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potter-imagines · 4 years ago

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Staying at the Burrow with your boyfriend Fred Weasley...

- Fred loathed his time away from Hogwarts on any break that you weren’t with him

- Since the Christmas of your fourth year, it has become a sort of tradition for you to going your boyfriend and his family for the holidays

- And if you would even suggest a change in plans, Fred would beg you otherwise

- “Y/n pleaseeee, angel? I already told my mum that you’re coming, and she already started knitting! You’ll break her heart!” “Okay fine, I’ll come but only for Molly.”

- It means the absolute world to Fred that you love his family and that his family loves you

- Ginny would await your arrival by the front door, practically buzzing with excitement

- Every time you visit the Burrow, you make sure to bring gifts for his family

- Your favorite person to give presents to is Arthur

- You always bring him some new muggle object that never fail to fascinate him

- “Oh, Molly! Y/n’s here- ooh I wonder what she’s brought for me this time! I hope it’s one of those clicky writers!” “You mean a pen, dear.” “Yes, yes, Molly, a pem!” “Arthur, no-“

- Most breaks Harry would also tag along which meant more players for your quidditch games

- Fred and George were usually team captain

- Fred always picked you first for his team

- Unless George got to pick first

- He would pick you just in spite of Fred, which usually caused petty bickering between the twins

- “Bloody hell, George! You pinky promised me you wouldn’t pick Y/n! You said I could have her-“ “Freddie, you spend almost 24 hours a day with her. She’s just on my team for one game!”

- George would playfully torture you two during the whole break with comments here and there

- “Hey dad, I saw Fred sneak Y/n into our room last night.” “George!” “…let’s just not tell your mother, understood?”

- Doing the dishes with Fred and having a bubble fight

- George wasn’t lying tho

- Fred would sneak you into his room almost every night

- Molly had caught you two a few times but she never brought it up

- Fred was nearly 18 and Molly absolutely adored you

- So she’d smile to herself and pretend she never saw a thing

- Going on walks with Ron and Harry

- A lot of cute little moments with Fred

- Like him giving you his sweater when you get cold at night

- He likes to draw pictures on your back when you’re cuddling as you try to guess what it is

- “Uh… I’m not sure, is it a flower?” “No, angel. It was an owl! Okay now guess this one…”

- George would constantly whisper shout at the two of you when he’s trying to sleep

- “Can you lovesick puppies shut up! Some of us are single and would rather be miserable in peace. I can’t handle all the cute lovey whispers, it’s bloody sickening! I’m ready to share a bed with Percy- that’s how bad it is.”

- This would cause Fred and yourself to erupt with laughter much to George’s displeasure

- Sneaking around the house to have some *cough* private time

- Making out in his backyard

- Fred doesn’t like when you go for walks alone outside the house

- Times are tense and you’re the last person, besides a family member, that he could afford to lose

- He’ll always walk by your side and crack jokes just so he can hear you laugh

- Whether he realizes it or not, whenever you two go walking together Fred will always hold your hand and swing it back and forth

- He loves kissing your knuckles and the back of your hand

- He’s honestly so sweet when he’s not putting 24 hour color changing hair dye in your shampoo

- You’ve spent so many Christmas’ at the Weasley’s that Molly has a stocking for you and a gift ready every time

- Fred purposely places mistletoes around the house for you two to ‘conveniently’ meet under

- “Fred! You know I’m your girlfriend so you can kiss me whenever, right?” “But this is more romantic, darling! You’re the first girl I’ve ever kissed under a mistletoe- and the only, and last girl I want to kiss for my whole life. I’d like to continue that tradition.” “Well how can I say no to that?”

- Fred will literally take any chance offered to kiss you

- George loves to annoy the two of you by squeezing in the middle of your cuddles

- “George! You git, get out of here!” “But I need some love too!” “Yeah, find it with a girl who isn’t my girlfriend!”

- Fred will make you coffee or tea each morning, whichever you prefer

- Making hot chocolate together for the whole family during winters at the Burrow

- Marshmallow mustaches

- You kiss the marshmallows off Fred’s mouth, running your tongue along his upper lips which causes a deep scarlet blush to slap his cheeks

- “How do you like it when the tables are turned, Fred?” “I quite like it actually… that was hot.” “Fred!”

- During winter, you guys will have snowball fights outside with all the Weasley siblings plus Harry, and Hermione

- You and Fred have a competition on who can make the biggest snow man

- Your relationship is built off humor, friendship, and love so there is not a day that passes by where tears aren’t pouring from your eyes out of laughter

- Fred likes to wake you up by jumping on you and attacking your face with little pecks

- “Wake up, angel! I’ve been waiting ten minutes for you to get up but I couldn’t wait any longer now c’mon!”

- Fred loves to watch you get ready for the day

- Oddly enough, his favorite part is your makeup routine (if you wear any)

- It’s such a foreign world to him, he’s amazed by all the different products and how you can tell them all apart

- “Freddie, baby, can you hand me my mascara?” “Uh... sure?”

- Hands you your concealer

- He just wants to help!

- He teaches you how to ice skate out on the pond

- Loves kissing your frozen red cheeks when you two come inside after being in the snow

- Will boop your nose

- You spend a lot of time with Ginny on breaks

- She looks up to you greatly, so she gets so excited when you stay with the Weasley’s

- “Y/n, Y/n, you’re here! Come, put your stuff in my room! We can have a sleepover-“ “Wow, Ginny, hadn’t realized Y/n was your girlfriend and not mine.” “Shut up, Fred.”

- You help Fred and George play pranks on differently family members

- Molly is typically the only one that is immune from these pranks

- All three of you are far too terrified to make her angry

- You will often rummage through Fred’s closet instead of opening your suitcase

- And when he catches you in the act

- Fred will chase you around the house

- “That’s my jumper! Oh you’re in for it, Y/l/n!”

- Some days at the Burrow, Fred and you barely get out of bed

- Especially on rainy days

- The sound of raindrops pounding against the roof of the house was comforting, the warm embrace of Fred had that effect on its own even without the rain

- Maybe once a trip, you guys will take the car into town

- It’s a bit of a drive so the Weasley’s don’t like to make more trips than necessary

- Molly refuses to hand the keys to either of the twins and will only give them to you

- She doesn’t trust the twins not the wreck the car

- Every trip to the Burrow, you find yourself growing closer to your boyfriend

- You spend every day together at school, but being outside of the castle is a little different

- You have more freedom, more choices

- It makes the both of you thrilled about graduating and moving in together

- Fred can’t wait for the day he is able to spend every day with you by his side

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heyitssmiller · 4 years ago

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Clandestine: Chapter Three

The first mission doesn’t exactly go as planned. Also, Logan has a thing for glasses, apparently.

@lumosinlove Thank you for letting me run away with your characters! <3

Again, @donttouchmycarrots is my hero and the best proofreader ever! This fic wouldn’t be what it is without her.

Clandestine Masterlist

The bank was quiet, save for the soft murmurings of tellers and customers. Sunlight filtered through the windows of the storefront, light and hazy. The office plant by the front door was growing way too big for its pot. There were a few people waiting in line, absently scrolling through their phones. Others were sitting in the waiting area, mindlessly taking in their surroundings. It was calm, peaceful.

Or it was, until a redhead came sprinting out of the men’s restroom, screaming “Fire!” at the top of his lungs.

The bank then descended into madness.

A man watched from the driver’s seat of his car as people frantically streamed out of the building and onto the sidewalk. He sighed, taking a second to rest his forehead against the steering wheel. “Damnit, O’Hara. This wasn’t part of the plan.”

29 Hours Earlier

“Good morning, cubs!”

“Fuck you, Black.” Logan muttered into his cup of coffee. “It’s too early to be that excited.”

Leo smiled a little and set a paper bag on the table. Logan stared at it. Where had it come from? He hadn’t seen Leo carrying it into the briefing room, but it was too big to stuff into his pockets. He didn’t have a bag or anything – the only thing he was carrying with him was a notebook and a pen. How did he manage to smuggle it in?

Logan was so confused, and it was still too early.

“I brought muffins.” Leo explained, opening the bag and handing one to Finn. “They’re cinnamon swirl.”

“Nut, did you make these?” Finn asked, removing the wrapper and taking a big bite. Leo shrugged.

“I like to cook.”

Black looked up at him in awe. “These are amazing.” He cradled the muffin in his hand like it was something precious.

“I can give you the recipe, if you want.”

Logan grabbed a muffin, looking up quickly at Remus’ snort. “He can’t cook.”

“Neither can you.” Sirius shot back, a little more hostile than his usual teasing manner. Logan glanced back and forth between the pair, tearing off a piece of muffin and popping it into his mouth. Fuck, that was good.

His partners had clearly picked up on the tension, too, but neither of them brought it up. Leo twirled his pen around in his hand, eyes moving from the pair to Finn. He smiled as the redhead enthusiastically grabbed another muffin. Logan snapped his gaze back to Sirius. “Can we get started, please?” He asked pointedly. “If you make me get up this early, we’d better be doing something productive.”

Finn laughed at him, nose scrunching. “Are you always this grumpy in the morning?”

Green eyes rimmed with dark, dark lashes glared back at him. Logan didn’t say a word but took a long sip of coffee instead, refusing to break eye contact. Finn let himself stare a little longer than he probably should have. He wasn’t lying when he told Logan he was a sucker for green eyes.

Sirius finally broke the tension-filled staring competition between himself and Loops and looked down at his files. Remus started the projector without a word, only speaking up when he was ready to begin his presentation. “We’re starting you three off with the easiest flash drives to retrieve – the two in the banks.”

He moved to a picture of the layout of one of the banks, pointing at a small room tucked away in a corner of the building. “So the safe is back here in this room. You can’t get back there without permission or an escort, which makes it a little trickier. The security system is also very high-grade, so I don’t think trying to break in after hours is our best bet here. There’s too many little things we might miss.

“The plan is to go undercover. Leo and Finn, you’ll be infiltrating this bank. Logan, you’ll be lookout. Leo, you’re going to pretend to be a safe specialist. Tell them the make and model of the safe Riddle uses is faulty and the company sent you to see if this one needs to be replaced. I don’t really care what you say, just make it believable.”

“What kind of safe is it?” Leo asked.

Sirius looked down at his notes. “It’s a… Tigerking Digital Security safe. Does that mean anything to you?”

Leo grinned. “Makes my job a hell of a lot easier. They’ve got a weak spot.”

“What am I doing during all of this?” Finn asked through a mouthful of muffin, crumbs stuck to his mouth. He swiped at them with his tongue before speaking again, “Distraction?”

“Yeah. It’ll have to be big – big enough to get Leo alone with that safe. How long do you think it’ll take to crack, Knut?”

He shrugged. “Ten minutes, tops. It’s got this small hole at the back where bolts are fed through. I can get a stiff wire through that hole and hit the reset button. Then I can reset the code of the safe and open it without leaving a trace.”

Finn smiled, mischief in his eyes. “I think I can manage a ten-minute distraction.”

That… that didn’t sound good.

Finn took one look at Logan’s fearful face and laughed. “Relax, it’s nothing too dramatic. I’ll probably just ask for whoever takes Leo back to look at the safe and then throw a fit when they say he’s not available. And then I’ll drag out our conversation to give our dear Nut enough time. Simple.”

“That… actually works.”

Finn scoffed, giving Remus a look. “Why do you sound so surprised?”

“Because you’re Finn O’Hara.”

Finn thought about it for a second, then shrugged. “That’s fair.”

“Nut, when you open the safe you need to replace the real flash drive with this decoy.” Sirius said, holding up a blue flash drive. “This op might take weeks or months – if Riddle comes to check on this drive, he needs to see one instead of an empty safe. Now, if he actually checks the information on the flash drives… well, we’re screwed. Hopefully it won’t come to that. He doesn’t usually check the flash drives unless absolutely necessary – it’s too much of a hassle.”

“And I’ll loop the security camera footage when you get there, so there won’t be any evidence of you tampering with the safe.” Remus said. “Get in, get out. Not too hard, right? And we’ll both be with you every step of the way. You’ll have microphones and earpieces so that we can all communicate.”

Finn couldn’t tell if the bouncing of Leo’s leg was his normal restlessness or nerves. His face was a mask of calm that revealed nothing. For someone who didn’t have any previous experience in espionage or conning people, he sure was good at hiding how he was feeling.

Finn handed him another muffin anyways.

The dimpled smile he got in return was nothing but genuine.

***

Remus sat down on his couch with his dinner, sighing to himself as he stretched out his back. It had been a long day, but he finally felt ready for tomorrow. Their plan was solid, the cubs were as ready as they were ever going to be, he had his video loop for the security camera in the safe room, the rest of his tech had been checked over and deemed ready to go. There wasn’t much else he could do besides get a good night’s sleep if he could.

That would be easier said than done, though.

Sirius chose that moment to throw open the door and close it loudly behind him. Remus glared at him. “Is that really necessary?” He asked, but didn’t add anything else on as Sirius slammed down a stack of hand-written pages onto Remus’ coffee table.

“You want me to open up? Fine. There’s all you need to know about me.”

Remus looked down at the pages and instantly felt guilty. How long had he been working on this? “You didn’t have to-”

“You said you couldn’t trust me.” Sirius interrupted coolly. “I can’t get my brother to safety if you guys don’t trust me.”

It appeared that his brother was his sole motivation. For all of this. Remus could understand that. He’d stop at nothing if the safety of his own brother was put into question.

“Yeah, but you didn’t have to do this.” Remus looked up at him, at the stiff set to his shoulders, the detached look in his eyes. He went too far the last time they’d talked about this, hadn’t he? “Look, we got along for over a week when you first got here. I think we can do that again, right?”

At Sirius’ skeptical face, he sighed. “This is on me just as much as you. I… I don’t trust easily.” He had to laugh at that massive understatement. “Perks of being a spy. But I feel like we can manage learning to trust each other the old-fashioned way.”

Sirius raised an eyebrow. “And what’s that?”

“Getting totally, outrageously drunk and sharing all our secrets.”

Sirius’ straight face only lasted for about a second before he busted out laughing. “You go from wanting my entire life story to wanting to get drunk together?”

“It’s a failproof way to gain someone’s trust.” Remus said solemnly, cracking a smile when Sirius laughed again, incredulous. “But not tonight. We’ve got a big day tomorrow.”

“This Friday, then?”

He couldn’t help but notice the hopeful look on Sirius’ face. Had he ever done this with someone before? Did he have any friends besides his brother previously? He put up this excitable, outgoing façade, but Remus honestly had no idea what lay underneath. He nodded decisively. “This Friday.”

Sirius hesitated, then spoke again. “Do you think they’re ready?”

“I think so. And we’ll be there if something goes wrong.” Remus met his eyes, trying to instill confidence into the ex-Snake. “No matter what happens, we’re going to do our best to get your brother out safely.”

“And what if that’s not enough?” Sirius asked, eyes haunted.

That was exactly why Remus hadn’t made any strict promises. There was no way to guarantee that they would get Regulus back. If Remus was in Sirius’ shoes, if this this was Jules instead of Regulus, what would Remus most want to hear?

“We’re going to do everything we can, I promise.” He said, soft but firm. “I know that’s not enough, but it’s the best we can do as of right now.”

Sirius stared back, then nodded. “Thank you.” He looked down at Remus’ food. “What’s for dinner? I’m starving.”

Remus laughed, shoving him away. “Get your own, you leech. This is mine.”

“Leech?” Sirius demanded, dramatizing his offence. “I can’t believe you called me a leech. You were the one who offered to house me, after all.”

That was true. Even if he hated to admit it, Remus was lonely. He lived in this apartment all by himself, worked mostly on his own, and his family lived miles and miles away. And being a spy didn’t exactly make it easy to find friends. He was distrusting and cautious by nature, especially after... well. After he left fieldwork and transitioned to a desk job.

He didn’t know why he’d offered to let Sirius stay, honestly. He just got this gut feeling that it was the right thing to do.

And Remus Lupin always trusted his gut.

“Worst decision I’ve ever made.” He quipped, laughing as Sirius threw a pillow at him. Sirius was a horrible roommate. He left dishes in the sink, beard trimmings on the bathroom counter, and his shoes haphazardly strewn about the living room.

But he always had hot water on the stovetop in the mornings when Remus woke up, always let him pick what they watched on tv at nights, and always replaced anything he had used up without being asked. And, if Remus was being completely honest with himself, soft gray eyes paired with an even softer smile weren’t exactly a terrible thing to wake up to.

So far, this whole roommate business wasn’t too bad.

***

Logan hated nothing more than being lookout.

He watched on as Finn and Leo geared up, testing their mics and earpieces and making adjustments accordingly. He was supposed to be watching the entrance to make sure no Snakes entered the building. They were doing the first bank heist while Logan was stuck here, in the car parked on the street, where he couldn’t see what was going on or if his partners were in trouble.

Their first mission, and he was stuck outside.

Ugh.

“You ready for this?” Finn asked Leo as he discreetly tucked a wire under his collar and out of sight. Leo had his eyes trained on the building across from them, wrapped in his coat and a thick scarf, fingers drumming out a staccato beat on his thigh. He didn’t seem to have heard Finn.

“Nut?”

Leo swiveled his head to look back at them. “Hmm?”

“You ok?” Logan asked, watching the blond’s face for signs of nervousness or stress. But his gaze was steady, determined. For someone on their first mission, he was remarkably calm. Either that or a much better actor than Logan had given him credit for. But then his expression flickered and a shadow of doubt crept in.

“I’m fine.” He said, and Logan couldn’t tell if he was trying to convince them or himself. He reached out and gave the blond’s shoulder a squeeze, letting his hand linger before trailing it down his arm and pulling away.

“You’re fine.” Logan reassured with a smile and watched the resolve build back up in Leo’s eyes, causing the knot in Logan’s chest to ease up a little.

That was better.

Finn looked at him for a second, then took his glasses off. “Here, put these on. I feel like your cover story requires glasses.” He gently eased them onto the other boy’s face. Leo blinked rapidly, then squinted and widened his eyes to adjust to the lenses.

“Jesus, what prescription is this?”

“It’s not that bad.” Finn said, ruffling Leo’s hair in retaliation. He took a step back to see the finished product and whistled lowly. “Damn, maybe we should take those off again. We’re supposed to be unmemorable when we’re undercover. No one will be able to take their eyes off you with those on.”

Logan had to agree there. Soft blue eyes blinked back at them from behind tortoiseshell frames, looking larger than they normally did. Leo buried his nose in his scarf in an attempt to hide the blush caused by Finn’s flirtatious words.

The sight did strange things to Logan’s stomach.

Remus’ voice reached them through their com link, startling all three of them. “You guys ready to go?”

Leo took a deep, steadying breath. “Let’s do this.” He looked back at Logan, eyes fierce – a stark contrast to the soft look of only a few seconds ago. Logan sucked in a breath of his own. This kid sure was something.

“See you in a bit.”

“See you in a bit.” Logan echoed, grabbing the car keys out of his pocket and letting his lips twitch up into a smile at Finn’s cheery salute. He leaned against the car door and watched the pair make their way around the corner and towards the bank without glancing back.

He got back into the car and moved it around the same corner before putting it in park. His eyes shifted between the street in front of him and his rearview mirror, a book in his lap to keep from raising suspicions, and settled in to worry and wait.

***

Leo shoved his hands in his pockets to keep from fidgeting and made his way to the front desk. Ignoring his pounding heart as best he could, he locked eyes with the teller and smiled. “Hi there. Is your manager here?” He asked, dragging his accent out slow and sweet like molasses. “I’ve got a few questions about your safes.”

She smiled back. “Sure thing. I’ll go grab him.” Leo thanked her as she left, looking around while he waited and trying his hardest not to squint too much in Finn’s glasses.

“Nut, between the accent and the glasses - plus your looks in general - I think that girl is half in love with you already.” Sirius’ voice teased, causing Leo to flinch slightly. He needed to get used to hearing the voices of people he couldn’t see during these missions.

“She is not.” He muttered back as he pretended to rub his nose, covering his mouth as he spoke so that no one else could see it. His hand absentmindedly played with the old, frayed bracelet on his wrist.

“You can do better, Nut.” Logan chimed in, voice a little gruff.

“How do you know?” Sirius asked. “You can’t even see her.”

“I’m using my imagination.”

Sirius barked out a laugh while Remus just sighed and requested that they all stay focused. Leo glanced around at the lobby again. Finn was standing in line behind him, looking at something on his phone. He forced himself not to look at his partner too long and kept scanning the rest of the lobby. It seemed to be a pretty quiet day - there weren’t too many people inside. A few people were seated in the waiting area and some were waiting in line behind Finn. Leo saw the teller and a short, balding man who must have been the bank manager making their way back towards him.

Leo stuck his hand out when they reached him, which the manager shook with a fake smile on his face.

“Hi, how are you doing?” Leo asked, withdrawing his hand. “I’m Fred Decker with Tigerking Digital Security. I have on record that you’re currently using one of our safes, is that correct?”

“Fred?” Sirius’ voice asked incredulously. “Of all the aliases you could use, you choose Fred? Nut, you should be ashamed of yourself.”

Remus hissed at him to shut up. Leo ignored it.

“Yes, that’s right.” The manager said, a bit stiff. “What’s this about?”

“There’s a recall on a few of our safes. I was wondering if I could take a look at yours and see if it needs to be replaced. Free of charge, of course. This is an error on our part, and we want to do all we can to fix it.”

The manager hesitated, then nodded. “This way.”

Leo followed the man through a set of doors into a hallway, spotting Finn out of the corner of his eye as he approached the front desk and sent Leo a quick wink. That, more than anything, calmed Leo’s nerves. If Finn was acting like this was just run-of-the-mill and not a big deal, then they must’ve been doing something right. The door closed behind Leo, blocking his vision of the lobby. He took a fortifying breath and followed the manager into the safe room, secluded from the rest of the bank.

“Here we are,” The manager said, then pointed to a safe wedged into the corner of the room. “And there’s your safe.”

“The camera in the safe room is already on a loop, Leo. You’re all set.” Remus’ voice said, steady and calm. Leo looked the safe over, stalling as he waited for Finn’s distraction.

“Fuck,” he heard through his earpiece. “Leo, you’re going to have to hang in there for a few more seconds. The planned distraction didn’t work.”

