#at least in my entomology experience

[nikkidee]

Are we talking common names here? Cause if we're talking common names I'd argue you don't even need to find a new species.

Common names are just, well, commonly used and recognized names. The only "regulated" names are the scientific ones. As my botany professor once told me, if someone asks you for a common name for a species, just make it up because it's as real as any other common name.

For example, since neither are Latin binomial names, "Australian White Ibis" and "Bin Chicken" are both equally valid common names for Threskiornis molucca. Debatably Bin Chicken is the better common name because I could remember it and I could Google it to find the scientific name.

Which is all to say, just pick any bird, give it a nickname, get the nickname to catch on, boom you named a bird.

If you find a new kind of bird can you name it anything? I want to name a bird the Ass Grabber 5000.

i respect the hustle but I’m pretty sure it doesn’t quite work like that

[damedechance]

seek&destroy

read pt1 on ao3 || listen to the playlist

You're telling me I got to talk with @foundress0fnothing for the past few weeks (my favorite person) and write about Gwynriel (my two favorite idiots)? I have seriously enjoyed getting to know my precious giftee a little bit more during this event and I am so so so excited to finally share part of what I've been working on!!! Em, I hope you know how cherished you are in this little fandom community, and I hope this fic can bring you even just the littlest spark of joy! Love you endlessly, Santa 🌟

Pairing: Gwynriel

Parts: 1 of 5

Rating: Explicit (for eventual smut)

Summary: Those with a link to a realm long gone now live in secret, and Gwyneth Berdara is one of them. After a horrific tragedy rends her life apart, Gwyn finds herself in good company with her fellow Valkyries, a group of vigilantes who work to restore the forgotten relics of a land called 'Prythian.' When Gwyn's work brings her to an illustrious museum, her own world collides with that of the mysterious Shadowsinger--an encounter that leads to her vowing to bring him to his untimely end. [[FOR @acotargiftexchange]]

Read below for all of Chapter One:

CHAPTER ONE

Too. Many. Legs.

There were just too many legs, Gwyn thought, as she stared in open-mouthed horror at the projector screen. Just as she swallowed down a gag at the sight of the ghastly images before her, the presenter gestured passionately towards the slides, his tall frame and abhorrent posture giving the illusion of the rounded shell of a beetle. So uncanny was his resemblance to the subject of his own presentation, the species he’d apparently devoted his entire career to–the cerambycid beetle. Gwyn fought back a shiver. Or a scream of terror.

Not that she wasn’t sympathetic to his cause. A glance at the pamphlet in front of her revealed that he held a PhD in entomology–a degree she knew from personal experience was all but impossible if you didn’t feel truly dedicated to your work. He was probably a sweet old man, she struggled to convince herself. Someone like her, a person so entirely enamored with their subject of study that the less attractive facets of the field were of no consequence. In fact, she admired that sort of devotion. 

Still, the clearly impassioned man wasn’t exactly persuading her to actually take up an interest in the study of insects. Gwyn suspected that the sight of those beetles was the primary driving force in that decision. Especially since she still couldn’t keep her eyes open for more than five minutes at a time, and was currently squeezing them shut as she counted out her deep, steadying breaths. Just a few moments of relief from the images on the screen was all she needed.

When she opened her eyes again, the presenter had switched to the next slide, which revealed a close-up view of the beetle’s segmented underbelly. Heaving, Gwyn bit down on her tongue as she felt the blood drain from her face. To distract herself from the urge to evacuate the contents of her  stomach, Gwyn allowed her eyes to drift aimlessly about the room.

For not the first time, she was grateful that she’d been able to secure a seat for herself in the back of the auditorium. The badge hanging from the bright red lanyard across her neck proclaimed her a professor of entomology at the Dunmere College of Arts and Sciences, but she imagined that if any of the other conference attendees saw how green her face was, that title would prove itself somewhat implausible.

If nothing else, Gwyn needed to be sure that her act was flawless tonight. By the end of the Annual Entomology Society Conference, she wanted to have every single person in this room reasonably convinced that she was an ardent scholar of…bugs. Or, at the very least, she needed to not raise anyone’s suspicions to the contrary.

Perhaps if she simply kept sitting in the back, then.

Sighing quietly, Gwyn shifted down in her seat and allowed her legs to spread out in front of her. If she were to be stuck here, listening to the keynote speaker for the next–she checked the clock hanging above the door–five minutes, she should at least get comfortable. She crossed her arms over her chest, fingers tapping impatiently across her biceps, and stared unseeingly at the screen.

The minutes passed excruciatingly slowly. More legs, more antennae, more larvae, and by the end of the time Gwyn was biting on the insides of her cheeks to prevent herself from screaming in abject horror at each new, impossibly grotesque image. Until finally, the presenter reached the end of his slides, and only a blank screen appeared above his head.

“Right,” the bug doctor said. He pushed his wire-rimmed glasses up his nose, and began shuffling his papers over the podium. “Thank you all for such a thrilling discussion of cerambycid communities and their impact as an invasive species.”

Thrilling. Gwyn snorted to herself, and when more than a few heads turned in her direction, she quickly masked it as a sneeze.

“I will be available for a Q&A session later this afternoon,” the presenter continued, his finger prodding one of the papers on the top of his stack, as if pointing to a time. “Until then, I suggest perusing the rest of the museum for the insect nursery, where I am told some cerambycid beetle larvae are on display. Do take note of the well-progressed sclerotisation of the mouth parts, and if you find yourself peckish, I hear the cafe has an excellent gelato stand.”

That the presenter could possibly utter the words sclerotisation and gelato in the same sentence only served to confirm for Gwyn that she needed to get out of that room as soon as possible. Eagerly standing up, she shoved her notebook full of fake notes into her bag, and began to walk down the auditorium steps with the rest of the meager audience. Entomology was not a popular field apparently, and Gwyn could hazard a guess as to why.

As she approached the stage where the bug doctor still stood at the podium, politely accepting words of praise from some of the other attendees, Gwyn thought she hear the words antennal sockets and low tubercles, and immediately quickened her pace, slipping past others to ensure that she was towards the middle of the pack, instead of at the very end.

Sighing in relief as soon as she stepped out of the auditorium and into one of the connecting halls outside of the exhibits, Gwyn followed the flow of the crowd. She slipped her phone out of her pocket, pretending to be texting so that none of the bug enthusiasts would attempt to engage her in some conversation about pupation. Only looking up occasionally from her notes app where she just repeatedly typed the words ew ew ew, Gwyn nearly yelped when she heard a voice in her ear. 

“You missed your turn,” Emerie said, her voice slightly crackling through the earpiece hidden behind Gwyn’s hair.

She cleared her notes app, quickly typing the words, I know. And Sorry.

A tinny sigh in her ear. “That’s okay, just don’t attract attention. Pretend to look interested in the exhibit.”

Gwyn locked her phone, slipping it back into her bag as she lifted her head. Immediately regretting the action, once she came face to face with hundred of wiggling, nasty looking larvae.

This time, Gwyn couldn’t hold back her yelp, though she did manage to close her mouth in time to capture the sound, so that it didn’t disrupt the group of people that had gathered to marvel at the nasty little things. Pointing out some fascinating detail of another, as they crowded around the glass window into the bug nursery. In hindsight, Gwyn really should have expected that following the crowd of conference attendees would have led her here.

Carefully controlling her breathing rate so that she wouldn’t alert the others, Gwyn took several steps backwards from the case before turning and walking in the direction of the entrance to the next exhibit. One glance around the room revealed to her that the rest of the entomologists were already deeply engrossed with the contents of the many cases around them, and so Gwyn was able to easily slip out of the room without attracting notice.

The adjoining exhibit, a hall of various bones and skeletons, was relatively less crowded, and Gwyn was just as easily able to weave her way in and out of the gathered bodies. She allowed her head to swivel around, if only to appear as any other mildly interested patron, but stayed resolute in her path towards the exhibit that she’d originally missed.

“Slow down,” Emerie hissed in her ear. “Or at least pretend to be looking for the bathroom.”

Gwyn huffed, shoulders sagging as she forced herself to slow down somewhere in the middle of the ocean exhibit. Above her, the lights illuminated the room in slowly shifting shades of blue, casting the impression of walking along the ocean floor. She ran a hand over her face, and continued walking at a much more deliberate pace.

Admittedly, the museum was rather impressive and on any other day, Gwyn would have been among all of the other patrons, staring wide-eyed at the displays and devotedly reading each and every plaque. 

But she wasn’t here to admire the museum. The entomology conference had only been an excuse for Gwyn to come to the Helion Museum of Natural History. If she had simply attended as a regular patron, without a purpose for ambling through the halls other than pure entertainment, she wouldn’t have been granted a keycard that allowed her access to some of the more restricted sections of the museum.

She’d already taken advantage of that privilege the previous day, when she and the other conference attendees took a tour of the research wings, where the archivists and conservationists worked. Their guide had taken them through room upon room of lovingly organized samples stacked in neat rows upon the shelves or spread across tables as researchers gently worked to clean and preserve them. The ultimate purpose of the tour had been to view the yet unveiling showing of moths as the archivists carefully pinned and labeled them, but Gwyn had conveniently slipped out under the guise of a bathroom break before that ever happened. That night, she returned home to Nesta and Emerie with a neatly drawn map of nearly the entire research wing.

Now, as Gwyn ambled through the ocean exhibit, the brilliant displays of coral and skeletons of various sea creatures rose up around her. She walked slowly, arms crossed over her badge so that anyone passing her wouldn’t note that she’d wandered off from the rest of the entomologists. Emerie gently murmured her approval in Gwyn’s ear, just as she crossed the threshold into the next exhibit, a sign above it advertising the Space and Astronomy hall.

The entrance was a long, dark tunnel with white swirling lights on the rounded ceilings and walls. Not resembling stars, but instead pulsing from one end to another like a portal. Gwyn was the only one walking through it, and belatedly she realized that this was a relatively slow day and hour for the museum. She hadn’t seen many other patrons, except for the rest of the bug crew, and as she walked out of the tunnel and into the dimly lit chamber that was the space exhibit, she realized that she was the only one there, save for the security guard currently leaning against a wall and staring at the toe of his boot.

Gwyn adjusted her glasses, slowly winding around case after case of space memorabilia. Some artifacts collected from the surface of the moon, and hundreds of chunks of rock from meteorites that had crashed to earth. She paused at a few signs for good measure, but her gaze was drawn to the ceiling above, which was a careful recreation of the constellations in the night sky.

As she made her way to the end of the hall, Gwyn nearly tripped over a small pedestal that appeared to rise up out of nowhere. She stumbled back, staring dumbfounded at the small, square case that shone more brightly than any of the others in the entire museum thus far. 

Just a small, glass box atop a narrow pedestal at the center of the corridor, right before the entrance to the next exhibit. And she was so close, Emerie was murmuring in her ear a list of reminders of what to take note of as soon as she entered the next room–but Gwyn couldn’t resist. That one lone box, that felt like it had been waiting for her.

Slowly, she approached, carefully leaning over the glass case to observe the contents, only to see that it was a single glass tube, stoppered at the end with a metal cap.

Gwyn sucked in a sharp breath, holding it as if letting it out would disturb the little granules safely behind several layers of glass. She admired it, this fine powdery substance within the tube that almost looked like glitter, it was so reflective. She didn’t know what it was, only that it was beautiful, catching the light in this oddly mesmerizing way, and there was so little of it. A pinch, really.

Her eyes flashed to the small sign below the display, and read the label: Presolar Grains.

Lips parted in awe, Gwyn looked back to the small tube, and recognized the particles inside as actual stardust. The dust from stars formed billions of years ago, before the sun even existed. She reached out, her five fingers spread across the glass as she crouched to get on eye level with it.

How something so outstanding could be kept in a place as unassuming  as this–just perched on a small pedestal in a vacant section of the museum–was a wonder to her. There should have been hundreds of people crowding around this very case, craning their necks for a chance to see it, this evidence that something had existed before the sun.

“What is it?”

Gwyn jumped as soon as the voice sounded behind her, whirling around with her arm out in front of her with the impulse to shove the person away. With Emerie berating her in her ear, Gwyn managed to suppress her instincts just in time, her eyes widening as they trailed up a man’s chest to his face.

She was met with easily the most gorgeous eyes she’d ever seen. Like molten bronze, these fluent pools of amber and hints of green, and she staggered back, catching herself with a hand atop the case behind her.

“Careful,” the man said, a hint of amusement in his voice as he took half a step forward. Either to catch her, or peel her hand off the case, she couldn’t tell. “The guards might think you’re trying to steal something.”

Gwyn tore her hand off the case as if she’d been burned, hastily stepping aside to put as much distance between herself and the display as she could. She had the strangest feeling, that his eyes had tunneled straight through her, and could somehow see her true intentions as if they’d been written out just as plainly as any other sign in the museum–there was no other reason. He knew why she was there.

But as her heart hammered in her chest at the prospect of her cover being blown, the man only gave her a small smile, really just a fleeting jump at the corner of his mouth, before stepping forward and leaning over the case.

“What are you doing?” Emerie was screeching in her ear. “Leave, geology is in the next room.”

But so perplexed was Gwyn by the man in front of her, that she felt rooted to the spot. Her head cocked slightly to the side as she studied him. How he silently mouthed the words as he read them on the sign, how the slight hook of his nose caught the light emanating from the case, sending an elongated shadow across his face, carving out his cheekbone. Those eyes that were framed by long arching eyelashes and hair that was so dark it seemed to absorb and devour all of the light.

Something about him bothered her.

Suddenly, his head turned, an amused smile already melting over his face as he looked at her. Gwyn jumped, eyes going wide as she pretended like she’d been doing anything other than assessing him. But the man straightened, stepping away from the case to stand slightly in front of her.

