS S O FUNNY TO ME BECAUSE IT WAS LIKE

THERE’S THIS BIG BUILDUP – THERE’S BEEN THIS HUGE BUILDUP RIGHT? OVER THE COURSE OF THE WHOLE LAST FIC PLUS THIS ONE SO FAR

And when the phantom is like “I need you to trust me” it feels like a poignant moment! Bobby takes the plunge! He makes that hugely important decision to place his TRUST in the phantom!

AND THEN IS IMMEDIATELY BETRAYED

And I just love it. It’s kinda hilarious. It INSTANTLY blows up in Bobby’s face.

Character development or no, huge buildup or no, the phantom is still the phantom ;D I just can’t get over this it’s such a huge moment like – if this was a TV show or whatever it would be played as a bait and switch to the best of the medium’s abilities. The music would swell. The camera would focus intimately on the phantom’s face and then Bobby’s face in turn. Bobby’s slight expression change – his expression softening - as he makes that decision to trust. To trust. And then in the blink of an eye it’s just – betrayal. AHAHAHA

Bobby’s eyes widened in shock. He whirled around to get a better look at the car. The door to the back seats was open and it was empty. The Phantom was gone. The Phantom was gone and Bobby was the one who’d given him what he’d needed to escape…!

THIS WAS ALSO SUPER HILARIOUS TO ME BECAUSE??? THE PHANTOM ESCAPING. AGAIN. I can’t believe… honest to goodness it almost felt like a running gag at this point with the sheer amount of times it had happened. As if this series is just a bunch of “the phantom escapes captivity in a series of increasingly creative and convoluted ways” ahahaha. I WAS LAUGHING

You have his initial breakout in Chasing Phantoms. You have his hospital escape, you have his escape from the human trafficking cell… and now this. It just felt like a hilarious amount of escapes and I was loving every minute of it. Like, I couldn’t even remember how many there were I just knew there’d been a LOT. Enough for me to joke to myself about it being a running gag.

Vanquishing Mirages, Chapter 12

“Now you’re just putting words in my mouth. Shame on you!~”

Was so interesting to see the actual inclusion of a tilde to demonstrate the playfulness of her tone! AND. I’m just gonna. File this away. For Later Review Post reasons. 👀

It was a shame that Bobby Fulbright hadn’t been trusted with the keys for them. It was a shame, but considering how naïve the man had been, it’d save Interpol at least some face.

OUCH!

“[…] You think Shi-Long Lang will just send you on your way as if you were a friend departing on a vacation?”

This has gotta be like my third read of this chapter and I’m only now noting it to myself but huh! That’s, I guess, surprisingly creative phrasing for him as opposed to complete flatness and directness.

She looked hesitant for a moment, then closed the distance between them. Raised her free hand to his own shackled wrists, her fingers stroking down to the skin of his lower arms. Peered up at him with innocent, pleading eyes. Just behind her, he could see Simon Blackquill’s gaze darken at the gesture. He drew away from her touch, as he’d always done.

AAAAA

Okay.

So.

Here’s what I thought was going to happen around this point when the phantom said “leave it to me” and he and Mirage started plotting: I thought that, somehow, Blackquill was going to escape/get rescued (not by the phantom) – I obviously didn’t think Simon was going to be killed. Something – some outside force was going to intervene and stop that from happening.

But I also thought that Mirage and the phantom were successfully going to escape together, even if not everything was going to go exactly to plan for them, they would escape nonetheless. I was like oh wow… oh wow… they’re gonna be able to get away (somehow)…!

And that, then the next fic (pfff reading through blind here, I didn’t know how long this fic was or how close/far I was to the end!) was going to be about the search: tracking down Mirage & the phantom, who would now be stuck cooperating, however temporarily. (I think maybe? On some level my mind knew there was a “Tracking Ghosts” fic ahead and had just skipped over “Lifting Spirits” as a title entirely and/or blurred the two together. IT’S WORTH NOTING that for the vast majority of reading through this series, I didn’t know how long it was and/or how many instalments it actually had. Going into it, I knew it was long and that there was a fair bit of separate fics, then “kinda” forgot along the way. During Haunted Specters I figured it was a trilogy. And then during this fic I thought there was only four. I was just reading through chapter by chapter after all – not taking full note of the overall picture.)

So, that’s where my mind went in those moments of reading: Mirage & the phantom escape, next fic is centred on a) our main cast’s desperate search for them and then apprehending them, (yknow the usual) and b) getting to see some awesome Mirage and phantom interactions in the process during their POV segments. AND c) the phantom still on the run and trying to function, but being forced to come to terms with his small character development that he’s managed to make up to this point. Also his trying to keep on functioning with the debilitating knowledge of his identity actually revealed now and how he copes with that too.

Of course this largely glosses over things like the phantom’s severe headaches and the fact that he wants to be put out of his misery and escape them… But these were once again temporary thoughts that flashed through my mind when in the process of reading this chapter.

And with those theories I came up with on the spot in mind,

For a… For a wild bit of time here as well, I kinda thought the series would lean right into an uh, Phantom/Mirage direction… I mean… C’mooon… It’s called Phantoms & Mirages… Partnered right there in the series title…! That alone kind of made me feel like it may be an obvious choice if you HAD to pick a… hah… pairing to go with. ‘Cause the title. I mean I wasn’t expecting anything to truly come of it perhaps, but in terms of taking that direction, what I mean is purely in terms of subtext and shiptease that would stay underneath the surface. That would be clear as day to the audience, but would remain in an unrealised realm canonically. Or at least, become MORE prominent than it already was through their flashbacks and such… heh. (Also to be clear, I’m saying “because of the title” because I figure the series “Phantoms & Mirages” was named in retrospect after the fact, meaning… if it became the most prominent ship teased… it figures that would be the name of the series? XD)

That’s at least what I thought at the time! Not necessarily the direction I wanted for the series or would personally go with. I didn’t necessarily ship it either, but if the narrative wanted to give it a shot, I was still willing to read it and see where it would go. Well I was way more invested in Mirage on this second readthrough, so, weirdly enough, I found myself just outright shipping it EVEN WITH the full knowledge that it was 100% not gonna happen, neeeeever gonna happen. If anything, the full knowledge that it wasn’t gonna happen is what made myself don shipping goggles anyway ahahaha.

So I’m sitting here reading, momentarily thinking that Mirage and the phantom were gonna be running off together, and that things were leaning spyshipping…

Before the narrative went LOL nope

And then just went full phantomquill.

And then there was Simon Blackquill himself. Despite all the cruelty and the persistent investigations into the Phantom’s supposed true self, the notion of killing Simon Blackquill…- the notion of Simon Blackquill’s life ending… It hurt. It hurt his chest and it hurt his head.  He whirled around, the barrel of the gun pointing at Mirage’s chest instead. She recoiled instantly, shock spreading across her features.