Leo swallowed, looking back up at the manager. “So there’s these holes in the back, see?” He said, figuring a sure-fire way for him to stall was to talk about the safe. He could keep up a conversation like this for hours. “They’re used to bolt the safes into the wall. A few of our older models have larger holes.”

He grabbed the stiff coil of wire out of his pocket. “Some thieves have learned that you can get to the reset button in these older models if you use a tough wire like this and insert it through one of the holes. Basically all I want to do today is see if a thief could potentially do that with this safe. Is that all right with you?”

“Yes, of course! If there’s a problem, our client would want that fixed immediately.”

“I’m sure they would.” Leo said absentmindedly as he started fiddling with the wire for as long as he possibly could. He straightened it out from it’s coil, looked down it’s length, and then pretended to straighten some kinks out.

Don’t panic don’t panic don’t panic-

Remus’ voice was a little more tense now. “Finn, where’s that distraction?”

Finn, who was in the men’s bathroom grabbing handful after handful of paper towels and shoving them into a trash can, grumbled, “I’m working on it, ok? Sirius was right - that teller definitely has a type, and it sure as hell isn’t me. I had to improvise.”

“What does that mean?” Logan asked warily. Finn could practically see him gripping the steering wheel in a white-knuckled grip as he forced himself to stay put. “What are you doing?”

Finn grabbed the bottle of hand sanitizer on the bathroom sink and took the top off, dumping the contents into the trash can as well. He grabbed the lighter in his pocket (he liked to be prepared, thank you very much) and produced a small flame.

“Something stupid.”

He lowered the lighter to the trashcan and prepared to run.

Leo could hear the shouting from Finn’s distraction all the way back in the safe room. He looked up at the manager, pretending to be confused. “What’s going on?”

“I’m not sure.” The manager frowned, shifting from foot to foot nervously as he looked towards the commotion. “I’m going to check it out. I’ll be right back, ok?”

Leo waved him off with a reassuring smile. “I’ll be right here.” He messed around with the safe until the door closed, then hissed, “Finn, what the hell is going on out there?” He moved Finn’s glasses to perch on top of his head and shoved the wire through one hole in the back of the safe. He grabbed his flashlight to look through the hole on the other side, searching for a small red button.

“I might’ve started a fire in the men’s restroom.”

“You what?” Leo demanded, finally finding the reset button and moving the wire steadily closer to it. “You do realize that does the exact opposite of give me more time, right?” Sure enough, the fire alarm sounded, loud and clear.

“Fuck me.” Leo muttered as he jabbed the reset button with the wire. Someone - Leo thought it might be Finn, but he wasn’t sure - muttered something too soft and muffled to be picked up by their mic. Leo didn’t have the time to question it. The safe door opened with a soft click. He quickly switched the flash drive with the replica and closed the door again. The wire got recoiled and shoved back into his pocket, Finn’s glasses returned to resting on his nose. He climbed to his feet and made his way towards the lobby at a quick pace. “I’ve got it.”

“Nice work, Nut.” He heard Logan say, and couldn’t repress the jittery feeling he always got after a successful job. He exited the bank, looking around for the manager. He seemed busy as he talked to his employees in an attempt to get the situation under control. He caught Leo’s eyes and stepped towards him. “Mr. Decker! I was looking for you.”

Leo only just remembered to over-exaggerate his accent. “I heard the alarm and high-tailed it out here. Was it a prank?”

“No,” He said after a beat of hesitation, “Someone actually started a fire in the men’s bathroom. The fire department is on its way. Hopefully it won’t take too long and you can get back to looking at that safe.”

“No need, I already finished. The holes were too small for the wire, so y’all should be fine. Anything thinner than the wire I used will be too flimsy to press that reset button.” Leo glanced down at his watch. “I do have six more banks to visit today, though, so I’m afraid this is where I leave you. Thank you for being so cooperative.” He held out his hand for the manager to shake again and gave one last smile before walking back down the street towards their designated rendezvous, trying to look casual and not like he was running away from the scene of a theft.

Sure enough, a non-descript gray car was waiting for him, right where it was supposed to be. Without a word, he climbed into the back and sprawled across all three seats, throwing an arm over his eyes as Logan put the car into drive.

The three of them were silent for a few seconds before Leo cracked a smile and laughed. “The one thing – the one thing that could get me kicked out of that safe room too fast, and that’s what you decided would make a perfect distraction?”

Finn looked back at the back seat with a grin, which softened when he laid eyes on the blond. His hair shone in the late-morning sunlight, highlighting a streak of gray at his temple. Those long legs of his took up most of the back row, and even then he still had to bend his knees to fit all the way. His eyes were blocked by his arm, but Finn could’ve seen those dimples via satellite image from space.

“Hey, cut me some slack. I was making it up as I went.” This sent Leo into another fit of laughter, causing Finn’s smile to broaden.

“Besides,” Logan added, “You’re quick with your hands. You didn’t need all ten minutes, you barely needed three.”

Leo shrugged, which looked really strange in his current position on his back. “Got lucky. Found that reset button faster than I usually do.” He adjusted Finn’s glasses, which were still resting on his nose. “Maybe I need glasses, too.”

“Shut up. Those glasses are a statement piece, thank you very much.”

Logan snorted, watching Leo’s hand reach over the center console to return the glasses to their rightful owner. “Maybe that’s why you’re a terrible marksman, O’Hara. When’s the last time you got that prescription checked?”

Finn gasped in offense. Logan glanced over briefly and noticed the tips of his ears getting red. Cute.

“How dare you! I am not a terrible marksman!”

“That’s not what your file says.”

“What?”

“The evidence doesn’t lie.” Logan said, struggling to bite back his grin. Finn was just so fun to tease.

“Screw debriefing. When we get back to the office, we’re going to the shooting range.” Finn crossed his arms over his chest sulkily. “Terrible marksman. How dare they. Nutter Butter, back me up here.”

Leo blinked at the new nickname, but he couldn’t say he minded it too much. Especially when Finn said it like that, with such unfiltered affection. He watched the redhead turn around in his seat to look at him with big Bambi eyes, only then remembering that he was looking for an answer from Leo.

He put on a show of thinking about it, then shrugged. “I dunno, Finn. The evidence doesn’t lie.”

“Et tu, Brute?” Finn whined. “Betrayed by both of my partners. Unbelievable.”

Leo wished there was another word for partner. Maybe he should refer to them as just coworkers now. The term partner was giving him ideas.

Ideas he couldn’t afford to be having for the first and quite possibly the biggest op of his life.

“Also, you’re one to talk!” Leo looked back up at Finn when he realized he was talking to him. “Have you ever shot a gun before, rookie?” He stopped suddenly, then grinned broadly. “Oh man, please tell me you’ve shot a gator when you were back in Louisiana. That’s so badass.”

Leo arched an eyebrow.

“Just because there’s horror stories about gators doesn’t mean they deserve to be shot.” Logan said, switching his turn signal on and waiting for the left turn light to change from red to green. “They’re a big part of the ecosystem.”

“And they kill people.”

“Oh come on, when’s the last time you heard of someone being killed by a gator?”

“Literally last week, down in Florida.”

“Well, that’s Florida. Crazy stuff like that happens in Florida all the time.”

“Did you hear about that guy from Florida who made a beer run while holding a gator?”

Logan chuckled, glancing over at his partner in disbelief. “What?”

“You heard me! Apparently he walked in, looked around and asked ‘Y’all ain’t out of beer, are you?’ But then the story gets weirder!”

Leo just sat in the backseat and laughed at Finn’s dramatic retelling of Florida news as building after building flashed by outside their windows, feeling lighter than air. His first mission was a success. He grabbed the small, innocuous flash drive out of his pocket, twirling it in his hand. One down, six more to go. If all missions were like this, taking down the Snakes wouldn’t be so bad.

He should’ve knocked on wood after having that thought.

#lumosinlove #sweater weather #coast to coast #coops #sirius black #remus lupin #o'knutzy #finn o'hara #logan tremblay #leo knut #clandestine

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hlupdate · 5 years ago

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In a never-before-published 2012 interview, Harry Styles and Niall Horan talk about their childhoods, the future of One Direction, and much more

In the spring of 2012, I spent a few entertaining days hanging out with the five young members of a British boy band who were just breaking big in the United States. The guys from One Direction were unjaded, unguarded, totally charming, and a puppy pile of optimism and energy. On April 8th, in a New York City hotel room, an 18-year-old Harry Styles and 16-year-old Niall Horan sat down with me for a joint interview, published here for the first time. (The reporting was intended for a Rolling Stone cover story that never ran.)

It was late morning, and they had both just rolled out of bed. Styles wore a hotel bathrobe; Horan, with braces still on his teeth, was in sweatpants, a T-shirt, and a Dallas Mavericks hat a fan had given him during a recent trip to Texas. The conversation was casual, full of laughs, and focused on their formative years.

What did you do at the gym last night? Harry: One of our security guys, his friend’s over, he’s a personal trainer, so I was working with him, and he ripped me to shreds.

In 12 hours, you have to do Saturday Night Live. Are you ready? Harry: Yeah, I think so. I think it’s going to be a fun day. It’s just really exciting, obviously. The show is so huge. For us to get the opportunity to be on it at all was just amazing, and to us, to be performing and just be involved with the show is amazing.

Have you seen whole episodes of it? Harry: I’ve watched a lot of clips on YouTube. They don’t show it in the U.K.

Growing up, when did you realize you could sing or that you wanted to sing? Harry: I sang in primary school, like the school productions, plays and stuff.

What was your first one? Harry: The first one was…I was five, and there was a story about a mouse who lived in a church, and I was Barney, the mouse. I had to wear my sister’s tights, and a headband with ears on it, and I had to sing a song all by myself. I remember it was just like, whatever…in the second, I was Buzz Lightyear in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, so you know when they run and hide in the toy shop? Buzz Lightyear was in the toy shop, so they just created my character. The last one, I was in…you know Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat? I was the pharaoh, but I was an Elvis pharaoh.

Did you have a sense that this is what you wanted to do in your life? Harry: I think in school, I was OK, I wasn’t a bad student. I think I just knew I wanted to entertain people and stuff. I was a bit of an attention-seeker at school.

Niall: Me, too. I just talked too much, sang too much.

You were onstage as a kid and were like, “This is what I like”? Harry: I knew it was fun, I had a lot of fun doing it, and I stopped when I started high school, and then I didn’t really do anything, I just sang at home, in the shower, in your bedroom, that type of thing. I guess it started again when my friends were in a band and they wanted to do this battle of the bands competition that was at school, and they needed a singer, and one of my friends asked me.

What did you sing? Harry: We sang “Are You Gonna Be My Girl” by Jet, and “Summer of ��69.” We did it more towards the Bowling For Soup version.

How about you, Niall? Niall: I always knew I wanted to sing. I was academic…I was one of those people that if I’m not interested in something, I don’t really care. If I’m not interested in school, I would have never trained or done my homework or anything, I’d have just gone outside and played football or whatever.

Harry: [helpfully translating] Soccer.

Niall: So I always wanted to sing. I was singing here and there, not gigs or anything, but I always sang around the house or whatever, and I played Oliver in a school play. And then I just did that, and people told me I should do something…I was only 10, what could I do at 10? I just did a couple of gigs, and when I got to high school, they told me that I should just try out for The X-Factor.

Who told you? Niall: My French teacher. We used to do talent shows and stuff at school, she was like, “You should do it,” so I did it.

What did that entail? What were the steps from being a kid in high school to getting on the show? Niall: It was the final of The X-Factor the year before, and at the end credits of the final, it says, “If you want to apply for 2010, go online,” so a couple of weeks later, I said, “Right, I’m going to do it,” and I filled in the form online, we were sending emails back and forth, going to this place at this time. The first one is at a big stadium, then if you get through that, you come back the next day. Is that the way they did it with you?

Harry: I had to wait a little bit, I think.

Niall: I was there at five a.m., I got seen at 12, and I was out of there by quarter past 12, and the next day I came back at 10 in the morning. You get through the first round, then they do a round where they don’t tell you if you got through after that.

Harry: They film it.

Niall: The producer and someone from the label. They film it and show it to whoever. Then if you got through that, it takes about two or three weeks until you find out. I was in Spain. Then you just go through the audition.

Harry, how did you wind up on X-Factor? Harry: I basically said, the same as Niall, I was watching the year before, and I remember looking at the young guys on there, and I was kind of like, “I’d love to have a go at it just to see what happens,” and that was kind of it. My mum actually did the application, and then three weeks later, I walked upstairs and she said, “Oh, you’ve got your X-Factor audition Sunday,” and I was like, “OK.”

Niall: In England, it’s the biggest thing ever. It took a while to build.

Harry: The two or three years were steady, and third or fourth, it just blew up.

Niall: It works that one in three people in the UK watch it. There’s 60 million people in the UK, and 21 million people watched the final the year we were in it.

Harry, your band also played at least one wedding right? Harry: Yeah. We actually said that we’d do the wedding gig, and…

Niall: You get paid for it?

Harry: Yeah. 160 quid, between all four of us. 40 quid each…we said we’d do it, and then we found out it was the weekend coming up, and we hadn’t done anything for it, so we asked the bride what kind of stuff she wanted, and she said she didn’t mind, but she wanted some Bob Marley songs. Literally in three days, not even three, probably two days, we learned like 25 songs. We might have known like three of them before. I was 16, maybe 15, singing these Bob Marley songs. There was a girl a couple of years below us, and it was her mum, she said she wanted us to play.

Niall: Can you imagine you’re at a wedding and you have 16-year-old kids up on the stage?

Maybe you were really good! Harry: Yeah, the drummer is one of my best friends from school, he’s a sick drummer, he’s so good.

Did you think the band could be something? Harry: A bit. My friend’s mum was a radio presenter, and she did a radio show for a bit, so she was trying to sort us out a little bit of studio time, we were going to go in and record.

What do your parents do? Harry: My mum is a PA. My dad is a financial adviser.

How about you? Niall: My dad works at a supermarket, he’s the head manager, general manager of an area, not just one, and my mum is unemployed now, so I try to help them out whenever I can.

You probably can. That must be nice. Niall: Yeah, it’s nice, it’s good.

Plus, now you can tell them what to do. Harry: [laughs] “Now you go to bed.”

Were you happy as kids? Did you have adolescent angst and stuff? Did you go through depressed periods? Harry: Not really. I think at one point, I started acting like I was…I had a phase of listening to really heavy music.

Niall: I never went through that.

Harry: Not stupid heavy, but a bit… just because I thought it was cool.

Like what? Harry: Like Nirvana T-shirts, wore black all the time, pretty much.

Were you pretty happy go-lucky? Niall: Yeah, I was always happy. I think me and Harry were lucky. Our parents got divorced quite early, didn’t they, when we were really young. I was four, I didn’t know much, so I was always a happy kid, always up for a laugh, very carefree, and I’m a bit like that now.

Did you both grow up in your moms’ houses? Harry: Yeah.

Niall: I went between both, my mum moved to the country and I didn’t have any interest in it. I always felt like the country is for when you’re older. I was with my mom for a while but got bored, all my friends were in town, I went to school in town and all that stuff. It was more like that.

Harry: I lived with both parents, and then moved with my mum, and we owned a pub for like five years. I remember the first night, it was like a night where a band was playing, and I just thought, “How am I going to get to sleep?” I was three stories up, I was like, “How am I going to get to sleep with this noise?” I was next to a road in Sussex in the middle of nowhere, and by the end, I could fall asleep next to the band, I was so used to the noise.

Was it imprinting your brain? Harry: Maybe. One of the guys who used to play every so often, he used to be in Deep Purple or something… He started teaching me guitar when I was like 10, I think 10, maybe nine. I loved it. I was 10, 11, all of the regulars, I got on with them. I’d walk behind the bar and my head would barely go over the bar. It’s still going now. We sold it to my best friend, we go in all the time still.

People say you come off as more mature than your age, you come off wiser. Did hanging around all those people as a kid help you mature?

Harry: I don’t know, maybe. I moved when I was seven or eight from Cheshire, and it was still Cheshire, but half an hour away, but in terms of not driving and stuff, all my friends lived near my school, so that was a bit further out. One of my friends there was my sister’s age, he was 16 when I was 10. It was so tiny, they were the only teenage boys…we’d ride our bikes and go to the driving range and stuff. It was good, it was fun.

You both wanted to entertain – if it hadn’t worked out, would you have been really unhappy? Harry: Yeah, I think it would be kind of like…one of the reasons you go for X-Factor in the first place is that you want to do this, and it kind of helps you get out of the life that you were doing before. I worked in a bakery for two years. Obviously, I didn’t want to do that for ages!

If you’d asked people at school, would they have said, “Yeah, they’re probably going to be famous,” or would they never have guessed that? Niall: My aunt, I was in the back of her car. We used to go across Ireland to go to the beach for a couple of weeks, and I remember we were in the car, I was singing, and she thought I was the radio, and she told me, I never forgot it, that she thought I was going to be famous since I was six, seven. She was the only person who told me that, so I always remembered that.

Harry: My dad said it. I used to listen to a lot of the music he was playing, he’d play Elvis Presley to death, the Stones, I’d sing along to that and he’d say, “You’re going to be famous,” or whatever. He came on tour with us for a few days out here, he came to the Radio City show. He just said, for him, it was so educational. Obviously, he hears about what happens when I call him, but to see it and see it actually happen and how everything works was so good for him, he really enjoyed it. So that was nice.

So you grew up on Elvis and the Stones? Harry: Yeah, pretty much. My dad was a massive Stones fan, so it was pretty much Beatles and Stones in terms of what my dad played.

People say you kind of look like Mick.

Niall: He gets that a lot.

Harry: I get it more here, probably, than I do at home. It’s because of the British thing.

What have you learned about life from the last few years, what didn’t you know? What advice would you give yourself? Niall: How much more independent we actually are – me, anyway. Your mum attends to your every need and does your food and washing and gives you somewhere to live. Then you go into the real world, as you’re told as a kid…

Harry: We’re living on our own now.

Niall: We just started living on our own in the last six months, really.

Harry: I’m moving when I get back.

Niall: We do our own washing, we make our own food, we rent places, we’re out on our own now. You mature so quick, you’re dealing with big businessmen every day, you’re not dealing with school, people your own age. It’s a bit different.

Harry: You seem to learn so many life lessons, but in such a short space of time. If I speak to my friends and they’re having problems with girls, whatever it is, now I seem to just have the answer. I don’t know, it’s just different. Or I think I have the answer. In terms of…one of my friends was trying to decide what to do with school, stuff like that, and I would have had no idea what to say to him before.

The last two years must feel like 10. Harry: Yeah, but at the same time, it feels like six months, it’s weird. X-Factor was two years ago, but it seems like five years ago, but at the same time, it’s gone so quick. It’s a really strange dynamic of how it feels.

Do you have a sense of how this is going to go? Does it matter if it’s two years, five years or forever? Harry: I think how much we all enjoy it, because we love what we do – if you have to call it a job, it’s an incredible job to have, and we love it. We’ll all want to do it for as long as possible. If we have the opportunity to have a Take That kind of career, I don’t see any reason why we wouldn’t want to do that. If we don’t, I don’t know…we’ve done some amazing things already, but we don’t want to stop there, we want to keep going. I guess if we didn’t, I think we’d probably want to still be involved in…I’d just write, I guess.

Do you want to act? It feels like you could have your own TV show. Harry: I think it would be more of a documentary, because obviously, we’re not actors.

People must want you to try. Niall: Watch tonight, tell us what you think. Watch SNL.

Will you all make solo albums? Is that inevitable? Harry: No, I don’t think so.

Niall: Let’s do a swing album!

Harry: [laughs] We’ll all do swing albums. We’re just so focused on this, we all feel so lucky just to be part of this opportunity that we’ve all been given, it’s incredible, we’re just loving it. It’s sick.

People make a lot of assumptions about people in your position. They think you’re puppets and do what you’re told. What do you do when people make those assumptions? Harry: When you look from the outside, especially if you’re a skeptic of groups made through TV shows, which is fair enough, people don’t see what we do on a daily basis, people don’t see…I think from the outside, it looks so glamorous, they see us do TV performances every now and again, see us doing an interview every now and again, but they don’t know that we work seven days a week.

Niall: If there was eight days, we’d fit it in.

Harry: It’s not as completely glamorous all the time, of course it’s not, it would be stupid to think that it would be, but it’s hard work.

Niall: You’ve got to remember that you’ve got people on your team that have been doing this for many years and have been through the mill. You have all that experience around you, even from our tour manager, who’s been doing this for 20 years, they know what’s right, but at the same time, we want to have creative control, because at the end of the day, it’s us stepping out onto the stage of SNL tonight and have to sing these songs. We want to be singing what we enjoy, as we said last night. The music we all listen to is what we try and blend together to make this One Direction sound.

Harry: We obviously want to make it authentic and have our say without going, “People say we don’t control it, so we need to take control.” We’re not…we haven’t been writing songs for 20 years, we’re not producers. We’ve got an incredible team around us. Luckily, we’ve been given a lot of freedom, so we don’t go, “OK, we just need more and more control,” because we have a lot of control already. I think we find a really good balance in the way we work with our record label and our management, and it’s just how we work together, I think.

In any case, it’s probably better than the bakery. Harry: Yeah. But I don’t get a nice bun on my break anymore, that’s the thing.

Did you wear an apron? Harry: Oh yeah, I wore a white polo shirt and a maroon apron with white stripes. “What would you like? 78 pence, thank you very much.”

Were you behind the counter? Harry: Yeah, I was behind the counter. It was good. It was Saturday morning, I started at five and finished at four in the afternoon and got like 30 quid, it was a joke.

Niall, did you have a job? Niall: No, never.

So this is your first job. Niall: Yeah, not bad at all. I was chilling, I was being a kid.

Harry: I had a paper route before that. It gave me a bad back, bad posture. It was a heavy bag.

I interviewed some fans downstairs, and asked if they knew who you were six months ago, and they all said yes, and a year ago…They were all early adopters, heard you from the Internet, watched X Factor on YouTube… Harry: It’s the internet. People have friends over here that might tell their friends and look on YouTube and show their friends. It’s insane how it’s blown up. We’ve had the opportunity to come over to America and do shows, and release our music over here, which is amazing. Through the power of social media, we already had a bit of a following before we’d ever been over here, we hadn’t done any shows. We had some fans out here, which was amazing, but weird, really strange. I don’t know, it’s gone crazy. We don’t really see loads of it. We do the shows, then we’re in hotels, then we fly somewhere else. We don’t see massive amounts of it, we just go with it. This whole thing has gone on, and it’s sick.

