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forestclan-clangen · 1 day ago

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MOON 8 (Part 1)

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Cloudthunder is pregnant! This surprises a few cats, but they always knew her to be adventurous. Cloudthunder grooms herself bashfully, feeling pressured to explain herself, but Redstar decides to step in. She reinstates a law that she knew existed before Lakestar's reign - the Queen's Law. No parent has to disclose the parentage of their kits, if they chose not to. Cloudthunder is relieved.

(Cloudthunder, warrior, female, 41 moons) (Redstar, leader, female, 66 moons) (Hopechase, warrior, female, 90 moons)

Cloudthunder won't say it out loud, but deep down, she wonders if she could just...pretend it wasn't happening. That way it won't hurt when the woods come for the kits. Iciclepool sits down next to Cloudthunder quietly, providing support that didn't require any words.

(Cloudthunder, warrior, female, 41 moons) (Iciclepool, deputy, female, 64 moons)

Branchkit is asking Tree interesting questions, and the warrior is happy to entertain her. Branchkit thinks that Tree is really cool!

(Branchkit, kitten, female, 3 moons) (Tree, warrior, non-binary, 39 moons)

Perchkit keeps comparing herself to Morningpaw. Morningpaw thinks that Perchkit is acting increasingly annoying and uncomfortable, and she tells her off firmly. Perchkit doesn't understand, and doesn't like that Morningpaw yelled at her.

(Perchkit, kitten, female, 3 moons) (Morningpaw, apprentice, female, 10 moons)

Redstar is stress from being bound to camp with her broken bone, the wound getting infected. She can't keep wasting time. She knows the woods need to be fed. She should be out there, not in camp. In her anger, she makes snide comments at Tree and hisses at Cloudthunder about what kind of sire would want to give a Clan cat kits. Both cats are taken aback, given her usually kind nature. [STRESS EVENT: MELTDOWN]

(Redstar, leader, female, 66 moons) (Cloudthunder, warrior, female, 41 moons) (Tree, warrior, non-binary, 39 moons)

Windfur and Shiverpaw get into an argument that leaves them both feeling tense and upset. Neither of them apologize. Windfur is afraid that Shiverpaw isn't being honest with him.

(Windfur, medicine cat, male, 22 moons) (Shiverpaw, medicine cat apprentice, female, 8 moons)

---

"And you're adamant that you didn't touch it?"

"No, Windfur," Shiverpaw repeated defensively.

Windfur felt a twitch of annoyance surge through him. "Are you absolutely certain?"

"I said I was sure!" Shiverpaw protested, her voice angled with frustration. "Why are you so mad about this?"

"Because they cause hallucinations, Shiverpaw," Windfur retorted. Shiverpaw shrunk under the harsh emphasis of his words. "Talonpaw said you came into contact with the Nature's Mockery. For everyone's safety, I need to know if something happened to you during it."

"Nothing happened, Windfur! We found it and Talonpaw said we had to go back to camp. I swear that nothing else happened!" Shiverpaw pressed, her blue eyes filled with anger.

Windfur's tail twitched. He bit back on a hiss and stopped himself from saying that she was lying to him. He wanted Shiverpaw to confess what Talonpaw had told him - that she was stuck in a trance and muttering something that he didn't catch.

This wasn't the first time this happened, and while he hoped that it was all just a coincidence, a kit's hyperawareness of the forces around them, now he was getting anxious. First, Shiverpaw seemed to be aware of things she shouldn't have known when she was a kit - reports from Redstar and Talonpaw where she knew that Living Tendrils could force their way into dens, and there was a hungry eye she was worried about. Then, there was the night Warblerkit was taken. The entire camp was in heavy disarray, and Windfur had just finished looking over Olive's condition and removing the water that flooded the nursery. Shiverkit stared at the dark, rainy sky. Her eyes held an intensity that bore through the fabric of the sky above, as though she could see beyond the veil.

He would never forget her final words - whispered and unnaturally cold.

"The vessel floats into the maw. The jaw unhinges."

He wanted her to tell him what she saw and felt. He wanted some kind of reassurance that her words were from StarClan, or were her own. But still, she denied it. And that scared him.

StarClan did everything in their power to shield ForestClan from the Iris' gaze, but what if it had found a loophole? What if it found a way to observe them in the waking world? Did it even have that ability? Could Shiverpaw have somehow become the beacon? Did he just doom ForestClan by agreeing to take her on as an apprentice, allowing something to see into StarClan? Did she even know? Was she aware that it was happening? Which answer was worse - ignorance or deceit?

He must have been giving Shiverpaw an intense stare, as the young cat's ears flattened and her tail was tucked between her legs. "W-Windfur?" Her voice was meek.

Windfur closed his eyes and turned away from her roughly. "Just…nevermind. Forget it. Sort the herbs you collected."

The tense silence that followed unnerved and upset him. It took everything in him to ignore Shiverpaw cautiously tip toeing around him with a basket in her mouth, then removing and sorting every herb as though they were delicate, newborn birds. He should've enjoyed the silence, but he didn't. He liked silence. He liked working alone. Now his silence was filled with the permating presence of a child who may or may not doom the entirety of ForestClan, and it would be his fault if she did.

A foreign emotion broke from its seed, and sprouted. He was reminded again of his dead mentor, of how she seemed to know just what to do, and felt like he was left with nothing and no one to rely on. In his den, right now, was possibly a threat to all of ForestClan, and he was alone with determining the truth.

He couldn't do it. Windfur stormed out of the medicine den and found himself heading towards the gates.

Hopechase was standing guard this time, and as he approached, she twitched her ear.

"Going to the graveyard," he grumbled.

Hopechase merely nodded at him before letting Windfur stride past her.

He journeyed past the west of camp, scaling up the slope of cold ground and dead leaves. He stepped on every leaf in his path, not caring about the noise he could possibly make. He just didn't care anymore.