My brain, in like ten seconds flat:

And by “phantomquill”, look, I don’t mean romance or anything explicitly shippy or whatnot. You can put any spin you want on the duo – familial or WHAT have you. Phantomquill need not require actual “romance” in my eyes. It merely warrants the two characters having their lives intertwined and some kind of connection, having some kind of pull between them, whatever form that connection or pull takes. The both of them having SOME kind of influence over the other beyond mere hatred. The hatred and everything is there, but there’s ! A tiny little bit of something else too, whatever that something else might be. That’s one of the huge draws of phantomquill. This whole setup and the ensuing scene(s) are peak phantomquill to me – if it doesn’t constitute phantomquill. Then I don’t know what does.*

*(JUST GONNA LEAVE A LITTLE. ASTERISK HERE. DON’T MIND ME. I MAAAAY (see: will) BE RETURNING TO THIS IN FUTURE WITH A LITTLE BIT OF A DIFFERENT DEFINITION OF PHANTOMQUILL, SO UH – DEFINITION SUBJECT TO CHANGE IN FUTURE REVIEW POSTS…! But for now, for now, this is the definition I’m working with in this particular review post. The definition I was working with.)

“No!” She was beginning to look frantic, now. Pained and dismayed. “I’m on your side! I killed Lex Luster for you! That old son of a bitch- I punished him for you!”

I was kind of really of mixed feelings over Mirage on 1st readthrough around here cause like. Her saying this + her behaviour following did soften me up a little but at the same time. I WAS STILL KIND OF MAD AT HER BECAUSE LIKE? WAS this all just a game to her? Some kind of game to her? She’s the one who claims to have some kind of “investment” here in his best interests, right? But like. Does she really not realise just how much the revelation of the phantom’s identity felt like the very end of the line for him? He wanted to die. He had given up. He stopped eating and he – he was willing to die. He would have rather DIED. But Mirage, you ensured he was kept alive. You prolonged his suffering. You did that to him, YOU forced him to cross what he perceived to be an uncrossable line. That just feels super cruel! She made him suffer so much and now she’s claiming things like “I did it for you”! I was torn between, as I said, being softened a bit but also still being like WHAT THE HELL MAN?

The fact that she thinks they can just run off together is like – how much had something like that been part of her plans prior to this point? Did she have full knowledge that he was refusing to eat, watched the way he broke down (on more than one occasion), his intense suffering over the impending identity revelation and the aftermath, ALL of that, and seriously, SERIOUSLY think they could patch things up after so brutally crossing the line with him?! That he would even be in any state to, considering how it impacted him? How he had to be put on life support? Arrrgh, Mirage what are you doin girl! She planned to break him out or whatever, she says? Still planned to “look out for him” after all of that? Look out for what? As far as he was concerned it was all over. Did she not see that?

These were my primary thoughts but, there’s always some vagueness when it comes to interpretation, I suppose. The extent to which she might be spinning things because she is being held at gunpoint. The extent she might have either a) not realised the seriousness of the identity issue and therefore viewed the situation(s) way too lightly OR b) she may have been absolutely aware of how serious it was and using it to full advantage… he was utterly breaking, BREAKING and she knew that and went with it anyway. Because at least she was exerting power over him or something. Or maybe both. Or maybe despite knowing how serious it was she figured he could bounce back. He would disagree and yet, he still has the ability to conduct himself mostly normal which can in a sense be defined as “bouncing back”.

Also, also. There are some other things about this entire scene that can be interpreted in slightly different ways. How much of the phantom’s actions are fully premeditated throughout the whole scene vs on the fly. Let’s see… One wonders with what intent he entered to speak with Mirage with. Was he always planning on helping to free Blackquill? I doubt it, but that was the pretense with which he had Bobby free him. Did he ever plan on actually cooperating with Mirage? Or had he been planning on betraying her from the start? Perhaps he ultimately planned to shoot both of them. To wipe out two of his enemies, two birds one stone, and it’s simply that his subconscious would not allow that. Well there are a couple of lines we can examine for this.

“You’re right.” He gave a light nod of the head. “If you hope to fix the unsteady situation you’ve created, you will stand back and allow me to take over.”

So is this all just part of a ploy aimed at getting her to hand over the gun? Or is he actually considering cooperation to escape with her at this point?

Despite seemingly considering the matter, there was still an air of suspicion to it. She didn’t quite trust him just yet. He couldn’t blame her for that. He could only make it so she did trust him. He needed her to trust him.

Does this imply that he means to betray her from the start? That he needs her to trust him even though such trust would be misplaced?

Then she stepped aside, leaving him face-to-face with her hostage. He slid the gun around his palm until his index finger found the trigger. …Finally. 

I definitely read this as him fully planning on shooting Blackquill, right here, right now. There is a chance it might be “finally got the gun” but nah. Nah. He wants to kill that man, on a conscious level. Doesn’t he?

For a split second, he considered validating that very same suspicion. He considered taking advantage of a possibility that’d likely never present itself again. To put a bullet through that skull and end Blackquill’s miserable life once and for all.

This might… Imply that he wasn’t actually planning on shooting Blackquill originally, but upon getting control of the gun like this, the thought then does cross his mind to actually go through with it. I don’t think this is the correct reading, but it’s fun to point out nonetheless!

So when he whirls around to face Mirage… What’s going on? Is he sticking with his original plan to turn against her? Or is he actually turning against her purely in the moment? Did he plan to shoot Blackquill and then Mirage, and skips to Mirage in this moment because he found shooting Blackquill to be too difficult for him…?

IF the phantom had been 100% planning on shooting Blackquill from the start, or, regardless of whether he originally planned to or not, if he had actually gone through with it in that moment wherein he considers it?

That casts a whole new shade of light onto him apologising to Bobby earlier on – of his betrayal of Bobby in escaping. That would be unbelievably huge and unbelievably devastating. Simon Blackquill would have died as a consequence of Bobby trusting the phantom – a trust that resulted in the phantom’s escape. The phantom’s “for what it’s worth, I apologise” would mean absolutely nothing. ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. A completely worthless apology, because Bobby would have lost Simon. Betrayal in the highest degree. It means that Bobby would have trusted the phantom, and then the phantom would have gone right ahead and just shot Simon in response anyway. Was probably actually PLANNING to do just that.

For the record, my reading of the scene is, he didn’t have any intention of freeing Blackquill, and that most of his actions during this scene ARE spur-of-the-moment

She was the closest thing to a friend he’d ever had. His hand began to shake. Another headache was building- one that was much stronger than before.  “Do not shoot,” Simon Blackquill’s voice reiterated through the pain. He was faltering. He was faced with two of his greatest threats, the both of them defenseless, but he couldn’t bring himself to harm either of them. 

He was more broken than he’d assumed up until now. …He must’ve been broken.

THIS KILLS ME. THIS ABSOLUTELY KILLS ME. THIS IS GENUINELY HEARTBREAKING – HIS OWN THOUGHT PROCESS IS GENUINELY HEARTBREAKING BECAUSE HE JUST FAILED TO KILL TWO PEOPLE AND HE THINKS THAT ACTUALLY MAKES HIM BROKEN. He truly believes that. I cannot get over how sad that is, that their lives have been spared and he thinks that is a bad thing – a sign that he is DAMAGED, somehow.