Do you ever feel anxious through all this? Harry: Yeah, I think, obviously, just naturally, you think about what’s going to happen in the future. We’re 18, 19, 20 years old, we’re young. I wouldn’t say anxious, we’re just excited most of the time, and having so much fun, that if stuff were to finish and you were to look back on your time and all you did the whole time throughout this amazing stuff was shitting yourself about what’s going to happen next, then it would just be…I think you have to enjoy it while it’s going on. I think you should be wary about the future, but not worrying about it all the time. We still enjoy it and have fun, but obviously, you do think, “What am I going to be doing in 20 years, 30 year?” I’ll have kids by then.

Harry, I saw a tabloid with pictures of everyone smiling, and you were looking thoughtful. Do you get down sometimes? While everyone else is having fun, do you start drifting off? Harry: No, I think I’m naturally…not everyone is happy all of the time. I think you always have times when…like when you’ve just landed off a really long flight or miss home or something. They got a picture of me where I wasn’t smiling. I usually smile, but they got one where I wasn’t smiling and used that, and then said I wasn’t happy. They did that for a few days, that’s when we were in L.A. last time. It goes with the morbid voice.

Ringo would say, “It’s just me face.” Niall: “Who’s that little old man?” [quoting Hard Day’s Night]

Harry: “That’s Paul’s grandfather. He’s very clean.”

Sometimes you can drift off, that’s just your thing. Harry: [laughs] I’m just soulful, man, I try.

Harry, do you mind when you’re singled out for attention? Harry: I don’t know. I don’t really…I don’t know. We’re a band. Everything we do is together. I don’t take much notice of it.

So you’re not the Justin. Harry: No.

Niall: J.C. was popular, too, wasn’t he?

It’s not like that for you guys. Harry: Not at all.

There was an imbalance in that group. Harry: I think we find it important that people get to know all of our individual personalities, because…

Niall: I think that’s what’s good about it, people see us as individuals as well as a band, we all have our own personality, and we all give something to a band. Previous bands, they go around and can never explain themselves, they can explain the band, but as individuals, what we bring to the band and stuff…

Harry: We all know that we all have our roles, and we all know that without one of us, it wouldn’t work.

#harry styles #niall horan #one direction #230720 #1d ten

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redstarwriting · 5 years ago

Text

Period Pain (2nd Edition)

Avengers x Reader(s)

Request: “This is a specific request but could I have a story where the reader has their period (A bad one, heavy and painful) and the Avengers (Anyones you want) take care of them. Please make it extra fluffy.”

Word Count: 2,759

Genre: Fluff

Warnings: swearing, period, mention of Ibuprofen

A/N: The first one of these did Really Well so I decided to write for the rest of the people I didn’t write about. I still have to do the Guardians, Loki, Valkyrie, and Carol, so keep your eyes out for those ones, too! I hope you enjoy this one!

───────────────────────────────────

Mother Nature must really hate you. You can’t move, your cramps are restricting you from functioning like a normal human being. The only time you got up today was to go to the bathroom to make sure you didn’t ruin your clothes and the sheets. You’ve been curled up in a ball for the past many hours, and even snapped at your significant other earlier. You feel bad deep down inside, but the pain you’re feeling overrides your remorse right now. You’re in the middle of your self loathing and hating being a female when in walks…

…Rhodey.

He walks slowly and quietly, making his way over to your bathroom. “Why the fuck are you walking like I’m a feral animal that will literally leap up and maul you to death if you make a sudden movement you fucking weird ass?” you say, louder than intended. He freezes, looking at you. “Did you not hear what you just said? How you just said it?”

“I did. Your point?”

“I just proved my-”

“What are you doing, James?” you look at him, your expression completely unamused. He’s actually quite scared and begins rethinking the idea he had. But he clears his throat and straightens his back. “I was just going to run you a bath so you can relax a little. I heard heat helps with the… girl pains?” You stare at him, raising your eyebrows. “They’re called cramps,” you say, and he smiles apologetically. “I heard heat helps with the cramps,” he repeats, and to his surprise, you smile. “You’re the sweetest, you know that?” He gapes at you, amazed at how your mood went from bloodthirsty to loving that quickly. “I try my hardest?” he replies, obviously very confused. “Let me know when everything’s ready, okay?” You sound very excited and happy and he smiles at you, “Of course.”

…Pietro.

Well, it’s more like you see a flash of blue, then have a weighted blanket covering you, then nothing. About two minutes pass before you see the flash again, and a heating pad is next to you on your bed. Then after another two minutes, some chocolate and your favorite food gets plopped down on your nightstand. You appreciate everything your dear loving boyfriend is doing, but goddamnit. Can he stay still? You just want him to hug you and stop. Moving. For. Once.

Before you know it, he’s sprinting in the room again, and you announce his name loudly, and it is quite possibly the fastest you ever said anything in your life. Much to your surprise and happiness he stops dead in his tracks. You can’t help but laugh at the expression on his face and the four bottles of water with a container of Ibuprofen in his hands. “Why are you running around like that?”

“Well, uh… you see…” he begins, slowly setting the things in his hands down next to the food he brought. “I know you are on your period right now and having a sister I know what that can entail,” he starts, and you stare at him with an amused expression. “Uh-huh…”

“And, well, I know what helps Wanda, but I do not know what helps you. So… I asked Wanda what I should do and now I am… doing all of what she suggested along with a google search. But I did not own all of the things I wanted to get for you, so I have been running back and forth from the store this whole time. Also, you are scary when you are mad. Especially when you are mad at me,” he finishes, and you burst into laughter. “Pietro, that’s adorable. Also, I was only mad at you because you gave me a reason to be mad at you. So, don’t give me another reason,” you say, and he smiles. His smile, however, turns quickly to a scared expression as he hears you say, “Now if you don’t get into this bed and cuddle with me and don’t leave, then I’ll be pissed!”

He has your favorite cookies baking in the oven. What is he supposed to do now?

…Stephen.

“I brought you some more Ibuprofen,” he says, walking over and setting it down next to you. “I hope it helps.” You glare at the back of his head as he leaves the room again. Dealing with this with medicine and heating pads works, yes, but you’d much rather have the warmth radiating off of Stephen’s body to make you feel better. Sadly, it doesn’t look like that’s about to happen.

He may be book smart as all hell, but boy is he dumb when it comes to dealing with literally anything else. He of course tries, but he is so clueless sometimes. This is one of those times. He knows that certain over the counter medicines will lessen your cramps, and that typically applying heat also helps with the pain that accompanies one of your organs genuinely attempting suicide inside of your body, but he really doesn’t know what to do to actually comfort you. He of course thought of laying down with you, holding you until you felt better. However, that wouldn’t be very efficient for him. He needs to make sure the universe doesn’t implode, after all. He can tell, though, that all you want is for him to be around because of the way you’ve been snapping at him all day. Luckily, he thought of another plan that he hoped would work.

You sigh into your pillow, the pain nowhere near stopping when suddenly you feel quite the cozy sensation. You turn your head, curious as to what just wrapped around your body, when you get a big whiff of your boyfriend. You giggle, realizing that the Cloak of Levitation has just wrapped you up in a little burrito. “Cloak, what are you doing?” you say, amused. That’s when a note appears next to you, and you pick it up. “Dear (Y/N), I really do wish I could keep you company right now and make you feel better, but I have quite the workload right now. Instead, I sent Cloak. I hope that’s okay for now, if I get any free time I’ll be there. I love you, Stephen.”

You smile to yourself. As much as you wanted to be mad at him, you couldn’t be. He was really busy after all, and the fact that he did think about how you felt was enough for you to know that he wasn’t as stupid as he seemed. Oh, and he did get some free time, but he didn’t want to interrupt yours and Cloak’s little nap. He just took a lot of pictures.

…Scott.

“I was thinking, maybe I can shrink up and go inside of you and see just how bad this uterus is acting and then give it a stern talking to,” he says, trying to lighten your mood by joking around. You think. He’s not serious right? “You’re not serious, right?” you ask, just to be positive that he wasn’t being a dumbass this time. “Oh no, your brain must be suffering from blood loss. Your humor is fading! Whatever shall I do?! Oh, what a cruel, cruel world,” he drops down to his knees, beginning to fake cry which causes you to giggle at him. “Calm down, Scott, my humor isn’t going anywhere. I just honestly never know when you’re being serious,” you tell him, and he gives you a grin. “Well, I can’t blame you there. I do have something that will cheer you up though.”

You give him a questioning look when all of a sudden Cassie runs into the room, hopping up next to you in bed. You smile as she snuggles into your side, giggling the whole time. “Hey there sweetie,” you say as Scot takes a seat on the bed next to Cassie, sandwiching her in between you two. “She’s been asking for hours to watch a movie, I kinda figured it would be better if all three of us watched it instead of just me and her.”

“You’re absolutely right,” you say and hear Cassie shout a “yeah” in agreement. You and Scott chuckle at her reaction before he picks up the remote to the TV in your room, scrolling through Disney+ to find the right movie.

…Peter.

Well it’s more like he came through your window. “Karen said that I should get you these things,” he starts saying as soon as he touches down in your room. You glance over to his right arm full of medicine, a heating pad, lots of chocolate, and various feminine hygiene products. “I didn’t know which… things… you used so I bought all of the ones that I could carry, I hope that’s okay. Oh, and uh… I brought a lot of chocolate! I don’t really know why Karen said it might help, do you know why it helps? I mean, I obviously wasn’t like, ’No Karen, I don’t see how chocolate could help anyone in this situation,’ because I mean I don’t really know anything when it comes to this stuff but Karen’s a computer, so obviously she would know. Oh yeah, I brought a heating pad! Heat helps right? Or is this one of those things hear heat helps sometimes but the cold helps other times, oh crap, should I have gotten Icy Hot instead? I was right there next to it when I got all this other medicine… God I’m so stup-”

“Peter!” you make him stop rambling and one of the medicine bottles he’s holding falls out of his grip, and when he tries to save it, the rest fall. You laugh at his floundering to pick everything he just dropped back up. He rips off his mask and sighs. “I was just trying to help, you know. A now it’s all on the ground and-“

“Pete, just because you dropped it doesn’t mean it’s all useless.”

“I know, I know, I was just supposed to come in here all heroic and be like, ‘I’ve brought you what you need to feel better!’ and now it’s just…. it’s on the floor,” he says, and the disappointment in his voice is only the more endearing. “C’mere, Pete,” you say, opening. your arms so he can come hug you. “I’m all sweaty, (Y/N/N),” he mumbles, and you roll your eyes. “I need to take a shower anyways Peter, right now I just want cuddles,” you say, and lay on the puppy dog eyes. Those make him ridiculously weak to you. He just grins and jumps into bed next to you. You used the things he got you, but only after Peter himself made you feel exponentially better.

…Miles.

“Knock knock,” he says, walking into your room holding a stack of comic books. “Miles, why do you have so many comics?” you ask, turning to look at him. “Well, I know you have all the things you need to feel better with this whole… bleeding… thing?”

“This is true, I am prepared.”

“I know, but I figured the one thing you don’t have that you’d want is some good ‘ol Mile Morales loving. I also know that you kinda like the sound of my voice, even when you yell at me, so I decided I’d bring these comics and read them out loud. Oh, we can also play a little game where I describe the picture to you and you can tell me if it’s any good or not, I thought that might, y’know, take your mind off the pain,” he says, walking over to you and plopping down on the bed. “Miles I don’t think this bed is big enough for the two of us,” you say, but before you can even attempt to tell him to use your computer chair, he picks you up and moves you so you’re lying on top of him in a very comfortable position. The warmth radiating off of his body also makes you feel a little bit better. “Oh, okay, well this works perfectly,” you mumble nuzzling your face in his chest. You can feel the vibrations through his body as he laughs at you.

“Sorry for snapping at you earlier,” you say, and he just smiles. “It’s okay, I know how unbearable I can be at times,” he jokes, and you grin. “Now, how about I start with… well uh… I have a lot so…” he trails off, holding up all the comics he brought so you can see them. “which one of these is your favorite…?”

…Gwen.

“Do you wanna bang on my drums? Banging on my drums helps me,” she says, leaning against your door frame. You roll your eyes and throw a pillow at her to which she catches in one hand and tosses back. “I think you should bang on my drums,” she says again, and you sigh. “Gwen, baby, even if I wanted to do that, I can’t move. My uterus is really trying to end itself right now, and I swear if it doesn’t succeed, I will end its life for it by ending my own.”

“I thought I was supposed to be the edgy one in this relationship. Are you coming for my brand right now?” she asks, walking over to you. You narrow your eyes at her, causing her to grin and sit at the foot of your bed. “Okay, well, how about this. The newest season of that true crime show came out today…”

“No fucking way, I thought it was supposed to come out Friday?”

“It was, but then they said, ‘fuck it, let’s release it early.’ And I got all of my homework done. So, I’m totally free to sit back, rub your stomach, and get my fill of murderers and how corrupt bad police officers are. What do you say?” she gives you a sincere smile, which causes one to break out across your face as well. “Come here, woman.”

…T’Challa.

“Can I just say I have fought many a warrior, but you are the most ferocious person I have ever met,” he says, and you raise an eyebrow at him. “Is this because you were being annoying earlier and I let you know that you were being annoying earlier?” you snap again, and he points at you. “There it was. Terrifying.” You roll your eyes and turn away from him. The truth is he wasn��t doing anything annoying at all. You just really wanted him to stay with you for an hour or two and make you feel better with his presence, but he had some “Kingly duties” he had to attend to, so you’ve been alone. Dying.

“I have finished what I had to do today, you know,” he says, and you roll back over to face him again. “Oh really?” He chuckles at your immediate response and nods, walking into your shared room. “Yes, it seems I am completely free for the rest of the day. I have no idea what to do, honestly. I guess I’ll just-”

“Just stay here in bed with me? Yeah, damn right you will. Get over here yOuR hIgHnEsS,” you say, quite obviously laying the sarcasm on your highness to which he smiles at. The rest of the day was spent with the two of you just talking and you eventually falling asleep in his arms as he told you stories about when he was younger.

…Shuri.

“Even though you can be a bitch on your period I invented a new kind of heating pad for you because you are a spoiled brat, you know that right?” she says, walking over to you and dropping down the heating pad next to you. You give her a cheesy smile before thanking her and picking up this new heating pad. “The way it works is that it adjusts to your cramp pain. I’ve put a censor in it that can detect how severe the cramps are and then it administers heat accordingly. Also, you don’t have to worry about it catching on fire or anything, if it begins overheating it automatically turns off.”

“How did I end up with the best and brightest girlfriend of all time?” you ask, placing the pad on your stomach and letting your girlfriend’s technology take it from there. “Because she took pity on you,” she responds, and you laugh. She rolls her eyes, but a smile appears on her face none-the-less and she begins walking out of the room again. “Excuse me, but where do you think you are going?” you ask her and she turns to you, raising her eyebrows. “I am going to get us some ice cream so we can relax for a little bit. Is this a problem, princess?”

“Hey now, you’re the princess, I’m just your girlfriend. And no, carry on. Me and your dope ass heating pad will be waiting for you when you get back.”

“Mhm,” she says, and walks out of the room mumbling something about how you’re too spoiled, when in reality, you’re just the luckiest person in the world.

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entropy-game-dev · 4 years ago

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Getting organised in 2021

Huh, me? No I mean you! You!

I'm sure many people are looking ahead to 2021, and, with the new year comes renewals of goals, habits, motivation and so forth. I'm not really about that, but I thought now would be an apt time to talk about what I've learnt over the past 2 years regarding project management and keeping motivated.

Now, I want to preface this blog with my thoughts about the whole "productivity" thing. I make a huge, HUGE distinction between being productive at work and productive on your hobbies. The idea of productivity in the workplace can be used in a manipulative fashion, where one may work themselves to mental and physical exhaustion for the benefit of someone else. Considering most people reading this will probably be on a fixed wage (rather than commission-based), does it really make sense to push oneself harder without getting any immediate, tangible benefit from it?

So that’s my rant for the blog, I promise! Anyway, on the other hand we have productivity on your hobbies, which is a completely different matter. You get out exactly 100% of what you put into your hobby, and it'll benefit you in multiple ways. I don't think I need to sell this to you, as I'm sure most people, myself included, would love to be more productive on their own personal projects. In this blog, I'm going to be talking exclusively about this sort of productivity and how to improve it in a couple of different ways. Again, this is all stuff I've personally tried and tested, so while I am confident this approach will work for me, it may not necessarily work for you. But, you won't know until you try!! So if you're convinced and want to get motivated, read on!

I first want to talk about one's mindset, and then dive into the tools I use. The latter will provide a bit more context for the former, and in the end, the most powerful tool you have is your brain, so use it!

Training your brain

So, the biggest problem I find myself, and other people have, is how to tackle a project and starting a work session. One I start, I find it easy to get into the zone (and this comes back to the choice of tools that augment my workflow), so getting started and knowing what I'm doing is the main thing I have to tackle.

On the broadest level, I work with a general plan that has been written up previously. This contains all the key points from start to finish, without worrying too much about the detail at this stage. There is some skill involved in identifying what constitutes a "key" point, but this all comes down to practice. For reference, if I estimate something will take a week or two to finish, that's a task. If something will take longer than that, it's more than likely several tasks, and rolling it up into one task will probably cause some decision paralysis. Anything smaller and your list will get too clogged up, and again, decision paralysis. Right, so that's your high level plan done. Cool, but not really going to help you on a day-to-day basis as this will be something to refer to between tasks.

Ok, so now you have a list of chronological tasks. Take the first one and start it. Oh, you don't know where to start? Don't worry, I'm with you. It's important to recognise the mental signs related to approaching a task. If I find myself hesitating or not looking forward to a particular task, it often means I haven't defined it well enough. That means breaking the task down into individual steps, until you're comfortable saying "yep, I can do this right now" with each dot point. Again, it'll take some practice (depending on your hobby) to visualise and write down each step, but it is definitely something that you get used to, and will save you so much time umming and aahing with your program of choice open, but not actually getting any work done. If you are finding that happens more often than not, it breaks your workflow and you can't get into the zone!

A few more general tips. It helps to be consistent with your work. Try to dedicate a regular time to your hobby and you'll find it a lot easier to get into the working mindset and the zone. Allow yourself some days off, but don't use the excuse of "not being motivated enough" as a reason to take time off. What would be better is, if you can't force yourself to, say, program, work on the art, or the sound, or design. But do it consistently!

Be accountable as well. This means involving others as much as you can - as an example, say you want to discuss a design aspect with a friend and you'll find extra motivation to work on that aspect, and get it ready for someone else to read over. Just having that knowledge of another person looking at your work will bring it to a new level, trust me! You can also be held accountable to people you don't know! Part of the reason why I started this blog and my Twitter account was because I always have in the back of my mind while working, that it'll eventually make its way to my blog.

Finally, if your hobby has one, make use of the community where possible - get involved and see if there are ready made templates or resources you can use. I know people like to do things without help, and I absolutely respect that, but I find that people have often gone through the same struggles as you, and will provide ways to make your life easier!

Tools of the trade

Ok so I've used a lot of different software and systems in my time, and by process of natural selection the ones that I still use today are the ones that have been most helpful for me! Here's a short list with both the specific thing I use, and in brackets, what I use it for. If you already use something similar that fill a similar role, then my suggestion is to stick with what you know:

ClickUp (Project management, checklists): This is where I keep a list of all my major tasks. You can have checklists nested in checklists which is amazing for planning, and can organise things into broad categories, and tons more. Any good project management software like Trello etc. should support this.

Google Drive (Cloud storage of other assets, easy sharing, MS office replacement): I use this to store anything that isn't code related, and to work on things simultaneously with other people. While this game is a mostly solo effort, I absolutely discuss and show a ton of stuff to my more experienced friends, who in turn provide very helpful feedback. It's much nicer and more organised than sending files through a messaging app or (heaven forbid) emails!

Bitbucket (Source control, cloud storage of code): If you code, you need this. I don't care how small your project is! Actually, smaller projects are better to learn from! Github is definitely used the most for source control, so if you like that more, use it!

Google Keep (Note taking, brain dumps): Ever had a genius idea right before bed? Same, and I use Google Keep to keep track of them. I could use Clickup in this instance but I find the app to be a bit clunky compared to Keep.

Notepad++ (Rapid notes, copypasting error messages): Notepad ++ is what I use mainly for copypasting error messages to look at later, but I also use it when I need to break down a sub-task down, or make a note to do something later without interrupting my flow. The fact that Notepad++ specificaly can have multiple tabs and will save your tabs automatically without you having to manually save it is amazing.

Good 'ol pen and paper (Scratchpad): For those REALLY hard problems that can't be solved in my head, I turn to pen and paper to get my thoughts organised. While I could use something like Notepad++, I find that being able to write and draw anywhere on the paper, and link things up with lines helps immensely to get a clear idea of things.

Summing up

Right, so, that's about it from me. If you have any questions or want me to elaborate on something I've mentioned here, feel free to leave a comment or an ask. In any case, I hope you’re feeling more motivated now, and all the best for your personal projects in 2021!

P.S. I've know I’ve been a bit quiet lately because I'm working on designing the five factions present in the demo - I can't reveal much lore about them (as those will be in logs you'll find in-game), but I will be showing off some more designs and gameplay mechanics in the near future, so look forward to it!

#game #videogame #devblog #gamedev #scifi #spacegame #dungeon crawler #rpg #entropy #gamemaker #programming #pixel art #robot #indiedev

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dailytomlinson · 5 years ago

Link

In the spring of 2012, I spent a few entertaining days hanging out with the five young members of a British boy band who were just breaking big in the United States. The guys from One Direction were unjaded, unguarded, totally charming, and a puppy pile of optimism and energy. On April 8th, in a New York City hotel room, Harry Styles and Niall Horan, both 18, sat down with me for a joint interview, published here for the first time. (The reporting was intended for a Rolling Stone cover story that never ran.)

What did you do at the gym last night? Harry: One of our security guys, his friend’s over, he’s a personal trainer, so I was working with him, and he ripped me to shreds.

Have you seen whole episodes of it?