“What’s your name?” he asked, his eyes slowly traveling down to the badge around her neck before she could answer.

Gwyn hurried to cover it with a hand, some deeply ingrained instinct of self preservation telling her that she couldn’t trust him despite his friendly smile or Emerie’s pleas for her to just act normal. 

He lifted a brow at her, his gaze snapping back to her face.

“Is it a secret?” he said.

“Diana,” she blurted, forcing her hand to lift away from the badge. “Diana Bishop.”

He simply stared at her for a moment, before letting out a short, caustic laugh.

“Okay.”

Gwyn narrowed her eyes, her hands turning into fists as she studied him. Gorgeous face aside, he looked absolutely normal. Black shirt tucked into immaculately pressed and tailored trousers. Stylish, attractive even–but decidedly normal.

Why, then, couldn’t she smother the feeling that he knew all of her deepest and darkest secrets?

“What was that?” she asked, flinching slightly when her voice came out slightly more accusatory than she supposed it should have. She could at least keep up the appearance that she didn’t suspect him of anything.

“Just let it go,” Emerie hissed in her ear. “Apologize and walk away.”

Apologize. For being her best friend, Emerie apparently didn’t know her at all, because instead of walking out, Gwyn took a step forward, invading the man’s space, crossing her arms over her chest so that they bumped against him. And when she looked up to his face, where she expected to see reproach, instead she saw eagerness.

“Nothing,” he practically purred. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Diana.”

Gwyn frowned, her eyes roving over his face for any sort of tell. Reason told her that he couldn’t have been like her. He was tall, and built like a damn soldier with those broad shoulders and muscles pulling the fabric of his shirt taut over his chest, but there was no way he was dangerous. He had to be normal.

And then there was that gut feeling. Like electricity arcing over her skin, sirens blaring in her ears. He had come out of nowhere.

“And what’s your name?” Gwyn said derisively.

“Fine,” Emerie sighed, resigned, into her ear. “If you won’t listen to me, fine, but when Nesta comes back–”

Irritated, Gwyn jerkily tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, hooking her finger into the clear cord of her earpiece and tucking the entire thing into her palm in one movement so that he couldn’t see.

“Azriel,” he said, reaching his hand out. She noticed scars running up the lengths of his fingers towards his wrist, and she stared at the nearly mesmerizing patterns for far too long before she realized that she was meant to shake it, and she still had the earpiece in her palm.

“I have to go,” Gwyn said slowly, backing away and angling her body towards the entrance to the next exhibit.

She put Azriel at her back as she paced towards the short corridor leading to the gems and minerals exhibit, her steps quickening as she passed by the security guard she’d spotted earlier.

Azriel wouldn’t follow her, she assured herself as she crossed into the gems and minerals exhibit, where there were countless glittering gems winking at her beneath the lights. He wouldn’t follow her, because she had been so off putting and strange, he wouldn’t deem her worthy of the effort.

Placated for now, Gwyn adjusted her glasses over her nose, and swiveled her head about the room so that the camera hidden in the frames could capture the overall layout of the exhibit. It was a rushed job, not nearly as meticulous as it would have been if she wasn’t so paranoid that Azriel would jump out of nowhere with twenty armed guards ready to escort her to some secret dungeon in an underground government bunker.

Been there, done that.

She considered popping her earpiece back in, but just as she rounded the first display case at the center of the hall, a mother and child came bounding down the aisle, stopping right next to her to admire a row of amethyst.

She backed up, allowing the little boy some space, and was about to continue her walk around the rest of the room, when she ran into something hard, all of the air whooshing out of her lungs.

“Ugh,” Gwyn grunted, as hands wrapped around her upper arms and steadied her.

“Sorry,” the same voice from before said, helping her to turn around. Of course he’d followed her. She’d been off putting and strange, and he was definitely not normal.

Gwyn glared up at him, all pretenses of being some bookish bug enthusiast easily forgotten. He had found her out, she was sure of it, and she now dedicated all of her efforts towards thinking of a way to get rid of him. Collecting footage of the display cases so Emerie could catalog the contents for later was secondary, because clearly he was a threat to the mission.

Belatedly, she wished she hadn’t taken out the earpiece.

“What do you want?” Gwyn said, a hushed whisper so that the family behind her wouldn’t pick up on the thinly veiled hostility.

Azriel furrowed his brows. So he was going to pretend to be confused, then.

“You left in a hurry,” he explained. “I thought you might be in some sort of trouble, so I came to ask if you needed help. I didn’t mean to run into you.”

Gwyn scoffed. “Yeah, sure. Look, I really should be getting back.”

He hummed thoughtfully, his eyes drifting down to her badge again.

“To the… bugs?”

“Screw you,” Gwyn blurted.

She whirled away, stalking down the aisle as the mother gasped and clapped her hands over her son’s ears. Gwyn didn’t even bother with trying to capture more footage. Her cover was blown, and all she needed to do now was lose her tail without attracting anymore attention.

Unfortunately, that also meant it was rather easy for her pursuer to catch up to her. 

She supposed she could kill him, if it came down to it.

“Did I insult your profession somehow?” He asked, jogging up beside her. “Was I not supposed to call them bugs?”

He came in front of her, trying to capture her gaze, which forced her to halt right beside a large tower of some type of quartz. She knew, not because she bothered to look at it, but because the reflection of it glimmered in his eyes.

“Get out of the way,” Gwyn said through her teeth as she rolled the earpiece within her palm. She glanced around him, eyes noting the camera wedged up against the ceiling. Murder was out, then.

He only smirked down at her, and just the sight of that gentle arch of his mouth was enough to convince her that he was privy to her homicidal intent, somehow. Any normal person would have walked away by now. He was staring her down like an adversary.

“Sure,” he said easily, stepping out of her way, and then waiting. Like he expected her to walk with him. “Maybe you could show me around? I had a bug phase as a kid, you know.”

Gwyn pushed ahead for the exit, struggling to ignore him as he easily matched her pace. If she could just lead him into an empty stairwell, she would be able to lose him. Knock him unconscious, and then leave him there for some poor museum employee to find. She could do it.

She tried to ignore him, and failed because then he started rambling about egg sacs, and Gwyn couldn’t take it anymore.

“Shut up,” she said. On an impulse, she grabbed his arm and pulled him with her towards a door marked Staff Only in a secluded vestibule off of the gem and mineral exhibit.

As the door clicked shut behind them, Gwyn immediately regretted her decision. Chest heaving, she looked around to see that she’d brought them into a storage room. Small, but not as tight as a closet, even with the towering stacks of clearly labeled bins around them. There were no windows, and the only lights were the strips of LEDs along the floor marking the narrow aisles.

“Diana,” Azriel said slowly, letting out a low breath as he glanced around the room. “This is all very flattering, but are you sure you want to do this here?”

“What?” Gwyn shrieked, her hands balling into fists. She backed up towards the door, where she thought she saw a broom, and considered using it to knock him out.

He was crowding her, slowly walking into her until her shoulders pressed against the door. She had been so sure, before bringing him in here, that he wanted to capture her, and with each vanishing inch between them, her mind was thrown into further disarray.

She had to get rid of him.

“I’ll admit,” he said, “There’s clearly something between us.”

Gwyn shook her head, trying to order her thoughts before she looked back up at him. “What are you talking about?”

“But don’t you think it’s a bit too soon for clandestine meetings in dark rooms?” he said.

His hands came up on either side of her head to cage her in. He leaned down, leveling her stare with one of his own, and she watched as his gaze drifted to her mouth.  

“What were you thinking we would do?” he murmured. “When you led me in here?”

“Don’t play with me,” Gwyn said, her pulse thrumming in her ears. She reached out a hand, groping for the door handle.

“No?” he said, face angling to the side. Like he might try to kiss her, and the thought of it was no more terrifying than her realization that she wouldn’t have minded it.

And again, like he could hear every one of his thoughts, his mouth curved into a smile.

“Then what should I do with you?” he asked.

“Look,” Gwyn said, her fingers finally landing on the handle. She pressed herself flush against the door as he stepped closer, so that his chest wouldn’t brush against hers. “Just let me go, and I promise–”

“Let you go?” Azriel murmured, smirking at her.

“Yes,” Gwyn said flatly. She stared resolutely back at him, unwilling to allow him to see even a shred of nervousness. She could do this. She could knock him down right now, if she wanted.

So why wasn’t she?

“Let you go,” he repeated, humming as if he was turning the idea over in his mind. Considering it. His face dipped to the side, his lips somewhere near her ear when he whispered, “Why? Have you done something you shouldn’t have?”

Gwyn’s mouth fell open, her eyes roving restlessly up and down the side of his face as she tried to reconcile the part of her that desperately wanted to see him lying across the floor as she smacked him repeatedly with the broom handle–with the part of her that wanted to see him lying across the floor as she crawled over him and pressed her tongue to his neck.

Her fingers slipped off of the door handle, and were reaching for his shirt collar to do something, when the door suddenly opened behind her, knocking her into his arms. She scrambled for a moment, her hands peeling his off of her waist as he tried to steady her.

Above them, the overhead light flashed on, and she squinted against the harsh light as she turned to face the person who had walked in.

“What are you doing in here?” one of the security guards frowned at them.

Gwyn’s mouth opened and closed, struggling to come up with a reasonable excuse as Azriel scrubbed his hand over his mouth beside her, trying to hide a grin. She had just landed on I got lost, when the security guard groaned, stepping to the side to let them pass.

“They don’t pay me enough to deal with this,” he muttered to himself. He looked up at the ceiling, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’d think adults would behave with some decency.”

Gwyn glared at the security guard, brushing past him and out the door. She expected Azriel to be right behind her, but once she’d gotten over her indignation at having someone assume she’d been doing indecent things with him in public, she turned to look behind her.

Only to see the back of his head.

He was going in the opposite direction.

Stunned, Gwyn tore the lanyard off over her head and chucked it into the nearest trash can. She headed straight for the main staircase at the end of the vestibule, where she knew she could reach the museum atrium and eventually the exit. She needed to get out of there, needed to get lost in a crowd so she could rid herself of the feeling of being watched.

He had let her go.

It didn’t make sense, Gwyn thought as she hurried down the steps. He’d clearly been onto her, had clearly recognized that she was up to something. Any reasonable person wouldn’t have let her go, especially not if she had been his target in the first place. Gwyn wouldn’t have let him go, if the roles were reversed, and if she wasn’t so concerned with getting out of the damn building, she would have been right on his heels.

There was something wrong, Gwyn knew. And she would have to head back to Emerie and Nesta and tell them.

Tell them they needed to call this mission off.

[rollinouttahere-writes]

I've got an interesting idea for a bug race for a one piece au! Since there is Fishmen and Minks with many distinct animal and fish features in their appearance so how about a race with insect, arachnid and other invertebrate features! 🐌🦋🐛🐜🐝🪲🐞🦗🪳🕷️🕸️🦂🦟🪰🪱 And what kind of bug would each straw hat member be in this AU?

Okay so fun fact about me, I was an entomology major in college before I dropped out. So thank you for this request because it was very self indulgent!

Insect AU

Luffy would be a jack jumper ant (Myrmecia Pilosula). This ant is very strong even by ant standards. Like their name suggests, they can leap up to 76 millimeters, which is extremely impressive when you take into account that they range from 11 - 14 millimeters in size. On top of that, they possess a potent venom that kills other insects with ease. They are notably aggressive, even towards things much larger than themselves, and can reliably kill prey much larger than themselves. Truly a fierce fighter that can go toe to toe with many enemies.

Zoro would be a centipede, specifically the Scolopendra Polymorpha. This centipede varies a lot in color, and can even be green. These guys pack some pretty serious venom with necrotic properties, not something you want to experience. Centipedes are extremely agile predators that can take down all kinds of prey with ease thanks to their strength and ability to contort their body.

Nami would be a velvet ant (Dasymutilla Occidentalis). Despite the name, these guys are not ants, but are ground dwelling wasps that happen to resemble ants. They have a deceptively cute reddish-orange fuzzy appearance, that makes their venomous sting all the more surprising. While only males of the species can fly, females have a stinger that delivers a devastating venom to whatever has it on the defense. While the effects of it are excruciating, it is not fatal. 

Usopp would be a spiny leaf insect (Extatosoma Tiaratum). Despite the name, males don’t have many spikes beyond the ones on their face and some defensive ones on the legs, but they can fly so at least they have that going for them. One of their means of defense is to do a threat pose that makes them resemble a scorpion (and the nymphs mimic the appearance of a toxic species of ants), which sounds like a very Usopp thing to do in my humble opinion. 

Sanji would be a budwing mantis (Parasphendale Affinis). This is widely considered to be the most aggressive mantid species. I will preface this by saying that this mostly applies to females, but for the sake of the AU, I’m going to ignore that and allow Sanji to have these qualities. The budwing mantis is a voracious predator that regularly kills prey three times the size of themselves, and will do their damnedest to intimidate even bigger animals. These guys are ambush predators with insanely fast reflexes. Males are especially eager to find a mate (however fatal that may be). 

Chopper is a bumblebee, specifically the Bombus Balteatus. Why did I choose that one, you ask? Because it was the fluffiest looking one I could find. As for the rest of the reasoning, Chopper just has cute bumblebee vibes to me. He likes using his honey in his medicine when applicable. This is another case of us ignoring insect gender-roles.

Robin is a noble false widow spider (Steatoda Nobilis). This spider is commonly mistaken for black widows even though I don’t get how because they look nothing alike I mean really it’s like saying wolf spiders look like a brown recluse, so they have an unfairly bad reputation. While their venom is medically significant, it’s on par with a bee sting and nothing to worry about.