He saw Mirage move and his first instinct was to prevent her from reaching the weapon, but she wasn’t going for it. She darted straight for the door. He couldn’t stop her.

I feel so sad because she’s just. Running. Getting the hell away from him. Because he just tried to kill her.

All in all, though. This chapter – and the next one – are god tier. They are just god tier.

Vanquishing Mirages, Chapter 13

Just thought I’d let you know, it’s around this point that I sent my friend this message:

Ahahaha. I just couldn’t DEAL with how great it was! Really! Like, it was causing actual overload, hence the “stop! Stop!” xDDD. Like, “It’s okay! It’s okay! This has already proven to be awesome beyond words! You don’t need to do any better than this, I promise! I may not be able to take much more greatness!”

Were it not for the Phantom speeding out the door without a second thought, Simon would’ve considered offering to break the chain tying the man’s handcuffs together. Then again, perhaps leaving them like this was for the best.

IT CERTAINLY IS FOR THE BEST SIMON. Doing that would noooot have ended well. We’d certainly have no Lifting Spirits, that’s for sure D: It would be Bye Bye Phantom!

Vaguely, he wondered just what sort of a physical state the man was in right now. He hadn’t properly eaten in two weeks, surviving only because Interpol had forced him to, and whether his shoulder had fully healed or not was another matter entirely. In a way, the Phantom hadn’t been well since February, because whatever chance at a complete recovery was cut short in one way or another. It was a miracle he was capable of running at all.

Man I loved this being noted cause it really goes to show just HOW… I don’t even know the right word… (persistent? Difficult to defeat?) that the phantom is. This guy can really just keep on going despite EVERYTHING ahaha. Legend.

There was only him and imminent danger, and then, all of the sudden, there was fluent cursing from nearby. The section of the walkway that the Phantom was lying on had tilted towards the street as well.

“fluent cursing”…

His shackled hands were raised over his head but were unable to reach anything to hold onto. He was slipping towards the abyss that lay below Simon. Slipping towards that same death that Simon was fearing for himself.

I felt so in the moment reading this. I could well and truly imagine the level of danger – the panic. I could barely look away from reading because this was just. Whoa. Life or death stuff going on right here.

He wouldn’t let the Phantom fall. Not again.

BRILLIANT TO LINK IT BACK. TIE IT IN PERFECTLY WITH THE GUILT THAT SIMON FELT. BRILLIANT. THIS ENTIRE SCENE IS SO GOOD. SO GOOD. I WAS HANGING ONTO EVERY. WORD.

There’s not even anything I can add or say about this whole scene, this whole dynamic of Simon holding on and the phantom protesting. It’s perfect.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Peak Phantomquill. When I think about phantomquill. Scenes like this one are exactly what I think about. It’s the pinnacle. You don’t get better than this. You just don’t.*

*Terms and conditions apply.

And then the “Fool Bright”… is the killing blow. It just kills me. With how GOOD IT IS GOSH THE EXECUTION OF THIS WHOLE SCENE IS AMAZING.

Through the dim of his mind- of what little emotion had seeped through- a desperate little voice had cried out for help. It hadn’t cried out in exact words, rather in feelings. His subconsciousness, perhaps. ‘I’m here,’ it had said. ‘I’m right here. Find me.’

You know what this made me think of?

‘Please come back,’ the voice had insisted. ‘Don’t leave me like everyone else has. I’m right here. I’m in pain and I’m right here.’

FEELS

Vanquishing Mirages, Chapter 14

“Fulbright! Don’t just…-!” –stand there with your mouth open as if you were attempting to catch insects? That wasn’t quite the right command to give. Too many words. “Help!”

Omgg

“What’s foolish about it? Rehabilitation is the best kind of justice! Criminals atoning for their misdeeds by helping others… It’s a much better fate for them than execution, don’t you think?”

So at this, I kind of just narrowed my eyes again once more and went “no, no, don’t you dare, story. Don’t you dare. He needs to die, remember? SO MAKE SURE HE DOES…”

BUT AT THE SAME TIME… This whole flashback segment with Simon and “Bobby” was nothing short of sheer brilliance. I couldn’t help but be impressed by it… If there was ANY way to introduce this rehabilitation concept into the story, to just throw it out there – this was it. So I was still in defensive mode, absolutely, and I was still fighting against it, but… The writing of the flashback scene is just so good that I kind of crossed my arms reluctantly and went, “WELL… I… I SUPPOSE I’M LISTENING? JUST A LITTLE?” How could I not grant the story at least a small little platform upon which it could make its case… For me to at least crack one eye open in attention… Even though, for all intents and purposes, I still absolutely wanted and believed it was necessary for the man we call the phantom –– to die. To be executed.

Anyway… also, the scene of Bobby and Simon holding onto each other, and the phantom… is so wonderful. I hope they stayed like that for minutes.

They sat there until the Phantom stirred in his hold. The movement managed to kickstart a semblance of Simon’s awareness and his hands released the spy’s shoulders. Even so, the Phantom didn’t push away from Simon’s chest. For a good fifteen seconds, he didn’t even speak. And then the words finally came. “Prosecutor Blackquill…”

Oh wow… OH WOW.

He became even more aware of just how closely the Phantom was pressing up against his chest and felt his brow furrow in dismay. Bobby said nothing.

Okay all I’m gonna say is… this is kinda… really funny in the sense that… Bobby’s perception of this situation and Simon’s perception of this situation are uh, VERY different.

“Wait! I’m not ready! I’m not ready to die! Wait! Let GO of me! ”

Oh goodness… Oh goodness… He’s not… He’s not ready to die anymore either… Which also changes things.

Vanquishing Mirages, Chapter 15

Ted Tonate and LaSoote go so well together – FIT well together, now that you mention the whole dismantling-designing thing. And I loooved their interactions when disassembling the bomb.

Vanquishing Mirages, Chapter 16

Bobby hesitated for a moment, not quite meeting Simon’s gaze. “… There’s more.” “More?” “I asked Athena and… She said that birth defects count as extenuating circumstances.”

Me: HMMMMM NARRATIVE. NARRATIVE. I THOUGHT WE TALKED ABOUT THIS…

Simon didn’t like where this was going. Not one bit. With that, his feelings on the matter didn’t seem quite so trivial anymore. “Fulbright. Whatever line of thinking you’re attempting to follow, I suggest you abandon it.”

IT’S SO WILD TO ME HOW CONSISTENTLY ALIGNED I AM WITH SIMON’S POV FOR THE VAST MAJORITY OF THIS WHOLE SERIES. Like. I barely need to say anything because Simon’s POV this chapter already has it all written out for me.

This whole line of thinking was so optimistic that Simon was sure it couldn’t be done.

The entirety of Lifting Spirits – (even the title is optimistic sounding!) – is just. The entire thing feels so optimistic and idealistic and – and it’s a thing that actually happens and it’s all so lovely and waaaah. We’ll get there. But yes, I, too, was sure it couldn’t be done. idealism & optimism way too off the charts.