Finally, as he crawled up the top of the hill, he stared at the large clearing around them, lined with stones and one, singular oak tree branching out to shield the graves in dark shade. Windfur stared listlessly at the tree's large trunk, with rows and rows of scratched lines engraved into its bark, encircling it over and over. After the storm, he had scratched one more line for Olive's unnamed kit. One line for every unnamed cat and unknown stranger whose bodies were lost to the woods.

A monument to all of their pain and suffering.

Windfur stared at the towering oak for only a moment longer, before his eyes fell on a dark, slated stone with dried chicory resting upon it.

With a heavy heart, he padded towards it and sat down.

"...Hi, Chicoryglint."

Only the wind replied to him. Windfur's dark blue eyes locked themselves on the grave. A squirrel shuffled up a tree in the distance. For a moment, Windfur let himself sit with his thoughts. He failed to parse them into separate subjects. Why was he even doing this? This wasn't going to help. A grave wasn't going to tell him what was wrong with Shiverpaw. So why?

You're here to confess your failures, he thought.

"...I've made a horrible mistake, Chicory. I really have." Windfur's throat tightened. "I…I brought something into StarClan's skies. I thought after the last moon, that maybe, Shiverpaw was normal. Maybe she just…had a stressful episode during greenleaf. Maybe she had potential, and she could have a good bond with StarClan. But…" He trailed off into silence, his thoughts swarming around him like gnats.

"...Look, I know…I know you don't like talking a lot. I…I get it, I'm the same. But, I could use my mentor right now."

Chicoryglint wouldn't answer him. Not at a grave…and not in his dreams. Even after moons of waiting for anything from her, after they held a vigil, and ate her favorite meal, and shared their memories…

He had visited the Half-Moon Dome ten times since her death. Ten times she could've visited him.

"Look, I know I've driven us all into fox-dung, the least you can do is tell me how to fix it!" He lashed out all of a sudden, his tail thrashing. "I've brought StarClan some kit who may or may not be linked to…to that thing up there, and you won't even bother to tell me if she is, or isn't, or just - "

Windfur spiralled and started snarling when he realized what he was doing. This wasn't about Shiverpaw, was it? He thought it was, but maybe it never was.

It had been ten moons now. Ten moons since Chicoryglint was seen alive. Ten moons of silence. Ten moons of her not visiting him at the Dome.

Why? Was he a failure? Did Chicoryglint see a prophecy that spelled him as a harbinger? Was she ashamed of him?

"Why won't you see me, stars damned it all!" He yowled and furiously scratched at the gravestone. He felt his eyes stinging with pain. "I don't want to fail us! I can fix it, if you would just tell me! What is wrong with her? Is she connected to the Iris? Have I brought the Iris into StarClan's abode?"

Windfur glowered at the gravestone with pale scratch marks now stretched across it. The dried chicory was now crushed, the petals scattered. The woods were silent.

"At least my father told me where he was going when he left," Windfur hissed. "At least he asked me to join him. He gave me a choice. I…I turned him down. I stayed, because you asked me to. And then you left. You just gave me my full name and…died." Windfur stopped. A feeling of dread crawled up his legs and surrounded his heart. "...You…you died."

An intrusive memory broke through his defenses. Iciclepool was speaking to Redstar in her den. Windfur had just brought back herbs and passed under the High Rock. He was going through the motions, not thinking, not feeling. He couldn't accept that she was truly gone. And his ears picked up on something that made his blood turn cold - more than any monster or beast of the woods could ever inflict on him.

"She isn't dead, you know."

He froze. He wanted to keep moving. He didn't. His ears strained to listen.

"Redstar, we don't know that."

"I was a part of their little in-group for moons, Icicle. She was a walking contradiction. Unwilling to hurt others, but willing to protect her own life more. Windfur's story about how she told him to head back to camp and she'd catch up…how she had given him his name before vanishing…"

Windfur bristled. He couldn't turn away. He couldn't leave.

"You're suggesting she ran."

"I am."

"Why didn't she leave with everyone who abandoned us when Lakestar died, then?"

"The same thing that's always motivated her."

Windfur clenched his teeth. He felt the taste of bile and dandelion.

"Fear."

Windfur yowled as he broke free of the memory. He slammed his paws into the dirt and started digging, his claws dragging every inch of grass and mud that housed Chicoryglint's grave. He dug until he felt the stone wobble uneasily. He ripped it out of the ground, and he felt like it held the weight of a mountain. He sobbed, his face burning with indignation.

"Tell me you're dead! Tell me you're actually dead! I don't care if you're mad at me! Just - " Windfur's dark blue eyes stared at the stone pleadingly, as though it held all the answers. He closed his eyes firmly, and bit back a screech.

He hoped. Pleaded. For so many moons that she would show herself to him when he went to the Half-Moon Dome.

But he realized something.

He realized that if he died tomorrow, even if Shiverpaw was linked to the Iris…he would have visited her, at least one last time. One last time to say that he was sorry, and that if she really did doom cat-kind, it wasn't her fault, it was his. It was his fault for agreeing to mentor her and bring her to StarClan's abode. It was his fault for not figuring it out sooner, and not stopping it.

He would still visit her, and he didn't even know her.

Windfur pushed the rock with his head, shoving it over every other gravestone and monument with his paws. He hissed as he kept getting snagged and stuck, and eventually he grasped the flat rock in his mouth, ignoring the pain of the stone dragging down on his teeth. Finally, he made it towards the edge of the clearing, which gave way to a sloped hill.

He dropped the stone and watched it tumble down thrashing against every branch and tree before finally landing flat, dragging a layer of dead leaves and flattened twigs with it.

Windfur stared at the stone at the bottom of the hill. Pain throbbed in his paws and teeth. He felt numb. As the sun continued its path, shifting the shape of shadows below, Windfur focused on the rise and fall of his chest. His anger cooled, and he stared sadly at the stone thrown across the forest floor.

A drop of guilt sat at his paws.

That was still his mentor. His teacher. The one who sang him rhymes and taught him the value of patience and precision. The same skills he was trying - maybe failing, but still trying - to teach his apprentice.

But he still felt betrayed.

“If,” Windfur swallowed, “if you come to visit me. If you apologize. If you tell me what to do, I’ll bring it back up. I’ll put it back. Do you understand?”