Franky is an atlas beetle (Chalcosoma Atlas). These are massive beetles with a very tough shell and most notably, have three long horns both for defense and mating purposes. Despite their intimidating size, they are actually quite friendly and make for great pets.

Brook would be a prairie mole cricket (Gryllotalpa Major). Despite the name, these aren’t true crickets, just a close relative. Lacking the specialized legs that crickets use to chirp, they instead rub their wings together to make noise. They dig burrows specifically designed to have excellent acoustics so as to help more females hear their “music”, which is surprisingly complex and can have up to five harmonics.

Jinbei would be a lobster. Not really an insect, but a relative of them no less.

[probablyanalienindisguise]

ranty personal talk or wtv, no trigger warnings besides maybe insects but just talking yk :)

I think the funniest part about human life is how much the little details can affect something.

I like what I do now yes, both for my job and what I've dedicated most of my life to studying for in school or otherwise.

I do tech stuff for game design for clarification, but i wanted to study entomology.

Do zoology for insects and stuff simply because I loved bugs as a kid y'know? Yet was never able to truly do those things. As unlike tech, entomology, surprisingly, wasn't really rising to popularity anytime soon. Or at least to the rates at which technology was? Leading to most schools in my area just completely removing the option altogether, literally way before I was born.

And yeah while I do love designing video games and making art, I wonder what would've been different if given the options I wasn't given before sometimes.

I study insects for different reasons now, as I incorporate them into my art and games as characters or background inspirations. Create things with them in mind sometimes. But it isn't really solely focused on the insects themselves, moreso the idea of them.

I have a love for arthropods yet its almost always going to be something long distanced. As without certification or experience, my chances are pretty low for a genuine job. So for now I do my best efforts to just find peace in studying them from afar.

Ironically, I've taken marine science classes as they were the closest to genuine entomology classes. But not fully? They were in the same families as some insects or arachnids but not exactly full bug study.

But I mean hey, I probably would've never gotten into the electric guitar without the help of tech and gaming so that worked out. Love doing that honestly lmao

I think my longest obsession was insects though, have always liked them or drew them in art classes or just in my freetime.

Idk maybe people like them as much as I do so I'll post some of the ones I still have :D (they're pretty old now though sorry)

These included with also fictional bugs/ bug based characters and creatures that I drew all the time

Like these don't even account for the multitudes of Scarab fanart I've made, simply because he's based off a beetle

[msadmiral]

Would it be possible to write some Frank Frankly headcanons? [If you don't mind, of course!]

As a fictive of yours truely, it makes my day reading what people have to say about me. /:-]

No problem anon! Heads up for our favorite entomologist!

Frank Frankly headcanons

By yours truly, Ms Admiral

[🦋📖] Frank is the kind of person who’d have a book wherever he goes. Whether it’s sitting out on his porch or going to hang out with Julie. If Frank has his nose with him, he’ll have a book to tag along.

[🦋📖] Frank enjoys gardening! He actually has the best looking yard out of all the neighbors at Home. Frank is always planting new kinds of flowers in his yard in hopes of attracting new kinds of butterflies he can study, so best believe that if his nose isn’t in a book, it’s in a bed of flowers outside.

[🦋📖] NEVER. Put yourself in a position in which you’re helping Frank with his garden. It is a Grueling experience, with a capital G. While his garden may look beautiful on the surface, there is blood, sweat, and tears in that soil, so he expects PERFECTION when you are helping him. At least every neighbor (especially Eddie) can assure you that once you start, you’re going to be there ALL day.

[🦋📖] Frank has a diary that he uses for many things. If you were to ever get your hands on it (by some miracle-), you’d find many of the pages filled with notes on flowers and intricate doodles of butterflies. Only once every 15 pages or so will you actually find a journal entry (and there’s a 50% chance that it’ll just be him complaining about his garden beds).

[🦋📖] Frank has written books! Specifically on insects and entomology. But even though he says it’s one of his greatest achievements getting his books published, he always gets embarrassed or ashamed whenever you find and pull them out of a box collecting dust in his library room. He says he wrote them when he was in high school. And that period of his life was when he, quote, “Unknowing of proper etiquette in poetic expression, especially in that of textbooks.”. Whatever that meant…

[🦋📖] He owns binoculars… And you better believe he puts them to good use with his neighbors. While Frank is the kind of person to respect people’s privacy, you know that big ass squidward-lookin’ nose be snooping. So slide him a new gardening catalog and he will be SPILLING. He knows dirt about everyone. Especially Eddie and Howdy.

[🦋📖] Isn’t on the best of terms with Sally… Frank is a humble and reserved person by nature. So seeing Sally’s over-the-top boisterousness and exuberance doesn’t exactly… sit well with him. However, being best friends with Julie, he’s forced to get along with them regardless…

So sorry for the wait! Thank you so much for your submission anon! I really enjoyed writing this one!

[sonohban]

Weird question but who (if anyone) are the academic rivals of entomologist? My friend is in grad school and claims academic rivals are a thing, like psychology students and sociology students having a rivalry with each other.

lololol in the realm of eeb (ecology and evolutionary biology) i'm not sure any fields have any serious rivalries with each other, at least from my limited experience. entomologists do get a little peeved that vertebrate biologists always get the spotlight when their study organisms make up like 5ish% of all animals tho

something i also learned recently is that coleopterists (beetle people) and lepidopterists (moth/butterfly people) hate each other because beetles that get collected in traps alongside leps will crush their delicate wings but that's more of a joke. any stated animosities between us are likely for the meme

of course within any field you're going to have camps of people trying to refute each others' hypotheses over contentious things like evolutionary theories. doing a literature search on almost any organism's evolutionary lineage is going to dredge up a paper trail of back-and-forths claiming that THIS TIME they have the Bigger Better Robust-er dataset. this is especially true for entomology because there's SO MANY BUGS and they're an INCREDIBLY OLD lineage, so it can be hard to generate solid evidence for a hypothesis. one big debate we're still having (i think anyway?) is how insect wings evolved. people have largely been arguing that wings started out as either outgrowths of the upper thorax, a fusion of leg parts, or a combination of both (i think the third option is likely :p)

[g0nta-g0kuhara]

hmm… reverse unpopular opinion for gonta (if you have not already received him, that is) and/or kirumi?

Surprisingly you're the only one who's asked me about Gonta, so I'm gonna start with him!!

I mean. Where do I even BEGIN? My entire blog is themed around him for a reason. Gonta wasn't a love-at-first-sight character for me, his design intimidated me (which was intentional!) and I was worried he'd be a jock character, which I'm normally not the biggest fan of. The moment he opened he opened his mouth, though, I fell in LOVE.

I've always been a fan of science-nerd characters so his entomology talent was extremely exciting to me. I assert VERY STRONGLY that Gonta is smart. The world outside his forest is just very new to him, including technology and the language everyone else is speaking.

I also really love his passion. The intensity with which he expresses his love for bugs is extremely relatable to me. Of course, I also love the way he speaks and his colour scheme (brown and green are my favourite colours! His canon outfit was nearly exactly my dream graduation outfit in highschool before I even knew he existed!)

I relate a lot to his naivete and genuineness, especially with how fully he experiences his emotions. I could go really deep into the core of why I relate to him and how his story throughout V3 impacted me, but thats a bit much and this is already getting a bit long gdshjkfsd. In Short: I see a lot of myself in him as an autistic person. He just means so so much to me.

(Kirumi is the v3 character I draw the least so I'm still figuring out how to draw her!)

When I first played v3, Kirumi was the only female character I was voicing with my friends. I feel kinda nostalgic about her because of this. I also really love how elegant and calm she is. Not only is it a refreshing personality within a group of Very Intense ultimates, it also really highlights how desperate she was at the end of trial 2. and OHHH my GOD her english VA's work at the end of that trial is stunning!!! That Scream was so visceral!!

I think there's a lot to explore with Kirumi learning to be able to do things for herself and not put others above herself at all times. I wish she was around for longer in V3 so that we could've seen her in more high-pressure situations, especially the later chapters!

[ladymorghul]

Hello there! I’m the anon who couldn’t  understand why and how the brothel situation could foreshadow al*smond. Thank you very much for answering my question. Hope you wouldn’t mind me sending yet another ask. BTW I’m really happy I finally found an ANTI-a*smond friendly space.

Frankly speaking, I will be disappointed if in se2, Aemond’s “relationship” with A*ys is pictured as an overly romantic love story. From what we know from the books, she was literally his s*x slave, watched him butcher her entire family and had every right to, well, not reciprocate Aemond’s feelings even if he actually developed some kind of twisted fondness for her. As you mention, power imbalance between them was at least disturbing. Personally, I hope their relationship in the show would be much like the Melisandre and Stannis situation.

As for A*ys’ age… Well, from the books we learn she looked much younger than 40. The actress cast for this role is in her early 30s. I wonder if Aemond was generally attracted to women twice his age, which is why he spared her, or when he took A*lys as his POW, he thought she was like 7-10 years older than him?  Much as I believe it’s totally fine if you have the “Aemond was a milf hunter” headcanon and enjoy creating such content. However, I don’t understand why and how the “Aemond was into much older women HEADCANON” should debunk the helaemond theory. Personally, I really like helaemond, although I doubt this relationship will be confirmed as show canon. But on the other hand, why should Aemond’s (for want of a better word) romantic interests’ age be the only thing that attract him to them? Maybe those are just my headcanons, but I think Aemond and Helaena have something in common. For example, they both have a streak (Aemond is interested in history and philosophy and Helaena is into biology/entomology) and experienced se*ual abuse. In addition, it seems pretty in-character for !show Aemond to become fascinated with his sister simply because she’s a dragon dreamer. Also, why wouldn’t he want to gently make out with someone who’s an ethereal, melancholic girl approximately his age and not a curvy, dark-haired s*x worker, much older than him. And, most importantly, no one forces him to sleep with her Or maybe teenage Aemond simply needs someone who’d stand by his side and stroke his arm when he’s stressed 😊?

Those are just my thoughts. Thank you for sharing your rants ant theories on this amazing blog. Hope this time I made myself more clear. English is not my first language.

hey there 😇 no problem

i think you're right in that it's very plausible to assume he would find comfort in helaena who has a similar experience to him when it comes to SA and considering that we're shown aegon being annoying to aemond when they're young, and aemond standing up for helaena, we can easily guess he relates to her better than he does aegon. and vice versa.

and when they're older, when aemond walks in the room in episode 9, helaena literally lights up at the sight of him. throughout the second part of the show you can see they're closer to each other than they are to aegon.

in general, i think anyone writing off helaemond completely as being this insanely impossible ship is doing so out of spite and i think the reason alysm*nds portray him as an exclusively milf hunter is because of they relate more to the idea of al*s that they have (not a noble, witch trope, so special that she catches the eye of a prince). and they're weirdly posessive with aemond's character... which is just a character.

[addictedtostorytelling]

Hi! I wanted to know how you think Sara and Grissom’s relationship dealt with his “science experiments” (like the blood in fridge) and bugs he may have had at home. Do you think he was more thoughtful once they started dating, or do you think that took more time?

hi, @happyladylourdes!

personally, i think that seldom do grissom's experiments really become an issue in grissom and sara's home life.

my reasons for saying so are fourfold:

i think we see evidence in canon that grissom does not use his home in the same way he uses his office at the lab (i.e., to store experiments and raw scientific materials).

i think that because of the way grissom's brain works, he is unlikely to carry that kind of "i'll do science any damn where i please" behavior over from a work to a home setting anyhow.

i also think ultimately he's already learned his lesson about being considerate of sara's feelings in that regard, so even on the off-chance he might be tempted to maybe put something funky in the fridge at their place, he'd probably hold off on doing so (or at least ask permission first), not wanting to upset her.

finally, i think that on the rare occasions grissom does do science at home, most often, sara is in on whatever his experiments are; what he's doing doesn't really surprise her because she's his de facto "lab partner," you know?

more discussion/rationale under the "keep reading," if you're interested.

__

so for as much as grissom is a workaholic who brings his work home with him mentally, i think physically things are a different story; on that level, he seems to maintain a much greater degree of separation between his personal and professional lives.

we see several different iterations of living spaces for grissom over the course of the series (not counting the ishmael), and, to a one, they are all supremely well-organized and don't very much resemble his dark, crowded office at the lab whatsoever.

though of course i cannot say so with certainty, my impression is that grissom (even during the period when he lives alone, before he and sara get together) keeps most of his "science stuff" in his lab office, where it will be of most use to him, conveniently within arm's reach should he need it for his investigations. it's there he houses his live insects, amphibians, and reptiles; preserved specimens; the majority of his entomological and forensics libraries; his instruments; his charts; and curios, like his irradiated fetal pig.

only a small percentage of his scientific equipage otherwise is kept at home, and most of this much smaller collection is probably on the more sentimental/antique side; the kind of stuff that may be cool to display for aesthetic reasons but not as useful to him practically.

while the same can be said of his early seasons condo(s), here, since it's most relevant to the question, we'll just focus on his and sara's s7/s8 condo.

from what little we see, there is no visual evidence to suggest that either one of them makes a habit of strewing anything, including science experiments, all over their living space.

while theirs is obviously a home where two scientists live, as is shown by the décor choices of shadow-boxed insects and antique microscopes and mounted fossils and cool rocks, they keep the place incredibly neat, with everything, including the scientific equipment, stored in its rightful place.

you can tell: that back corner by the two windows is the designated "science space," with the active vivariums and working microscopes.

but otherwise the rest of their house, well—just looks like a house.

the kitchen is very much just a regular kitchen, filled with cooking implements and food and cleaning supplies (though some of the items, such as the cloche by the refrigerator, are insect/butterfly-themed).

as we see in episode 07x22 "leapin' lizards," they have a television set in the bedroom. as we see in episode 08x12 "grissom's divine comedy," a sofa and another television set in the living room.

everything looks very normal.

in no way is their home "the mad scientist's lair" that one might expect.

all of the above so, my impression—and, of course, ymmv—is that grissom tends to leave his work stuff, including his experiments and raw scientific materials, for the most part, at work, or at least if he does bring them home, he keeps them confined to their designated places (like to that back "science corner" by the windows or his own study), where they aren't cluttering and contaminating his and sara's eating/resting/sleeping areas.

i mean, albeit we never get a peek into their fridge, but, barring a break from the otherwise established pattern there, i just don't see him treating his and sara's condo like a laboratory.