Vanquishing Mirages, Chapter 17

To see whether a man who prided himself in having ‘no emotions’ would step down from his pedestal and become like every other mortal.

I LOVE THIS SENTENCE – THE WORDING OF IT – so so much you don’t even know. Like this is one of those sentences – one of many throughout this series from your writing – that was just left ringing in my mind well after I’d finished the chapter.

If Simon had thought the Phantom looked bad during the last trial day, it was nothing compared to this moment. Dark lines were set under his eyes, which were scrunched shut in some sort of lasting cringe. Simon was sure it was the regained memories that were to blame.

>:D hehehe…

It was Fulbright who ultimately broke the silence with a half-hearted attempt at a cheery disposition. “Hey. How are you feeling?” “Leave.” The Phantom didn’t bother to raise his head or even open his eyes. He uttered a single word and it was that.

When I sent my friend this snippet, she had such a perfect response to it that there’s nothing better I could possibly come up with, and with her permission I’m posting it here:

Oh my god… I’d totally forgotten about the phantom just taking it upon himself to roast them all in turn in this scene… It’s soooo good. This whole dynamic, of people – of characters being invested in someone who does NOT want it, who actively REJECTS it – just the whole image of anyone wanting to help the phantom and his SEVERE rejection of it is SO much fun.

“No one should have to ask. We were…” Bobby trailed off, unsure how to finish that sentence. “Worried?” The Phantom asked in a tone of voice that seemed almost spiteful.

Sdkjbdakjadkj BLESS THIS FIC.

I just, love the scene. It’s very good. I know I’m just a broken record of saying “I love this” at this point, have been for a while, but it’s because it’s TRUE.

… The person sitting before them could be someone. “Who he will be from now on is a dead man,” Simon began, once again earning him a mean scowl from Athena.

OMG I ACTUALLY LAUGHED AT THIS ON THIS READTHROUGH

Anticipation seemed to rise as the Phantom rocked himself back and forth in a calm pace. His face was still hidden behind his hands, fingers ruffling his uneven locks so forcefully that they might as well become entangled in a mess of frizzed blond. When at last he spoke, it was so quiet they could barely hear him. “Do you really believe it? That someone like me could still become human?”

THIS IS…….. DARE I SAY IT……… C-CUTE……

I’m calling him cute and you can’t stop me

They couldn’t predict what sort of effect removing the bone sliver would have. Even if the doctor was sure the procedure was safe, brain surgery was a tricky thing. It could just as well leave the Phantom paralyzed. Or perhaps the system responsible for emotions was damaged beyond repair after all this time.

Ohh I’m glad this is taken note of here, because I felt like the surgery was being portrayed as a little too easily straightforward a little closer to the fact in the narrative!

The Phantom drew one more ragged breath before responding. “Then… I will try.”

AAAAAAAAAA :D

Also just also. Wow. Can’t imagine how it went when Palaeno went in to visit him afterwards. xD

Here’s… the thing? During Haunted Specters, things like Bobby’s behaviour towards the phantom was odd and FUNNY. Fun to think about. And the dynamic certainly is still pretty amusing, but… There was some kind of tipping point along the way. A tipping point that was passed way prior to this point. It’s… kinda less of a joke now… Bobby’s caring behaviour is well and grounded in the story, in the setting… The “liminal space” left behind, discarded long ago. And Athena by his side with the same mindset…!

So, continuing on, we

[glances at the next chapter]

AAAAAAAND THAT’S ALL WE HAVE TIME FOR TODAY FOLKS.

S-see you… next time…!

[thosemultifandomwritings]

Ink Pt. 2 (Peter Parker x Reader)

Pairing: Peter Parker x Reader

Word Count: 1.7K

Summary: Soulmate AU where everything you write or draw on your skin appears on your soulmate too

Part 1  ...  Part 2  ...  Part 3 

Good luck on your chem test today!

You smiled down at your wrist, grabbing your bag before heading out the door. Walking down the many stairs of your apartment, you gripped a felt pen in your hand, cap gripped in between your teeth, careful not to loose it. Over the last few weeks, you had experimented with a lot of pens, and if you didn’t have a marker, felt tipped pens were the next best thing. It was soft enough on your skin and pretty easy to wash off. Honestly, you had gone through many pens these past few weeks.

Thanks P. Try not to write any equations on me this time, wouldn’t want to get caught cheating(:

Peter leaving his apartment in Queens couldn’t help the breathy laugh that escaped his mouth as he read the words appearing on his arm. He basically tripped over his own foot as he began his walk to the subway, pulling out one of the many pens that sat in his pocket.

It was one time!

The relationship between the two of you had flourished quickly in the past few weeks. Even with the little time you had known him, you had found yourself developing a cliché high school crush on a guy you had never even met.

You had learned his name was Peter and he was from Queens, which made you absolutely giddy inside. You yourself lived in Manhattan and knowing your soulmate lived so close brought you instant joy. People always said fate brought soulmates together, but you could have never pictured fate placing your soulmate a mere bus ride away.

You were having an amazing time getting to know Peter, but there was always a nagging voice in the back of your head to keep your guard up. Of course, having a soulmate was an absolute blessing. But soulmates are only human after all. You had heard countless stories of people who had developed a connection with their soulmate, only to have them ripped away from them by death and other horrible travesties. The soulmate bond is such a strong feeling, that many soulmates of those who had perished end up spiraling. You didn’t like to think these horrible things, but even from the little time you had known Peter, you couldn’t imagine not having him.

Despite this, you still caught yourself reaching for a pen anytime something amazing happened, or on the other hand, if something bad happened. You itched to tell Peter about almost every aspect of your day. It was as if there were a magnet between your hand and a pen, and you constantly found yourself trying to hold back from making a fool out of yourself before you had even gotten the chance to meet him.

Peter on the other end, was doing no better than you. He would constantly check his arm to make sure he didn’t miss a note from you. He had even equipped his Spidey suit to have room for a few ballpoint pens in case he found himself on the top of a building late one night and felt his arm tingle. On his late night Spider Man adventures, he would find himself in Manhattan more often than not. Sometimes he would picture one of the giant skyscrapers he would swing by would be your apartment, you sleeping away as he worked to keep the city safe.

The two of you up until this point had never discussed meeting up, but as the weeks went by, Peter felt an urge to meet you. An urge to see what you looked like. To meet the person he was destined to be with.

But he was also worried. He hadn’t told you anything about Spider-Man. I mean, what we he supposed to say? “Hey and by the way, you know Spider-Man? The red and blue spandex wearing crime fighter who can sling webs from his wrists? That’s me! You can look me up on YouTube!” Not only was that way too much to write on his arm, but he would sound like an absolute crazy person. Peter was already nervous enough talking to you, let alone telling you all about his alter ego. As Spider-Man became more of a household name, more and more enemies were coming out of the woodworks. Everyone knew about soulmates, and if one of the many villains that littered the streets were to find out the Spider-Man had an ultimate weakness? There’s no telling what could happen to you. What could happen to you all because of him. Peter refused to get you in the middle of his Spider business.