He heard the sound of dead branches falling from a tree somewhere.

He breathed deeply, then slowly turned away and padded back down the hill, back to the only home he'd ever known. He felt the pain jab at his paw pads. He stared at them briefly, and saw bruising. He scowled as a melody for soothing bruises appeared in his head, and he pushed it aside as he allowed the pain to anchor him to reality.

He was an adult cat now. He wasn't a fresh, young apprentice. He wasn't a newbie healer. It was ForestClan's sole medicine cat.

He...he couldn't keep doing this. He couldn't keep relying on the memory of someone he thought he knew.

If only it was easier on his heart to embrace. If only.

---

Talonpaw clears up a misunderstanding with Shiverpaw. He only told Windfur about the Nature's Mockery, and doesn't know why Windfur is acting out. Shiverpaw believes him. Unfortunately, Talonpaw lied - he did tell Windfur about the trance Shiverpaw had. Talonpaw feels really guilty, believing that he got her in trouble. But...what else was he supposed to say? Shiverpaw scared him.

(Talonpaw, apprentice, male, 12 moons) (Shiverpaw, apprentice, female, 8 moons)

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beef-brisket · 3 days ago

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Lucifer sighed and sat on the bed near Adam: I... I'm not happy about you pretending to be someone else. And I'm not too pleased that I had sex with-.

Adam: With me?

Lucifer: Not... in those exact words. I... I don't mind that it was you, I just... would have liked to have known, you know?

The first man rubbed his eyes, he felt a rush of emotions and none of them were good. He felt hurt and angry, but he was more sad than anything.

He knows Lucifer wouldn't have had anything to do with him if he knew it was him.

Hugging his bucket, Adam nodded and looked away.

Adam: M-Maybe... w-we should... get rid of it...

He felt sick even muttering the words. But he couldn't think of a better solution. There's no way Lucifer would want a child with him, he could barely stand to be in the same room with him.

Lucifer: You don't mean that. I know you. You'd want to keep it.

Adam: I do... I was just thinking of you.

Lucifer: ...Like you thought of me while pretending to be someone else?

Adam tensed and refused to look at the king. He felt tears prick at his eyes, but he tried his best to stop them.

Adam: I-I'm sorry- I just... liked being with you... I tried to tell myself I didn't. But I did. I... fuck, I... m-miss you sometimes. I just- fucking liked that you actually seemed interested in me! Even though it wasn't me- to you. I wanted to tell you. At dinner. But I couldn't... I was fucking scared... of losing you again- I didn't even have you, but I wanted you to stay- I wanted you to want me... fuck, this is pathetic...

Lucifer stared at Adam as he wiped his eyes. He still refused to look at Lucifer.

Lucifer: ...I didn't know you wanted me that bad. I thought... you hated me.

Adam glanced at him: I do... I think... I don't know... it's been so long... I think I just hurt now, instead of hate... I'm always fucking angry. At everything. Seeing you that first day...I was pissed off that you even had to be there, but when you started talking to me- like I wasn't me- I liked it. I thought... if you don't want me, you could want her. And you did... I didn't think this would happen.

Rubbing his face, Adam groaned: I'm just fucking lost. I'm sorry I dragged you into my bullshit- I just... wanted you, I guess...

Lucifer: ...You hurt my daughter, Adam. And now you're having my kid. I'm lost too. I'm... blind sided, Adam. Really. And to find out that Alastor of all people, that's... when did you plan on saying anything? Something?

Adam: I... w-wasn't...

Lucifer sighed: So, what- you were going to stay here, leave, then what? Birth my baby on the streets then... what? Leave and go back to Heaven?

Adam: What? N-No-.

Lucifer: They'll kill our child, Adam. Without a second thought. That's why you're here, isn't it? They'd make you get rid of- force you.

Adam: I-I know-! Alright?! I don't know what they'd do! I don't know what I'm doing! I just need you, okay?! I fucking- want you.

Lucifer: You... want me?

Adam: ...I... y-yeah...

Lucifer: ...We're... n-not friends, Adam. I wouldn't have... slept with you if I knew...

Adam wanted to curl up and die. Maybe he should have let that weird little bitch stab him.

He didn't say anything, and neither did Lucifer. They sat in silence for a few minutes before Lucifer jumped up from the bed, and fixed his suit.

Lucifer: Welp! I uh... I'll be in my office! I think we both need to have a good think about things. Alone.

Adam nodded, watching Lucifer head to the door.

Lucifer: I'll let you know when dinners ready, and uh- no apples. I promise.

Adam: Okay...

As Lucifer left the room and made his way to his office, he's sure making a duck would help clear his head properly.

Adam didn't know how long he sat there in silence before he put the bucket on the floor and curled up in his blankets.

Adam: Shouldn't have come here...

Adam the Exorcist

@beef-brisket

Lute looked up wide eyed as her commander was giving his speech and there was a little sinner coming up behind him.

Lute: SIR BEHIND YOU!?

Adam stopped and turned, he gasped and grabbed Nifty by the neck and threw her at the hotel crew and Lucifer, glaring at the lot of them.

Adam: THIS ISN'T FUCKING OVER!!

Lucifer: I think it is bud, you should go home.

Adam glared more, he was leaving because he wanted to not because this little fucker told him to. He waved his hand giving them the signal that extermination day was officially over.

Adam: Exorcists fall back!

Lute: But ..... Sir -

Adam: NOW Lute!!

She nodded and glared at the King and princess of Hell along with her friends. They all flew back to heaven and Adam flipped Lucifer off before he was fully back in.

Adam groaned when the portal closed, they had never had it go that wrong that fast. This wasn't going to end well.

Adam: Retire!?

Sera sighed she knew Adam wouldn't take this well.

Sera: Yes Adam, it's time you step down as the commander of the exterminators.

Adam: Is this about what happened!? Because it won't happen again.

Sera: You're right, it won't.

Adam sighed: But Abel? My boy is too soft to do that job.

Sera: There's no one else to do it. You nearly died down there we....... We can't lose you.