—and especially not because of how he tends to view the world.

again, while grissom is a workaholic, he is also a great compartmentalizer, at least in terms of his thoughts.

feelings are another story; far less easily confined into neat categories.

two of the main mental "boxes" he has are for work and for home.

according to how i understand grissom—and, once more, ymmv—i think one of the reasons he is the way he is at work, in terms of using the communal fridge in the break room to store science experiments, is because he tends to view everything at the lab as falling into the "work box."

for him, the purpose of the work done at the lab is to solve crimes using science. accordingly, in his view, every person and object in the building is supposed to function toward that end—hence why he gets so frustrated with both policies and people (such as, for example, administrators like ecklie) who impede the scientific crime-solving process; hence also why we sometimes see him make unconventional use of both lab equipment and human resources in his experiments.

for example, why not rope the department secretary into helping you prove a theory about how a corpse was dragged, even though doing so falls nowhere inside the bounds of her normal job description (see episode 03x09 "blood lust")? and what's to stop you from infecting your dna tech's feet with mildew if doing so will help you determine something about a potential suspect in a homicide case (see episode 03x03 "let the seller beware")? and if nick's eating an apple in the layout room, then who's to say you shouldn't demand he hand it over to you so you can stab it with scissors and establish some characteristics of a possible murder weapon (see episode 03x23 "inside the box")?

after all, they all work at/"belong to" the lab, so regardless of individual job descriptions or other considerations, they should, ultimately, be viewed as resources to be used to scientifically solve crimes; they are all "fair game" for that purpose, as far as he's concerned.

certainly, that same line of thinking applies to the break room fridge for him, as well.

though its primary function is to contain the food items of the people who work in the lab (thereby serving them as they scientifically solve crimes), in a pinch, if other lab fridges, such as the one in grissom's office, are full and/or unsuited to the task, it can be used more directly to fulfill the lab's "prime directive," housing experiments if needs be.

as i talk about here, "[grissom] sees no problem with [putting rancid blood in the communal fridge] because he’s just of such a one-track mind that science takes precedence over everything for him; the human element doesn’t even register (even as the team complains to his face, seemingly not for the first time, about the rudeness of his actions)."

the fridge is lab property; ergo, it can be used for lab business: so goes his reasoning.

however, the same is not true of his home living space.

there, everything falls into the "home box" and anything that may follow him home from work—such as administrivia—is marked as being out-of-place within his mental schema. while his and sara's home does have scientific objects in it because they are scientists with scientific interests, the home itself isn't dedicated, in the same way the lab is, as a space to do science in™; ipso facto, it's not "fair game" for him to leave science experiments all over the place there in the same way it is at the lab. the majority of the objects there have little or nothing to do with science and are instead meant to serve grissom and sara's domestic needs.

frankly, most of the time, grissom probably doesn't even feel the need to do science at home because he can always just go to the lab—with its superior resources and designated space—and experiment there.

doing science at the lab is not only easier but ultimately safer and more manageable.

much better to test his theories in a controlled environment with the tools, resources, and technology he requires already on hand—especially considering that any work-related science he were to do at home wouldn't hold up in court and would need to be redone in a more controlled setting anyway.

note: in the reboot, when we see him doing science experiments in his and sara's hotel room episode 01x04 "long pig," he is doing so specifically because he is, at that point, barred from doing them at the lab; the situation is one where he feels he has no choice but to do the work wherever he can, regardless of propriety, which is a very different ballgame than is in play at other times when he and sara are more settled and fully employed by the lvpd.

under typical circumstances, the only serious science he might even consider doing at home would be stuff he was pursuing either just for his own edification (because he was curious to test something out, unrelated to any cases or his general work as a criminalist) or for his academic entomological studies.

but even in those rare cases, i think that he would a) still relegate that work mostly to the designated science spaces in the condo, and, b) communicate with sara about it and not do anything that might freak her out/piss her off.

—because that's the thing.

grissom learns his lesson about this issue long before he and sara ever move in together.

his whole takeaway from the events of episode 02x15 "burden of proof" is that his actions (even ones he views as being entirely professional in nature) can in fact impact other people, and specifically sara, on a personal level. he has to be more careful about sharing space with her and showing regard for her feelings or otherwise he runs the risk of losing her.

he sees: bad blood in the work fridge can lead to bad blood between him and the love of his life, and that's something he never wants.

while it still takes him a couple of seasons after the point of the "raw hamburger debacle" to get his act fully together where sara is concerned, one mistake we never see him repeat with her again is the actual, physical action of making her deal with animal blood or meat; he is always, from that very early point forward, respectful of her vegetarianism and love of animals in the future.

that so, i've gotta believe: when they finally move in together, he's probably incredibly careful to make sure she feels comfortable in their home in that regard. he won't put anything in the fridge that might squeeg her because he doesn't want her to feel disrespected or uncared for.

should he ever feel the need to bring home anything even potentially objectionable to her, he likely makes sure to run the thing by her, and if she says no, he undoubtedly stores whatever it is back at the lab in his own office rather than at the condo because he understands: there is a boundary there.

and should he ever make a mistake, assuming that she'll be okay with something he in actuality ought to have asked her about, i've got to believe that he immediately apologizes once he realizes his error; unlike with the rancid blood in the lab fridge (which, from the context of episode 02x15 "burden of proof," seems to have been an oft-repeated offense on his part), he doesn't need to be told twice.

of course, as talked about earlier, i tend to believe that only very rarely does he ever even attempt to bring experiments or raw scientific materials into their home anyway, but on the few and far-between occasions when he does do so, i also think: by the time he and sara are together and sharing a home, she is most often in on his extracurricular scientific activities from the get-go.

the facts that she accompanies him to his apiary in episode 08x04 "the case of the cross-dressing carp" and in the later seasons applies for a joint-research grant with him while they're living in paris and works as his partner in marine biology once they are on the ishmael all suggest that at times when grissom and sara are a couple, she is his de facto lab partner both at work and at home.

so if he cooks up some experiment he wants/needs to do "off the clock" at the lab, then nine times out of ten, i bet he tells her about it and invites her to take part in it with him from the onset; it's not the same kind of deal as we see in episode 02x15 "burden of proof," where he is (largely inadvertently) stonewalling her and keeping her at arm's length. rather, she's right there with him in the trenches; she knows what's in that specimen jar because she's the one who helped him collect it and she's monitoring it right along with him.

now.

you may have noticed, most of the above discussion is centered on animal byproducts.

as for bugs—

i don't think sara has a problem with them, as long as they are properly contained.

not only are there numerous mounted and displayed insects visible in their s7/s8 condo, but sara herself also has mounted and displayed insects visible in her s5 apartment in episode 05x13 "nesting dolls," before she and grissom even become an official couple. there are also, seemingly, live insects in vivariums in that window corner of their s7/s8 condo.

she knew what she was getting into when she married a beekeeper.

in terms of how any of the above might change once grissom and sara live on the ishmael, i imagine that on such small boat, adhering strictly to the concept of designated space becomes more important for them than ever.

since the ishmael is not only their home but their floating laboratory, they undoubtedly do have experiments going onboard. however, they are probably careful to keep them where they belong, as out-of-the-way as possible, both for safety reasons (so they're not tripping over things) and also to prevent contamination/interference.

they probably have two fridges: one for food and one for specimens, both clearly labeled and on separate sides of the boat.

anyway, all of this rambling is a very long way to say: i absolutely think grissom is considerate of sara from the moment they move in together, with regards to how he makes use of their shared space.

any science he does in their home, i think he makes sure he has her seal of approval to do and does in its properly assigned area, most often with her taking part in the experiment right along with him. everything else, he does at the lab.

thanks for the question! please feel welcome to send another any time.

p.s., you should set up a profile picture and header and post/reblog some stuff so that people don't mistake you for a bot and block you! if you have questions about how to do so, let me know, and i'd be happy to help.

[minecraftrelatedrandomness]

burn the night away: writer's annotations

The benefits of writing from p!Martyn's POV is that I have more flexibility to be anachronistic — I default Pirates to be set in the first half of the 19th century, but p!Martyn, being from our real-world time period, means that I can let the guys play custom Monopoly if I want to. As for remaking and customizing boards from scratch, I tried that when I was a kid using mostly paper, so it's not impossible.

I am also unfortunately unable to write from a p!Saus POV for any extended period of time (especially since my giftee seems to be a fan) — I've taken unprecedented amounts of psychic damage (re)watching his VODs, and I don't think there's any way I can replicate that in my own writing, at least in my current state of mind. I did try to make sure he had a major presence in the fic, though.

Speaking of, this is my first time posting from Martyn POV and my first time writing Kyle and Scar in general — I've written a fic draft on p!Martyn and p!Shelby a couple of months ago, but never finished and posted it.

Most things I've written about the characters and their experiences have some sort of canon or canon-adjacent basis — and yes, I did so much research for this. A few are admittedly headcanons due to a lack of information, and p!Scar's characterization is in part inspired by Hermitcraft Season 8 and the Life series, since both series are referenced in his POV. I'm leaving it ambiguous as to whether he is the same character throughout those series, though.

I genuinely have a spreadsheet listing 39 of the 40 "Never Have I Ever" prompts I'm using for this fic, along with who answered what and a tally counting who actually did win. Mind you, the statistics are slightly skewed by the fact that several of these people are lying their asses off a good chunk of the time.

Among them, I ended up having to change one of the prompts and rewrite a small section less than 12 hours before my deadline because I found out that every single character here (other than Jellie, for obvious reasons) has at least somewhat played a musical instrument in the series! Music is a foundational basis for p!Kyle's lore, p!Saus has his "(snake)skin flute" heirloom, Scar did so briefly during his 2nd stream, and everyone else played something on Oct 13th (SMP Day 76), mostly while in Cultist captivity.

The details about p!Scott's accessories are actually inspired by my own personal experiences. I have a bird necklace in real life (admittedly just a generic bird in flight) and thought I'd let my guy have an equivalent to that, as a treat. As for the badge, when I was in secondary school, I had a house badge that I used for all my six years there, and by the time I graduated, maybe a third of the coloration has been chipped off.

Like fic!Martyn, I considered whether I should have him lie about his brief engagement to r1!Water. If I had the chance, I would have had him give r1!Water's kingdom to be Isopteria — from Isoptera, the infraorder name for termites, but I don't think c!Martyn is knowledgeable enough in entomology or cares enough about it to make that reference (it's the biology student brain at work here, so forgive me).

The dumpling ban is actually a reference to a one-off line from the Oct 13th (SMP Day 76) VOD. It was a Heron base ban in an earlier draft, but I changed it after rewatching the VOD to make it a bit more canon-compliant. (As if the timeline isn't already non-compliant as it is, but it is my solemn archivist duty to stay true, alas.)

The full process of writing this fic has been harder than I expected, to say the least. I've had this idea for a couple of months before the event, but decided to put it aside. I took a couple of weeks off from working on it at all after the event started because of finals and then oopsie daisy, my family lost Wi-Fi for four days, so I couldn't even write and could barely VOD-watch during that time, since I could only access the Internet using my phone's data plan! Then I had to take another couple of days off to study for and take my TOEFL exam, and then I caught a stomach bug that I'm still recovering from as I post this (+ burnout on my final day)! In other words, the AO3 author's curse was out to get me, even after I got an extension. And that's discounting how I still don't quite know how to write shipfics on account of being inordinately aro/ace (that VS my perfectionism, fight!), as well as my computer buffering from the sheer number of tabs I have open!

Also, this fic was originally supposed to be like 1K or 2K words long… but it just kept getting longer and longer and now it's ended at nearly 5K.

I don't even know how I pulled all this off, especially since I haven't even watched all the VODs I wanted to watch for research, but here I am.

[cnestus]

hm. that would really depend on what your sister wants to learn. does she want to learn insect taxonmy? general identification skills? insect ecology and physiology? without a more specific question the best i can offer is that the two main textbooks i learned entomology from in undergrad are still pretty much the best introductions to the subject that i'm aware of, assuming your sister is the kind of person who can just sit down with a textbook and read it all the way through outside of a classroom setting. Gullan & Cranston is a good overview of most facets of entomology in general, while Borror & DeLong is more focused on taxonomy and identification keys, though at this point the taxonomy is starting to get out of date.

depending on which subfield of entomology your sister is interested in (insect ecology, IPM, medical entomology, forensic entomology, taxonomy, etc.) there's tons of other textbooks but again idk if just sitting down with a textbook is a viable way to really learn entomology outside of a structured educational setting. if you're looking for non-textbooks for beginner entomologists that also aren't surface-level then i don't think i have a ton of advice off the top of my head.

i guess what i'll say is in my experience a lot of people do enter into entomology grad school with degrees from related fields like ecology or environmental science, but with not a ton of entomology knowledge already under their belt and tend to do fine as long as they are actually interested in the subject matter. though the people that enter grad school with a decent knowledge-base at least as far as like basic taxonomy and physiology definitely struggle less though. i'm definitely glad i was in the latter group.

i have no idea if that was helpful. i'm on 2 hours of sleep and having a medium time at life right now. always happy to answer more specific questions though i plan on spending most of the next 10 or so days in the redwoods becoming one with a mossy stump and not looking at screens so answers might not be forthcoming immediately

in the meantime here's a cute leafhopper i saw today

Hey, so I have a sister that was always super into bugs as a kid. She wanted to be an entomologist and all and it was her big thing. She's now studying environmental stuff and has entered that sort of world, but said she has a hard time figuring out how to get into learning about bugs. Apparently there's loads of resources on things like plants and fungi because people are into those, but less on macroinvertabrates. What sort of books and resources got it kick-started for you? Moreso science and technical stuff rather than surface level stuff

I will direct you to @cnestus to ask your question because they are an actual entomologist and I am not!