Harry: I’ve watched a lot of clips on YouTube. They don’t show it in the U.K.

Growing up, when did you realize you could sing or that you wanted to sing?Harry: I sang in primary school, like the school productions, plays and stuff.

What was your first one? Harry: The first one was … I was five, and there was a story about a mouse who lived in a church, and I was Barney, the mouse. I had to wear my sister’s tights, and a headband with ears on it, and I had to sing a song all by myself. I remember it was just like, whatever.… In the second, I was Buzz Lightyear in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. So you know when they run and hide in the toy shop? Buzz Lightyear was in the toy shop, so they just created my character. The last one, I was in … you know Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat? I was the pharaoh, but I was an Elvis pharaoh.

Did you have a sense that this is what you wanted to do in your life? Harry: I think in school I was OK, I wasn’t a bad student. I think I just knew I wanted to entertain people and stuff. I was a bit of an attention-seeker at school.

Niall: Me, too. I just talked too much, sang too much.

What did you sing? Harry: We sang “Are You Gonna Be My Girl” by Jet, and “Summer of ’69.” We did it more towards the Bowling For Soup version.

Harry: [helpfully translating] Soccer.

Who told you? Niall: My French teacher. We used to do talent shows and stuff at school, she was like, “You should do it,” so I did it.

Harry: I had to wait a little bit, I think.

Harry: They film it.

Niall: In England, it’s the biggest thing ever. It took a while to build.

Harry: The two or three years were steady, and third or fourth, it just blew up.

Niall: It works that one in three people in the UK watch it. There’s 60 million people in the UK, and 21 million people watched the final the year we were in it.

Harry, your band also played at least one wedding right? Harry: Yeah. We actually said that we’d do the wedding gig, and…

Niall: You get paid for it?

Niall: Can you imagine you’re at a wedding and you have 16-year-old kids up on the stage?

Maybe you were really good! Harry: Yeah, the drummer is one of my best friends from school, he’s a sick drummer, he’s so good.

What do your parents do? Harry: My mum is a PA. My dad is a financial adviser.

How about you? Niall: My dad works at a supermarket, he’s the head manager, general manager of an area, not just one, and my mum is unemployed now, so I try to help them out whenever I can.

You probably can. That must be nice. Niall: Yeah, it’s nice, it’s good.

Plus, now you can tell them what to do. Harry: [laughs] “Now you go to bed.”

Niall: I never went through that.

Harry: Not stupid heavy, but a bit… just because I thought it was cool.

Like what? Harry: Like Nirvana T-shirts, wore black all the time, pretty much.

Did you both grow up in your moms’ houses? Harry: Yeah.

People say you come off as more mature than your age, you come off wiser. Did hanging around all those people as a kid help you mature?

So you grew up on Elvis and the Stones? Harry: Yeah, pretty much. My dad was a massive Stones fan, so it was pretty much Beatles and Stones in terms of what my dad played.

People say you kind of look like Mick.

Niall: He gets that a lot.

Harry: I get it more here, probably, than I do at home. It’s because of the British thing.

Harry: We’re living on our own now.

Niall: We just started living on our own in the last six months, really.

Harry: I’m moving when I get back.

Do you want to act? It feels like you could have your own TV show. Harry: I think it would be more of a documentary, because obviously, we’re not actors.

People must want you to try. Niall: Watch tonight, tell us what you think. Watch SNL.

Will you all make solo albums? Is that inevitable? Harry: No, I don’t think so.

Niall: Let’s do a swing album!

Niall: If there was eight days, we’d fit it in.

Harry: It’s not as completely glamorous all the time, of course it’s not, it would be stupid to think that it would be, but it’s hard work.

In any case, it’s probably better than the bakery. Harry: Yeah. But I don’t get a nice bun on my break anymore, that’s the thing.

Did you wear an apron? Harry: Oh yeah, I wore a white polo shirt and a maroon apron with white stripes. “What would you like? 78 pence, thank you very much.”

Were you behind the counter? Harry: Yeah, I was behind the counter. It was good. It was Saturday morning, I started at five and finished at four in the afternoon and got like 30 quid, it was a joke.

Niall, did you have a job? Niall: No, never.

So this is your first job. Niall: Yeah, not bad at all. I was chilling, I was being a kid.

Harry: I had a paper route before that. It gave me a bad back, bad posture. It was a heavy bag.

Ringo would say, “It’s just me face.” Niall: “Who’s that little old man?” [quoting Hard Day’s Night]

Harry: “That’s Paul’s grandfather. He’s very clean.”

Sometimes you can drift off, that’s just your thing. Harry: [laughs] I’m just soulful, man, I try.

Harry, do you mind when you’re singled out for attention? Harry: I don’t know. I don’t really…I don’t know. We’re a band. Everything we do is together. I don’t take much notice of it.

So you’re not the Justin. Harry: No.

Niall: J.C. was popular, too, wasn’t he?

It’s not like that for you guys. Harry: Not at all.

There was an imbalance in that group. Harry: I think we find it important that people get to know all of our individual personalities, because…

Harry: We all know that we all have our roles, and we all know that without one of us, it wouldn’t work.

#brian hiatt #rolling stone #harry styles #niall horan #press #230720 #10years1d

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skrltwtch · 4 years ago

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Muse

Prompt 1: Just like some people sleep-walk, you tend to paint or draw while in your transformed state because it calms you down. And apparently, people really like your art.

Prompt 2: A is a popular artist, and B messages them without thinking one day. They didn’t expect to become friends, and they definitely didn’t expect to become more. Person B just felt that connection between the two of them.

Prompt 3: A/Werewolf has a tendency to curl like a dog in front of the fireplace a lot (usually in their werewolf form, but it’s not uncommon for them to do it as a human). (Sources in master list)

Word count: 3,721 words

Genre: Fluff, romance, supernatural

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

I put up with the long commute to and fro between home and work for two reasons, and two reasons alone: the decent rent for a place with a picturesque view and that catered to my monthly needs, and the glut of time to catch up on my reading. And by ‘reading’, I meant ‘scrolling through the handful of social media feeds that survived my latest cull of shit that was taking up my time and storage space unnecessarily, and occasionally attempting (and failing) to pay attention to my Kindle’. Hey, at least I was aware I had a problem …?

Instagram was my first hit of the day. I flicked past images of makeup, friends in situations I wouldn’t be finding myself in anytime soon, and cute animals. The occasional meme and comic draw out an exhalation of air from my nostrils. I marvelled at artwork and photography, half wishing I were half as good as the people I followed and admired, half chiding myself for not practising either enough and losing interest quicker than I’d dropped money on new equipment in the name of my new endeavours. You could say one of my hobbies, the ones I’d been consistent about, was amassing gadgets obtained to indulge my whims and fancies.

My heart skipped a beat — or was it the pothole the bus went over? — when I came across a new post by George. I didn’t know him personally to refer to him by his first name like that, but hadn’t social media broken down boundaries between people, making them seem closer to each other than they really were? He was an illustrator whose work I chanced upon on Reddit a while back. His portfolio was a patchwork of subjects, often portraits, rendered mostly in traditional media like watercolour and oil paint. He sometimes shook things up with abstract, contemplative pieces. He had something for almost everyone. For me, it was his attractive, angular yet distinctive faces and statuesque figures, use of watercolour, and versatility: one piece could be superhero fanart, followed by a collection of moody, atmospheric paintings of the English landscape with some fantastical additions.

It also helped that he seemed to be a nice, chill person, and a handsome one at that, too, based on the smattering of pictures he had of himself on his feed. Please, let me imagine a world in which someone as ideal as him — or what I knew about him — wasn’t beholden to anyone for a moment.

His latest post was a drippy bust of a snarling wolf with full moons for eyes. The caption simply read: ‘Mood.’ I smirked as I hit the like button. Did I mention that he drew wolves a lot as well? Sometimes his wolves were feral; sometimes they were humanoid, but still wild. The latter featured heavily in his conceptual works, albeit as hazy, indistinct forms, like blurry photographs. In any case, I liked that he had a fondness for wolves and werewolves, as the constant presence of the full moon in art of the latter would suggest. Anyone who liked wolves was a-okay in my book. Anyone who liked werewolves was even more so. Because.

An interrupted connection between my brain and my reflexes led me to visit his profile. Instead of returning to my feed, my thumb gravitated toward the message button at the top of the screen. Not a single cell in my body resisted this turn of events despite the restored connection. Oh, what the hell. Why not? Like, what were the chances he’d read my message? He had tens of thousands of followers, a likely considerable chunk of them being bots aside. He must receive DMs every other minute. I’d be another sycophant in his sea of fans. Or he’d see my homely mug and locked profile, and he’d think I was driven to add to his never-ending count of unread messages simply out of misguided thirst.

The beauty of the Internet was that it made ‘out of sight, out of mind’ fairly easy to put into practice.

I got the following out of my system and into his inbox: ’Hi! Hope you’re doing well. I’ve been following your Instagram for a while, and your latest post just made me want to say your art is amazing. (I can totally identify with the sentiment behind it.) I especially love your more abstract pieces. There’s something so … raw about them. And I like that you seem to like wolves a lot, too. They’re beautiful animals, and your art really captures that about them. Anyway, keep up the great work! Take care.’

I exited Instagram, not caring about the rest of my feed anymore and not wanting to feel like I was stalking my notifications for something that’d never come. My phone buzzed with several notifications as I went down my Reddit homepage. I swiped away the banners with green icons that pelted the top of my screen. Those could wait. What couldn’t were the banners stating that I had a new message and a new follower request from —

‘Oh, my God!’ I said, loudly enough for me to hear my own voice above my music (the chorus of Walk the Moon’s ‘Shut Up and Dance’ at half of maximum volume, so … loud). Not one soul on this lightly populated bus acknowledged my exclamation — not even the woman sitting next to me. (Come on, lady, the front was mostly empty.) Thank God for technology making hermits of us all. Or my sudden outburst paled in comparison to the shit that could happen and had happened on public transport. When you took long journeys as I did every day, you’d see some real shit in due time, too.

I launched Instagram for the second time this morning (stop judging, Screen Time) and the first time ever with trembling hands. The notifications were real. I approved his request first. My mind raced to recollect anything on my profile that might make him regret his decision to let my piddling photos of food, myself, my cat, and random junk take up precious space on his feed. Nope, couldn’t think about that now, because I was now staring at an actual, honest-to-God message from George:

’Hey! Thanks for reaching out, and thank you for your kind comments. They mean a lot to me, especially what you said about my experimental stuff and wolves. They are stunning creatures, aren’t they? And yeah, I drew that last picture after a particularly rough night. You could call it a self-portrait of sorts, I suppose.’

I snorted. Change the fur colour and make the eyes normal, and it was a portrait of myself every full moon. Okay, not something I could tell someone I just met, let alone a popular artist on the Internet …

Before I could recover from the shock that my inbox held an actual, honest-to-God message from George Holden (that was his last name — the oxygen made it to my brain for me to remember that he had his last name on his profile), he sent another one: ’Anyway, how are you? I took a look at your profile, and it looks like we have quite a number of things in common.’

What, really? No way. Was it the lashings of sweet treats I subjected my stomach to every weekend? The horror and science fiction titles, celebrity memoirs, and comics, sometimes paired with an iced coffee at either a café I put down roots for the afternoon or the one-bedroom house in Waltham Forest I called home, I showcased to put forth some form of air of intellectualism? The cross-stitch projects featuring memes and popular culture icons? His profile was quite barren of anything that could provide insight into what else he enjoyed doing besides his art. Which, hey, was perfectly fine: no one was obligated to share their personal life online.

I replied, ’I’m fine, thank you. I’m on my way to work. Favourite part of my day, really. And really? Like what?’

Most of my notifications that day were from him.

✦✧✦✧

I was a bustling hub of activity in my seat: A sip of my drink. A shake of my knee. A lift of my phone. A turn of my neck. A shift of my weight from one butt cheek to the other. I was certain I was generating enough electricity to power a lightbulb in five-second intervals. I couldn’t help it. I was so, so excited — and so, so nervous. This was my and George’s first time meeting each other in person. There’d be no screen between us. Actually, what difference would that make? We’d been talking to each other for months, either through text or video calls, the latter more common in the weeks leading up to today. We’d seen each other even on our ‘I’ll put on a clean shirt, brush my hair, and hope for the best’ days. What could either one of us do in person that would irrevocably alter our friendship for the worse? Well …

The sound of someone entering the café stopped me from starting on a list of things that I could do to fuck things up. I looked up, probably the seventh time I did so in the last ten minutes. This was on me. I grossly overestimated the amount of time it’d take me to get somewhere as usual; a natural by-product of living far from the city. Seventh — probably — time was the charm: it was George — and right on the dot, too. His punctuality added to his attractiveness, which had already gone through the roof and was heading straight into the stratosphere. I bit my lip to suppress any unfortunate exclamations. He was a friend, Evelyn … just a friend, and I had no illusions otherwise.

I called out to him. He waved at me and joined me at the table I picked out for us. And the second our eyes met, devoid of any barrier between us, everything about him — and everything about us — clicked.

He was just like me.

And I was just like him.

And he was as astonished about it as I was, going by the long silence that passed between us, a first since we got to know each other.

‘Hi! Oh, my God, it’s so good to finally meet you!’ I said with a grin to break the tension. He broke out into a smile, his posture relaxing. Success. Should I go in for a handshake? No, that’d be too stuffy for a months-old friendship. A hug? No, that’d be too intimate for a months-old friendship, and an online one, too, no less. Was it obvious this was my first time meeting someone I met online?

‘It’s good to meet you, too,’ he said, his expression of cheer unabating. ‘I’m going to get myself a drink first, and then we can shoot the shit.’ His smile turned into a grin. ‘Do you want anything? My treat,’ he added as he spotted me reaching for my wallet.

‘I was thinking a red velvet muffin, please.’ I didn’t know why I didn’t get one earlier. ‘Thank you.’

‘No problem. I’ll be right back.’

As he left, my nerves turned into happiness that I met another werewolf. It was rare to meet other werewolves just about anywhere. What were the odds that two werewolves, one of whom was Internet-famous, would become friends because the other one had a brain fart one morning to send a message to the Internet-famous one? You couldn’t make this shit up. In all the years I’d been a werewolf, George was the first one I knew. I didn’t even know the one that turned me. I got bitten one night, and that was my life changed forever. I figured everything out on my own — I had to. And my puny social network of werewolves made sense: this wasn’t exactly the kind of thing anyone would advertise about themselves.

Once George settled down and courtesies were out of the way, the first thing out of his mouth was ‘I never thought I’d meet another one like me’.

I moved my chair closer to him so that we could speak at length about what we were without the fear of being overheard. ‘Me neither.’ Then it hit me, and I quickly said, ‘It’s fine if you don’t want to talk about it, though.’ Personally, I was okay with what I was. No existential dread here, contrary to what one might expect of a werewolf. It happened. I learnt to manage it in a way that made it not have any kind of significant impact on my life. I refused to let it define me. And honestly, I lived for particularly bad days that coincided with full moons.

‘Are you kidding me?’ His face lit up with boyish glee. ‘I’ve been waiting for this day for so long! As in, us meeting up in person for the first time and me getting to know another werewolf. Two birds, one stone: the only kind of killing I endorse. And I’m so fucking chuffed it’s you. I always felt like I could talk to you about anything, and now that really, really means anything.’ It was his turn to be able to power a light bulb, but in twenty-second intervals this time.

‘Same. How were you turned?’

‘I was bitten during a camping trip with friends a couple of years back. You?’

‘Secondary school. I was walking home from the library.’

‘Shit, that was some time ago, huh?’

‘Almost half my life a werewolf.’

‘Do you know the werewolf that did it?’

‘Nope. How about you?’

He shook his head. ‘Nah. Kind of sucks, doesn’t it, that you’ll never get to know the person who’s changed your life so … deeply? They won’t remember either that they turned someone. If only having kids was like that, yeah? Absolutely no sense of responsibility whatsoever.’ He gave his teaspoon a lazy twirl, causing a faint plume of milk to rise and sink into the dark, bittersweet depths from whence it came. ‘I struggled with what I’d become the first couple of months. The transformations were one thing.’ Oh, yeah. ‘I felt … grotesque. God, the amount of self-pity, like, why was I the only one who had to go through this every month when there were four other guys ripe for the picking? So, I decided to start incorporating wolves in my art to get to know and reclaim that part of me. I didn’t want to see it as something ugly. I mean, you get to experience a kind of rebirth every month. That’s extraordinary if you think about it. And I told myself that like myself, the wolf didn’t ask to be born. Ha, ha. Millennial humour. Anyway. Then the most miraculous thing happened one full moon: I woke up next to a coherent painting that wasn’t there the night before.’

‘Oh, my God.’

‘Right? My more artsy stuff? The ones I hate coming up with captions for? Almost all done while I was transformed. I’d started some of my art — bet you can’t guess which one — on full moons, too, and I finished them after I changed back. It’s as if the wolf knew we were now cool with each other.’ He took a big chunk out of his apple crumble and jammed it into his mouth. ‘Sorry if that sounded like spiritual woo-woo. I’ve been wanting to tell someone about this forever.’ Crumbs fell out of his mouth as he spoke. ‘Shit, I’m such an’ — he shot me an impish look as he swallowed — ‘animal, aren’t I? Fuck, I can make stupid references like that now, and someone would get it!’

I laughed. He was such a dork. ‘It’s not “spiritual woo-woo”. It’s amazing. How is that even possible?’

‘I have no idea.’ He held out his hands in front of him. ‘So thankful we get to keep our hands and not have them turn into paws.’ He waggled his thumbs. ‘Fuck, yeah, opposable thumbs. And I want to say it’s like when artists get high and make stuff. I do know artists who do that, and hey, no judgment. To them, I do the same thing, too.’

‘And here I am, feeling accomplished whenever I make it through another full moon without waking up in a trashed place. Seriously, that’s amazing.’

‘I think that’s what’s keeping me from losing it while transformed. I was surprised people liked those pieces when I started posting them, considering they’re such far departures from what I usually post.’

‘That explains why they’re so … visceral.’

‘Yeah? I figure you’d appreciate them even more now.’ He smirked. ‘And you know, no one really talks about my wolf art, and especially my werewolf pieces. Maybe if I didn’t make them blurry and made them more explicit …’ Oh, he’d get a different breed of followers altogether. ‘But that’s fine. I don’t want my lycanthropy to define me and my work. It’s just a part of who I am.’

‘My turn to say something possibly corny: I like your wolf art because … they make me feel seen, because they’re drawn by you.’

He put a hand on his chest. ‘That’s not corny. I’m happy my art makes you feel that way. You know I don’t care about the likes or comments. It just so happens I like drawing things that make me get likes and comments.’ He pushed his plate toward me and motioned at me with his fork to try some of his apple crumble. I obliged him. ‘Did you ever suspect anything? Not that, you know, I purposely drew wolves and werewolves as a kind of signal for other werewolves to pick up on. That’d be giving me way too much credit.’

‘No, I just thought you like wolves a lot.’

‘Same here. What you said about wolves being beautiful creatures when you messaged me the first time … that made me feel something, too.’

‘Then I’m very glad we got to be friends,’ I said. Born from the same blip in brain activity that set us on this path, my hand found itself on top of his. His touch had a pleasant, almost familiar heat to it.

‘Me too.’ He turned his hand over and clasped mine.

‘I have an idea,’ I said, mostly to distract myself from how right this felt. ‘Do you want to meet on the next full moon?’

‘Sure. I can’t wait to see what kind of inspiration will strike with another werewolf around.’

‘Your place, then?’

He nodded. ‘Unless you’re cool with me possibly trashing your place with paint and stuff. That hasn’t happened before, but who knows? What if wolf-me doesn’t like change?’

I stared at him in disbelief.

‘I can’t help it. You have no idea what kind of beast this has unleashed. Oops.’

We sat and talked in the café the entire afternoon; we took turns treating each other to food and drinks to justify our occupancy. Our conversation moved on to other topics besides the one special, biggest thing we had in common. Just like we didn’t want it to define who we were as people, we made a promise to each other, and we did so over a strawberry custard tart, that we wouldn’t let it become the foundation of our friendship from this point on. It’d be unfair to the moments we shared before this. We were friends because we cared about each other, we brought out the best in each other, we could truly be ourselves around each other, and, honestly, I didn’t think anyone else would have the patience for his goofy in-jokes.

✦✧✦✧

I lay in front of the fireplace, rejoicing in the warmth it offered on this cool night, while George was working on his newest painting. Since getting to know each other in these forms, we’d been able to exercise better control. For me, that meant greater peace of mind; for him, that meant a more refined grasp of his artistic sensibilities. As with much about our condition, we didn’t question this. What could possibly be a drawback of us spending more time in each other’s company? I now understood why animals curled up by a fire was a common sight in media and real life, too. Wait, what if this, and not George’s presence, was what I’d been missing all my life?

My tail wagging like a fiend when I felt his breath on my skin begged to differ. I licked his face. He gently parted my lips and slid his tongue onto mine. Our tongues engaged each other in a playful scuffle; the fire crackling in the background could only dream of coming close to causing the rise in temperature in the pit of my stomach. The tussle between our tongues didn’t get to turn into something more: he’d had a long night. I nuzzled him to convey reassurance. He lay down beside me and wrapped his arms around me, his hold firm yet tender. We fell asleep like this, keeping each other warm long even after the fire had died out.

We wished each other a good morning with a kiss — no, two kisses, and we got ourselves ready for the day. As we were having breakfast, George piped up, ‘Do you want to see what I painted last night, love? I’m really proud of it, and I think you’d love it, too.’

I nodded excitedly, my mouth too full of scrambled egg to speak.

He returned as quickly as he’d left the table. His hands held on to a painting … of me curled up by the fire last night. The figure was the clearest, most detailed he’d ever done; the lighting was phenomenal. ‘It’s beautiful,’ I said, tearing up a little, frankly. ‘I love it. It’s going to look so good in our new place’, along with the recent paintings he’d made of a similar nature. He’d come so far from the gauzy forms that once populated his attempts at capturing his — our — condition on canvas.

‘Of course, when I have the most stunning model.’ He gave me a peck on the cheek. ‘I love you, my muse, my mate.’