On one hand he understands where she's coming from, but he was meant to do this! The only reason things went bad was because Lucifer showed up.

Lute just HAD to kill the princess's pet.

Adam: I don't want him to die.

Sera: He won't. We will be doing a more regimented training routine. You deserve a rest Adam.

Adam: ..... Yes Sera.

She smiled and held out her arms, Adam hugged her. She was only doing this because she loves him, he knows that. Doesn't make it suck any less.

Adam went back to his room to lay down, he didn't realize how tired he was until he did.

There had to be a way that he could still be an exterminator.

Some how.

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blueishspace · 18 hours ago

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(Something old and new, borrowed and blue p170)

Jimmy: Ok, so

Scott: So?

Jimmy: I wasn't exactly like there when it happened but Martyn accidentally killed Cleo, his soulmate by pushing her off a cliff.

Scott: But if they are linked then he must have died too. Why would he do that?

Jimmy: That's the thing, apparently he's just really really bad at math and thought Cleo would survive.

Scott: Jimmy. You know I'll never be able to look at Martyn the same after this.

Jimmy: Yeah.

Scott: Ok, ok, going back to your soulmate.

Jimmy: Uh sure?

Scott: Would you say you know Tango well?

Jimmy: I would like to think I do?

Scott: Hmmm... I have an idea if you are interested.

Jimmy: Uh...go on.

Scott: Do you think you could bring my Tango to our side? In case this whole deal with Ren falls through?

Prev Next First

#trafficblr #traffic smp #scott smajor #jimmy solidarity #Something o.n.b.b au

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luckysheepharmony · 3 days ago

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Why didn't Lennon/McCartney get therapy for their issues?

As a family/couple therapist in my day job and mclennon obsessive at night, I want to correct some overly positive views I feel people on this site often have about therapy and its potential.

Therapy, like anything else, is the product of its environment and the social attitudes of its time. While I'd love to imagine 1969 John and Paul getting couples therapy and living happily ever after, sadly, I have a more jaded view of my profession. Homosexuality was identified as a mental disorder in the DSM 2 (published 1968). Although the wording of this was softened in 1974 to reflect social pressures put on the psychiatric profession by gay liberation groups (suddenly we queers became officially less mad than before!) the DSM 3 (published 1980) still classified "ego-dystonic homosexuality" as a mental illness. (The difference, practically speaking, is that people were no longer deemed as being mad for being gay on its own; they were only mad if living in a homophobic society made them feel sad about being gay. That was, according to the dsm, a problem of the individual, not society. If we take DSM-II (1974 revision) to its natural conclusion, a mentally normal homo in 1974 would simply have skipped along the street, delighting in receiving the punches of strangers and rejection of their close friends and families for their perverted ways; but anyone feeling sadness about how they were treated and maybe feeling bad about being gay as a result should have got therapy to make that problematic sadness go away.) Any therapist, individual or couple, valuing their licence in the late 60s/early 70s would be working within this framework within their profession, as well as the wider social and their own personal attitudes towards homosexuality and bisexuality.

There is also the constraint of the particular therapeutic training. Psychodynamic/psychoanalytic therapy, for example, wouldn't allow LGBTQ people to train as therapists even as late as 2000. I had my own therapy back then (from a nationally known, respectable institution) as a troubled bisexual adolescent, and my therapist kept trying to perform conversion therapy on me, which was technically unethical back in 2000 but many therapists at that time still persisted in these attitudes, feeling it was most ethical to try and cure their patients' mental illness by changing their homo ways (rather than wondering if it was, in fact, society that was sick rather than the individual queer). Luckily I had sufficient self belief, undiagnosed autism and general stroppiness (together with being backed up with the more positive social attitudes towards queers in 2000 when compared to 1970) to tell them to fuck off, but I doubt I would have been able to do that in 1970, even if I had happened to be a Beatle suffering from extreme internalised homophobia and self loathing, desperately wanting to be straight.

If I was a celebrity, I would also not want to chat my business with some random stranger for fear the therapist may try to sell my story. John, I think, might have been OK taking the risk, being the outspoken edgelord he was, but we could certainly rule out the more cautious Paul for this reason alone.

Under all these conditions, even if Lennon wasn't seeing quacks, I can't see how even my favourite 1970 therapist, Salvador Minuchin, could have helped Lennon or Lennon/McCartney with their issues at this time.

A therapist from today, with our revisionist eyes, would of course do things differently than those back then. But unfortunately, as far as I know, even the Beatles didn't have access to a time machine. Therefore, in my professional opinion, mclennon would not have been helped by 1970s therapy. Please understand that doesn't mean I think today's therapists are better than those practicing 60 years ago; I just think today's social attitudes towards LGBTQ people are better than they were 60 years ago. Currently. Let's see how Trump gets on with making America great again.

I think what it comes down to is that it just wasn't soon enough for John and Paul to stand on top of a mountain with their flag unfurled. So just standard mclennon tragedy things then.

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ohhicas · 21 hours ago

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What are your favourite headcanons about Even and Ansem the Wise? (About themselves and about them as a pair)

Ohhh I know I'm gonna forget something, but I'll try to list a few (gonna start typing without thinking & see where that lands me ehehe) All these are gonna be Headcanon, but if I slip in something I know Is Canon I'll try to like, asterisk it to highlight (I may forget to do this. just know most of what I'm saying is from the brain and not canon)

(this got huge, I scrolled back up to slap a cut down LMAO)

AtW got his position through family/born into it; he didn't really want the Power behind it (and preferred science, not politics) but knew he needed to step up and be the King that Radiant Garden required, especially after the passing of the previous. I feel it happened fairly young (if AtW is high 50s, 60s, I'd imagine it happened low 30s), so he had to learn to balance hobby (science, exploration, etc) and work (politics) really quickly.

He was kind of a soft-handed king. Not known as being strict, and wanted to mingle with his people and be more hands-on. Before he had his crown, I like to imagine he was always down shoulder to shoulder with the people. He's an engineer at heart, always wanting to build and expand and see what limits man can breach. He'd absolutely want to be down with the masses with the blueprints and battle plans to expand the castle town!!