[motorclit]

My special interest came in handy tonight.

Back in autumn of 2014, we had bedbugs I our apartment that the manager wouldn't do shit about, so we ended up having to move in with my parents. The whole infestation thing left a bit of trauma on us, and the first few years, I was hyper-vigilant with anything that remotely looked like a bedbug, especially when bringing out any quarantined items we managed to save from the apartment.

Fast forward to tonight, and we're living on my parents' barely held together farm. We get insects all the time indoors, and sometimes dead ones stick to our footwear and we track them in. It's through this method somehow that my muž had a chunk of long-dead insect in his sweatpants. I'd imagine it was caught on his sock or something when he put them on one time. But when he lifted the sweatpants up to put them on after work, the long-dead carcass of a chunk of insect that had a few bedbug-like features (at least in his mind) made him nearly have a breakdown, causing him to tear our room to nearly pieces for a half hour to inspect.

When I came in, he told me about it and said it was wrapped in a paper towel. So I checked it out.

Not a bedbug.

I had a rekindled special interest in the last few years in entomology, and while I can see how he could have mistook it for a bedbug, I had a hunch, looked up a picture of a bedbug, and sure enough, it's not a bedbug.

Bedbugs do not have an elytra (the hardened forewing/wing cover you on things like beetles), not even tiny ones. The abdomen was also a little too narrow, and the overall carcass was nowhere near flat enough.

I figured it was a beetle but at some sort of young stage; maybe even a hemipteran. But nothing on iNaturalist helped, especially since I got results involving scarab beetles that weren't found in the US, let alone Ohio.

Then I had another hunch after carefully considering what actually lurks in this area.

After another Google search, I've discovered it's a chunk of an earwig.

Yes. Earwigs have an elytra. They have wings. I don't know what they're for, but they're not for flying. And I already could tell this carcass has been dead a while (you basically know after rummaging through storage in this house after shit sat untouched for years).

I showed my muž, showing him a comparison between a pic of an earwig and the insect in question, and then a pic of a bedbug and the insect in question. He understood this wasn't a bedbug, and thankfully has calmed down.

I'm mighty fucking proud. I say this because I've watched my muž deal with all sorts of problems I'm absolutely helpless about and it pains me. But tonight? Tonight, a problem decoded to show up not knowing I'm a damn nature nerd.

If you've made it this far in my little post, I encourage you to look up pictures of bedbugs to know what to look for. Then I want you to look up your local insects and get familiar with them. Yes, it can be icky, but this will save you a LOT of stress and anxiety if you know what you're looking at.

Also: in regards to bites, you won't feel bedbugs actually biting you. But you will itch like hell afterwards. I speak from personal experience. My bite-welts didn't show up until around 24 hours after being bitten (timed with 2 sightings of them on me), they were thick welts about the size of relatively large under-the-skin zits, and sometimes felt like sunburns (mainly on my ankles).

Bedbugs are stupid hard to get rid of, and if you manage to do it successfully, you'll probably be in debt or something.

[saturniidays]

I guess now would be a good time to tell you all about another project I’ve had going for a while ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

If you ask me what I value most in the world, I will probably answer education. It is of the utmost importance to me that information be free and accessible. To everyone. I wish I could provide you all with all the knowledge in the world, but alas, I am a simple human, and I have bugs on my brain. 

You guys have sent me asks like this: 

And it makes me kind of sad that I don’t really know how to answer, most of what I know I learned from my university classes and not any particular sources.

So for the past several months I have been making a website where I put links to resources I find, and I will teach you entomology 101 (concepts, vocabulary, overviews of the insect orders, etc) so that you can understand the content. I am doing my best to avoid jargon, but where it is unavoidable, I explain it in a simple way. I have your back. I am even giving you instructions on how to bypass scientific article paywalls with Sci-Hub. Because screw them.

I am trying to make it at least a bit fun too! Education shouldn’t be boring! My major is scientific education so I feel like I should at least use some of those principles. I’ll use a variety of mediums like images, animations, videos, and sounds to make it a more stimulating experience. Everything will have captions.

It isn’t even close to finished because I am still a student, and my time is limited, but I am proud of what I have so far. I really hope it will be useful for you guys.

[thecupcakewritesmorethings]

Asa Emory/The Collector Escapes Arkin: The Good(?) Ending

Okay, let’s get it straight. Asa Emory is 100% a villain. While it’s true, he suffered a horrible, traumatic event at the hands of his father: he has committed a near innumerable amount of atrocities. Asa Emory is, in my opinion, the rare case of the slasher who is unsympathetic. He has delved too deeply with his dark passenger, and he is neigh redeemable.

So it begs the question… Can he even get a good ending?

I don’t think so. At least, not in the traditional sense… But there is a “best” ending. Here is my shot at it. Spoilers, I guess, for The Collection.

 You were once one of Asa Emory’s students. Specifically, you were in his class a few years prior, while you were working on your Batchelor’s degree in life sciences, like many others. Asa, in a way, didn’t think you different from any of the other bright-eyed future zoologists in his classrooms. You did your work, you came to class.

You were smart.

In fact, he found you a bit of a smart-ass.

There had been two or three times where he had shot you down in class for accidentally misnaming or mispronouncing something in his class. He had a reputation as a tough teacher to keep up… However, while most would cower to get things wrong in front of him- you took it in stride. You came to his office when your grade would inevitably dip in your lab reports.

There was no reason for your grade to falter, by the way, your reports were amongst the best of his class that year. One might even say he frequently would use them later as examples of “good” citation. The reason why your grades dipped? Curiosity. The need to lord his power over you like a god.

He’d bump your lab report grades up the more frequently you’d spend time doing “extra credit”, of course. This was simply his way of feeling in control at the time.

Of course, at the time Asa Emory hadn’t taken the plunge into becoming the Collector yet. In hindsight, you were perfect, however, as a potential victim. You were smart, hardworking, unique, even among all the other try-hards of your class. Perfect. It was a bit foolish, but he enjoyed thinking about you as the “one who got away” from time to time.

Of course, thankfully for you, you managed to get out of his sphere of direct influence before he went off the deep-end and met one of his idols (cough cough, JESSE, cough cough). However, you would pop back into his life once more to seek his advice on your Master’s Thesis. Still going for a masters in Zoology with a specialty in Entomology?

He scoffed when you asked for his opinion on the various auditory noises of the common jumping spider family. Internally he was pleased as punch. He… It’d been a while since he had been remembered as someone happily. Most people who take his classes bemoan his existence.

You were either very good at hiding it, or… You genuinely valued his opinion and experiences as an entomologist. Honestly, he couldn’t tell which he preferred. It was so simple when people didn’t like him…

Then again, you exchanged email addresses with each other. Personal email addresses.

He gave you a half-hearted joke about keeping your enemies closer. Now you were a competitor in the field… You laughed. It… Did things to him.

Asa wound up texting the only other person in the world who may hope to understand him, at that moment, how he may feel. His friend and idol responded only with;

“Ask them out, don’t bring the ropes out till the third date.”

“That’s a bad idea.”

“No it’s not. I’m trying to get you laid.”

There is a surprisingly sincere text that follows shortly thereafter.

“We’re difficult people to get along with. We’re not normal. Sometimes you need something normal to encourage you not to do dumb shit.”

“Introducing a person into my life, and an alumnus from my school, seems like the worst case. It’s not like you have something ‘normal’, either.”

“Speak for yourself. I got a spouse, a mortgage, and shitty in-laws like most married men. :)”

Asa was stunned.

“Also, counter-point. I never said that they were *normal*.”

That stuck with him… Longer than it should. He mulled over his friend and mentor’s advice. Observed it from multiple angles, gave time to watch it grow and sprout ideas… As a scientist should. In that time you and Asa had grown distant. Distant enough that your messages became short enough for text messages, so your numbers had been exchanged.

Though, the possibility that you were… “Abnormal” crossed his mind from time to time. You left the city to take on an internship at a Zoo a few hours away, but came by frequently throughout the year to visit family. He bemoaned Thanksgiving, though, your arrival to his home always made things seem as though the world didn’t stop in it’s tracks to stare at him for a day.

Then he met Arkin… Then the Hotel went pear-shaped…

Now here is where things deviate.

Asa Emory knows it is a foolish idea to return home to his house. However, he is not about to explain to you, who is currently asleep in his guest bedroom, why he refuses to come home while you have a guest. Not because he doesn’t wish to, mind you, more so because he cannot find what he deems to be a good enough excuse.

He spends all night patching himself up. He waits till about eight in the morning before returning (when he usually returns from his morning run) to enter his home. The house is silent, pristine, and just as he left it the night before. Clearly, you have not woken up. He sets his keys down and idly shuffles through some junk mail that has been sitting in his mailbox since yesterday. He makes his way upstairs to rest an hour or so just… To recollect himself when the radio goes off downstairs. A sinking feeling arrives in his gut. He pulls out his pocket knife and walks back downstairs to the radio, flips it off once more and proceeds to do a five-point room scan.

It's Arkin.

Arkin pulls the gun on him, explains that he intends to torture him just as he did his own victims. He stuffs Asa Emory into his own case and most certainly breaks a few fingers on his left hand in doing so. In that moment Asa forgot you were there at all, but he certainly remembers when he hears something shatter. Then the sound of rapid footsteps, then the dull sound of something hitting the floor.

Moments pass as he wiggles against the box, and a few seconds later he is freed.

There you stand, looking down at him with something between horror and intrigue. You tilt your head, observing him before you reach in to grab his right hand to hoist him up. He stands wobbily to see Arkin with something thin and tight around his neck.

“… I can…”  The word explain falls silent. Instead his face curls into a snarl. “… He’s. Mine.”

It sounds… Childish. Like you had taken his toy away from him, not like you had just saved his life. Which, you absolutely have him dead to rights. He’d probably be in Arkin’s car right now on his way to god knows where.

Finally, you narrow your eyes at him. “Do you remember the first day I came to talk to you about my failing lab report grades?”

He doesn’t answer. His eyes widen as he hisses at you.

“You had me feeding your specimen. At first I thought it was rather cruel of you to do it, but you told me I needed to learn how to be better at exposing myself to a feeding. Passively, I asked you, ‘which roaches you think suffer more; the ones you feed to the widow specimens, or the trap door spiders?’”

He remembered this conversation, of course he had. You had been nervous to say the least. You had clearly arrived hoping to discuss your grade and go, but it was nearing Autumn break. Professor Emory wasn’t feeling particularly charitable, so he made you work for the grade you should have gotten in the first place. He had handed you a Tupperware container of German cockroaches and a metal pair of forceps and told you to feed his specimen.

“Do you remember what you said?” Your head gave an inquisitive tilt.

“… A funnel web spider is… infinitely worse than a trap door spider.”

“Do you remember why you said that?”

Oh. Did his heart just skip a beat?

“… Because trap door spiders act on impulse, but a funnel web will wait until you get close…”

How dare your smart-assery be endearing in a time like this? Damn you. Thank you?

Out of respect for your mentor, you let Arkin fall into his hands before he is too far gone. However, you cannot say for sure what he did with the ex-convict. You never ask, and Asa never really choses to tell you. A part of him realizes he may not need to, now.

What you do know is that Asa has most of his necessities packed up by lunch-time. His hand is bandaged up, and you spend the better part of that Autumn day driving back towards your home town while he feverishly clicks away on his flip-phone messaging someone.

All he knows is that you’re just as he had described. You’re smart, a wise-ass… But you’re crafty, clever. Beneath your innocent façade belied something in the funnel. Something hungry, and placative lurking deep within that most would never get the fortune to live through seeing. Something he could respect.

There is a deeper sense of camaraderie between the two of you from that day. Turns out you were the SIXTH Entomologist on Arkin’s list.

Still. Asa is in deep shit, despite the newfound… Addiction the pair of you share. It’s only a matter of time before they find Arkin, or Arkin’s trail, and a simple side-step before they find yours. He texts his friend once more for some help.

“Only if you can admit I was right.”

“Perhaps you were.”

“So. I get to be best man at the wedding right?”

“No.”

“Maid of honor?”

“Chromeskull.”

“You’re right. I’m saving your ass. I want to be the BEST HONOR.”

[ne0n-n1ghtm4res]

Hello bugblr!!! Last post I made related to bugs was my entomology journal. Well I have super exciting news!!!

So, this is nubbins:

I bought him for 2 dollars from the "live lizard food" section at the pet store. Obviously I am not feeding him to any lizard.

He is a tobacco hornworm, or Manduca Sexta

He buried himself a few days ago, and this morning I woke up to this!

I changed his container and I put some dirt in there, it's damp with cold water. He should emerge in about 2 weeks!! I'm very excited. After that he'll live for about 2-3 weeks. I plan on taking care of him until he dies, and at that point I'll pin him.

I'm actually not sure if he’s actually a he right now, but I'll know once he emerges. Hopefully he is because I absolutely love the big fluffy antennae.

Anyways, that's all! Thought I would share, I'm super super excited about this!!! It's my first time raising any arthropod from the larval stage, I hope I'm doing everything right- I have done quite a bit of research for this. If he dies before he fully emerges I'll definitely be upset, but at least it will be a learning experience- after all, I can always get another 2 dollar caterpillar.