#exophilia #terato #werewolf #monster love #monster romance #mine #fun fact #I wrote this story in early october last year #and it's kind of truth in television for me now

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birdwonder · 5 years ago

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Genos and Saitama | Your Heroes

|| whoo, another amazing request from @tishimaaa! honestly people, feel free to request stuff from me, it makes me so happy! i really hope you all enjoy this lil’ fic - the main plot was a struggle to come up with, but the request for a reader who liked taking photos was so cute and perfect. <3

[F/N] [L/N]. Full time journalist and sadly, only part time blogger.

As generic as your occupation sounded, your life could be the furthest thing from that. You were a young adult, living in Japan in an apartment with decent rent but little to no neighbours, which made perfect sense seeing as your surrounding area was a honeypot for swarms of monsters that were ready to kill and slaughter.

Now, as horrible as that sounded, it wasn’t all that bad! As a journalist, it gave you an easy and early access to juicy scoops that you could impress your boss and editor with; and it gave you a heap ton to talk about for your hero fan blog online. Not to forget - you weren’t living alone. To be specific, you had two other roommates living in the cramped apartment that had a generous amount of space for one person, but no room at all for three.

Well, you say roommates but more officially they were your boyfriends. Emphasis on the plural. It may be unconventional to have not one but two lovers, but after staying with the both of them for such a long time and all three of you developing mutual feelings, why just settle for one when everyone could be happy? Genos, or more popularly known as Demon Cyborg by the masses, and Saitama who was doomed with the title Caped Baldly, were the two that had captured your heart. Your perfect heroes. Which worked well considering the fact that you were a hero fanatic, and they were always out doing something incredible that you could add to your page. Well, Saitama did a lot less than Genos but when he did fight oooh boy. Was it amazing.

It was seriously painful to know that Saitama got absolutely zero recognition for his heroic efforts, especially when he hasn’t lost a single battle to your knowledge! It’s the same routine really; a villain approaches, one hit and it’s over. ‘Caped Baldy’ really didn’t do him justice. He deserved a better name like ... The Punching Man! Or Single Punch.

You should really just stick to writing about heroes instead of creating them.

Sometimes when you felt like your blog had gotten dry or you were in desperate need of material for your work, you would wait close by Genos so that you could be there when he was alerted of any ‘approaching life forms’ as he occasionally put it or monsters that were attacking the cities.

Right now, your head was rested on his shoulder while you were sitting on the floor in front of a small TV, neither of you really paying attention to what was being said on the screen but it made for great white noise as the two of you simply enjoyed each other’s company. It would be even greater if Saitama was there too, arms wrapped around your waist or his head on your lap as he usually liked to laze about with you, unfortunately he was out buying groceries.

You sighed contently as Genos reached over to take a strand or two of your hair between his fingers, trying to get his sensors in his finger tips to pick up on the texture as he’s done so many times before. “It’s so soft...” He noted, focused so intently on your hair that it might as well been what was on TV instead of the weather report.

“Thanks Genos,” you laughed, winking as you joked, “I make sure to keep it brushed and conditioned just for you.” As appreciated as his praise was, you were certain that no matter if your hair was straight, curly, long or short, he would probably have something nice to say about it.

“Don’t do it for me! You should be taking care of yourself on your own accord. I read somewhere that treating your body well and taking care of yourself can help keep your mood up by a large scale.” The cyborg began to ramble, listing off a number of ways that you could pamper yourself as though he was a walking self-care beauty kit ad. At least you knew that next time you went shopping, you had the OK to buy a face mask.

As informative as it was, you lifted a finger to his lips to hush him, something you usually did when you wanted to keep him quiet. Or kiss him. That usually worked but then he wouldn’t speak for a good ten minutes.

From there the two of you continue to sit in comfortable silence until you heard the sound of a door unlocking and opening, causing you to lift your head from Genos’ shoulder to see Saitama had returned, hands filled with bags which had increased since the time you and Genos officially moved it. Thankfully being a journalist and S-ranked hero helped cover the expenses.

“Sai, welcome back!” You greeted with a sweet voice that instantly put a small smile on the C-ranked hero’s face.

“Hey. See you two are comfortable.” Saitama then proceeded to start putting the products he had bought away, careful to not put something cold in the cabinet or rice in the fridge since he was trying to do it all quickly to join your cuddling session. How dare you two be lazy and snuggle up when he had to sort out 50 coupons at the check out to find at least one that wasn’t expired? Unforgivable. “Totally not like I was outside freezing my ass off or anything”

You snickered at his sarcastic comment and made a ‘come here’ gesture. “Well if you hurry up, you can join us, dummy.”

“Or you could help out? Better yet. I sit down and chill and you do all of this, and cook lunch. And make some dessert while you’re at it maybe.” Saitama retorted, huffing at his lack of assistance while you cheekily grinned and tapped your chin, as if deep in thought.

“Hoooow about ... no.~”

Throwing his head back a little, Saitama groaned with annoyance even though he knew he wasn’t going to stay mad at you. “Maybe you want to help out, Genos?” He queried, raising a brow at the cyborg who had suddenly stood up, startling you from his unexpected move. Was he that excited to help sort out groceries?

“There’s something outside. No. Two beings are nearby.”

Finally, some action! Your eyes sparkled with excitement, looking back and forth from Genos and Saitama with an expecting look, knowing that they'd have no choice but to go check it out. After all, no one came round here except for monsters, and they wouldn’t dare let you sleep in a dangerous environment. What sweethearts.

They gave each other a nod, both knowing what they had to do, before looking over at you. “Stay here, [F/N]. We’ll be back in a short bit, just put the food away for me, yeah?” Saitama asked, only needing to take a few steps to be standing in front of you and place a hand on your head. In return, you leant up to peck his cheek as a good luck charm, a thing you usually did when they were about to head out.

“Do your best out there, guys!”

“We will do even better than that,” Genos corrected, mimicking Saitama by also patting your head. Guess he was trying to learn more from his sensei than just how to become a strong hero.

With that they were both gone and you were left in the apartment, standing in the middle of the square living room by your lonesome, but not for long! Turning on your heel, you rushed over to a corner of the room where you usually dumped your bag after work and rummaged inside looking for your camera.

You cheered a small ‘yes’ once you grabbed it, rushing to the door to slip your shoes on and dash out the house and down the building’s stairs. It took a lot of frantic looking around to find out where they went but luckily they had moved to one street over, already battling it out.

Well, Saitama was just standing there talking or maybe debating with one of the monsters who looked like a mix of porcupine and a mole rat while Genos was going head to head with an identical looking being but slightly taller and stockier. Already a few seconds in and you had snapped a few shots of Genos landing hits on the monster.

From the safety of just blatantly standing behind a brick wall’s corner, you continued to take more photos while the excitement of going home to upload them to your laptop was bubbling inside you. Obviously a few of the more up close and handsome would be saved for yourself . You may love sharing the amazing abilities of your lovers to the world but even you got a little jealous over fans looking at Genos too much.

‘It’s not fair, why is he so perfect?’ You mentally complained, cursing the fact the cyborg looked so good while also being a badass fighter. Sadly for you, you got way too wrapped up in your thoughts and failed to noticed the looming figure behind you.

With no warning or even an idea with what’s to come, a large hand wrapped around your throat from behind, forcing a gasp and sickly choking sound to escape your throat.

“Lookie, lookie. A little lamb fresh for the slaughter house,” a gruff yet arrogant voice cooed, sending all the worst kinds of shivers down your spines. With a grip tight on your throat, it was hard to move your head, especially when the stranger’s hand seemed to cover the whole surface area of your neck. Yet you managed to tilt it just enough to see the face of your attacker.

A deep blue mole like muzzle sniffled disgustingly near your face, as if to take in your scent. Small, black squinting eyes seemed to be heavily focused on you and it was clear by his much larger porcupine quills and stature, that this guy was the superior of the two other beasts fighting Saitama and Genos. Damn, he must have been too far away at first for Genos to have detected him.

“Let...go!” It was hard to choke out the command and all of your energy was going into swinging your legs back and forth, and scratching at the hand holding you in hopes it hurt enough to make him release his grip on you. To no avail, his hand didn’t so much as loosen.

In the most mocking manner ever, the mole creature barked out in laughter and seemed to even tear up a little at your feeble attempt of escaping. “Don’t be stupid, little thing! As the Rodent King, I’m making it my mission to expand my empire by killing off every single one of you miserable humans,” he boasted, chest puffed out as though he was announcing the world’s greatest news. If you had the energy to, you’d roll your eyes. “From a burrow in the woods to the whole of the miserable planet, and then the world, I will claim all of this land and my people and I will live long and fruitfully!”

Despite it being loud and obnoxious, the monologging rodent’s speech didn’t take your mind off the serious lack of oxygen you weren’t getting and your limbs began to go limp. The camera that was once in your hand clattered to the ground and shattered, the majority of it still being connected together with all the inner components sprung out and the lens had to have shattered; not that it mattered to a dead person.

The loud clatter of the camera caught the Rodent King’s attention, and his looked down to spot what had fallen and yet he asked, “huh? What was that?” His nose sniffed a couple of times, trying to find the scent of what had fallen and then it struck you. He’s as blind as mole. This guy relied on scent to see!

“No matter, it doesn’t matter now.” He shrugged, letting go of your neck, causing you to fall onto your knees and gasp for a desperate amount of air. ‘Oh sweet oxygen, don’t ever let me lose you again. I promise to walk more to work, I really do.’

Meekly, you looked up to see that your nightmare wasn’t over. The monster was now knelt down on one leg in front of you, one arm resting on his propped up knee and another was raised above your head, a large, clenched fist ready to crash down on your skull. “Like I said, you humans are destined to die by my hand! Now, any last words?”

Shit, shit. What to do? You weren’t ready to die, not like this. You hadn’t regained enough air to cry out for help, so all you had right now was yourself to save you. You and a ... busted camera! Patting around, you knew that the Rodent King wouldn’t notice your fidgeting so you quickly tried to search for it while still keeping eye contact with him, just so he didn’t grow suspicious.

“Yeah actually... Just three.”

Got it!

You grabbed ahold of the largest chunk of the camera you could find, and pulled back your arm, smashing the once treasured device onto the villain’s face while simultaneously quickly standing up. “Eat shit, bitch!”

A pained cry came from the Rodent King, who slapped his previously raised hand over his face to cover where the camera had hit him. Just like you, he had quickly gotten up though you were already taking two steps away from him. Now, if you could just run away, you could head for the other two! Oh God, how you wanted to hold them. To feel safe and warm in their arms.

That desire crashed down like a burning plane however when you felt your arm be grabbed. The mole clearly was strong enough to recover quickly from the minor attack, and he looked furious, quills sticking up much higher than before. “You bitch! How dare you! Do you know who you are dealing with?!”

Before you could even make a clever comeback, or a pathetic cry for mercy, the hold on you suddenly became non existent when a blast had hit the head of the Rodent King, sending him flying back a couple of feet away.

‘Huh? Wait, that could only mean,’ you cut off your own thoughts by swiftly turning around to see two figures standing in front of you, your boys. Oh, and did they look pissed.

“I believe it is you who doesn’t know who they’re dealing with.” Genos harshly stated, a now closing canon whirring from within his hand as he glared at the now writhing in pain monster. Saitama looked just as deadly, his expression darkened and already he was stepping closer to the villain.

“I’ll take this one Genos, just make sure that [F/N] isn’t hurt.”

With an accepting nod, Genos gently put an arm around you and pulled you close to his side, guiding you further away from the street for the sake of your wellbeing and your eyes not seeing what bloodshed would probably ensue.

“[F/N], what were you doing there? Do you know how dangerous it is to follow us into battle?!”

The scolding stung a little emotionally though his concerned expression and gentle hands lifting your chin to brush over any potential bruising on your neck made up for it, letting you know that it was just the stress of losing you that had gotten him so riled up.

“I’m sorry, Genos. Really. I just,” you choked a little, tears threatening to spill but you wouldn’t let them, “I just love seeing you and Saitama fight, and I’m just so proud to have such incredible boyfriends- I guess I just wasn’t careful enough.”

The robotic hero sighed. He couldn’t understand why you would risk yourself for a couple of candid photos of him and his sensei, especially when you weren’t even close to being evenly matched against any hero or villain. Though it didn’t mean he wasn’t flattered, plus he also knew that heroes were a passion of your’s, something he wouldn’t dream of trying to change.

Brushing some of your hair from your face that had gotten loose and messy from the scuffle you had, he rested his forehead against your’s and let a beat of silence pass before speaking. “It’s fine, please do not let yourself cry over this. Just next time, give us a warning? We will maybe try and work something out if you are so insistent on getting photos of our fights.”

That made you smile a little. As stoic and harsh as Genos may seem, his heart was usually in the best of places, especially when it came to those he cared about. It’s one of the reasons why you love him so much.

“Sure hon, though I doubt I’ll be taking any photos any time soon. I may have smashed my camera back here while I was being, y’know.” A weak chuckle left your lips, and Genos was about to say a few more words of comfort for your loss of a prized possession when a much calmer than before voice spoke up.

“No biggie, we can just buy you a new one, right?”

Turning around and smiling softly, the usual nonchalant expression of Saitama was as welcoming as a warm hug on a winter’s day. In his hand was a brown wallet, a few yen notes poking out of the pocket which gave the idea that a lot was inside. “Turns out even rat things carry about cash on them, and if I’m right this should cover for a new camera.”

Saitama placed a hand on your head like earlier, his eyes soft while glancing at you, something you responded to by pulling him into a tight hug and burying your face into the soft fabric of his hoodie. A much better thing to soak a few tears in than his flashy hero outfit, in your opinion.

“Oh thank you so, so much. You guys really are my heroes.” You sniffled, pulling your face away from Saitama’s chest. “I love you boys so much!”

Of course, the two had to smile at that, both leaning down to plant a small kiss on a temple either side of your head. “We love you more,” Saitama chimed, wrapping an arm around your shoulder while Genos opted for holding your hand loosely, which was usually out of his comfort zone in public areas. Luckily, it was only you three.

“Now, I believe Sensei brought some food home, yes? Shall we go prepare some lunch?”

“Oh yeah! If you two could make some soba that’d be great.”

“Oh Sai...”

#one punch man #opm #one punch man x reader #saitama x reader #genos x reader #x reader #request #i've always wanted to write a OPM fic #saitama #genos #caped baldy #demon cyborg

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x--daughters-of-darkness--x · 4 years ago

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Evanescence: “Guitarists need to be honest. Use your voice. We don’t need fake – we need humanity and real people”

Jen Majura and Troy McLawhorn wax lyrical on the high-octane gear, influences and themes behind the band's upcoming fifth album, The Bitter Truth

The Bitter Truth, the fifth full-length from Evanescence set for release in March 2021, will be their first album of new material in a decade. The American arena group led by singer/keyboardist Amy Lee had already released three singles, though the record’s completion was stalled by the virus pandemic that dominated headlines for much of the year.

The first sessions took place at the beginning of 2020 with rock super producer Nick Raskulinecz [Foo Fighters, Rush, Alice In Chains] in his Nashville studio, spawning the tracks we’ve heard so far – Wasted On You, The Game Is Over and Use My Voice. Then, of course, came Covid, putting an end to safe travel and forcing virtually all plans to change.

For the members in America, it was incredibly problematic. For German guitarist Jen Majura, who joined in 2015, it was an absolute nightmare. Nevertheless, the group kept chiseling away and fleshing out their parts for album number five.

When Guitar World tracks down Majura and co-guitarist Troy McLawhorn towards the end of 2020, things are still very much in the process of being finalized...

Looking back now, that session in Nashville must feel like a very long time ago!

Majura: “Definitely! What hit me so hard was that we’d recorded that first chunk of songs and waved goodbye at the airport, thinking we’d be back in a couple of weeks. And then suddenly this pandemic hit, airports were all shut!

“I had never felt more apart from my friends in the States than since this all started. It’s so unnatural for me not to be there! I’m very old-school – I like my tube amp and 4x12 cabinet. I like to sit in the studio with the humans I’m working with and creating in the moment.

“Being away from Amy and the boys while working on material has felt so unnatural to me, but that’s the we have to do it and we have to make the best out of it. The time we spent with Nick in Nashville was the happiest ever.

“It felt amazing to see these songs coming to life – you have this idea but when you are all in a room creating, things change and become better, you end up trying out different ways. It’s such a vibrant and beautiful way of working. But I get it, there’s this thing called corona, so you know…”

This will be your first album working together on new material. How do you go about splitting guitar parts?

McLawhorn: “Whenever we’re jamming, if someone comes up with up something cool, they play it. There’s no set thing. So far I’ve probably played the majority of the lead guitar – if Jen comes up with something she is always welcome to play whatever it is. It’s a good working relationship. The first batch of songs, the first three that came out, were done in one session before the coronavirus hit. We were all together for those ones.

“But then Jen flew home back to Germany and we were supposed to tour in Europe, but it all got cancelled. Everything we’ve done since then has been without Jen with us, we’ve been kinda flying sessions back and forth. I probably played a lot of the guitar on the album, but she’s been coming up with cool ideas and putting her stamp on it too.”

The Game Is Over definitely feels like the heavier side of Evanescence…

McLawhorn: “There’s a lot of good stuff like that on this one, stuff that people will be surprised by maybe. There’s a fair amount of that aggressive type of music, but it’s a good mixture. So far everyone’s heard the lighter side of the album, like Use My Voice and Wasted On You… but then there’s The Game Is Over. It was a lot of fun to play and there’s more heavy stuff on there too!”

Majura: “That bridge is so heavy, I love it! It’s going back to the real rock roots and having lots of fun. When you have a low-tuned guitar you have to be a bit careful – you can’t just smash your strings but they will warp a bit.

“I remember forcing myself, especially during the bridge, to play gentle even though it had this badass attitude. It took me a couple of takes… the first ones were completely out of tune [laughs]!”

Jen, it must have been a rollercoaster five years for you. How did you end up getting the gig?

Majura: “What happened was that I was playing bass in another band, not really being happy as I’m a guitar player. We happened to play two festivals, one in Germany and one in the Czech Republic. And it turns out Testament were playing the same days as us.

“I’m a huge Alex Skolnick fan, so we ended up talking and keeping in touch. A couple of days later, I got this very mysterious email from him saying, ‘Jen! Some friends of mine are going to contact you and I can’t reveal too much but I think it’s something you should say yes to!’ I was wondering what the hell he was talking about…

“And then a day later, I got this email from Evanescence’s management asking if I would be interested in… and I didn’t even finish reading the email. I just immediately replied ‘Yes!’ and sent it. That was a total no-brainer.

“So this was around July 2015 and the next evening I was on the phone with Amy talking. She invited me to come visit her in New York and hang out. I thought, ‘Okay… cool!’ and three days later I was on a plane flying to fuckin’ New York wondering if this was really happening. It was insane.”

Did you bring your guitar?

Majura: “I didn’t! I asked her if I needed to bring one and she said, ‘Nah, I know you can play, I’ve seen plenty of videos – let’s just hang out!’ And that’s exactly what we did for the next three days. Hanging out, long walks and talks, going out for dinner or to a concert. Becoming friends and getting to know each other on a more human relationship kind of base.

“I realize now that’s the biggest deal when you have to replace a member. A band is a family. I’d like to quote Rob Zombie on that, because he said it in the movie Hired Gun!

“Finding a good player is the easy part – the world is full of virtuosos. You also need someone who can commit to touring, being on the road and that whole lifestyle. The third and last thing, also the toughest, is that you need people you can stand hanging out with 24/7.

“Concerts are only 90 minutes – what about all the other hours in the day? You need to all fit together. Within those first few days with Amy, I realized we both had a strong work ethic and know exactly what we want, which is beautiful.

“She’s a very strong character. I appreciate her musicality and personality too, she quickly became one of my best friends because we laughed about the same things and then figured out we both love Sex and the City [laugh]! I am so grateful and thankful to have experienced everything I have with her and the boys.”

Troy, you’ve been a member of Seether and filled in for Sevendust on some tours, but you’ve been an on/off member of Evanescence for over a decade now…

McLawhorn: “Yeah, to be honest, I never really left Evanescence. We have big breaks between albums. When I did my first tour with the band, Amy told me she was taking a long break, probably around four or five years. I just went out to find something to do in the meantime and ended up playing in Seether for a few years…

“When it was time for me to leave, it coincided with Amy being ready to do another album. And it was a huge coincidence. I ended up in New York and went to Amy’s house. I was having trouble in Seether and wasn’t happy there, and she said she’d love me to come work on the new album. That’s how it all went down.

“There seems to be some pretty long breaks in between albums with this band but I think that’s part of Amy’s creative process. She likes to take her time when she’s writing the lyrics. The final product always turns out really nice that way, so why mess with it?”

What can you tell us about the gear responsible for the guitar sounds on this album?

Majura: “I signed up with Synergy Amps in November last year. When I joined, I think Steve Vai was the only big name working with them, but I figured if it’s Steve Vai it’s gotta be fucking great. So I went over to check their amp out and I was very skeptical. It looks like a tube amp but with all these holes and parts missing!

“But I plugged in, hit one chord and realized it was actually phenomenal. They’ve sent all the different modules to me, like the Diezel, and the perfect solution for me was the Friedman HBE. It has the perfect rock and roll sound for my solos but it also has the mighty depth of high-gain stuff too – which are all frequencies you need for Evanescence.

“I was originally expecting I’d go with the Diezel one, but the Friedman felt more right for me. I’m very open-minded when it comes to technology. You have two modules, each with two channels, so you get a four-channel amp made out of your favorites.

“For example, I could combine a Vox AC30 Brian May sound with a Diezel VH4. It’s phenomenal what they’ve managed to open up for us musicians in terms of sound options. It’s been my tour rig and studio rig ever since.”

McLawhorn: “I used a combination of different things on this album. On The Game Is Over, it was basically my live setup which is an Orange Rockerverb 100, with an analog pedalboard.

“A big part of the tone I get from the amp comes down to a 10-band EQ I use to boost the mids on the lead channel. That’s about it – I don’t really use overdrive pedals or anything like that and probably use less gain than most modern guitarists. I almost use EQ to find a modern sound, instead of more gain.

“I also have a Fractal Axe-Fx III, which I’ve used here and there on the album, especially for clean parts – it’s really good for that. I’ve done some overdubs with the II as well, stuff that has a lot of effects or sounds really wet – Axe-Fx is great for that, too. I also have a 1969 Marshall Superbass 100 which we split with a Bogner Ecstasy or Uberschall, and used for the rhythm tracks on a couple of songs.”