I like to imagine Even wasn't originally from the Castle town, but from a city just outside it beyond the woods and etc we see surrounding RG. When Ansem was first taking over and looking for a staff refresh, I imagine he scouted Even out who would've had a Reputation both for his attitude and his brain/studies. They didn't get along at first with Ansem's calm vs Even's tightly wired. Eventually, Ansem figured out how to really 'use' Even to his full potential and let him stretch his brain, and they got along Much better (to a degree. I imagine their first meeting happened in AtW's high 30s/40s, just to keep a 'timeline' going here).

While they were trying to figure out like... Ansem's Security System (guards), the idea that everyone Inside the castle should also have some kind of defensive ability to them, may that be Magic or Physical (in Ansem's early curiosities, I imagine he either directly encountered a keyblade wielder or at least learned of them. This of course being Before he gets the chance to meet Mickey.) So anyone in the labs were trained in very, very basic combat.

Even rocked shop at 'very basic combat' in a way that had the current captain of the guard go "oh damn, can we have him instead--". Ansem called dibs and pulled rank (absolutely childishly sticking his tongue out at Lyna) to keep Even on the lab team. <- (I'm kind of shaky on this part exactly; I just know I headcanon Even as 'was good enough for the guard, but he got YOINKED to the lab team)

Because of his performance during the combat drills, despite Even's own "I'm not a warrior," grumblings, he gets a guard military dress uniform when Big Events come around. Ansem thinks it's a little cute how much the (20s, bitey, tugging at his collar and grumbling) lead scientist hates it. (--wait did he just think 'cute'? oh that's going to be a problem for the future. oh well.)

A Decade and a handful of years pass, the others crop up along the way (Dilan first, and then Aeleus). AtW & Even are not "A thing", but have an obvious push and pull dynamic of an old married couple despite doing no more than Ansem having grabbed Even's wrist to inspect for burns when a machine sparked at his fingertips. There is. Something, there, but neither man will go for it. Even is too busy with his labs, Ansem too busy with everything.

He leaves and returns with a boy. Even nearly blows a gasket when Ansem smiles oh-so-charmingly at him in a way he cannot (has never been able to) deny and announces the lost child as his ward, for the time being. Even wants to claw at the walls because (not)respectively, my lord, what the Fuck. (he immediately finds himself caring for the boy, despite his fussing, just like Ansem knew he would. He trusts Even so much it worries him. Ienzo stares up at them with his blank, emotionless face. Pours through every book and manual and report well above his age bracket and barely part of Ansem's own, and something in Ansem's heart wrenches. His thirst for knowledge reminds him so much of Even's own and it scares him.)

They all die. when Ansem fully learns of what happens, while he no longer has regrets for what happened, he does wish he would've been there to die alongside of them, sometimes. But it's his fault that all this happened in the first place, isn't it? It's only suiting for a pitiful father King to suffer everything being ripped from him. If only he was stricter. (While he's a man with so many regrets, while he's learned to keep going to try to amend them, there are some things he can't stop thinking about. Ienzo is a grown man, now. When he watches as Even and Ienzo bicker over a monitor while Kairi sleeps off and on, there's an ache for all the things he missed. [But what to miss? It's not like they were truly a family; Ienzo is just his ward, and he and Even were never--])

OK other things that dont' fit in whatever that checklist of points became LMAO OOPS,,,

Ansem:

As much as I'd love if he himself was ever allowed to travel worlds while younger, I feel it'd be a disservice to how much he's done while grounded in RG if he ever did. Instead I like to imagine he has a well known 'open door' policy for travelers; anyone who CAN enter his world, he wants to meet them. He wants to learn from them. He's so hungry for knowledge that he'll grab any "trying to be secretive" world hopper and drag them down for tea to needle for information until he can try to worm SOMETHING out of it. Even if they never cave, he'll feel like he learned something just by how much spark was in the traveler's eyes.

Doesn't have the best diet in the world. He's got a severe sweet tooth, and tends to lose himself in the labs and his library for hours on end. If someone from the guardstaff didn't chase him down with a sandwich and tea, he'd probably go a full day without eating anything beyond ice cream. Before the Fall, it was bad. After the Fall, it's worse; he went so many years without needing to eat, or drink, and just existing in the world between that he forgets food is a thing that needs to be eaten. He's frighteningly thin from his time as DiZ. Aeleus has been trying to figure out how to slip more protein into his food since recompletion and reunion.

Mickey brings him little treats from the outside worlds any time he visits. Ansem loves that mouse so much, he'll clear his entire schedule when he arrives just to have the time to sit down with an old friend and chat.

While he's a Scientist, yes, he leans more heavily into Engineering. He's incredibly good with tech* and even reprogrammed Tron to work for him. He built/helped build/got the build going and I assume the planning for that entire basement lab hellscape For Ienzo. He and Cid will get along so, so well when they get to interact.

Even:

Has always run a little cold, even before any magic reached his body. Like the joke that all nurses have cold hands, he was ice.

He has the shoulders and biceps of a linebacker for a reason, even as a scientist. Ansem's machines are so heavy, they couldn't always call Aeleus or Dilan down from their post to come lift something to Even took it upon himself. He was already decent at combat, the muscle was there. He just built it a little better so he wouldn't have to rely on anyone for his work. (as he gets older, he calls for one of the larger men because he is Not throwing out his back for a single machine.)

He was not unaware of any lingering... Feelings between him and AtW before the fall. He's married to his work, but not stupid. You don't do all this work on Hearts without understanding the ins and outs of them and being able to clock the emotions in those around you. Especially His Own. There was just no time for it, so he shoved them down and to the side to deal with never. He was always so close to a breakthrough, he couldn't waste his precious time with fraternizing. No matter how much he wished to linger there, in the softer moments, when it was just him and Ansem in the labs surrounded by the soft hum of machines.