It was as if the two of you together shared an unspoken agreement that for now, you two would remain apart.

It was another few days later when Peter found himself at Avengers Tower. He had fallen asleep on the couch in one of the many lounges after a very long meeting with members of the group. Having so many strong personalities in one room was always mentally exhausting, especially if they happened to slightly disagree on something. This time, Steve had suggested an alternate plan to one they had already discussed, many members disagreeing with him and frankly wanting to be done with the meeting all together. Peter had taken Steve’s side in the argument, shocking some of the other members seeing as he usually kept pretty quiet and agreed with whatever Tony said. In short, Peter had really needed a nap.

As Peter’s eyes were closed, he felt a slight shiver run up his arm, causing him to stir from his sleep. As Peter’s eyes blinked open, adjusting to the light, the first thing he did was look down at his left arm.

Hey P...why is there a red white and blue star on my forehead...

It took him a few seconds to really process what you had written, but when he did, he jolted off the couch, tripping over a blanket someone must have put on him while he was sleeping. He ran to the first reflective surface he could find, which happened to be one of the any gigantic windows that littered the walls, and looked at his reflection. Smack right in the middle of his forehead sat a very crudely drawn star covered in a red, white and blue American flag.

Peter groaned, reaching into his pockets to find a pen to write back to you. Forgetting he had changed earlier, he silently cursed to himself as he came up empty handed. He jogged to the nearest place he knew a pen would be, which happened to be Tony’s lab.

“Mr. Stark I really need a pen!” He exclaimed, bursting through the door and immediately scanning the room.

“Whoa kid, where’s the fire?” Tony asked, looking up from some piece of metal, “And what in the actual hell is on your forehead?”

“Thor and Mr. Barton think they are so funny,” Peter grumbled, his eyes never leaving the many drawers he was currently scrambling through. Clint, who had been snickering with Thor upon seeing Peter’s appearance, quickly stopped as he heard Peter.

“Hey kid, you have no proof it was us,” he said shrugging while trying to keep a straight face, pretending to get back to work on one of his bows.

“Thor?” Tony asked, as if Thor were a small child whose parents already knew they were guilty.

“It was I and my good friend Clint,” Thor laughed deeply, grabbing Clint around the shoulders as Clint groaned. Peter, disconnected from the conversation at hand, had finally found a pen. Gripping it rather tightly in his hand, he lifted his shirtsleeve to scribble back to you.

I’m so sorry! My friends think that are funny. Hope it didn’t inconvenience you too much.

Finally exhaling, Peter tuned back into the conversation to hear Clint explaining rather loudly to Thor on the meaning of a secret. Pen still in hand, he stared at his arm waiting for your response. He found himself waking out of the lab towards the bathroom to clean his face, knocking into a few walls on the way as his eyes kept flickering back to his arm.

Just stayed in my room to avoid questions. Kinda dig the patriotic look. Your friends seem ready for war :P

Peter finally relaxed at knowing you weren’t annoyed and began to scrub his forehead with soap to rid himself, and you, from the rather bad drawing.

Some of them were in one, a while ago though

Peter had written it before he really thought about it, wanting to write it before the soap got in his eyes. In the middle of scrubbing, he realized what he had actually written and immediately began to scrub his arm. Maybe he could get it off before you saw it. Water now trickling down his face, he had most of the words off his arm, but it was too late.

A while ago? P...please tell me you aren’t an old man

Scrambling for the pen once again, it slipped from his wet fingers onto the ground. He practically pounced on it, writing in all caps back to you.

NO!

Your response came mere seconds later as Peter now sat down on the cold tile of the bathroom floor, rubbing his eyes vigorously as soap had now gotten in them. His eyes teared up as his eyes stung, blinking rapidly in order to be able to focus them on your words.

Calm down P, I can basically hear your heartbeat from Manhattan. I’m just joking

Ignoring the fact that he was also currently in Manhattan when you assumed he was home in Queens, he let out a loud breath. His cheeks turned a deep pink as he reread your message, his eyes lingered on the end. At the very end of the sentence, you had drawn a tiny heart.

He felt his own heart beat faster in his chest as his eyes stayed glued to the shape. After a few seconds, he physically shook his head to snap himself out of it. I mean, you clearly didn’t mean anything by it. At least that’s what Peter told himself to make the blood stop rushing to his cheeks.

His head tipped back to lean on the cool tile that surrounded the bathroom walls, his bloodshot eyes staring up at the ceiling. It would be an understatement to say that Peter was completely shocked at the effect you could have on him with one little shape. If this is how he reacted when he read a message from you, what the hell would he do if he were to ever meet you?

A/N: Next chapter will be a lil drama so buckle in guys and gals ;)

If you would like to be added to the taglist for the series, just let me know (Sorry if anyone got double notifications, first time uploading this there was a problem <3)

As always, requests and comments can be sent here .xx

Taglist 

@abswritesfandoms , @blackcat-midnight-thatsme , @axielle-suson , @justmilla , @noodleboylester , @squirrellover1967 , @sockywell , @iris-suoh , @tom-holland-imagines-are-us , @issyogirllexie , @embrace-themagic , @monster-alien-chode , @parker-underoos , @sergeantrosabellaswan

[sweetlysilent]

Secret Santa

Requested By: @yoyococo18

Omg puLEASE do one with Harrison he is my DAD (I had to add this okok :P)

Pairing: Harrison Osterfield x Reader

Description: It's Christmas Eve, you were told to meet at the Holland's house hold to do Secret Santa with all of your friends. You had picked Harrison's name, someone you were 'secretly' hoping you were going to get. Now as you were on your way to the Holland's, you were starting to wonder who had gotten you.

Warnings: It's super cute and fluffy yeet (also the secret santa group has five members so it doesn't really work out but lets pretend it does, okok bye)

Word Count: 2,111

A/N: Merry Christmas Eve everyone!!! & for those who don't celebrate Christmas happy holidays! or simply just have a very nice day :)) Also, I hope you enjoy this lil imagine.

"Y/N are you on your way?" Zendaya spoke through the phone, making you roll your eyes slightly.

"Yes, Z, I'm on my way, I'm currently in the car driving as we speak." You replied, your eyes staying focused on the road.

Safety first kids, safety first.

"Alright well hurry because I want to open gifts!" She squealed out of excitement, making you laugh as you turned down a street.

You were going to the Holland's house hold for Secret Santa, something you all had planned on doing this year.

It started out as a joke, but as time went on the more everyone wanted to do it, so that's how you ended up here, with a gift in the back seat.

"I'm serious guys I think it would actually be fun." Jacob smiled, looking at everyone around him.

"I mean if you all really want to do it we can, I don't have a problem with it." Tom chimed in, shrugging his shoulders as Harrison nodded in agreement with him.

You and Zendaya both gave a 'sure I'm down with whatever' answer, while Laura was overly excited that it was actually happening.

Harry and Sam had written down everyone's names, then placed them in a hat, before one by one you all picked a name at random.