[punchdrunkdoc]

Given To Fly

Chapters 1 & 2

TASM! Peter Parker x Original female character

Summary: After the events of Spiderman: No Way Home, Peter 3 is determined to make some changes to his life. It starts with a new job, and a chance meeting with a beautiful stranger in a bar.

Notes: The lonely, somewhat tortured TASM!/Andrew Garfield version of Peter Parker in Spiderman: No Way Home broke my heart a bit. This is my attempt to give him his happy ending.

I can't say too much more, as there's a mystery at the heart of this tale that I don't want to spoil.

This will be a multi-part story.

Also available here.

Chapter 1:

The Girl At The Bar

Peter tried not to wince as the alcohol burned its way down his throat. Guess brandy wasn't his drink. It had been Uncle Ben's tipple of choice, and he would often pour himself one in the evening to help him unwind. He'd swirl the amber-coloured liquid in a fat glass, while reclining in his lazy boy, sock-covered feet up on the foot rest as he asked his wife and nephew about their day. Aunt May liked gin, and white wine with dinner. Peter sometimes joined her in a glass during their weekly meals together, but he wasn't a fan.

So far at this bar, he'd tried a glass of scotch, a shot of tequila and, of course the brandy, but none were to his taste. He'd kinda skipped the experimental drinking phase of college so was making up for lost time tonight, applying his scientific mind to the task of discovering a beverage that would:

A. Get him drunk and

B. Not make him want to gag in the process.

If he even could get drunk. He never had been before. And maybe his high metabolism and accelerated healing wouldn't allow him. Did spider's get drunk? Was that a known arachnid defence mechanism? Maybe he could write a paper after this little experiment and turn the world of entomology on his head: 'New study suggests spiders can't get drunk!'

Shaking off his idiotic thoughts, he flagged down the bartender for the third time in 20 minutes, yelling "Can I get a vodka this time?". The bartender spared a semi-judgemental glance at the half empty glasses lined up in front of him, before nodding and turning to the rack of bottles behind the bar. "With tonic!” Peter added, not wanting to endure another swig of pure alcohol. The bartender nodded again, back still to him, not bothering to try to converse over the heavy din of the music.

Peter swivelled around in his stool while waiting for his latest drink to be made, taking in the strobe-lit bar-slash-nightclub. The air was thick with sweat, and a crowd of people were dancing and stomping to the pulsing electronic music mere mere feet from where he sat. This was not his typical scene - at all. His lack of drinking experience was enough proof that bars in general were not his scene. This time of night he'd usually be swinging through the city on the look out for criminals, not downing drinks.

Its not like he was part of a roaring social circuit, where he was meeting up regularly with friends over drinks, and he wasn't a guy that needed alcohol to destress or help him sleep - his Spider-man activities did that for him. He wore himself out physically night after night, swinging from buildings, stringing up thugs and mobsters, getting the occasional beating in return. Then, in the early hours of the morning, he'd stumble through his apartment window, strip off his suit and collapse into bed, just sparing enough consciousness to set the alarm for later that day. Deep down he knew that wasn't exactly a healthy method for coping with life, but he justified it to himself that at least he was helping people and not just selfishly drowning himself in a bottle.

So yeah, this was not his scene. But after leaving May's that night, he'd arrived on his block and just...couldn't bear to go home alone. Again. His little foray into the multiverse had shown him how solitary his life truly was. Seeing Peter 1 with his MJ and his best friend, and hearing about Peter 2's relationship with his MJ…it had thrown Peter 3’s last 9 years into stark relief.

His life as Peter Parker was...non-existent. He had no social life. He survived paycheck-to-paycheck and, while he loved photography, taking photos of himself to sell to tabloid newspapers was not exactly creatively challenging. In fact, he was doing nothing to challenge himself. His degree was going to waste, he had no ambitions, he was just coasting.

Barely existing.

After he returned to his own universe, he vowed to change some things. The first thing he did (the only thing, if he was honest, but, hey! Baby steps!) was get a new job. From Monday he would be the newest research assistant at the well-respected GenTech biogenetics institute. He would actually be using his brain - and his degree - for something useful. The pay wasn’t life changing, but given enough time he might be able to upgrade his shitty apartment to something marginally less shitty.

Yay.

He still couldn’t cut back on the Spider-man activities though. Until his life as Peter truly began, he needed to be out in the city, in amongst everything. The alternative was sitting home alone, with no-one around to distract him from this thoughts…and that was far too depressing to contemplate.

Tonight he didn’t have the option to suit up; the still-healing bullet wound in his bicep (courtesy of a particularly over-zealous armed robber from the previous night), prevented him from using his webs, and it was too risky even for him to venture out without them.

So as he’d passed by the bar near the corner of his apartment building, contemplating the endless stretch of night awaiting him, he’d figured 'what the hell'. He'd get drunk - enough so he could sleep without dreaming - and then head back to his miserable apartment.

A figure emerging from the crush of intoxicated dancers caught his eye and brought him out of his reverie. She was tall for a woman - taller than even some of the guys she was trying to squeeze past. Her hair was...well, he couldn't make out the colour but the way the strobe lights hit the loose, wavy strands, he figured it was light - a blond or maybe a red head. Her shoulder's were bare, exposed by a metallic halter top, and her long, slim legs were encased in skin-tight jeans. Surprisingly, she wore heavy black biker boots instead of more fashionable heels. His eyes moved back to her face to find she was looking straight at him, one eyebrow slightly raised. Busted for checking her out, Peter blushed and swung back around to face the bar.

The hairs on the back of his neck stood up, his Spidey-senses tingling; not with a feeling of danger, just...awareness...as she came to stand at the bar next to his stool.

Huh, he'd never felt that before.

"Jack Daniels and diet coke, please," she called out to the bartender, her words laden with an English accent. Peter tried and failed to keep himself from looking at her face once more. He peered up at her profile, noting the cheeks flushed from dancing and the plump, slightly parted lips. Her heavy eye makeup made her grey irises seem pale and otherworldly. Those eyes flicked down to his and he quickly averted his gaze, taking a sip of the vodka in front of him. He forgot to hide his wince at the sharp taste, and heard a soft chuckle from the woman next next him.

"Does your drink taste bad, or are you grimacing at this appalling song choice?" she asked. He looked up to see her pointing at the speaker hanging over the bar, which was now blasting out a screeching techno hit from the late 90s.

He met her smile with one of your own. "It was the drink but...yeah, the music sucks too."

She reached over and lifted his drink, taking a small sip through the straw. "Hmm, just vodka. I was expecting paint stripper from the way you screwed your face up."

He laughed at that. "Are you familiar with the taste of paint stripper?"

"You'd be surprised what a poor, struggling student will drink on a night out," she replied straight-faced.

His grin stretched wider. "And is that what you are? A poor, struggling student?" he asked.

"Not anymore thankfully. I graduated a couple of years ago. Now I can afford the good stuff." She raised up her own drink as if in a toast before taking a quick sip. "Here," she offered the glass to him, "Maybe you'll like this better."

He took the glass from her, their fingers brushing for a moment. The contact set his Spidey-sense off again. He didn’t know how to interpret what his body was telling him. She didn't feel like a threat, and she certainly didn't look like one. It was more like he was being told 'pay attention. She's important'.

"Are you going to drink that, or absorb it through osmosis?"

He shook off his thoughts and took a drink, pleasantly surprised at the taste. So maybe he was a Jack man? Then his brain caught up to her words. "Osmosis? Are you a scientist then?"

"Wow, so knowing the word 'osmosis' labels me a scientist? Didn’t know you Americans had such low standards in academia," she teased.

He laughed but narrowed his eyes, pretending to peer intensely at her. "You are something science-y though," he guessed, more out of hope for a common interest than anything tangible.

"I'm a doctor," she admitted.

"Hah, I knew it! Medical or PhD?"

"Medical," she confirmed, looking abashed.

"Why are you so embarrassed, that's cool!”

"No, I know, and I am kinda proud of it," she sighed. "But people make such a big deal sometimes, like, just graduating Med School is this huge achievement, when really I was just lucky enough to be born with a reasonably high IQ and an ability to memorise a whole bunch of random information. Most of medicine is just memorising lists,” she finished with a shrug.

“Even if that’s true, it is a big deal being a doctor. It should be the first thing you tell people! You should only ever introduce yourself as 'Dr. So and So'. Brag about it!"

"Brag?! Have you ever met a British person before? We're sorta famous for our charming modesty," she said wryly.

He laughed again. God, when was the last time he laughed this much? He found it easy to joke around as Spider-man. The banter and quips flowing thick and fast under that guise. But as plain old Peter…he’d alway been kinda shy. Thankfully, he’d pretty much grown out the stuttering awkwardness of his teenage years, but he was never good with small talk. Especially with strangers. ESPECIALLY with beautiful female strangers.

To demonstrate, he followed up with the most inane question possible. ”So what are you doing here?”

"In this bar or in this country?" she countered.

"We'll start with this bar and then zoom our way out."

"I like to dance," she said, with a shrug of her slender shoulders.

"I can tell."

She cocked her head, "How?" "

By your boots," he said, and they both peered down at her feet. "You want to be comfortable, right? And not have to worry about breaking your ankle in pretty heels when you're out on the dance floor."

She gave him a thoughtful look, as if he'd done something clever, and he felt stupidly proud of himself. "How do you know its not the height thing? That I avoid 'pretty heels' so that I don't tower over every guy in here?"

He shrugged. "Something tells me that doesn't bother you."

"Correct again," she said softly, with that same thoughtful look. "I like being tall."

"How tall are you?" he asked, as he got up off his stool. He breached the small distance between them to gauge it better and realised she was the same height as him. Out of nowhere, the notion came to him that he wouldn't have to bend down to kiss her.

Just as he was shaking off that thought, the crowd that had been amassing at the bar suddenly surged against her back, pushing her against his chest. His hands automatically came up to steady her, wrapping around her bare arms. Now he knew why Peter 1 referred to his Spidey-sense as a 'tingle'. Because upon touching her again, that sensation suddenly coursed through his entire body, leaving him flushed and slightly out of breath. Her gaze met his, the two of them no longer smiling. The air between them grew heated, and his fingers tightened imperceptibly against her skin.

"Um...," Peter said, feeling like he had to say something to break the mounting tension between them. He knew he could just release her and step back, but found himself unable - unwilling - to do so. Being so close to someone so stunningly out of his league was short-circuiting his brain.

The decision was made for him when the crowd at her back let up the pressure and she stumbled back. His hands lost contact with her skin and, suddenly at a loss with what to do with them, he raked them nervously through his hair.

"Its getting a bit crazy down here," she laughed, and he thought he could hear nerves in her voice too for some reason. "Do you, um, want to get a table upstairs?" she asked.

His self preservation instincts wanted him to decline. Just ignore this connection with this beautiful stranger, end this whole experiment with socialising, go home and go to bed. Return to his solitary life where he didn't have to reveal anything of himself, or risk getting hurt again. 'What would the other Peters do?' He thought. It had become an almost mantra over the past couple of months, whenever he felt himself slipping back into bad habits. 'What would they do in this situation?'. And that cinched it for him. Because they wouldn't let this opportunity go so easily.

"It's okay if you don't," she said, responding to his silence. "I just thought, we c-"

"I'd love to," he interrupted. "Yeah, um, I mean yes. Let's go. Upstairs. Let's do that," he rambled, before finally clenching his jaw shut and nodding like an idiot.

They managed to find a free table on the balcony overlooking the dance floor - free because it was situated annoyingly close to the line for the bathroom. But the irritation of the milling, sweaty bodies around them and the relentlessly bad music soon faded away as they talked and talked and talked.

They found they had a common interest in scifi and fantasy, and spent an hour comparing thoughts on their favourite movies and books. They also had a lot not in common, but enjoyed trying to change each others minds about their respective passions.

He found out she loved music but couldn’t play an instrument to save her life.

He told her about his photography.

He loved her self-deprecating humour, and her intelligence - she was intimidatingly well-read and had theories on all sorts of scientific pursuits, including the multiverse (she was completely wrong, but he couldn't tell her without divulging some pretty hefty revelations). He was having fun verbally sparring with her.

And even when there was a lull in the conversation, it never felt awkward. They would just sit with each other and look out onto the crowd below, then start talking again. At one point he had moved to her side, the loud music necessitating closer contact to avoid having to yell, and they had stayed like that for the rest of the night. Their arms would brush against each other as they reached for their drinks and he'd occasionally have to lean even closer to her to be heard, his lips near her ear. He had to restrain himself from leaning in the rest of the way and allowing his lips to rest against the soft, inviting skin of her neck.

At one point he had taken her hand, gently turning her arm. "You have such pale skin," he had remarked softly, tracing his finger over the surface, captivated by the way she almost glowed in the soft light of the table lamp.

"Curse of the British: pale skin and bad teeth,” she joked.

“You have great teeth,” he murmured, his eyes not moving from the path his finger was taking across her skin. “I bet you sunburn easily," he commented, almost to himself.

"Yeah," she breathed. "Not really built for sunlight. We're more of an indoors people."

He met her eyes, grinning at her response, and suddenly realised how close they were, their lips mere inches apart. It would take no effort at all to lean just a little bit closer, to press his lips to hers...He swallowed nervously and sat back, maintaining his distance but keeping hold of her hand until the lights came on in the club signalling closing time.

That light offered him his first proper glimpse of her, and despite the late hour, the dance-induced sweat drying at her hairline and the harsh fluorescent bulbs, his first impression had been correct… she was absolutely, stunningly beautiful.

She ducked her head when he caught her staring and started blushing. It was funny, she looked like a freaking supermodel, but blushed whenever he stared at her. That British modesty thing really was charming as hell. He tugged on her hand to help her up from the table, and they made their way downstairs and out of the club together.