And how about for guitars?

Majura: “I’ve been with Ibanez for many years now and I’m very happy. They deliver the most perfect instruments. You pick up an instrument and either like it or not. Some of them seem to instantly merge with your system – you become one – and that is true of most Ibanez guitars, at least for me.

“Of course I’ve played Les Pauls and other things, but they’re really not my style. I have so many Ibanez guitars now. I think the AZ series was such a smart move – the family is even bigger and better now… Look at players like Tim Henson, who is just amazing. He makes me feel so old. He’ll be nailing it and I’m at home just playing along to AC/DC or something!

“For pedals, I stick with the Line 6 Helix pedalboard because I remember at my first rehearsal in 2015, they would tell me certain parts would need a chorus or flanger or this or that. At the end of the rehearsal I had a battery of pedals in front of me and realized I couldn’t do it. I’ve never been a pedal dancer. I went to Line 6 asking for a solution and they were just about to come out with the Helix… it was perfect.”

McLawhorn: “I was using a baritone PRS SE. I changed the pickups out, but that’s it – I love the guitar and how it plays. I tried a few different sets, most by Seymour Duncan. One of my seven-strings has a Seymour that my tech put in on the road and I don’t know which one it is! He just found it in my guitar coffin and asked if we should throw it in. It stayed for the rest of the tour – it was probably a JB, who knows!

“But the one on the record is the Distortion (SH-6). I really like how they sound. At first, they were a little hot for what I like – I tend to prefer somewhere in between modern metal and classic rock. It felt like really high gain, way too much, especially when switching from my other guitars. But he really lowered the pickup down and that fixed everything, making everything super-tight and adding some nice mids.”

Use My Voice has a really powerful message behind it…

Majura: “Yes! Another thing that connects me and Amy very strongly is that we both went through moments in our careers where males would tell us, ‘You’re just a girl – what do you know?’ It’s time for strong women – in rock or wherever – to stand up and say being good at a craft has nothing to do with gender. It’s been happening for way too long.

“That feeling of our voices being suppressed needs to change, because every voice matters. We’re all the same. It does not matter if you are male or female or transgender… humans are humans. I think we should spend more time understanding why we’re the same. Use My Voice is an important message for women to stand up and be heard.”

Where do you think your influences differ as guitar players?

Majura: “The first guitar hero I had at around 10 or 11 was Steve Vai. He was so revolutionary in terms of what he’s done for the guitar world, both sound-wise and crafts-wise. Electric guitar wouldn’t be what it is today without Steve Vai.

“I respect him so much for how he feels and talks through his instrument. He’s influenced my thinking about a lot of things. He’s an amazing person, not just an amazing musician.

“Then I got into Nuno Bettencourt, who plays for the sake of the song instead of showing off. Which is what I tried to do on my first solo album, Inzenity, everyone expected a shred album and it wasn’t. I played for the song. If it didn’t require a guitar solo then fine, I’d just leave it. I didn’t need to prove to the world how good I was.

“Nuno also has the percussive style of playing, which brings this tone that I really like. And finally, Angus Young. I’ve been playing in an AC/DC tribute band for four years and I love his playing.”

McLawhorn: “A lot of them for me were the classic players while I was growing up. So Ace Frehley for sure… KISS were like Slipknot for us who grew up in the '70s [laughs]! Then there’s Jimmy Page and Jimi Hendrix. Tony Iommi as well, he was a massive influence on me as a kid.

“Eddie Van Halen was a huge influence on me, too – it was very sad that we lost him so early and so young. When Van Halen came out, I started taking guitar very seriously. The bluesy side of his playing always appealed to me but he also had all that technical prowess, too. A very inspiring guitar player for so many people.”

What advice can you offer anyone out there hoping to become a good session player?

McLawhorn: “You need to know how to communicate with people. I’ve done sessions with some Nashville guys that have this shorthand way of writing music. Reading music and knowing theory is always important… I wish I knew more myself.

“It puts you at ease walking into a session knowing you read and play anything back. I can’t really do that – I just really really listen and learn things by memory. I can read some music but that’s going back to trumpet at high school [laughs]. So I rely on communication always!”

Majura: “I think guitar players need to be honest. Use your voice. Be real. Be pure. We don’t need fake, we need humanity and real people. What I love about people like Mattias IA Eklundh is he’s just himself. He’s pure and innovative in a really interesting way.

“I’ve gotten to know guys like him, Guthrie Govan, Richie Kotzen and Jeff Waters – they’re all awesome and very honest players. I think one should never think one has seen it all and learned it all.

“We need to keep in mind we’re all on a journey in search of becoming better. In terms of advice, I always have to say being open to different styles is so important. There’s something to learn every day. You should never stop trying to improve to make the world a better place. You should never stop learning… that’s what makes you human.”

#Jen Majura #troy mclawhorn #Evanescence #2021 interviews

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miikrokkosmos · 5 years ago

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jimin x reader: disney date headcanons!

Anonymous asked: hiya! Idk if this would be more weird than enjoyable for you to write, but I wanted to ask for hc about going on a date with jimin in the happiest place on earth! Esp since you worked there, right? Only if you want to though! I figured you might have some date tips and ideas or park knowledge that not everyone would think of anyway ;)

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a/n: omg not weird at all, I LOVE this request so much you have no idea. Idk if I have a lot of special insight or tips, but I hope you enjoy! Also I’ll be writing for the Orlando parks bc that’s what I know, and I also know celebrities often go backstage to avoid ppl but for the sake of this post it’s just a normal date out with Jimin and no celebrity treatment J Besides, who better to go to WDW with than the Disney Prince himself??

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· waking to a very excited Jimin flopping on top of you, embracing you close enough to him so he can half-whisper in your ear that “it’s time to waKE UP :D”

· you playfully pushing his head away with a whine to glance at the clock on the bed side table in your resort room – 6:55 am

· “jimin wtf this is supposed to be a vacation day, where u, u know, take it easy and sleep in”

· “but baby…the parks open in two hours”

· “right…two hours…so let me sleep another half hour”

· “NO D:” he practically shrieks, he’s full on pouting now, tugging your arm to help sit you up

· “I mean…we need the extra time to do our hair and coordinate our outfits :((((“

· you sit up and rub your eyes to fully take in his pouting form, eyes as big and sweet as you’ve ever seen them

· “well…I can’t argue with that”

· spending the next hour picking outfits that are comfortable for a day in the parks but complement each other nicely

· both of you styling and putting product in your hair mostly just to take cute selfies together and pics in front of the castle bc you know it’s all gonna get destroyed after an hour in the florida sun

· when you turn the corner on Main Street and see the castle and both just stop and stare with wide, happy grins for a few moments

· jimin giving you a toothy smile and sweetly grabbing your hand to get in line for castle pictures

· after one (1) silly pose jimin ignoring the photographer’s ideas for different poses bc he just wants to take pics in front of the castle with his arm around your waist and his lips on your cheek bc he knows the blissful, eye-closing grin that brings to your face and he wants as many pictures of that as he can have to keep forever

· then going back and getting in the long starbucks line bc neither of you ate breakfast in the two hour period you used completely to prep for the day and you need your caffeine to make the most of your park day

· sitting down on the hub grass in front of the castle to make some last minute adjustments to your fast pass selection for the day

· rock paper scissors bc you want to fastpass haunted mansion and he wants the many adventures of winnie the pooh (but it doesn’t really matter bc you both know you’ll wait in the standby line for the losing person’s ride anyway :)))

· giggling to each other whenever you get to use your magic bands bc you both specifically ordered matching ones

· jimin lightheartedly grumbling at how the splash on splash mountain was much bigger than he expected and just flat out ruined his hair and won’t believe you no matter how many times you tell him he still looks amazing (but that doesn’t mean he’ll try to stop you from continuously telling him that either)

· screaming your head off on space mountain which just makes jimin uncontrollably giggle behind you the entire ride so the ride pic ends up with your face like DX and his like XD

· having way too much fun in the gift shop after you ride pirates of the Caribbean trying on different pirate gear and taking goofy pics of each other

· jimin posing in his chest-out, hands on hips good boy pose for you with a big fluffy pink pirate hat on which you promptly make your new lockscreen

· grabbing a dole whip and rushing over to the people mover so you can just take a breather and enjoy views of Tomorrowland

· you have a soft spot for alice in wonderland and get on the teacup ride only for jimin to have WAY too much fun aggressively spinning the ride as fast as possible to get a rise out of you

· you feel a lil sick but his childlike giggliness is too adorable for you to not take snaps and video of on the ride

· “my love, I’m feeling kind of hungry”

· “me too…wanna get hot dogs at Casey’s??”

· “mmm...i was hoping we could make our dinner reservations at Be Our Guest?”

· “JIMIN WHAT RESERVATIONS THEY WERE BOOKED EVERY TIME I CHECKED”

· “that’s bc you didn’t try to reserve them as early as I did months ago…”

· somehow you’re not sure if you’ve ever felt more in love with him than in this moment but you’re okay with that

· playfully smacking his chest before jumping forward and smashing your lips against his, holding his face tight to yours

· jimin giggling right after, dimples on display and then hiding his face in your neck bc he can’t handle the cuteness that comes out in you when at your favourite place (but excuse u sir have you seen yourself)

· once you’re sitting at the restaurant “jimin does this mean we can please order the grey stuff for dessert” “of course, lovely, I’ve heard it’s delicious”

· you make a stop at Prince Charming’s Carousel after supper and jimin ends up just standing next to you on your pony, an arm around your waist as you enjoy the ride (since he gave up his horse next to you for a very little princess who really just had to have the same horse he chose)

· you pretty much just gotta stare into his eyes the whole time tho bc you can’t believe how beautiful he looks, grinning, all lit up with the night sky in the background and the carousel lights glowing in his eyes beaming at you

· you can’t really wrap your head around the fact that you are, in fact, dating a real life Disney Prince

· taking sneaky candids of him after the ride with the carousel as the backdrop bc you wanna remember how beautiful and happy he looked in that moment forever

· making your way to the front of the castle as fast as possible to get the best viewing spot for the fireworks

· jimin grabbing your hand right when the lights go down for the show to start

· you know the fireworks always make you emotional but you weren’t expecting for the waterworks that burst forth from within you this time

· there’s a difference between enjoying a fireworks display lighting up a real life castle and enjoying it when you’re deeply in love

· jimin sensing your emotion and the weight of the moment

· you being just a complete mess by the time “I See the Light” from Tangled is playing so he tilts your chin back with his finger, places a hand behind your neck and claims your mouth with his own, fireworks ablaze in the background

· you’re fully self-aware of the cheesiness of the moment but you really could care less and really wish you could just stay there and hold on to the happiness you feel in that moment, with jimin, forever

#jimin x reader #jimin imagine #bts fluff #bts x reader #bts imagines #thanks for the request!!#my stuff #jimin #pt

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sinceileftyoublog · 4 years ago

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Gretchen Lieberum Interview: Eerie Nostalgia

BY JORDAN MAINZER

Singer-songwriter Gretchen Lieberum wanted to make an album of standards while totally subverting your preconception of what that sounded like. With This May Only Be A Dream, which came out Friday, she succeeds, in both capturing the magic of old recordings and performance styles while talking full advantage of the time-bending quality of modern production. In BAFTA-winning composer Keefus Ciancia, Lieberum picked the perfect partner. After singing over piano, she sent what were basically demos to Ciancia, who removed the piano, deconstructing and reconstructing the songs to then be rerecorded with session musicians. The result shares the ambition of something like Julia Holter’s version of “Hello Stranger” but over a whole album. Album opener “Come Rain or Come Shine”, which has been recorded by Ray Charles, Billie Holliday, and Chet Baker, combines lurking, fluttering woodwinds with reverb-laden vocals and chaotic orchestration. On “Blue Skies”, a song that you expect to build up with drums, strings, and chorus, like in a climax scene in a Hollywood epic, the strings cut in and out, toying with your perception. While there are some songs that sound familiar, like the Fiona Apple-esque percussive clatter of “Angel Eyes” or the solemn, quiet closer “While We’re Young”, the back-and-forth between subtlety and Technicolor orchestration keeps you on your toes.

A couple months ago, I spoke with Lieberum from her home in L.A. and Ciancia from his in France about how the album was constructed, their approach to recording, and how they would describe the music. Read our conversation below, edited for length and clarity.

Since I Left You: So this seriously just started with you singing over piano, Gretchen?

Gretchen Lieberum: I have a friend who has a studio in his house. I wanted to do an album of standards for years and years. It’s just an idea I’ve had I couldn’t let go of. I wanted to do an album of these songs but interpreted in an unusual way, not acoustic bass, drums, piano, and that’s it. I’ve known Keefus for years, and he was the only guy I wanted for the job. So I waited years and years, and finally, the timing was right to start working on it. I’d just record vocals with my friend Peter at his studio playing piano, which is great because I do much better in low pressure situations. If I’m in a big fancy studio, I’m like, “Oh god, how much is this costing?” It’s hard for me to be emotional and in the moment. I was just able to go to my friend’s house and record any song that popped into my head or I was feeling. I would send them to Keefus, and he would pick his faves. I think I recorded maybe 25 songs in all, and we ended up with 10.

Keefus Ciancia: The most important part is what Gretchen said--the comfort zone that Gretchen was in where she could get to the feel and heart of the song, comfortably with Peter. He’s an amazing piano player, and they had such a good rhythm that everything I was getting made it so that it was just real. It felt right. That was always fun to be able to open these and also have total separation, pick out Peter’s stuff and start reimagining things, erasing the chords. Gretchen was on fire! She was knocking them out. A lot of great pieces I’ve never heard, too, which I really enjoyed. Maybe that was good for me, too, to not know those standards as well so I wasn’t trapped in the chords. Maybe my lameness of being a hack--I wanted to be a jazz player but I couldn’t do it! [laughs]

GL: That’s what’s so great. I didn’t want a jazz guy to produce it. That’s what ended up happening--he would choose his own chords underneath the melodies that were really interesting and cool.

SILY: Did you know he was gonna remove the piano?

GL: Oh yeah. I know Keefus’s aesthetic and how he works, so I was like, “I’m gonna send you this, have fun, go to town.” I sent him literally zero notes and never knew what I was gonna get back. There’d be a song that’s a stark ballad that would come back with a full orchestra, some of the tempo sped up, some of it slowed down. Different lines chopped up into different places. Quite a few times, I’d take the song and rerecord the vocal to go with what Keefus did, to emotionally match what he created. Sometimes not--the song “Come Rain or Come Shine” was one take I did at Peter’s house and didn’t change at all.

SILY: How did you whittle down from the initial list of 25 songs for this record?

GL: This project was so much about emotion and love and love of these songs. What songs I loved singing and what was inspiring me. I grew up in a house where jazz was constantly playing. My father wasn’t a musician but a huge fan. It was a big part of my life growing up. I was in the jazz band as a singer in high school. These are songs I’ve known my whole life. There were some that I tried that I didn’t feel that I didn’t send to Keefus.

There are a few that aren’t jazz standards, too. We do a Beach Boys song, which is also a song that I love.

SILY: They’re standards nonetheless, independent of genre.

GL: Yes.

SILY: What made you want to release “Come Rain or Come Shine” as the first single and open with it?

GL: It’s just one of my favorites. One of the ones I’m most proud of. It’s indicative of the project as a whole. It’s a standard I approach traditionally from how I’m singing it, but there are these surreal flourishes around it. Also, I mean, what an intro, that [screams] “Ahhh!”

KC: I agree.

SILY: What was the process of getting the session musicians in after Keefus worked on the songs?

KC: Basically, it was kind of known all the way through that once we got these bodies we’d get some more breath and air on it to get more of the quality Gretchen and I love from old 50′s recordings but also taking it somewhere new. That studio is now closed--Vox Studios--such an amazing place that was perfect for that record. It was the first commercial studio in Hollywood through Paramount.

GL: It was the longest continuously running studio in the world, I read.

KC: Someone will move in, I’m sure. Woody [Jackson], who owns it, there was no rebuilding the rooms because they sounded so good from how they were built in the 40′s. The room is amazing, and his engineer Michael Harris is incredible. He was the first one to get his ears on this stuff besides Gretchen and I. To be able to put it in a room, listen through a different system, warm things up for his outboard gear. We had some of our favorite musicians. It wasn’t a ton of folks, but the dream scenario where we had 5 days and a rolling, “Get moving”. The next day, Gretchen sings, then some more people come in.

GL: Jay Bellerose is so damn good. So tasty. He just goes in and does his thing.

KC: His heart breathes all the old jazz but he’s also someone who likes to keep pushing things. I think that was the trick with us--we always want to hear something new. Of course, there are some things that sound great that you should do again, but we all listen to music so much you just want something new. Sometimes, you have to make it yourself.

SILY: The album does sound new even though it has older reference points, both the songs themselves and aesthetically. A lot of older jazz tunes with woodwinds and fluttery strings have something eerie and disorienting about them. Thinking about a track like “Blue Skies”, when the sound cuts in and out. That’s not something you hear on traditional “standards” records. To what extent were you trying to achieve that eerie nostalgia?

GL: I think “eerie nostalgia”’s just our M.O., you know? [laughs]

KC: I like that, eerie nostalgia.

GL: I don’t even think we try.

SILY: “For All We Know” starts out with quiet plucks of string but ends up a swinging jazz tune, the moment on here that’s the most “traditional.”

GL: Even on that one, it’s funny because our friend David Ralicke, who plays the horns on everything--he’s incredible and has such great taste. But this one, I was like “Keefus, I don’t know.” Keefus was like, “It’s gotta get big. It’s gotta be a party at the end, an explosion!” Ralicke, he sent a bunch of horns. When he sent them in, they were very bright and intense, and I was like, “Oh god, this is a little weird!” Keefus was like, “Don’t worry, I’m gonna make it weird and demented.” It is traditional, but something about the way it’s mixed or the added affects give it that eeriness, which I love.

One thing Keefus often did that was really surprising to me was there were songs I sent as straight ballads, like this one. If you listen to the lyrics, the first half is like, “Who knows what’s gonna happen? Life is so uncertain.” But then it’s like, “Who cares? Tomorrow may never come.” And it’s a celebration. It’s one of my favorite songs now after being most uncertain about it at first. Keefus, you sent me Frank Sinatra, Jr. singing “Black Knight” [as a reference]. It starts as a ballad and explodes, an emotional outburst.

SILY: Is there any other specific track on here you think is a standout?

KC: Each one is such a little episode, that even that was tricky to put in order for the record. It almost would have been interesting to go old school and release 45s, make each one of them a single and B-side. When you hear “Wild Is The Wind”, on my radio, I would make that a single. It’s totally different than the others. It’s not this powerhouse. But if I bought it as a single, I would think it’s a really beautiful single. Same with “Who Knows Where The Time Goes”. That’s on Keefus & Gretchen radio. [laughs]

GL: “Who Knows Where The Time Goes” was the very first song Keefus did. It was the only vocal recorded at my house, with a different friend in my dining room, with a little laptop mic set up. We used that vocal. It’s a pretty special one, and genre-defying. “Wild Is The Wind” fits comfortably in the jazz section. Or not--I don’t know. It’s a weird question. One of the things I hate more than anything is when I’m uploading my music and it asks you to pick a category. I don’t know. I hate picking a category. Nothing feels quite right, and it feels like a mixture of all of these things.

KC: Gretchen is a huge jazz fan listening for a long time, but jazz records strayed from her and my tastes as it went along. Jazz records went on a different road and started getting not such a punk rock vibe. It was a classy thing, not so underground. That was one thing we were talking about when finishing the record. We think it should be heard by all age groups and invite them to learn these pieces because they might not have the chance to learn them as often. To pick a genre can really be dangerous for all artists because there are a ton of artists that like a ton of different music and can make a ton of different music and change their records as they go. That was big, too: approaching this apart from being a jazz record and bringing in new listeners. Gretchen and I don’t know exaxctly how this works with the tagging on Spotify, but if you put “jazz” on it, does that mean other people will never listen to it?

GL: I don’t think it is a jazz album. It’s an album of standards, but I wouldn’t call it a jazz album.

KC: I like to call it torched songs instead of torch songs.

SILY: What was the overall approach to the sequencing?

GL: I really pulled my hair out. I was crying myself to sleep at night. It was hard. One thing we ended up doing, which was Keefus’s idea, was he felt like the A-side of the record leaned themselves more to samples and surreal electronic elements. Keefus was like, “Once you get sucked into the album, the vibe is very complementary, and you can take people anywhere.” So after the first 4-5 songs, “Wild is the Wind” comes, which is a stripped down ballad. From then, you’re just on the ride.

SILY: What was the inspiration behind the album title?

GL: I had this idea of taking a line from one of the songs as the album title. I went through all the songs and went through some of my favorite lines. At one point, I thought I was gonna call it “How Blue The Sky” which is from the last song, “While We’re Young.” But then I thought “This May Only Be A Dream” felt really good with the dreaminess of this music and the somewhat surreal journey it takes you on. One thing I’m really proud of about the record is it takes you on an emotional journey from start to finish. I know the kids don’t listen to albums anymore. Peter was one of the people I sent it to, and he said, “I feel like I watched a film listening to this album.” That felt right.

SILY: What’s the story behind the cover art?

GL: Keefus’s daughter Raven [Violet Ciancia-Vincent] is a really talented visual video artist. She’s the one that directed the video for “Come Rain or Come Shine.” We made a video for the song “Don’t Explain”, and that’s just a still from the video. She layers things like a collage, so there’s a video of me with fireworks on top of it. When I was trying to come up with something to make the cover, I took a bunch of stills from the video, and that one jumped out at me, especially with the title, This May Only Be A Dream. I just thought it really worked beautifully together. The font, to me, is a throwback to the Blue Note covers. I know a lot of people do Blue Note covers, so I wanted to do a little nod to it without fully going there.

SILY: Are you planning on doing any shows?

GL: When we do end up playing live again--Keefus, I should probably talk to you about what the hell you think I should do--but some of it would be laptop-tracked songs with live bass or drums on top of it. That’s possible, right, Keefus?

KC: I would dream of a full-on 10-to-12 piece orchestra. For a special show in Los Angeles, and when everything explodes, a special show in New York and Paris. I think you could get the right band, and it’s all completely playable.