You were secretly hoping you would get Harrison, and out of pure luck you picked his name, internally screaming and jumping around with pure joy.

"Earth to Y/N, how far long are you?" You heard Tom speak through the phone, snapping you out of your thoughts as you looked at your GPS.

"Like two minutes." You replied, before driving down his street and pulling into his driveway.

"Scratch that I'm here." You laughed, making him groan and laugh before saying a quick 'goodbye' and hanging up.

You turned the keys, making the car shut off as you reached back to grab your nicely wrapped gift.

You placed it under your arm as you grabbed your keys and phone before exiting the car and locking the doors, before walking up the driveway to the front door.

"Knock, knock, anyone home?" You shouted at the door, your knuckles hitting the wood as you heard footsteps rush towards the front door.

"Y/N! You made it!" Harrison smiled warmly at you, making your face heat up a bit as you smiled back at him.

"Of course! Did you really think I'd miss out on something like this?" You gasped dramatically, making him roll his eyes playfully at you as he stepped aside to let you enter the house.

"I'm actually really glad we did this whole secret santa thing." Harrison spoke, making you raise an eyebrow in curiosity.

"And why is that?" You questioned, looking over at him as he smiled down at his feet.

"I don't know honestly, it might be because of the person I picked, and what I got them and I'm just really excited to see their reaction." Harrison shrugged, the smile never leaving his face as he fiddled with his fingers.

You couldn't help but smile at him, he was so genuine and down to earth that it made your heart melt.

You both eventually made it to the kitchen where everyone else was, they were laughing, talking, eating food, drinking eggnog, overall just being happy carefree people.

"Hey Y/N's here!" Harry and Sam shouted, cheering as everyone shouted with them, making you laugh and do jazz hands as your entrance.

"Hey Harrison do you want some egg for your nog?" You smiled, biting your lip slightly to stop yourself from laughing at your dumb joke.

"You never fail to confuse me Y/N, even with something as simple as eggnog." Harrison chuckled, before walking over to the bowl, and filling up two cups of eggnog, one for him and one for you.

You both did a little 'cheers' before taking a swig of the creamy drink.

"WHO'S READY TO OPEN PRESENTS." Laura shouted, making you laugh, as everyone walked down to the family room.

"Laura I don't think I've seen you so excited over literally anything." Jacob laughed, making her smile widely.

"I can't help it, it's just so exciting because it's with you guys, and you're all such great people to spend such a nice holiday with." Laura smiled, making everyone give a round of 'awws.'

You all eventually sat down, your gifts in your laps as you waited for whoever was going to go first.

"So, who wants to go first and share who they got?" Tom questioned, looking at everyone who shrugged in response.

"I'll go first." Zendaya ended up volunteering, getting on her knees as she handed the gift to Jacob, who smiled widely at her.

"No way, you picked me? That's sick!" Jacob cheered, making her laugh as she told him to open it.

"No way! You got me a new seat of headphones! These are so dope, thank you Z." Jacob smiled, picking up the headphones and gawking at them in pure happiness.

"Alright I want to go next." Laura smiled, picking her gift up before handing it to Tom, surprising him.

"Should I be afraid?" He teased, making her roll her eyes playfully before motioning him to just open it already.

Tom peeled the wrapping paper off, revealing a new computer, shocking Tom.

"Laura, this is amazing! You didn't have to do this though." He looked at her in shock, making her smile and shake her head.

"I knew how you needed a new one really badly, and I saw this one and I just knew I had to get it for you." Laura smiled, shrugging her shoulders as Tom leaned over to give her a hug.

As you waited for Tom to give his present out, you couldn't help but glance over at Harrison who still hadn't gone, making your mind start to wander.

Was it possible he had gotten you?

How ironic would it to be that you both had gotten each other?

It was then Jacobs turn to hand his present out, he was overly happy with what he had gotten, making you all laugh and smile at how cheerful he was.

It was then Harrison's turn to go, he anxiously lifted his present up, before turning to you and handing it to you, making your eyes widen slightly.

What a small world.

You gave a shy smile, before handing your own present to him, making his eyes widen in realization.

You both had picked each other.

"That's so funny, you both randomly picked each other." Jacob laughed, making your face heat up slightly.

"That's how love birds work Jacob." Zendaya scolded playfully, making both your face and Harrison's turn a shade of red.

Was it really that obvious you liked him?

Was it really that obvious he liked you?

"You can open yours first if you want." Harrison smiled, as you nodded slightly, tearing the wrapping paper off.

Your eyes widened, looking down at the tickets in your hand, your mouth slightly agape.

"Harrison.." You whispered, looking up at the boy who was giving you a soft smile already.

"I knew how bad you wanted to go, so I thought maybe you'd like to go.. you know.. with me.." He added the last part quietly, but you heard it, you heard every word.

"I'd love to go with you." You smiled, leaning over to give him a tight hug, which he loved.

Harrison had gotten you tickets to Disney world, a place you had talked about going to for years, but never had the time or chance to ever go.

"Hold up, did Harrison just ask Y/N out?" Jacob broke the silence, making you smile shyly while Harrison gave a small grin.

"Um, yes! Dude where have you been?" Tom laughed, hitting Jacob on the arm as he rolled his eyes and whacked his friend back.

While the two fought back and forth, it was now Harrison's turn to open the gift you had gotten him.

Your heart started racing as he tore the paper off the present, there was no way you could top what he had gotten you.

"Y/N, this is amazing." Harrison whispered, a smile growing on his face as he looked back up at you.

You had gotten him a whole new camera set, he had talked about getting a professional camera with different lenses so he could make videos, take epic pictures, basically anything he wanted. But he was never able to go out and really spend the time looking for a set.

"I hope you like it, I wasn't sure which set you'd like more." You smiled, watching him as he lifted the different lenses up.

"I had gone to so many stores and asked a lot of people what was better and I eventually found this one and to me personally it was the best one." You shrugged, watching as his eyes light up each time he picked up a different piece.

"Y/N, I love it so much, thank you." Harrison smiled widely, giving you a hug as everyone made a 'aww' sound.

You all then eventually went back to the kitchen, getting more food and drinks.

Tom and Jacob both announced the idea of playing a game, which Zendaya and Laura were both completely down to do, while you and Harrison stayed in the kitchen.

"So, looks like our first date is going to be pretty epic." Harrison grinned, stepping back from the fridge, a whip cream bottle in his hand.

You raised an eyebrow, a small smile on your face as the grin on his face never left.

"It was already going to be epic, because I have a pretty epic date." You replied back, winking at him.

He shook his head, a laugh escaping his lips as he put some whip cream into his mouth.

You watched him, the smile growing on your face as he gave you a challenging look.

You had no time to escape, you were already doomed, and before you knew it, you had whip cream on your face.

"How dare you." You fake gasped, using your finger to wipe the whip cream off your nose, as Harrison laughed.

You glared at him playfully as he kept on eating the whip cream.

It took a lot of convincing, but you did end up taking the can away from him and placing it back in the fridge where it belonged.

"Hey Y/N, look up." Harrison nudged your arm, motioning to something above you.