The cool night air was refreshing, and Peter raised his face up to the sky, eyes closing as he took a deep breath. He felt her come to stand against his side as he stood on the sidewalk, feeling comfortable in silence with her.

Her.

Peter laughed. He turned to her face her, and met her curious expression.

"What is it?" she asked, stifling a yawn. The cold air had invigorated him, but its seemed to have made her tired.

He took a step back and stuck out his hand. "Hi. My name is Peter."

She laughed too. All those hours getting to know each other...and they seemed to have forgotten the basics. She grasped his outstretched hand but...hesitated slightly, her eyes darting to the left before meeting his. "I'm Jen. Nice to meet you."

His thumb brushed against the back of her hand, the 'tingles' from the contact still present, but less jarring now. "Nice to meet you too," he replied, softly.

They stood there, hands clasped for several long moments. Peter didn't want this night to end, he wanted to invite her to his apartment and keep talking to her, but couldn't find a way to say it that didn't sound like a sleazy pick-up line.

She took the initiative once more. "Peter," she said, and, man, did he love the way his name sounded in her accent. He could see intent in her eyes and it made him swallow nervously. She stepped closer to him, grasped the back of his head with her free hand...and kissed him.

He stood rooted to the spot, his mind flinging in a million different directions. Was he ready for this? What was this? She didn't really know him - would she still want him if she knew the blood he had on his hands? He couldn't do this again. Was he betraying Gwen? What would the Peters do!?

Before he could sort out the maelstrom of his feelings, she broke the contact and tugged her hand free of his. "I'm sorry," she said sounding embarrassed. She wouldn't meet his eyes, and turned quickly to look down the street. “Shit, I'm so sorry. Just forget that happened."

A yellow cab made its way down the street and she stuck her hand out to hail it. She glanced back at him, "I'll get going now. Nice to meet you."

The cab slowed to a stop in front of them, the tires splashing through a puddle from the rainstorm earlier in the day. The sound of the water shook Peter from his stupor. "No! Wait!" he yelled, grabbing her hand. "Just...wait, please wait."

She looked at him and bit her lip, her other hand on the cab door. The driver called out, irritated at the delay, "Are you coming or not, lady?"

Peter answered for her. "She's not.” He pulled Jen away from the cab and grabbed her other hand. "I'm sorry, just listen to me for a sec and let me explain and if you never want to see me again, I'll flag down another cab. Or call you an Uber or something, okay?"

"Okay," she said, and waited.

And waited.

Peter swallowed. He couldn't really explain to her why he was acting so weird. From her point of view, she'd met a guy in a bar, they'd talked all night, done some mutual flirting, so she’d kissed him. It was all completely reasonable, and yet he'd had a mini freak out.

That wasn't normal.

But what could he say? "Sorry, I'm an emotionally-stunted superhero who lost his first love because he didn't catch her when she fell from a clocktower, and I’ve spent the last 9 years in a guilt-induced spiral of violence and solitude".

Yeah, that wouldn't freak her out at all!

"Peter," she sighed, "It's okay. I misread the situation, it happens. No big deal."

"But it is a big deal," he countered. "This doesn't happen to me. I don't meet people and have it be so...easy and effortless, and, and...nice! Tonight was really nice!"

Her brows came together in confusion. "Okay..." she said.

He dropped her hands and dragged his own through his hair, feeling agitated. He tugged on his locks and spun in a circle before facing her again. "I know that sounds weird, but you have no idea how much I needed 'nice' tonight. And it wasn't just nice. That makes it sound so...so...boring. It was so much more than just nice - it was amazing. You're amazing. And God, you’re so beautiful. And I wanna keep talking to you and yeah, I think I want to kiss you - properly this time - I'm sorry I was weird about it before. But, yeah," he finished, his smile growing with the realisation. "I wanna kiss you."

He reached for her, but the air was suddenly filled with the drunken cries of the young revellers spilling out of the club behind them. Making a quick decision, he grabbed her hand and pulled her away from the mob. "Look, my apartment is just there," he said, pointing to his window on the fifth floor of the building opposite. "Do you want to come up for a cup of coffee, or something?" He grimaced internally - guess he ended up going with the sleazy come-on after all.

But she just smiled and nodded and squeezed his hand.

He met her smile. “Good! Great, okay, lets go.”

Once they got through his apartment door, the nerves and awkwardness intensified. "Um, I'll get the coffee," Peter said, locking the door behind them. He started to shuffle towards the kitchen but he couldn’t take his eyes off her as she wandered around his small studio, studying the books on his shelf and the photos on the wall. She leaned over slightly to check out the view from his window, presenting him with the full expanse of her bare back. There was literally no material from the thin band at her neck to the waist band of her jeans - how did he not notice that before? And when did he become a back-guy? Because that's evidently what he was. Seeing all that milky soft skin...it snapped him out of his awkwardness and self-doubt.

He marched over to her, spun her around and kissed her.

There was no freezing this time. No hesitation or second-guessing. He kissed her, and kept kissing her, bring his hands up to tangle in her hair, angling her head so he could kiss her deeper. She kissed him and kept kissing him in return, stepping closer to him so they were pressed tightly together, her hands roaming over his back.

‘That’s a good idea’, the part of his brain still engaged in higher reasoning thought, as he moved his hands down to caress her back in return. God, her skin was even softer than it looked, and he could feel hints of delicate muscle under his wandering hands.

It wasn’t enough - he needed to feel her everywhere.

He started backing her towards the bed in the corner of the room, all the while tugging the material of her top from of the front of her jeans.

Once freed, his hands moved underneath, reaching up to cup her breasts. The sensation of hands on bare skin, jolted him slightly, enough for that last remaining bit of higher functioning to kick in. “Is this ok?,” he checked with her between kisses.

Her knees hit the bed and she collapsed backwards. He followed her down, resting the length of his body over her long, slim form. “Jen, is this ok?” he asked again, pulling away from her slightly. “I didn’t invite you up here for this. I mean, I thought, maybe another kiss or something…I just don’t want you to think I’m that guy. The one just trying to get into your pants, I li-“

“Peter!” she gasped, her tone slightly exasperated. “It’s all good, we’re good. I want this. So just shut up and kiss me!” She grasped him by the hair and pulled him back to her.

“Yes, ma’am,” he mumbled against her lips with a smile.

---

Chapter 2:

The Girl In The Lab

Peter jolted awake, unsure of what had disturbed his sleep. He was lying on his side, curled around a sleeping, naked Jen. Her blond hair was spread out between them and it tickled his nose as she nuzzled her head deeper into the pillow they shared. He figured that must have been what roused him. He smiled and edged his head back a bit, even as his arms tightened around her.

He mentally took stock of his body - his usual habit upon waking - checking for any new aches and pains or wounds. But of course, there were none. He hadn’t suited up last night. He’s spent it with Jen instead. And while his body felt used and spent, it was in the best possible way. In fact, he felt pretty great. Better than he had in years.

Jen shifted again in her sleep, one of her legs coming to rest between his. The contact brought up a vivid memory of last night, of him wrapping those long legs around his waist as he thrust inside her. His smile broadened until his cheeks almost hurt. Last night had been fucking amazing. He’d never had sex like it - not that he’d had that much experience over the years. But still, he knew it wasn’t always like that - it couldn’t possibly be, otherwise the human race would do nothing but stay in bed all day.

They’d been so in tune to each other, their bodies fitting together like they were made for each other. And it had been surprisingly light and fun - they’d still talked and laughed throughout the night, losing none of the easy interplay they’d shared in the bar.

He felt happy, he realised. The complete opposite to the shame and disgust he always assumed he’d feel after a one-night stand. Not that he considered this a one-night stand. Sure, they’d met at a bar and had sex the first night, just hours after meeting…but it wasn’t some sordid one-off. This was the start of something.

Something real.

Just as he was dropping off to sleep again, his Spidey-senses suddenly went haywire, coinciding with the sound of a terrible drawn-out metallic screech in the distance. His eyes snapped open. Shit, what the hell was that?

He carefully extracted his limbs from around Jen and crept out of bed, straining his super-hearing for any more clues, but all he could hear now was the blare of sirens as the emergency services raced to the site of a presumably horrible accident.

He quickly shoved some clothes on and grabbed the backpack containing his suit from under his bed. Sparing one last, long look at Jen sleeping peacefully under his duvet, Peter hurried to the kitchen to quickly scribble a note for her to find if she woke.

Hi. Something came up and I had to head out - help yourself to coffee and I promise to bring breakfast when I come back.

Peter paused, unsure what else to say. Well, he knew what he wanted to say: last night was one of the best nights of my life, I can’t wait to kiss you again and hear you laugh, and just sit with you and be with you…but he didn’t want to scare her off.

The sirens were getting louder now, and were sure to wake Jen if he lingered any longer. So he scrawled his phone number at the bottom of the note, just in case she needed him, and left the apartment.

———

Several hours later, Peter jogged up to the front of his apartment building, a stupid grin on his face that he couldn’t quite manage to suppress. Juggling two coffee cups and several brown packages filled with pastries, he pulled open the main door of his building and stepped inside. The emergency had turned out to be a subway derailment, which could have been a lot worse had it occurred at rush hour. But, luckily, in the early hours of a Saturday morning, the contingent of passengers was low, and between the efforts of Spider-man and the FDNY, they’d managed to locate everyone and get them all out alive in record time.

That left Peter the whole day to spend with Jen. Maybe they’d go see a movie or go to a museum. Or maybe they’d just stay in bed all day. At that thought his smile widened. He started whistling a random tune as he bounced up the stairs and let himself into his apartment.

The darkness was the first thing he noticed.

None of the lights were on and he could see the curtains over his window were still drawn, blocking out the bright mid-morning sun.

Then he noticed the silence.

There was no rustle of sheets from the bed, no sound of running water in the bathroom, no padding of footsteps on his wooden floor.

“Jen,” he called out, hastily dumping the breakfast items on his kitchen counter. He started hurrying around his apartment, checking every inch of the tiny space. “Jen,” he called out again, futilely, knowing the truth the moment he’d walked into the apartment and felt the utter lack of life and warmth in the place.

She was gone.

“Shit,” he muttered, jumping back to the kitchen to check the note he’d left. He let out a relieved breath when he realised it had moved from the place he’d left it. That meant she’d read it at least, and hadn’t thought he’d just bailed on her. He flipped the scrap of paper over, hoping she might have left a note of her own, or her number, but there was nothing. Quickly rummaging through his pockets he located his own phone and checked the display.

No texts. No missed calls.

“Shit,” he repeated, louder, as he collapsed into the chair by the kitchen table. “Shit!” He yelled it this time, his stomach sinking like a stone as he realised that she’d left and he had no fucking way to contact her.

———

For the rest of the weekend, Peter ran the gamut of nearly every emotion known to man.

There was soaring hope whenever his phone chimed or he heard footsteps outside his apartment door.

Crushing disappointment when it turned out to not be her.

Irrational anger at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority for not maintain the tracks of their subway system allowing a derailment to occur the exact morning he was waking up with someone special!

Overwhelming annoyance at himself for not getting her number or even her fucking LAST NAME before walking out the door and leaving her. They’d talked for literally hours and he felt that he knew her...but in retrospect he realised a few very important details had been missing from their conversation. Like who she was, where she was staying, how long she was in New York…all pretty fucking vital information!

On the back of these thoughts, creeping doubt and mistrust directed at Jen started to plague Peter. Why was she so evasive about who she was? Was she just in it for the sex, and hadn’t really cared about forming a connection with him? Was it just a one-night stand to her? She had been the one to approach him at the bar, and she’d kissed him first. At the time he thought the contradiction between that boldness and her otherwise shy nervous blushing was endearing…but was it an act? Was it a routine she regularly employed to get her rocks off?

Those thoughts led to him hating himself and feeling like an idiot and wishing he could do everything differently that morning.

“Fuck!” Peter yelled, trying to silence the thoughts flying through his head for the millionth time since Saturday morning. He startled the old man passing him on the sidewalk with his outburst. “Sorry, Sir,” Peter called after him, but the man just gave him a sour look over this shoulder as he carried on walking.

Peter sighed and picked up his pace. He was gonna be late for his first day at GenTech at this rate, and he wanted to make a good impression, mainly for Professor Samuels benefit. Prof Sam (as he liked to be called) had been Peter's favourite professor at college. He’d always taken an interest in Peter, recognising his talents and trying to convince him to go to Grad School. But Peter had always declined. He wanted to get his diploma (mostly just to make May proud), but at that point in his life he couldn’t see a future for himself beyond his role as Spider-man.

Reaching out to Prof Sam after all these years had been a long shot, but Peter had very few other contacts in his chosen field and he needed some help getting through doors. Help that Prof Sam had been all too happy to provide. He’d put Peter in contact with an acquaintance of his - Professor Henri Allard, a renowned French geneticist who had just set up a private research lab in Manhattan studying gene modification therapy - a subject Peter had some personal experience with, although he’d obviously left that out of his application.

Prof Sam’s recommendations, as well as Peter’s college transcripts had been enough to land Peter the gig of an entry level research assistant.

Which he was going to be late for.

Shit.

———

Peter managed to reach the reception desk with minutes to spare, thanks to a last minute dash through traffic, relying on his Spidey-sense to help him dodge any oncoming cars.

Panting slightly from the exertion, he introduced himself to the receptionist and was given his pass along with directions to his supervisor’s office on the second floor. Stepping off the elevator on said floor, Peter straightened his shirt and tried to smooth his hair down as he made his way to meet Dr. James Newsome.

James, or Jimmy as he preferred, was just a few years older than Peter, but was already noticeably balding and his large gut strained against his button-down shirt as he reached over his desk to shake Peter’s hand.