GL: Maybe a keyboard player adding samples.

KC: Do you play, Jordan? Gretchen’s looking for band members.

SILY: I don’t.

GL: Show me ya stuff, kid! [laughs]

SILY: What else is next for you?

GL: My husband [filmmaker Jacob Aaron Estes] ended up doing an alternate video for “Don’t Explain” that we’re gonna release that I’m pretty excited about. The other thing that I do--which is a totally other universe--is my Prince cover band with Maya Rudolph. I hope we start playing again. That would be great. I am glad, though, that I had so much time to focus on my own music. As much as I love doing Princess, it’s not totally me. I want to really focus on this for a while.

KC: I’m doing Pringles commericals. [laughs] I’ve been working on a bunch of shows and some records and a new soundtrack for a show [Made For Love]. I’ve made a lot of music during the last year and a half. There’s some fun stuff coming up. I’ll start a new Unloved record when our band is allowed to fly over here.

SILY: Anything you’ve been listening to, watching, or reading that’s caught your attention?

GL: My mind just went utterly blank. [laughs] Utterly. I’ve been reading a lot of weird dystopian future stuff to distract my anxiety about the dystopian future stuff we’re dealing with in real life. Reading it calms my nerves.

KC: I watched the Bee Gees documentary [How Can You Mend a Broken Heart] the other night on HBO. I thought it was beautiful. They just touch those places, when you hear those voices.

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julienschuester · 4 years ago

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AIN’T TOO PROUD TO BEG

WHO: @ivystjamess & julien schuester (ft. @davisgools ) WHERE: the lima community theater WHEN: thursday, 12/17 — moments before opening night WHAT: Julien has had enough of this ‘broken up’ business. In a moment of uncharacteristic bravery, he storms into Ivy’s dressing room and demands that she hear him out. His big speech leads to a kiss, but their reunion is cut short by one Davis Goolsby walking in on the action.

JULIEN: It was safe to say that Into The Woods had snuck up on Julien Schuester. Between the musical, sectionals, hockey, the holidays and all of his recent relationship drama, he felt like he was in a never-ending state of unrest. Things were off. Plain and simple. Under “normal circumstances,” meaning if his heart hadn’t been absolutely stomped on by Ivy St. James, maybe he would’ve been able to juggle everything. But that wasn’t the case. So, come opening night, Julien was panicking in his dressing room, pacing back and forth while his understudy watched him curiously. He knew ‘giants in the sky’ like the back of his hand, he knew he had it in him to nail the performance, but if he caught even one weird energy exchange between Ivy and Davis while he was on stage? He wasn’t sure he’d be able to recover. “Fuck this,” Julien muttered to himself, the uncharacteristic curse earning him a wide eyed stare. With a huff, Julien exited his room and beelined it to the one across the hall and pushed the door open without knocking.

“Ivy, I need to talk to y—“ he announced, but the person he was looking for wasn’t alone. While Ivy stood by her vanity, Julien’s eyes narrowed in on the girl he recognized as Amber from Vocal Adrenaline. The one he’d seen at the Carnival talking to her and likely scheming with Davis to get her to transfer. “Amber,” Julien greeted curtly, feeling his face redden, “I need to talk to Ivy alone.” Despite Ivy glancing at him, her new teammate seemed to take no notice. Was he really that invisible? No. Not today. “Hey, I’m talking to you,” he said again, this time loudly, “get out.” A pause. “Please.” He clenched his jaws and glared at her, stepping into the room and holding open the door. That did the trick and she got the hint, hesitantly making her way out. Thank God. Julien closed the door behind him once she was out and turned to face Ivy. Of course, she immediately launched into some rant, but Julien didn’t care. He’d come to her dressing room with a purpose and he knew he was going against all of the advice he’d gotten, but again, he didn’t care. It took all of five seconds for him to cross the room, put his hands on either side of Ivy’s face, and crash his lips into hers in the middle of whatever sentence she was uttering. He knew he’d have to explain himself and say something eventually, but first he needed to kiss her. As he slowly pulled away and opened his eyes, for the first time in weeks, things felt right. “Hi,” he said quietly, scanning her face to try and get a read on where she was at before he launched into his speech.

IVY: If Ivy was asked to do one thing under all the pressures in the world, she would hope it was to perform. Usually she was blessed with a calm disposition before opening nights and worked magic on the stage, but with all the turmoil that had shrouded her personal life as of late, she'd be lying if she said those St.James nerves of steel had softened. It left her stuck in her head, miserable as she sat in front of her dressing room mirror, touching up her make up every few minutes or standing up and doing vocal warm ups. Amber, one of her new friends on Vocal Adrenaline and a member of the chorus for this production, had been like a savior to get her out of her head. The girl had brought her a tea with some honey and a pep talk she had hardly been expecting. Having someone around who was removed from both her old life and her newfound Davis drama did wonder for all the nerves building their way up from the pit of her stomach up to the top of her head. She was feeling ready to tackle the night. When she glanced in the mirror, she was no longer critical of the way her hair was falling incorrectly or how the dirt smudges on her face didn't look real enough. She radiated confidence, and not the deep rooted sadness that lurked beneath the surface. The heartache that could consistently be traced back to her break up in McKinley's hallways a little over a week ago. Feeling more comfortable in her own skin, Amber and Ivy chatted, laughed, and enjoyed each other's company. That was until the door swung open.

Amber didn't seem to pay much mind to Julien, but a million looks crossed her expression as he came in with his demands. Confusion, fear, anger, longing. It was emotional whiplash to say the least, but the more stern he grew in the way he spoke with Amber had Ivy's chest racing up and down as she breathed heavily and the tips of her ears turned red. Her Vocal Adrenaline buddy said an awkward goodbye and Ivy wasted no time to give Julien a peace of her mind. Was he trying to ruin the show by throwing her off? What didn't he get about respect my choices? Couldn't he see she was trying to keep his pain to a minimal? Before she could choose her words carefully, Ivy was pointing a finger at Julien and huffing, "Okay so for starters that was like so rude, we were talking you can't just storm in here and talk to my friends like that, Jules, that's totally not cool!" her tone reached it's typical shrill heights while she ranted at the speed of light, and while she was very visibly bothered, it didn't keep her from speaking her mind. "I told you to like respect what I was saying and you're doing like the total opposite! I am a smart girl who can make her own choices and--" Before she could comprehend all that had happened, Julien had crossed the room, cupped her cheeks, and latched his lips to hers. It made Ivy weak in the knees. The movement of his lips against her own had her wanting to cry, yell, and kiss him more all at the same time. Still stunned in the position she had been when Julien had made his way over to her, Ivy's hands were raised midair when he pulled away as she silently stared at him as if she were a dog waiting for it's bone. For once, no words passed Ivy's lips as she stared at him expectantly. He'd successfully rendered her speechless as Ivy tried to decide how she wanted to present herself to him. Though her prominent sorrow fought it's way to the surface as she mustered up a pathetic, "hi."

Her gaze briefly flicked to his lips as she wished she could rewind a couple of seconds to where things weren't so complicated and they were just a boy and a girl sharing a special moment that didn't need to exist outside of the walls of this dressing room, or within the context of the real world. Ivy reluctantly moved on and took one look into those sad eyes of his. Stupid Idea Ivy a pang radiated throughout her chest, causing her to turn away from him and plant her hands firmly on the counter that sat below the mirror in the dressing room. Sucking in a breath and therefore the sobfest she could feel coming on, with her back turned to him, she forced out an oddly meek, "What do you want?"

JULIEN: What do you want? Julien stood behind Ivy, breathless from their kiss, as he stared at the back of her head and let his arms drop to his sides again. That was a loaded question, but no matter how he broke it down, it always boiled down to one very simple simple answer. “You,” he said quietly, shedding all the toughness he had walked into her dressing room with. “Look at me,” he told her, finding some of that stern energy again as he made eye contact with Ivy in the vanity mirror and placed a hand on her arm, urging her to turn around. He could tell she didn’t want to and he could see very clearly that this wasn’t as easy for her as he previously thought, but that made him even more certain that he’d done the right thing by storming in. Once she was facing him again, their eyes connected and he held her gaze bravely. He wasn’t going to look away, even if it hurt, even if it was hard.

“I know you’re smart,” he started, feeling the tips of his ears and the back of his neck getting hot as his his stomach began to twist into nervous knots, “and I know you’re right about a lot of stuff…” Julien gulped, swallowing his fear as he squared his shoulders and straightened out his posture, “but you’re wrong about this.” He said that with his whole chest. He knew it to be true. “We go together,” he said, taking a step towards her and causing her to bump up against the edge of her vanity, “and I do know you, legs.” It was so obvious to him. He knew her, just like she knew him. “I know you’re kind of a really bad driver, that you watch Saved By The Bell whenever you’re sad, and that you rub your lips together whenever you’re nervous...or when you’re flirting.” Anyone who spent enough time with Ivy would eventually be able to pick up on those things though. Knowing those things just meant he paid attention, but they didn’t mean he knew her heart. “You talk a big game but you’re actually like…a really tender person,” he said quietly, closing some of the distance between them as his hands gripped the edge of the vanity on either side of her, fencing her in. “You might be tough like Buttercup on the outside, but deep down you’re a Bubbles. You care what people think and you’re sensitive. I know that tonight when you go out there and totally kill it and stuff, it’s going to mean everything to you when your parents tell you what an amazing job you did. You care so much about making the people you love proud.”

What did Davis know about Ivy that Julien didn’t? What did he capitalize on that had Ivy so convinced he knew her better? As Julien stared into the big, sad blue eyes of the girl he loved, he finally dropped his head and averted his eyes. “I know that you’re a force to be reckoned with, Ivy,” he admitted, slumping his shoulders, “you like to win and you probably do fit in better with those Vocal Adrenaline kids. They can probably keep up with you a lot better than any of us ever could.” It sucked to admit, but it was true. Ivy was built differently than a lot of the people in the New Directions or the Trouble Tones. She was so talented it made Julien’s brain hurt sometimes. “You are a powerhouse.” A pause. “But you know what?” he started, feeling his cheeks redden again as he brought a hand up to gently pinch her chin and angle her face upwards so she was looking at him, “that’s not all you are. You’re hilarious and blunt and so sweet and fun.” Julien felt himself starting to smile as he spoke, reflecting on the years and years of experience he had with Ivy. “I’ve loved you since I was like…fourteen or something…” he admitted, shrugging as he dropped his hand from her chin, “and I want to be with you. I don’t care if you’re on Vocal Adrenaline. You mean so much more to me than show choir and musicals and stuff. So…” he let out a deep breath as he neared the end of his rambled speech, “ball’s in your court, legs. I just…I needed to tell you. But if you want me to go away forever and stuff, I’ll respect that.”

IVY: Julien didn't need to give this large grand speech to make Ivy want to be with him. She wanted to be with him many times in her life, but she never wanted to be with him more than she did as she left him stranded by a locker in the hallways of William McKinley High School. There was no denying Julien. Not long term at least. And not for Ivy. They'd both seen how that worked out after a summer of Ivy ignoring him, cutting him out, protecting her heart. And even now it was painfully obvious how difficult placing a wall between them was. As Julien gently turned her around, with a quivering bottom lip, Ivy refused to look at him. She was walking an emotional tightrope, on the other side was getting away from this incident tear free. Below sat Julien, waiting for her to run into her arms and pretend everything was okay again. Her balance was obviously wavering as he struck chord after chord, each one hitting her deeper than the last. Ivy had been foolish to say Davis knew her better than Julien, but Ivy often said stupid things in an emotional haze. That wasn't a new development. While his hands gripped the vanity counter behind her, Ivy could feel his breath on her neck as she looked away from him and at the floor. Each time she thought he was going to let up, free her from this breathlessness, and inner anguish, he continued speaking, reminding her how he loved her so.

There were plenty of reasons for Ivy to be conflicted, again, her sister was sounding in her ear telling her to protect her heart. The issue of Julien essentially being a human doormat wasn't lost on her, though this firm display had her wondering if there was hope. She didn't know. All of this came back to Ivy not knowing. Not knowing if she was doing the right thing, not knowing how to cut Julien out pain free. But then again, was there a painless way to cut off someone who was just as much apart of her as her blue eyes or pinky finger? Probably not. With her hands trembling, Ivy sucked in another ragged breath and forced herself to stare back into those favorite brown eyes of hers. It killed her. The look on his face and the words he was saying were too much for Ivy. All this came back to Ivy not knowing.Not knowing how they wound up here so quickly, not knowing why doing what she deemed the right thing could feel so wrong. Conflict played out across her face as clearly as a movie on a screen. 'ball’s in your court, legs. I just…I needed to tell you.' through this entire exchange though, the one thing Ivy did know was that she loved Julien Schuester. Even though they weren't together, Ivy loved Julien in the breathless, head spinning, want to be near you always, kind of way. A sad adoration clouded over her gaze while fear was painted on her eyebrows. It wasn't apparent to Ivy just how to share her vast range of feelings, so instead she stared at him in the silence for an insufferable five seconds before closing the minimal distance between them and urgently pressing a kiss to his lips. Was this the smart thing to do? Probably not, but her heart told her this was the correct course of action. Ivy was strong, but not strong enough to hurt Julien for the benefit of the feelings of hers she wasn't entirely sold on.

So Ivy did the only thing she could think, kiss him. Kiss him suddenly and desperately and in a way that said I love you. Because while there were a lot things about this situation she didn't know, there were two things she did; that she loved Julien and kissing him was the best feeling in the world. Her hands rested on his chest and just to be sure he got the message, Ivy briefly pulled away to weakly whisper, "I love you." before bringing their lips together again. This wasn't the smartest of Ivy's plans, but it also wasn't one of the stupidest. She'd deal with the real world consequences later when she couldn't feel Julien's heartbeat beneath her hand and they weren't sheltered by the walls of the dressing room. For now it was just them, and for now Ivy didn't think she needed to know. While Julien didn't relent with his verbal message, Ivy didn't relent with her physical one as she held herself close and kissed him like opening night wasn't awaiting.

JULIEN: In this moment, Julien and Ivy were just two kids who loved each other, who were in way over their heads and searching for answers in each other’s eyes. He held his breath as he waited for her to say something—anything. If only this could be easy. Couldn’t it be easy? With each agonizing second of silence that passed, Julien grew more anxious. “Ivy…” he started, determined to fill the quiet with more words or more begging or reasoning, but her name was all he managed to get out before she closed the distance between them. Julien’s lips melted against hers as his hands found a place to rest on her hips. Little by little and piece by piece, things started clicking back into place. His heart was bouncing in his chest under the weight of her hands as she took the lead and deepened the kiss. This was good right? This meant that she still…

I love you. He knew it. “I know,” Julien responded breathlessly, and just like that, their lips were connected once more. Julien had come into this situation wearing his heart on his sleeve and getting the verbal and physical confirmation from Ivy that he wanted only confirmed that it was the right call. In one swift motion, he snaked his arms around her and without breaking their kiss, hoisted her up on to the surface of her vanity so that he was standing in between her legs. The last time he’d kissed her had been before sectionals, so they were no doubt making up for lost time. He let his hands wander until one of them eventually a home in her hair while the other settled on and squeezed her thigh. Kissing Ivy was the only thing that mattered. He was so lost in the moment that he forgot where he was and that there was an audience surely settling into their seats in the auditorium and a cast doing vocal warm-ups and playing theater games in the green room. None of it was important. All he cared about was this.

That was, until he heard the sound of a knob turning and a door swinging open. Julien’s eyes widened as he pulled his lips away from Ivy’s and caught a glimpse of their intruder in the mirror. When his eyes landed on none other than Davis Goolsby, he saw red. “Ever heard of knocking?” Julien shot at him, not moving from his place in front of Ivy but instead just turning his head to look over his shoulder. If he was being honest with himself, as annoyed as he was that Davis had interrupted them, he was also glad he was seeing this. Contracts be damned. Everyone had been quick to tell Julien that Ivy was into Davis and that there was something going on between them, but he knew it in his bones that they were wrong. Ivy loved him, she’d just said it herself. So this moment, as messy as it would surely be later, felt like a victory.

DAVIS: Davis was thanking every single god in existence that opening night was upon him. It was hard enough trying to participate in something so closely tied with the student body of William McKinley High School, but having to practically court one of the members of the cast to ensure a solid performance? He was fucking exhausted. But alas, the show was promising enough. He was sure his father wasn’t going to be in attendance for the night (or any night, really) but he was going to perform like the entire audience was filled with important people, not stupid ‘townspeople’. The perfect way to get into his star mindset? Linking his mind and energy with someone that had started feeling more like his platonic soulmate than anything else - Ivy St. James.   If he were honest, Davis’ interest in Ivy had come as easily as him realizing who her father was. Once he knew that, he was sold that she in the wrong place. It was fate that that was corrected and she was finally on the side of Ohio that she belonged - with him and with Carmel. She would flourish with him at her side, definitely far more than being tied down at the freakin’ Titans torture school. He won and in turn, he was pretty sure that Ivy would too. It was why he opened the door to the dressing room with such a confidence.   But something was off.

As soon as he peered inside and saw the unmistakable disaster tragedy of a mop head human being in front of Ivy? Davis questioned just how much he had won. Ivy was still seeing Julien freakin’ Schuester. If Davis had been more focused on maintaining their friendship from the start, he might have realized the signs of her toying around with the Schuester, but he had been blinded by his own selfish deeds - typical. Fair game, Julien Schuester.    “Apologies, I didn’t realize I was walking into the filming location of a porno,” Davis said with a light smile as he locked eyes with Ivy. He wasn’t upset with her by any means, but it did make him question a lot. Perhaps she had a little bit more of her mother in her than he had pegged her for. “There’s fifteen minutes until curtain, so I was wanting to talk with Ivy. I see she’s busy. Julien,” Davis greeted before he was staring down the cocky looking boy before him. God, he was a level of pathetic that Davis hoped he would never stoop to. “My apologies.” His words were softer now, knowing that if he was going to spin this in the proper way? Julien would have to stand before him, baffled as ever, and questioning as ever. “I’ll catch you guys later then,” he said with his tone sounding sadder before he was closing the door and turning to be on his way. It was evil, he knew that much. The look he conveyed was one he had seen a thousand times on his step mothers face trying to act as if they’re not hurt by seeing his father screwing another woman. He was acting before the curtains even rose - he was playing the part of a secret lover scorned. God, he was good.

THE END.

#para #discord para #ain't too proud to beg #p: ivy #p: davis #davis #ivy

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footballfangurl · 5 years ago

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Virgil Van Dijk - Baby Fever

So I finished this much sooner than expected so I can post this now. This is the first one shot I've posted in about 6 months, I think, so please let me know what you guys think. I'd absolutely love some feedback 💕

Words: 1528

Getting out of the car, I shivered as the cold December air hit my exposed face. Despite being decked out in a scarf, mittens, a hat and a very warm and cosy winter jacket, I still hated being outside in this weather. Winter wasn't anything for me. And Virgil goddamn knew it too. That's why he dragged me out here in the cold Belgian weather on this holiday, when we were supposed to be inside, laying in bed with nothing else to do except enjoying each other's company and getting up to eat and sitting in the jacuzzi.

"Aww, come on, grumpy pants. Lighten up!" Virgil laughed as he walked around the car towards me, having just gotten out of the driver's seat. I pouted at him as I closed the car door behind me.

"It's cold. If the weather lightens up, so will I!" I grumbled back at him and he laughed again, reaching my side and putting a hand on my waist to pull me slightly closer so he could press his warm lips against my cold ones.

"You and I both know that's not true. You're just being dramatic." He whispered against my lips, pecking them again before he pulled back and grabbed my hand, towing me along towards the little Christmas market that was being organised in the quiet village we were staying in.

"Fine, you win." I answered and he laughed again.

The market was quite lovely. There were Christmas lights hung up in the trees surrounding the marketplace, and because it was so dark outside, it made for a very romantic setting. There were beautiful Christmas trees lined up along the marketplace as well, decorated with red Christmas balls and each of them having a large white star on the very top of it. And the goods in the Christmas stalls were interesting to look at too. There were quite a few stands and stalls that sold things with alcohol in it, but there were a lot where the market stall holders sold products that they handmade, like scarves and jewellery and hats. Virgil got himself a new scarf, because he forgot his back in England and I bought myself some earrings. The old lady who sold them was so happy when I started asking more about her trade, that I couldn't help myself from giving her a large tip. She was just so sweet.

After 5 minutes of staying there and talking with her, Virgil tugged me away from the sweet old lady and I waved goodbye, wrapping my hands around Virgil's arm and leaning my head on his shoulder. His hands were in his pockets, to protect them from the cold seeing as he forgot his mittens back in England too. I swear, this time was the last time I'd let him pack his own bags. He always forgets stuff when we go on holiday. Last time, we went to Ibiza during the summer and he forgot his sunglasses and the sunscreen. The time before that, we were already at the airport when he realised he forgot our plane tickets on the kitchen table. We had to reschedule our flight.

We walked in silence for a minute before the quiet was interrupted by a few children that came running down the market, playing a game of tag. We sprung apart so we could avoid them running into us, because they weren't playing much attention to where they're going but more to avoiding being tagged by their friend. I smiled at seeing the joyful looks on their faces. One boy, who was being chased at the moment, took the chance to deftly step aside to hide behind me, holding onto the back of my jacket. The boy who was chasing him switched targets at seeing that and started running after another girl who was playing their game.

"Amai, dat scheelde niet veel. Sorry mevrouw, en bedankt!" The kid said to me, giving me a toothy grin before running off again to continue playing with his friends. I looked to Virgil questioningly and he smiled, coming over to me to wrap his arm around my shoulders, pressing a kiss against my forehead, which was partly covered by the hat I was wearing, before gently pushing us forward again in a walk.

"He just apologized for hiding behind you and thanked you, babe."

"Aww, that was so sweet!" Virgil hummed in agreement. My heart basically melted at how very cute and very polite the kids were. The way they were enjoying their game, it was so innocent. I loved kids, always have. And I knew Virgil did too. We once talked about it a few months into our relationship, just to see if we wanted the same things for the future. We hadn't brought it up since, though. Maybe it was time…

"Say, Virgil…" I tilted my head upwards so I could see his face. He was looking around at some of the stalls but as soon as I addressed him, he glanced down at me and raised an eyebrow at the look on my face. I didn't know what he saw but it must have been a little bit different or suspicious.