I like to imagine all the Org, reformed, maintained the whisper of their old magic. Even doesn't fully find reason for it, or the hollow ache and need for it like Some of them, but he can feel it in his fingertips sometimes. The shield and sword come to him like second nature thanks to his Guard training he took, once. The ice he once summoned so naturally for years sits like an itch under his skin, only crackling to the surface as frost at high emotion. He hopes the others dont catch him shaking his wrist out and hiding his hand behind his back until the frost melts. (They catch it. They have no room to speak as the walls shift, the wind picks up, and the ground quakes.)

Absolutely never considered himself a 'father'. He doesn't hate the term, but it sits uncomfortable in his heart. (Joke's on him, he has the most children out of all of them. Ansem would love to tease him on it, but he's still trying to judge the acceptance level of such a joke.)

Despite All That

i like to imagine everyone still assumes them a couple. If asked, Dilan will handwave it ('of course they are a thing, in their own way. He doesn't care about the fraternizing of his peers. Why are you asking him?'). Aeleus will clench his jaw like he knows it's not his place to gossip, and he cares too deeply for Ansem (like a mentor figure, like a teacher. The man saw him with all his bulk and muscle and still gently taught him the sciences and let him flex his brain to become a treasured pupil.) to disturb that trust with such a thing. Ienzo will wrinkle his nose and laugh it off. Do not make him even think about things like that. (Part of him knows. Understands. They are both categorized as his Fathers in his mind, even if he refuses to allow himself to call Ansem that out loud.) Braig (Luxu, taken over) saw the weak point and exploited it. Whispered to Xehanort where to hit and how to twist the dynamic to work best for their goals.

[ I also like to pretend they made out once in the younger years, tipsy from drinks at a party, not thinking straight. both men remember it, both are pretending it didn't happen. Life carried on like normal after it. Ansem brings it up like an execution shot after recompletion, when things finally resettle. "Have you ever wondered, dear--" speaking of things that could have been if they weren't so foolish. Even is so tired after everything, he doesn't even pretend to be angry about the topic. OLD MAN YAOI GENTLY STARTS UP, TENTATIVELY. ]

#kh chara talk #wow havent used that one in awhile

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abusivelittlebunny · 2 days ago

Note

Can I ask why you think jos Verstappen is an alpha?

I think it's his sheer forceful aggression on and off the grid, he's a known physical abuser and the tight control he had over max is pretty self-explanatory this way. When Max presented he was so extremely infuriated at having his firstborn son turn out to be an omega he near trashed the whole house and blamed Max's mother for it because he's an unreasonable dickhead and he went extra hard on max so all his efforts wouldn't go down the drain.

It was especially humiliating for him to have his son turn out an omega when he's been competing against Carlos Sr, another alpha, and after his son turned out an alpha earlier, Jos promised that his own son will put up a good fight and beat Carlos Jr easily once he also officially presented as an alpha; Max turning out an omega was like losing the fight before it even began to Jos.

Max works hard to earn his father's approval and not disappoint him further, to show that he can compete with any alpha despite what Jos may think. He succeeds mostly, bagging win after win, but he near loses all of his father's trust and confidence in him when Max ends up pregnant by none other than Carlos Jr.

Jos didn't even know Max lost his "virtue" until then let alone that he was secretly going out with Carlos, who he was raised to despise, and that's when the whole Jos leaving Max at the gas station fiasco happens, with Jos calling Max all kinds of versions of whore, saying how he should sell his cheap cunt at the gas station toilet clearly he was more born for that than to be a champion. For some reason there's a huge stigma with omegas keeping their virginity to enter the sport and it holds value to the sponsors, so a "used" omega is less appealing to them, hence why Jos freaked out so much (plus Carlos being the babydaddy was the biggest blow to his ego he could ever imagine). After Max gets safely returned home Jos immediately schedules an abortion for him, forcing Max to go through with it and forces Carlos out of ToroRosso, quickly marrying Max off to Horner so his "dirtiness" doesn't leak out to the press. He also puts a contract into the selling of Max that Max can't have a baby before he secures a world championship, hence why Max annihilates the grid the moment he steps on it; he wants back the baby he wasn't allowed to have and get out from the last collar his father had on him, finally being free of his control.

Max ends up having a lot of children, racing up unti the third trimester as a big fuck you to the media and his father who all claimed an omega's career ends when he gets pregnant and he changes the face of the sport forever, and doesn't let Jos interact with his children.

#headcanons #versainz #my heart BEATS for versainz but max ends up with 3 different babydaddies and a very content marriage in the end and a lot of babies

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jo-harrington · 1 day ago

Text

Luminous Beings - Episode 4: Order 66

Art by @monologichno || Beta Read by @undead-supernova Part of the @eddiemunsonbigbang

Summary: The Dragonborn is plagued with tension and uncertainty as Thalia's secrets finally come to light.

Word Count: 9.8k

Pairing: Eddie Munson x OFC (Thalia Trieste)

Warnings/Themes: Star Wars AU, Fluff, Budding Romance, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Canon-Typical Violence, Torture, and Death, Miscommunication, Distrust, Minor Canon Inaccuracies/Adaptation, Galactic Politics, Criticism of Government and Authority, Criticism of the Jedi, Betrayal, Depictions of Order 66 and the Jedi Purge

Note: This chapter made me nervous, I'm not gonna lie. There have been so many depictions of Order 66 in so much Star Wars media but when you fold such a huge canon event into a fic like this...UGH. I truly hope I did it justice. Thanks to @courtingchaos for giving me a second look at that little snippet and giving me some extra courage, I feel so much better. And yes, if I ever decide to write Thalia's story, I will be pulling a Dave Filoni and writing it again.

Thanks again to everyone for reading.

Luminous Beings Masterlist - Jo-Harrington's Masterlist

Please do not interact if you are not 18+.

Thank you for reading. Enjoy!

Hyperspace, 10BBY

The atmosphere in the Dragonborn was tense.

No one said a word once they'd gotten off Outpost 86 and jumped to lightspeed.

None of them knew what to say, least of all Eddie.

They'd all witnessed what happened—the Guavians had too—and Eddie knew that he should have said something to his crew at least. He knew he should have gone and said something to Thalia. But as soon as the boarding ramp was shut, he had stomped up to the bridge, barking orders to his friends to get to their stations so they could get the hell out of there.