‘"Nice to meet you, Pete. I was in Prof Sam’s class in ’09. Anyone who impressed that dude, is a good dude in my books,” Jimmy commented, leading Peter back out of his office for a tour of the department.

“Will I get to meet Professor Allard at some point?“ Peter enquired partway through the tour. “I read that piece on him in the New Yorker, and...just...wow. The things he’s been able to accomplish within the field of cancer gene modification is amazing…but he also does all this work in Africa and his advocacy for-“

“You’re a fan, I get it!” Jimmy interrupted, laughing. “Dude, we all are, that’s why we’re here. But we’re just the grunts on 2. His office is up on 6 and he doesn’t make it down here much. Too busy wining and dining grant money out of senators to bother with the likes of us.”

Peter tried to hide his disappointment as he and Jimmy rounded a bend in the corridor and reached an open plan area. “Next,” Jimmy said, opening both arms wide, “we have our Data Geeks.” Jimmy motioned to a group of eight small cubicles, seven of which were already inhabited. He pointed to the empty desk “This will be yours, newest Data Geek,” he said with a smile. “I assume you’ve already been given the run down on what your job will be?”

“Yeah,” Peter replied. “Data entry and analysis of exome sequencing from the mice trials”.

“Correct-amundo. Talk to Steve after this,” Jimmy said pointing to the guy in glasses sat opposite Peter’s desk. “And he’ll get you up to speed on the software.” They reached a set of double doors and Jimmy swiped his access card, allowing them entry into a small laboratory. The solitary occupant was a young woman in a white lab coat. She was sitting at a desk, her back to them, as she peered down a microscope.

“Now we have the Lab Geeks. Well,” he corrected, “Lab Geek singular, seeing as Jane is the only one here so far. Yo, Janey,” Jimmy called out loud enough for the woman to hear. “Got a newbie starting today. Meet Peter.”

The woman glanced over her shoulder dismissively. But then she did a slight double take, her eyes widening a fraction when she saw Peter, before quickly turning back to her equipment.

“She’s a bit of an odd one, don’t take it personally,” Jimmy whispered ushering Peter back out the door.

Peter’s gaze lingered on the woman, a strange feeling almost like déjà vu falling over him. She’d looked at him like she knew him.

And he felt like he knew her too.

———

Determined to get to the bottom of the mystery, Peter approached the woman - Jane - the moment he saw her enter the break room later that day.

“Hi,” he said as he came to stand beside her at the counter.

He saw her stiffen slightly, and she kept her gaze fixed on her cup as it filled with coffee from the espresso machine.

Peter stiffened too - the spider tingles were back! The same ones he got being near Jen. But this was not Jen. Their names might have been similar but they looked nothing alike. Jane was shorter than Jen by about an inch or two. Her much longer hair was dark brown and pulled up in a messy bun. The eyes he’d glimpsed back in the lab, hidden behind dark-framed glasses were hazel, not grey.

She finally peered up at him, realising he wasn’t going away. He got a good look at her face then. She wasn’t ugly, but the moniker ‘Plain Jane’ suited her in more ways than one. She had nothing on the striking beauty of Jen.

“Bye,” she replied stiltedly, turning to walk away, her cup in hand.

“Do I know you from somewhere?” Peter called to her back.

She paused at the doorway, and without looking back replied simply “No.”

Peter watched her walk away with a frown on his face.

———

“So, how was your first week at work?” Aunt May asked as she sat down at the dining table.

Peter, who had already started tucking in to his meal, answered “T’sokay,” around a mouthful of spaghetti.

“Peter,” she sighed. “Don’t talk while you’re eating."

“Well don’t ask me questions when I’m chewing,” he replied with a grin. It was a back and forth they’d been having since he was 8 years old.

She smiled at him fondly. “Make any new friends?”

“Its a job, Aunt May, not grade school.”

“But your colleagues must all be around your age, and you obviously have similar interests. Its not outside the realms of possibility that you’d meet someone you get along with.”

Peter’s mind immediately flashed to an image of Jen, her mouth pulled up in a smile as she leaned towards him. He let out an involuntary sigh.

“What is it?" May asked.

Peter deflected the question, not really in the mood to talk about Jen, who he hadn’t heard from at all since the previous weekend. “Oh, there’s just this woman at work who’s annoying.”

It wasn’t a lie. Jane was annoying. Or at least, the mystery of her annoyed Peter.

“How so?” May asked, taking a sip of her wine.

“She’s just…,” Peter tailed off. “She’s…,” he tried again. “She’s aloof.”

“Aloof?” May echoed with a laugh.

“Yes, aloof! Cold, distant, unfriendly. Basically the dictionary definition of ‘Aloof’,” Peter replied, chasing a rogue meatball around his plate. “Everyone on our floor avoids her like the plague, which is fairly easy since she stays hidden in her lab most of the time. I’ve literally heard her say two syllables the entire time I’ve been there. Two! And when she does stomp out of her little hole to get her daily coffee, she ignores everyone and everything happening around her. She’s rude.”

“Stomp out?” May asked, trying to hide her smile. She hadn’t seen Peter this animated in a long time.

“Stomp! In these big ridiculous Doc Marten boots that she wears with everything. Skirts, jeans, dresses. All with the same black boots.”

“It sounds like you’ve observed her a lot in just a week.”

Peter froze, realising how his little diatribe must have sounded. He tried to backtrack. “Not really. There’s just not that many people in the lab so you tend to notice the weird ones.” In truth, he had been watching her closely, hoping something would jog in his memory and he’d be able to place her. He was still plagued by the notion that he knew her somehow.

“‘Weird’ seems harsh,” May said with a frown. “Maybe she’s just shy.”

“She’s not shy. She’s rude,” Peter repeated, finally managing to stab the meatball with his fork.

———

She was rude. And aloof, and all the things he’d told May.

She was also fucking amazing.

It happened on his third Tuesday at GenTech. The day started much like every other day. He arrived at 9am, got settled in to his station and started ploughing through the latest results. He went looking for his caffeine fix at 11am and found Kevin - the work experience student - sitting in the break room looking…not well.

“Hey, you okay, man?” Peter asked, coming to crouch by the teenager. He was panting and every breath looked pained.

“Something’s wrong,” Kevin managed to whisper between laboured breaths. “My chest hurts.”

“Okay, dude, everything will be fine. I’ll call an ambulance real quick and we’ll get you looked at.” Peter stood up to dial 911, keeping his eyes locked with the frightened youngster, trying to reassure him with a smile.

Instead, he watched as Kevin’s eyes slowly fluttered shut and he slumped over. Peter dropped the phone and managed to catch Kevin has he slid from his chair unconscious.

“Hey!” Peter yelled, hoping there was someone in hearing distance. “I need some help in here!”

Peter laid Kevin out flat on the linoleum away from the furniture and checked his pulse.

Absent.

Shit!

Just then, the familiar stomp of Jane’s boots rang out behind him, much faster than usual. She dropped to her knees beside Peter, barking out, “What happened?”

“I don’t know! He was complaining of chest pain and looked short of breath, then he just collapsed.”

Jane quickly checked the boy’s vitals. “He’s not breathing. No pulse.” She started chest compressions, causing one of the girls in the gathering crowd at the door of the breakroom to gasp and cover her mouth.

“Someone call an ambulance,” Jane ordered, still rhythmically pumping Kevin’s chest. “And someone find a defibrillator or a first aid kit or something, whatever we have.” Jimmy, who’d wrestled himself inside the break room, nodded and got out his phone while barking his own orders at Steve, one of Peter’s fellow data geeks.

Jane looked at Peter. “Do you know how to do chest compressions?”

Peter glanced at her, numbly shaking his head.

“Just do what I’m doing,” she said, her voice calm and reassuring. “Use the heel of your hand, lock your elbows and lean your weight over your shoulders. You want to compress the chest about a third, and you need to do it fast - faster than you think. Try singing Staying Alive while you’re doing it. You know, the Bee Gees song?”

Peter nodded and edged closer, ready to take over. The minute she lifted her hands he placed his down and started pumping.

“That’s it,” Jane said, “Let me hear you sing.”

Peter glared at her, but complied, wanting to do his best by the boy under his hands. “Staying alive, staying alive, ah, ah, ah, ah, staying alive” he sang, feeling ridiculous and freaked out all at once. He was so much better at being under pressure when he was Spider-man.

“If you get tired, let me know,” Jane said positioning Kevin’s face and performing two rounds of mouth-to-mouth. “Does anyone else know CPR?” She called out to the crowd by the door which was getting bigger by the minute.

“I won’t get tired,” Peter said, as a member of the lab staff stepped forward with their hand up.

“Don’t be a hero,” Jane said. “If you get tired, you won’t be effective and you’ll do more harm than good.”

“I won’t get tired,” Peter bit out.

She ignored him and turned to the new volunteer, a black woman in her early forties. “Take over mouth-to-mouth.” The woman nodded and got to work. Just then, Steve came bursting through the crowd with the defibrillator kit and several first aid boxes in his hands.

Jane quickly attached the AED leads to Kevin’s chest, working around Peter’s hands, the lock of hair that had escaped her bun brushing against his forearms.

Moments later the electronic voice intoned “No shock”.

“Is that bad?” Peter whispered, not wanting to alarm the crowd at their back.

“It’s fine,” Jane mumbled as she rooted through the first aid kids, obviously looking for something. “He’s not in a shockable rhythm but if we can reverse the cause of his collapse we can get him back.”

“Reverse what? We don’t know what’s wrong with him?” Peter exclaimed.

She looked up at him quickly, her eyes focussed and sure. “I do.”

Peter shook his head slowly, not understanding what was happening. He watched as she pulled out a cannula from one of the first aid kits, the kind they stick in your arm in the ER when you need fluids.

She quickly unwrapped the device and ran her hand over Kevin’s upper chest, counting out his ribs. When she found the location she apparently needed she pushed the needle straight through the skin and removed it, leaving the plastic tubing sticking from his chest. Peter’s sensitive hearing could pick out the faint whistle of air coming from the small port on the end.

Peter continued CPR, getting increasingly worried as he watched Jane do…nothing. Nothing but observe the trace on the AED monitor and rest her fingers on Kevin’s neck. Shit, did she really know what she was doing?

Long, endless, agonising moments passed before she spoke again “Stop CPR, we need to reassess.”

Peter reluctantly removed his hands, having no choice but to trust her. The ambulance crew hadn’t arrived and no one else was stepping forward to help.

They both watched the monitor on the AED as the flat line weaved across the display. Then…a beat. And another.

“Got a pulse,” Jane said calmly, removing her fingers from Kevin’s neck.

“He’s breathing!” The older woman at Kevin’s head cried out.

A cheer went up in the crowd and Peter fell back on his heels, taking what felt like his own first breath in minutes.

A paramedic finally shouldered into the room, carrying a stretcher. “What have we got,” he asked looking between Peter and Jane.

Jane answered, her voice amazingly calm and controlled. “16 year old male, complaining of dyspnoea and chest pain. Witnessed asystolic arrest, 5 cycles of CPR, left-sided thoracocentesis for tension pneumothorax. Return of circulation after approximately 6 minutes of down time.”

The paramedic looked at her in surprise but quickly nodded. “Good work.” Then, with the help of his partner, he scooped Kevin onto the stretcher and carried him from the room.

Peter slowly got to his feet, his eyes never leaving Jane. She looked visibly uncomfortable as she was suddenly surrounded by a swarm of grateful coworkers.

Jimmy noticed her discomfort too. “Okay, everyone, lets leave the good doctor alone and go back to what we were doing. I’ll call the hospital after I speak to Kevin’s parents then let everyone know how he’s doing.”

The crowd dissipated, and the sound of people chatting and exclaiming to each other about what they’d just witnessed got quieter as everyone returned to their workstations.

Leaving Jane and Peter alone.

“So, you’re a medical doctor,” he finally said, still watching her closely.

She met his eyes, her face completely impassive, as if she hadn’t just saved someone’s life with a crowd of people watching. “Yes,” she said simply.

“And you’re English,” he stated. He’d registered her accent the moment she started barking orders. Considering this was the most he’d ever heard her say in two weeks it wasn’t surprising that he hadn’t caught the accent before.

“Yes,” she replied again, cocking an eyebrow as if to say ‘And?’

He just shook his head. “That…what you did…it was amazing,” he admitted. “How did you know how to save him?”

“There aren’t many things that can cause cardiac arrest in teenagers - spontaneous pneumothorax leading to displacement of the mediastinal structures and interruption of the venous return to the heart is one of them. Tall, thin adolescent males like Kevin are particularly susceptible. I just needed to remove the air from his chest and let things return to normal. Medicine is really just memorising lists of causes and effects. I knew the possible causes, treated the most obvious one. Simple.”

“Simple,” Peter echoed shaking his head again.

———

Later, once his heart rate had recovered to normal, he replayed her words in his mind.

'Medicine is really just memorising lists of causes and effects.'

And he remembered another similar statement, from another English medical doctor.

'Most of medicine is just memorising lists.'

Jane was English, and a medical doctor. And his Spidey-sense was triggered by her presence.

But she wasn’t Jen.

Somehow she wasn’t Jen.

Was he just seeing Jen everywhere because he was obsessed with finding her again?

Just the other day, he’d chased a tall, blond woman through Times Square, convinced it was Jen. He’d called out her name, barrelling through the crowd of milling tourists, frantic in case he lost sight of her. Eventually catching up with the woman, he’d spun her around to see…a complete stranger. He’d stuttered out an apology and left her, feeling like a mad man.

Was he going mad?

Or was there more to this?

The coincidences felt too unreal.

But she couldn’t be Jen.

She was aloof, cold, arrogant…all the things that Jen wasn’t.

And, yet…she was also fucking amazing.

CHAPTER 3