You glanced up, and sure enough, there hanging above you both was the mistletoe.

Harrison gave you a cheeky smile, making your cheeks heat up, and before you knew it, your lips were interlocked.

The kiss was soft and passionate, as if you both had craved this moment for years, which wasn't a lie.

He eventually pulled away, his cheeks tinted a light red while yours were a rosy red color.

You both smiled at each other, amazed this was all really happening.

"I'm so glad that mistletoe was there." Harrison chuckled quietly, making your eyes snap up to look at him.

"You didn't put that there intentionally?" You questioned, your eyebrows scrunched together in confusion.

"No. I thought you did." Harrison responded, his own eyebrows scrunching together.

After a moment of thinking, both your eyes widened, glancing over to the family room.

"I TOLD YOU GUYS IT WOULD WORK!" You heard Jacob shout in excitement.

"SHIT I OWE YOU TEN DOLLARS NOW." Zendaya complained.

"I OWE HIM TWENTY SHUT UP, I'M MORE AT A LOSS HERE." Tom whined.

"I'm just glad they finally kissed, it's only been YEARS." Laura shouted the last part, making you both laugh.

It was surely a secret santa they would remember.

Tags: @the-crime-fighting-spider

[weekendwarriorblog]

The Weekend Warrior 8/27/21 - CANDYMAN, LILY TOPPLES THE WORLD, TOGETHER, VACATION FRIENDS, NO MAN OF GOD, and More

There’s only one new wide release this week, and I’m so happy about that, that I’m gonna say the name of that movie FIVE TIMES!

Candyman

Candyman

Candyman

CANDYMAN (Universal)

Well, you get the idea. Jordan Peele seems to have done it again with this sequel the 1992 movie from Bernard Rose, although in this case he’s just co-writing and producing along with the film’s actual director, Nia DaCosta, who directed a small indie called Little Woods, which not that many people saw but that played at the Tribeca Film Festival a bunch of years back.

Of course, the movie is really being sold on the basis of Peele’s involvement, because he had such success with two horror movies as a director, the Oscar-winning Get Out in 2017 and Us two years later. Both of those movies grossed over $175 million domestically and another $75 to 82 million overseas. Get Out opened with just $33 million, which is fairly impressive for an R-rated horror comedy, but Us opened with over $70 million based on the popularity and success of Get Out.

Peele and DaCosta have another decent cast with Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, possibly best known for playing Black Manta in James Wan’s Aquaman, playing the lead, an artist named Anthony Mccoy, who learns about the myths of the Candyman at the Chicago projects, Cabrini-Green. He also starred in Peele’s Us right after that, and also appeared in The Greatest Showman with Hugh Jackman, another huge domestic hit. Later this year, he’ll appear (presumably as the younger Morpheus) in The Matrix Resurrections. HIs girlfriend and art curator Brianna is played by Teyonah Parris, who might be best known for her role as Monica Rambeau in the Disney+ series, WandaVision, a role she’ll reprise in next year’s The Marvels, which will reunite her with director DaCosta, as she becomes a full-fledged superhero with the film’s star, Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel. The movie also stars Colman Domingo, who had a big breakout by starring in HBO’s Euphoria, the AMC spin-off Fear the Walking Dead, and well-received movies (at least critically) like Zola and Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom. That’s a pretty amazing trio right there for the movie, and they’ll help the movie get the hoped-for African-American moviegoers but also the young people who enjoy horror.

Horror has generally done okay during the pandemic, although obviously, there’s been a lot of sequels with John Krasinski and Emily Blunt’s A Quiet Place Part II doing the best of all of them. More recent sequels like Escape Room: Tournament of Champions and Don’t Breathe 2 haven’t done as well. And there’s no way around the fact that Candyman is a sequel, but it’s a sequel to a movie that came out nearly 30 years ago, which doesn’t mean that young people will have that close a connection to it.

Maybe it’s no surprise that reviews for the movie have been stellar, similar to Peele’s other two movies, although some definitely have issues with the movie. (My review of Candyman can be found over at Below the Line.)

Candyman seems good for an opening somewhere in the low-to-mid $20 millions, although the anticipation for the movie, and its strong draw within the Black community could give it a nice bump ala the movies Peele has directed. Expect the movie to do especially well on Thursday and Friday, but I think anticipation will make it fairly front-loaded as would be the case with most horror movies released in the summer. (I also expect a massive 55%+ drop next week when Marvel opens Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.)

But in the meantime, this is where I see this week’s top 10.

1. Candyman (Universal) - $22.7 million N/A

2. Free Guy (20th Century/Disney) - $11.5 million -38%

3. Paw Patrol: The Movie (Paramount) - $7.5 million -43%

4. Jungle Cruise (Walt Disney Pictures) - $3.9 million -40%

5. Don’t Breathe 2 (Sony/Screen Gems) - $2.5 million -50%

6. Respect (MGM) - $2 million -47%

7. The Suicide Squad (Warner Bros.) - $1.6 million -52%

8. The Night House (Searchlight) - $1.5 million -48%

9. The Protégé (Lionsgate) - $1.4 million -52%

10. Reminiscence (Warner Bros.) - $900k -54%

A great film I saw at SXSW earlier this year that’s finally coming out and is therefore, this week’s “THE CHOSEN ONE” is the doc LILY TOPPLES THE WORLD (Discovery+) from director Jeremy Workman, which follows the amazing life of 20-year-old domino artist and YouTube sensation Lily Hevesh, who has built up a following due to her amazing domino constructions.

The movie works as a documentary on so many levels, first in terms of relaying Lily’s history as a Chinese orphan adopted at the age of one by non-Asian parents and how that affected her life and her interest in discovery, which ultimately led her to this passion. But building and toppling domino art is much more than a hobby as Ms. Hevesh has been able to monetize her passion with a thriving YouTube channel and also being hired by big corporations to create domino art for commercials and such. I’m not sure how long Workman was following her around but we do get to see Lily in all sorts of environments. We mostly get to see her as entrepreneur as she’s designing and developing her own line of dominoes that would be ideal for the work she does.

Lily Hevesh is just so inspirational and watching this amazing woman go through her life and the wonder she creates in others makes this one of my favorite docs of the year. It will stream on Discovery+ starting Thursday but you can also catch it in NYC at the IFC Center starting Friday.

Over the weekend, I caught a movie that I missed when it got a platform release in New York and L.A. on August 6, as well as when it played at the Tribeca Film Festival back in March. David Gutnik’s Materna (Utopia), an anthology of sorts about four very different women, played by the wonderful Kate Lyn Sheil,Jade Shete, Lindsay Burdge, and Assol Abudllina (the second and fourth of those who co-wrote the script with Gutnik). It’s an interesting anthology that deals with four women who are on the same New York subway when an incident happens, but it never really goes too far into the incident, or even resolves it, since it’s more about the individual women and their lives. I was really only familiar with Sheil and Burdge, although I like the former’s segment more than the latter, though they’re both strange looks at motherhood. I’ll freely admit that there were aspects to all the stories I didn’t get, but I think I ultimately enjoyed the final Assol Abudllina segment the best, even though that’s the only one not in English. I don’t think Materna (which is now available digitally on TVOD) will be for everyone, but it’s certainly an intriguing and somewhat enigmatic film from Gutnik and his collaborators.