"Yeah?"

"Do you remember, at the beginning of our relationship, when we talked about the future?"

"As a matter of fact, I do." Virgil grinned and stopped walking, making me stop too. He then turned to face me, wrapping his arms around my waist to pull me closer to him. I rested my hands on his chest and started fidgeting them, my gaze falling from his face to my hands out of nervousness. I knew I could talk about anything with him, but it was still a serious subject and I couldn't help but be nervous.

"Do you think, maybe…" I trailed off, one hand smoothing out a crinkle in his jacket and the pointer finger of the other one tapping the zipper of his jacket absentmindedly, as I searched for the right words to broach the subject.

"Maybe…?" Virgil repeated after a few seconds, ducking his head to try and catch my eyes but I avoided looking at his face, instead keeping my eyes fixed on my pointer finger, which was now flicking the zipper back and forth. Virgil sighed a bit and removed his hands from my waist, making me tense up a bit, before one of them came to rest on the hand that was playing with the zipper of his jacket, stilling the movement, and the other one gently pulled my chin upwards so I had no choice but to look at him.

"Hey, baby, what's making you so nervous, huh?" He asked, eyes flicking back and forth between my own worriedly and it only took a few seconds before his eyes widened slightly in realisation.

"Do- do you want to ask if we can start having children? That's what the conversation was about back then, wasn't it?" He asked but I knew it wasn't a question but a statement. He knew me way too well for my own good. He already guessed what I wanted to talk about before I could utter the words, just by looking at my face.

"I-I-… Well, yes."

A smile lit up his face at those words and he leaned in and pressed his lips against mine elatedly. I was a bit surprised at his reaction, but then again, I wasn't. I knew he wanted kids, we talked about it before, but I didn't realise he'd been this ready to have them.

"Really?! Are you serious?" He asked when he pulled back and I nodded, smiling up at him dazedly.

"Yeah, of course I'm serious," I breathed, my hand moving up from his chest to cup his cheek, "I think we'd be great parents, don't you? Can we maybe start trying for a baby?"

"Yeah, I do too. I've actually been wanting to bring this up for a while, but it was never a great time. I think you'd be an amazing mum! The most sweet," He turned his head to press a kiss to my wrist, "loving," he leaned forward to press a kiss to my cheek, "patient," his lips moved down my jawline, pressing featherlight kisses as he went, "and fierce mother in the whole world. You'd be amazing." Finally, his lips reached my lips again and I pushed up into the kiss, hands trailing up and to the back of his head to pull him even closer. His lips were a bit chapped now from the cold, but I couldn't care less. This man truly was the man of my dreams. He was the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, the man I wanted to marry and have children with. A pair of chapped lips certainly weren't going to stop me from kissing him.

"And, as for the trying to make a baby part, well, practise makes perfect, doesn't it?" He replied cheekily as he pulled away from the kiss a minute later, winking down at me. My eyes widened in excitement, moving out of his embrace and ignoring his protest at that, before gripping his hand and starting to walk back to where the car was parked.

"We're going back to the hotel. NOW."

Tag list: @virgilvandick @avsensio @leroysanei @theblxefox @no-not-with-out-you @rafinasmarco @the-place-to-sparkle @football-laeli @del-boi @neymarlionelmessi7 @i-ship-it-okay

#virgil van dijk #virgil van dijk fanfiction #virgil van dijk one shot #virgil van dijk imagine #liverpool fc #liverpool fanfiction #liverpool one shot #liverpool imagine #liverpool #football fluff #football #football fanfiction #soccer #soccer one shot #soccer fanfiction #soccer imagine

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today-only-happens-once · 6 years ago

Text

With Great Power - Chapter 8

Title: With Great Power - Chapter 8

Word Count: 3474

Fic Summary: Thomas Sanders is just a regular social media personality. But when he gets bit by a spider during filming one of his YouTube videos, his whole life is about to turn upside down—whether he (or the aspects of his personality) want it to or not. Platonic LAMP/CALM + Character!Thomas. Spider-Man AU.

Catch up or Read on AO3 here!

Chapter Warnings: arguing, science that isn’t real science, arguing, violence/robbery/hostages mention, a couple of OCs make an appearance this chapter, let me know if I forgot anything.

A/N: It’s been a minute on this fic. Sorry for the delay! Always a joy to work on this fic, but real life was pretty busy for a while there. Special thanks to @creativenostalgiastuff for helping me out so much with this chapter. The science of this chapter is based in the lab notebook page we get a glimpse of in Spider-Man: Homecoming for Web Fluid 3.0. I found a picture of it online and used that as my baseline for the science of their development of this formula. I am not a chemical engineer. If you are, I beg for suspension of disbelief. Also.... please let me know what ya think! We’re starting to get more and more into character stuff, and I’m always interested in knowing how it’s coming across. ^u^ Love you all.

Three days later, Thomas makes his way down the hallway of the third level of the engineering building of his old college.

It had been a little odd being on campus so long after graduation. So much had changed from when he’d thought he’d be a chemical engineer; he’d gotten famous on Vine. He’d started YouTube as a full-time gig. He hadn’t done any chemical engineering work since his first job out of college, and he’d only done that for a few years. Thomas remembered the late coffee-fueled nights of studying in the library, the stupid adventures with friends for donuts at midnight, the tears shared over failed tests and where their lives would be going …

So much had changed for Thomas in the years since his graduation. The campus, however, seemed to be exactly the same except for a few updates to the old brick buildings he’d spent four years walking past.

Thomas approaches the lab down the hall and can hear music floating from under the wooden door. He’d sent the email to his old engineering professor, Dr. Washington, the same night that the Sides had given him the idea for the suit and webshooters. She’d responded the next morning, telling Thomas that she’d be doing research work with her lab assistant most of Wednesday and to drop by whenever he was free. Thomas spent most of the day in-between working with Logan to come up with some ideas for the formula, however incomplete it clearly was. At least he would have notes to give Dr. Washington as a starting place.

As Thomas raps a knuckle against the door, he can make out the suddenly familiar song. “And they’re gonna see what stop the presses really means! And the old will weep and go back to sleep—”

Thomas opens the door, smiling. “You’re listening to Newsies, Dr. Washington?”

The lab is relatively spacious; black tables are filled with various vials, beakers, and equipment that takes Thomas back to his own lab assistant days. The tiled linoleum floor reflects the fluorescent lights above. On the other side of the room, Thomas sees Dr. Washington—in a lab coat and goggles—look up at the sounds of his entry. Beside her is a man with blonde hair and glasses with something like a laser pointer attached, who looks a few years younger than Thomas, seated in an electric wheelchair.

She grins, sliding the goggles up over her cropped hair. “I told Andrew he could choose the music today.” She nods to the man beside her. “As long as it wasn’t Les Mis.”

Thomas laughs at the affronted look on Andrew’s face. He looks at a board attached to his wheelchair, and Dr. Washington leans over, reading. “I S-T-- still don’t know what you H-A-- have against L-E-S Les Mis.” She quirks an eyebrow at him. “Nothing, the first eighteen times we listened to it.”

Thomas smiles. “Only eighteen? Then you’re fine. When you get into like, the thirties is when you maybe consider listening to a different musical.”

Dr. Washington points a finger at him. “Don’t encourage him, Thomas. Having one thespian in my midst is enough. I feel outnumbered now.” Andrew looks at the board again and she leans over to read. “I like him. He G-E-- gets it.” Dr. Washington rolls her eyes. “Of course you do.”

Andrew and Thomas grin at each other.

Dr. Washington screws the lid onto a petri dish and scribbles something on it. She sets it aside. “I can’t win.” She pulls her gloves off and tosses them into the wastebasket underneath the lab table. “So what brings you in, Thomas? Your email was pretty vague.”

“Right. Well…” The internet personality swings his backpack around from his shoulder and unzips it, digging through it for his notebook. “I have a question about a hypothetical formula.”

“H-Y-P-- hypothetical?”

Thomas pulls the notebook out, flipping through it for the pages he’d been working on with Logan. “I—yeah. I was wondering if I combined salicylic acid, methanol, carbon tetrachloride, touline, H-heptane…” Thomas trails off as he flips through the pages before finding the one with the partial formula he’d been working on, stepping up to the other side of the lab table and setting the notebook open in front of them.

It’s a long moment as Thomas watches both them glance over his notes. Andrew furrows his brows in thought as Dr. Washington flips the single page back and forth. She looks up at Thomas.

Thomas jumps in before she can say anything. “It’s incomplete. I know it is. I’m just not sure what’s missing.”

“Well,” she says, tilting her head slightly as her dark eyes flit over the page, “that depends on what you’re trying to get this substance to do.”

Thomas rubs the back of his neck as he walks around the table to stand on the other side of Andrew. “I was wondering if it’s possible to create a flexible but strong adhesive… thing.”

Andrew’s looking at him with curiosity. Thomas glances down as Andrew uses the communication board, reading his question aloud. “Like a G-L-- glue?” Thomas sighs. “Not exactly. I… was hoping for something a lot stronger and more flexible than glue.”

Dr. Washington hums, tapping a pencil to her mouth. Her brows are furrowed in thought. “I may have an idea. But you’d need to add carbon tetrachloride and ethyl acetate to the list you’ve got here.”

Thomas nods, scribbling that under the list of other chemicals, not picking up his pencil as Andrew adds on.

“S-O-D-I-- sodium T-E-T-R-A-B-- tetraborate could work as an A-C-T-I-V-activator.”

Dr. Washington and Andrew spend the next ten minutes bouncing ideas off each other. Thomas scribbles down as many notes as he can. Dr. Washington starts bustling around the lab, grabbing chemicals and starting equipment up as she goes. Thomas studies the new list and equations they’ve developed, and he can feel Logan’s presence at the forefront of his mind like a comforting weight.

Add CC14, K3Co5 and C7H6O3 after you’ve boiled it, Logan tells him suddenly. It’ll help the consistency prior to adding the sodium tetraborate.

Thomas jots that down.

The three of them make themselves busy. Thomas grabs a lab coat and pair of safety goggles from the cabinet near the door. Dr. Washington hands Andrew an iPad, and he pulls up a software that Thomas isn’t familiar with and inputs a series of chemical equations. Dr. Washington swirls a clear liquid in a flask as she crosses the lab.

The hours pass by in a flurry of scientific trial and error. Andrew runs simulations on the iPad before they adjust the formula each time fails—something that Thomas is especially grateful for when the simulation for one particular change involves a small explosion. It hardly absolves them of error, every slight change resulting in something different. In some ways, it serves to remind Thomas one thing he loved about chemistry: it had always been precise and measured. One small change could lead to a very different reaction.

Even when Thomas can feel his frustration rising, Dr. Washington and Andrew make him laugh. Andrew’s nerdiness rivals Thomas’s own, and Dr. Washington’s sarcasm seems to have continued in the years since Thomas had her for class. While they waited for the current fluid to boil, he and Andrew swapped opinions about Kingdom Hearts 3 and Marvel (with a healthy debate about Captain America’s arc in Endgame) and musicals.

“It’s a shame that Dr. Washington is a musical hater,” Thomas teases, being sure to speak loud enough that it was obvious he wanted the professor in question to hear.

Andrew shakes his head, tapping a few things on the iPad in his lap. Through the speakers in the lab, Thomas hears a familiar song that’s a quick change from the music of The Prom that they’d been listening to a moment ago. It’s Hairspray. Specifically, “Run and Tell That”.

Dr. Washington’s eyes flicker up across the room to the two of them. “Andrew, I will forever regret telling you that.”

Thomas raises his eyebrows. “Tell you what?” Andrew has an amused glint in his eyes as he meets Thomas’s gaze, then looks to his board. Thomas leans over. “She told me she was M-A-Y-- Maybelle in a C-O-M-M-- community theatre P-R-- production.” Thomas looks at his old professor. “Wait… really?”

Dr. Washington shoots a mock glare at Andrew. “Traitor.”

Andrew laughs before Thomas reads his reply aloud. “If any of us are a T-- traitor, it’s you. You hate L-E-S Les Mis.”

Dr. Washington pulls the pencil out from behind her ear and points it at him. “Of all the musicals we can agree on, Andrew, you’re going to get hung up on one that I just happen to think is overrated?” Andrew shakes his head sadly. Dr. Washington snorts.

“That’s amazing,” Thomas replies. “I never knew you did theatre.”

Dr. Washington opens her mouth to reply, but sharp ding cuts off her response. The timer signals the need to add the activator and start the de-gassing process. It’s a sudden, sharp reminder of what he’s here to do.

…

Thomas blows out a breath as he spins the office chair in a lazy circle. It’s nearly 7 in the evening, and Dr. Washington had gone with Andrew to pick up some dinner for the three of them. Thomas had offered to stay behind and watch their current attempt slowly heat in the flask. The internet personality had written in his notebook that this was trial fifteen.

The empty lab is suddenly quiet, too. Andrew had given Thomas the iPad to play music, but he hadn’t selected anything. Instead, Thomas listens to the quiet gurgling of the fluid in the flask on the table in front of him, the whirring of the AC unit, and a distant, muffled voice of a professor giving a lecture in a nearby room. Not for the first time today, it takes Thomas back to his own time as a student and lab assistant. It felt like such a long time ago.

He’d always been interested in the environment and helping the world on such a big scale. Throughout high school, Thomas used to read articles about scientists engineering new biotechnology that could help slow deforestation, or developing alternative substances to harmful pesticides, or creating more environmentally-friendly methods of gas consumption. He’d always found it interesting, and though he was generally a pretty average student, he’d done well in chemistry.

He remembers talking to his Aunt Patty before he chose a major, during his senior year of high school. She was an elementary school librarian, and she’d been doing that for as long as Thomas could remember. When he asked her how she knew what she wanted to do, she told him to find where his passion intersected with his ability and to pursue it.

But it hadn’t always been that simple, either. Thomas was as passionate about performing as he was about the environment at the time. There was greater job security in an engineering job than trying to make it as an actor, so Thomas had chosen chemical engineering and decided that he could keep performing as a hobby. It had seemed like the most practical solution at the time.

But then he was introduced to Vine, and what started as goofing around on a social media app quickly turned his life around. In a few years, Thomas decided to make performing and social media his full-time job once he realized he could actually make a living out of it. It had fixed the practicality issue, and his fans were so incredibly kind. He realized that, maybe, he could make a positive difference in the world this way, too.

Thomas sighs, standing up to stretch.

Making a positive difference in the world was really his biggest hope with anything he did. It was true when he was a chemical engineer, and it was true now.

Now.

The thought stops Thomas short suddenly. The video he’d watched the other day flickers through his mind again. The card. The entire reason he was here in the first place was to help others, right? But he thinks again about the video—the footage, the threat—and feels something uneasy settle in his stomach.

“We’re in way over our head, Thomas.”

Thomas jumps slightly. “What?” He’d been so lost in his roaming thoughts that he hadn’t even noticed that Virgil had risen up by one of the tables to Thomas’s left, in his familiar hoodie and a black shirt underneath. “What do you mean?”

Virgil shoves his hands into the pockets of his hoodie, scowling. “I mean this isn’t our fight. Not really.”

Thomas blinks, taken aback. “I—”

“Look, Ekko made a threatening video but there are people in place to protect everyone. Police. Military, if it comes to that.” Virgil shakes his head, looking away from Thomas. “You just got these powers a few weeks ago. You can’t even control your sticking ability. And you really think you can just… take on this kind of fight?”

Thomas holds up a hand, his brow furrowing. “Virge… where is this coming from?”

“Common sense,” Virgil snaps. “Apparently, I’m the only one who has any of it.”

Thomas opens his mouth, then closes it. He doesn’t know what to say. Maybe Virgil has a point. They don’t even really know what Ekko is capable of, or where to find her, or what she’s planning. Meanwhile, Thomas can’t even fully control his own abilities. He’d been getting better, sure, but it wasn’t enough. Not yet. Maybe not in time.

And there were people in place to help protect others. Thomas was just one guy.

He’s pulled out of his thoughts at the sound of another one of his Sides rising up. Patton appears on the other side of the table, his arms crossed over his chest and a vaguely disapproving look in his eyes. Out of the corner of his eye, Thomas thinks he sees Virgil roll his eyes.

“Kiddo,” Patton says to Virgil carefully, even as he casts a quick glance at Thomas, “you’re coming across kinda harsh there.”

“But I’m right,” Virgil replies insistently. He huffs a frustrated sigh. “Listen, all Thomas is doing is putting himself in harm’s way when he doesn’t even need to. Why not leave this up to the authorities?”

Patton’s expression softens slightly. “Because Thomas has the ability to do something. He should use it.”

“Why? Just because someone can doesn’t always mean that someone should, Patton.”

It’s another good point. Thomas still doesn’t quite understand why Virgil was coming forward with these arguments now as opposed to earlier, but he supposes it doesn’t much matter. Maybe because Virgil felt that the web shooter formula made the whole thing feel a lot more real and sudden. Thomas certainly felt that way. Maybe that feeling was stemming from Virgil.

“It does if it means doing a good thing,” Patton insists.

Virgil seems to bristle slightly. “If a cat is stuck in a tree and you don’t know how to climb a tree, what do you do? You call the fire department. You don’t risk hurting yourself in an effort to get the cat yourself when you aren’t qualified to do it.”

“But Thomas can climb a tree.”

“It’s a metaphor.”

“I know, but even in the metaphor. Thomas has abilities, Virge.”

“So that makes him qualified to get involved?” Virgil stops for a moment and takes a deep breath. Some of the edge is gone from his voice when he speaks again, but the underlying frustration hasn’t left. “Thomas is in over his head. And I don’t want him to get hurt tackling a fight that isn’t his in the first place. Sometimes you have to pick your battles, Patton. Why does Thomas have to choose this one?”

The question is met with silence.

Thomas slips his hands into the pockets of his jeans and glances down at the linoleum floor between his feet. He studies the specks of blue amidst the white as if it will distract him from the tension in the room. The web fluid gurgling in the flask on the table between the three of them is the only sound for a long, uncomfortable moment. Virgil’s question seems to echo in Thomas’s head.

When Thomas finally glances up, Patton is looking at Virgil with something soft in his eyes. “Because it’s the one given to us. Maybe we don’t get to pick the battles, kiddo. Maybe… we lost that luxury when Thomas got these powers.”

“That’s not fair.”

Patton sighs. “It’s not. But with great power, comes great responsibility.”

Thomas swallows and nods. He speaks quietly, despite the weight he can feel settling in his chest. “And it’s my responsibility to do what I can to help. I… have to at least try.” He glances up at Virgil. “I don’t think I could live with myself if I didn’t give it that much.”

Thomas can see the tightness in Virgil’s jaw; something he can’t place flashes quickly through his eyes. “It’s not just Thomas at stake, you know. If he gets involved, he puts everyone he loves at risk. None of us want that.”

The reminder squeezes something in Thomas’s chest. “That’s why we’re making the suit, Virgil. To protect me and my loved ones.”

Even as he says it, though, he realizes Virgil’s point. The suit would only do so much. He looks around in the lab and realizes suddenly that he was putting Dr. Washington and Andrew at risk by involving them like he had. He’d almost asked Dahlia about advice on his suit construction and no matter how vague he’d been planning to keep it, it was still involving her. It was still putting her at risk, putting everyone at risk.

He had to stop. Nobody could know his identity, but nobody could be involved in this fight, either. Not unless Thomas was willing to risk his friends’ lives, and that… that wasn’t a price Thomas would ever be willing to pay.

“This… is my fight,” Thomas says, his voice tight. Patton and Virgil both look over at him. “But it’s mine alone. After today, nobody else gets involved. I can’t…” Thomas thinks about the look of raw fear in the hostages’ eyes during the bank robbery and the tearful, desperate reunion between Mikey and his mother. “I can’t take that risk.”

He sees Virgil opens his mouth but he’s cut off by the ding of the timer beside Thomas. The host blinks a second, forgetting for a brief moment what the timer had been set for in the first place. Then his gaze focuses on the flask in front of him. Right, Thomas remembers suddenly. Web fluid.

The timer meant that he needed to take it off the heat. Cool it down—which would occur quickly—filter and wash with C12H8O2, then add silica gel to purify the substance and… theoretically, it would be complete.

The rest of the process would take about five minutes. And then, well… Thomas could leave. He could keep Andrew and Dr. Washington from knowing the final product and maybe that would help protect them. When Thomas looks up again from the flask, Virgil and Patton have both left.

Thomas stands alone in the lab and keeps himself busy for the next several minutes walking methodically through the rest of the process. He can’t help his quick glances at the clock and the door, silently pleading that Andrew and Dr. Washington are at least longer than five minutes away. Thomas works in silence, but he barely realizes it. He just wants to finish this and get out as fast as he can.

He adds the silica gel and stirs it quickly with a glass rod. He can’t help the bubble of disbelieving laughter that bubbles in his chest as he watches the fluid react to the purifying process and oxidation, attaching to the glass rod as he pulls it out. The substance forms a cloudy-colored web of adhesion. It stays attached as Thomas tries to pull the glass rod out. It’s strong. So strong, in fact, that Thomas can’t pull it out.

Thomas grabs the other flask of the same substance that they’d had on stand-by (in case Thomas had been wrong about the filter liquid or the silica gel), and pours it into a vial with a stopper. He stashes some silica gel and C12H8O2 in separate vials. He shoves them into the outside pocket of his backpack before quickly shedding his lab coat.

Before he races out of the lab, he leaves a note and enough change to cover the dinner he wouldn’t be eating.

Had to rush out. Thanks for the help. -Thomas

...

WGP Tags: @captain-loki-xavier, @human-dictionary @the-peculiar-bi-tch @mining-pup @band-be-boss-blog @asexual-trashbag @samathekittycat @why-should-i-tell-youu2 @theobsessor1 @always3charcoaltea @changeling-ash @logical-princey @crimsonshadow323 @flickering-raven @smokeyrutilequartz @dontbugmeimantisocial @liz-a-bell @black-king-white-knight @soijusthavetoask @analogical-mess @marvelfangeek09 @dolphidragon @thelowlysatsuma @approximately12lbs-of-ducks, @princelogical

#sanders sides #sanders sides au #sanders sides fanfiction #platonic lamp/calm #spider-man au #with great power #tw arguing

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