Now, safe and sound, Eddie’s mind began to race as quickly as the streaks of stars and nebulae that soared past them. He kept flipping switches and turning knobs to keep himself from facing the inevitable. To keep himself from facing the truth.

Thalia saved his life.

Yeah, that was one thing.

And she was a Jedi.

That was the other.

He was almost hesitant to think those words, but once he did, all of the pieces seemed to fall into place. All of the odd things about Thalia that he noticed suddenly made sense. The feeling of calmness that surrounded her, the connection he felt with her.

Did that mean she had read his thoughts? Or manipulated him in some way?

No, that wasn't it. Was it?

He would've known. Wouldn't he?

However, those realizations, those answers, seemed to raise new questions.

Because...she wasn't really a Jedi, was she? She was around his age, if looks were anything to go by; she must've been a Padawan at the time of the Clone Wars. He remembered seeing the names and faces of Padawans on the Holonet, wanted by the newly-formed Empire, and how horrified he'd been when he realized the implication that they'd be hunted down too.

She couldn't have been accomplice to any sort of treason against the Republic then. But there was suddenly no wonder why she had a negative opinion about the Empire now.

If she was a Jedi Padawan, that is.

And if she wasn't?

He'd been around the galaxy a few times. He'd heard whispers of Force-users in hiding, ones who weren't Jedi. They'd been hunted down by the Empire, too. Maybe she was one of them?

He'd never know unless he asked.

He rose from his seat and ordered G'areth and Dayv to keep an eye on things. Then he made his way down to the medbay.

Thalia, of course, wasn't alone when he got there. While he’d rushed off to the Bridge, Jeff had gone to tend to his blaster wound.

Admittedly, the guys didn't know much in the way of medicine. Bacta, stimpacks, and synthskin bandages. That was what they had, what they felt comfortable using. Anything requiring more than that, they could go planetside and seek medical attention.

That was the extent of healing that Eddie expected Jeff, who was a notorious crybaby when he was hurt or sick, to receive. But there was something to be said about having someone take care of you, instead of injecting yourself with a hypo-syringe.

Eddie leaned against the entrance to the medbay and crossed his arms over his chest as he watched D5-TN pass kolto patches for Thalia to apply to Jeff's injured leg. All while Jeff softly, but animatedly, told a story that Eddie—and Dustin, for that matter—had heard a thousand times.

"...and then I said to him, 'Strono, I know I just made you the best cup of Caf you've ever had, but you cannot propose to me. You can have the recipe though.'"

Thalia snickered at the tale Jeff spun, but kept working.

Even from a few yards away, Eddie could feel the calming energy emanating off of her, which caused the bitterness to rise within in him.

The story telling continued, along with hums and beeps and the ambient roar of hyperspace, until Thalia announced, "Alright, you're set." She clapped her hands together as Jeff swung his legs off the bed. "How does it feel?"

"Good as new," he grinned, attempting to jump to his feet, only to falter and nearly fall. She grabbed him as he gripped the edge of the bed tightly, and they worked together to haul him back upright. "Ok, maybe not as good as new, but close enough."

"To be fair," Eddie piped up, startling Jeff and D5-TN but somehow not Thalia. "You weren't in that great a shape to begin with. I've put you in the crosshairs enough times."

Then, for some reason, Jeff turned his attention to Thalia when he said, "Ed gets us into all sorts of trouble, but we've all made mistakes. Ask G'ar about the time he broke his wrist."

"I'm the reason G'ar broke his wrist," Eddie insisted.

"You tell yourself that, captain," Jeff scoffed. "Hey Dusty, you mind helping me up to the bridge?"

D5-TN whistled and honked; he teased about running Jeff over if he fell, which earned a deadpan laugh from Jeff.

Before long, though, they were gone.

And then Eddie and Thalia were finally alone.

The medbay hadn't ever really felt like a sterile place of healing, but it had come a long way since Eddie and his friends had taken their first excursion across the galaxy. If Thalia complained about having kolto over bacta now, she would've had a conniption back then. They barely even had a bandage and a bed to their name.

But now the small medbay had taken up a new purpose since she'd been onboard. It had only been a few days, and she didn't have much by way of luggage or belongings, but the room held the same energy she did.

A cot was set up in the corner, one she insisted on instead of the medibed, and a few changes of clothes set out atop a nearby cabinet. A datapad, a small commlink that he didn't realize she carried, and a handful of credits that, even from a distance he could tell, were a mix of old republic dataries and new imperial ingots.

The pack she'd brought with her to the Outpost lay on the floor by her cot, slumped and misshapen; with everything that was strewn about the medbay, Eddie wondered what might still be inside.

"Is that why you don't carry a blaster?" he asked once he finally found his voice. "Because you have a lightsaber?"

"No." She shook her head.

"So you don't have a lightsaber?"

She paused as she cleaned up the supplies she used for Jeff, then glanced up at him. She inhaled slowly. Pensively.

"Now you're just putting words into my mouth."

Any joy or excitement that the child that still lived inside Eddie might've felt at the prospect of there being a real lightsaber aboard his ship was immediately extinguished when he began to demand answers from her.

"Why didn't you just tell me? Us," Eddie questioned desperately. "We're outlaws too. Criminals. It's not like we'd have delivered you to some imperial labor camp on a silver platter."

"Ignoring how...absolutely idiotic you sound to even suggest that," Thalia began with a scoff. "Say I did trust you not to sell me out; how would that conversation have gone? 'Hi, it's nice to meet you. I'm in need of your services and, oh, by the way I can use the force and need to hide it from the empire?'"

"Well, no, but—"

"Then how would you have liked to find out a secret that countless beings need to keep in the name of self preservation? Because I think saving your life is a pretty appropriate method. You're welcome, by the way."

He took an involuntary step back at the venom in her words, but recovered quickly.

"Thank you," he said softly, then pivoted back to the original topic. "I don't know another way that wouldn't have made me question everything, but some kind of indication that I was working with a fugitive Jedi would've—"

Thalia immediately squared her shoulders and crossed the distance so she could press a finger into his chest.