Premiering on Hulu Friday is Clay Tarver’s comedy VACATION FRIENDS (Hulu), starring John Cena and Lil Rel Howery as two guys who meet while on vacation with their partners Kyla (Meredith Hagner) and Emily (Yvonne Orji), and they become friends! Okay, there’s a lot more to the movie than that, but I’m embargoed until Friday at midnight so there’s not much more I can say. I do think it’s interesting that this was originally announced in 2005 with Nicholas Cage and Will Smith in the lead roles, and at one point, Chris Pratt and his ex-wife Anna Faris were attached, as well as Ice Cube. It certainly would have been interesting to see any of those pairings, and maybe this would have gotten a theatrical release rather than just streaming.

Mini-Review: A high-concept movie like this could definitely be very funny or absolutely horrible, because it is basically a buddy comedy that relies so much on whether the leads can be funny on screen together. I generally like Lil Rel Howery (even though he’s literally been everywhere this year and is in danger of getting into a James Corden level of annoying) as well as John Cena, who I’ve been a fan of from his wrestling days.

Like I said, the premise is really simple, Howery’s Marcus and his girlfriend Emily are vacationing in Mexico where he plans to propose when they encounter Cena’s Ron and his girlfriend Kyla, who are clearly having the time of their lives, but they’re also the kind of people you don’t want to spend too much time with since they’re VERY LOUD. They end up spending a lot of time together and when they go their separate ways, Marcus thinks that’s it. He and Emily continue to plan their wedding with Marcus trying to prove himself to Emily’s military father Larry (Chuck Cooper). Of course, Ron and Kyla show up and make everyone uncomfortable as they “do their thing” to ruin Marcus’ wedding.

Comedy is a tough thing to critique and gauge how people will receive it, because everyone finds different things funny, and I’m sure that most actual critics will find many reasons to hate this, because it’s incredibly inappropriate and quite low brow. Fortunately, the movie doesn’t rely merely on Ron and Kyla making Marcus uncomfortable as when the movie transitions into a wedding comedy, there’s lots of family dynamics to add to the humor.

Although The Suicide Squad is still Cena’s best and funniest movie of the summer, this is another example of how he’s really trying to mix things up with his acting roles, and even though he’s still way behind Dwayne Johnson in terms of getting to the A-List. Howery is definitely better in this than in some of his other recent movies (koffSPACE JAMkoff), and he continues to be a really strong comic actor that does well with the right material.

Hagner is hilarious and I’m sure I’ve seen her being just as funny elsewhere but some of the best laughs are when she’s faking out Marcus and Emily, but she’s also a great counter to Cena. Unfortunately, that means Orji almost always has to play the straight-person to the other three, but there’s a lot of great set-ups for laughs around her. There are some things that feel played and overdone like the gag of Marcus and Ron getting high and what happens with that, but then there are more original yucks as well.

Ultimately, Vacation Friends does what it’s intended to do. As far as vacation/destination comedies go, this one could have been a hell of a lot worse, but the combination of cast and Tarver’s direction makes this a consistently funny movie that probably would have done okay with audiences in theaters.

Rating: 7/10

I haven’t had a chance to see the Pen15 Animation Special, which also debuts on Hulu this Friday, but I’m looking forward to it for sure, as I love this show.

The pandemic dramedy TOGETHER (Bleecker Street), directed by the great Stephen Daldry and Justin Martin, is the definition of a two-hander as it stars James McAvoy and Sharon Morgan (from last year’s Military Wives) as a couple who end up quarantined together during the COVID pandemic even though they clearly loathe each other and probably shouldn’t be together.

This is a movie where I really didn’t know what to expect, but it’s very dark and can’t necessarily be called a comedy and definitely not a romantic comedy, but is something akin to last year’s Malcolm and Marie, although in this case it’s very much meant to be taking place in the here and now. At first, the movie does seem to be fairly funny because of the jabs the two actors take at each other, but then it gets quite dramatic as it deals with her Mum dying in the hospital on her own.

In many ways, Together seems like something that would have worked just as well as a fast-paced play, since writer Dennis Kelly doesn’t make it anything that couldn’t be put on stage, although Daldry and Martin do find ways to keep it interesting as the two actors are moved around their flat. What’s particularly interesting is the pace which starts out quite quickly but then it slows down and gets quite dramatic as each actor goes off to do their own monologue.

It also deals with the seriousness of how badly England was struck by Covid, and it even gets into the mad rush to get the vaccine and the crazy things people would do in order to get it as soon as possible. Much of the question surrounding the duo is how they possibly could have at one time loved each other but now hate each other as their young son is seen in the background during their fiercest arguments. You spend much of the movie wondering whether they can reconcile and get back together, but more importantly, whether they should.

Listen, I’ve long been a fan of McAvoy, and I’ve always known what he could do as an actor but Horgan is a nice surprise, and it’s amazing to see two actors really push each other to get this amazing dual performance that drives the film.

Together covers a lot of ground, and its combination of an amazing script and two actors who can clearly dig in and really get the most out of it makes it a completely riveting film. Everyone involved with this movie has created a really brilliant piece of cinematic drama that can probably withstand multiple viewings to really appreciate what they’ve done, but especially for those two massive performances.

A movie that also debuted at Tribeca is Amber Sealey's NO MAN OF GOD (RLJFilms), another two hander of sorts with Elijah Wood playing Special Agent Bill Hagmaier and Luke Kirby playing notorious serial killer, Ted Bundy. The movie takes place in the mid-80s as Bundy is on death row at the Florida State Prison and Bill is trying out the FBI’s new methods of profiling serial killers in order to find them before they kill more people.

This is another movie that didn’t really click with me when I saw it at Tribeca, but I wanted to watch it again and give it another chance. This is definitely my kind of movie, and you can definitely see how the interviews between Hagmaier and Bundy could have led to things like the novels by Thomas Harris or David Fincher’s Mindhunter series on Netflix.

It’s well-written by Kit Lesser and the performance by Kirby is particularly strong, as he has a method of speaking that lulls you into a false sense of security, but overall, the delivery and pace of the film just isn’t as compelling as it could and should have been. The whole thing feels kind of stiff and staid, and while I like the idea behind the movie.

The movie also has a pretty amazing score, which does add a lot when things just aren’t very interesting, but as much as this is meant to be dark and creepy ala Silence of the Lambs, it just never fully delivers on the promising concept.

Premiering on Apple TV+ this Friday is the second season of the fantasy series, See, starring Jason Momoa and Dave Bautista, but I still haven’t seen the first season, so nothing more to add here.

Other movies out this week include:

BEHEMOTH (Level 33 Entertainment)

DEFINING MOMENTS (VMI Worldwide)

THE COLONY (Lionsgate)

Next week, Marvel Studios is back with a brand new hero in its MCU, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.