"I want to make one thing clear," she said, practically through gritted teeth. At this distance, her eyes even looked glassy with unshed tears, and Eddie felt his stomach drop, knowing that he was the one who caused them, in one way or another. "I am no Jedi."

Wait.

"What do you mean, you aren't a Jedi?" Eddie scoffed. "Of course you are. You just said you had a lightsaber...and you saved my life...and there's that feeling of—"

"There you go again, Moonsun," she said, voice more lighthearted than it had just been, as she poked fun at him. And she quite literally poked him again, prodding the same place that she'd jabbed him to get her point across just moments ago. "Putting words in my mouth. I didn't say I had a lightsaber. And I didn't say that I didn't have one."

"Do you have a lightsaber?"

"Not with me." Eddie clapped his hands together and just about shoved his finger in her face in triumphant mockery, but she continued. "But that doesn't mean I am a Jedi. And I have never been one either. I know...in the lift, you said that you'd always dreamed of becoming a Jedi...and I'll admit I had that dream fed to me once...but I don't understand how anyone would have dreamed of that life.

"The Jedi were the heroes of the galaxy...and I'm no hero." She held her hands out in front of her and then clenched them into fists. She looked back into his eyes. "But I'll do what I must to keep people safe, Eddie. To keep people alive."

If Eddie had been demanding answers from Thalia in the medbay the night before, his friends were absolutely relentless come morning. It seemed like the chance to let their thoughts and feelings simmer meant that they didn't carry the same chip on their shoulders as he did; they'd not only had time to process what they'd witnessed on Outpost 86, but also what Eddie had told him when he'd returned from confronting Thalia.

To be fair, after they'd parted ways, Eddie also cooled down and cleared his thoughts.

And Thalia answered their questions good-naturedly, as she had before. As if they were still asking about simple things, how the weather was on Dantooine, instead of questioning the workings of the force.

"Can you float things?"

"Sometimes."

"And can you read minds? What color am I thinking of right now?"

"Blue."

"Woah."

"But that's because you're staring at my hair, Dayv."

"Oh, kriff, you're right."

"Have you ever met Obi-Wan Kenobi?"

Even Eddie looked up from his bowl of oats at Jeff's question.

Thalia was frozen in her seat, spoon just inches away from her mouth; her eyes darted around the table to each of the guys as they stared expectantly back at her.

"Eddie has a great impression of General Kenobi," Jeff added, as if the context would help. Thalia's eyes drifted to Eddie and she lifted a single brow in question. "Uh...well...he used to. When we were kids."

"I probably do a better impression of the Emperor now, to be fair," Eddie snickered and ducked his head back down to his breakfast. Still, curiously, he glanced up at her through his bangs. "So...did you ever meet him?"

"I'm..." she put down her spoon and ran a hand through her hair nervously. "No. I didn't."

The questions became more rapid fire after that, especially from Eddie as he picked up where they'd left off before.

"Who did you meet?"

"What did you do?"

"If you weren't really a Jedi, did you live in the temple?"

"If you weren't really a Jedi, how do you have a lightsaber?"

"What really happened when the Jedi betrayed the Republic?"

That seemed to be where the line was drawn for Thalia though, because she slammed her cup of blue milk on the table. She sat back in her seat and folded her arms across her chest.

The galley went silent, save for the shameful coughs and scraping of utensils along the bottoms of bowls. None of them were brave enough to meet her scathing gaze, especially not G'areth, who'd uttered the fated question in the first place.

D5-TN, who'd been sitting at his charging station in the corner of the little galley, was the first to pipe up. His blunt binary beeps questioned why Thalia looked about ready to murder when the Jedi were supposed to be peacekeepers. That immediately cooled her down.

"Supposed to be, is the key phrase there, Dustin." She let out a dry laugh. "Everyone is supposed to be one thing, and then they turn out to be something else. I'm the living proof of that. I'm supposed to be hiring you guys to haul something to Coruscant for me."

"Does that mean we can dump that container right into hyperspace?" Dayv chuckled.

"Does that mean we're not getting paid?" Eddie added, much more seriously.

"The Jedi were supposed to be peacekeepers,” she continued, ignoring their questions. "Not soldiers for the Republic. But that's exactly what they became, little by little. The Clone Wars were a catalyst for the downfall of the Order, but it had been a long time coming. Hundreds of years, not just over the past few decades. And this wasn't the first time in their history, either."

She got a faraway look in her eyes, and a bitterness in her voice.

"What made a good Jedi was that you could be a good soldier. That's how younglings were chosen as Padawans, even before the Clone Wars. Even before the possibility of war was on the galaxy's doorstep. And I wasn't fit for being anyone's soldier."

"So you weren't chosen?" Eddie asked. "And then you...what'd you say? You worked at a diner on Coruscant?"

"No." Thalia's brow furrowed. "No, that...came after. If someone didn't pass the Initiate Trials or they didn't get chosen as a Padawan, most of the time they got foisted off into the Service Corps to keep them useful. Education Corps...Medical Corps—"

"Well, we know you're not Medical Corps," Jeff interjected and then patted his leg. "You did a better job than any of us could've but, uh, if that was your job, I would be concerned."

The mood in the room lightened as everyone laughed and returned to their meal.

"No," Thalia continued serenely. "I was in the Exploration Corps. We would travel across the galaxy, scouting and surveying planets. Transporting Knights and Masters to different temples."

"So you've always been a sort of flight attendant," Dayv noted, along with D5-TN whistling his own question about what in-flight snacks were served aboard Jedi Order transports.

"You know," she snorted, "now that you mention it, I guess this was my destiny after all.” It got a laugh out of everyone. “I was assigned as an assistant to the researchers looking into ancient secrets of the Force. I'd always been interested in the history of the Jedi...in the deeper meanings in the ways of the Force. That's why I was shocked that you'd gone on a trip to Moraband. It's a forbidden planet."

"Forbidden?" Eddie smirked and leaned back in his seat. "Sweetheart, nothing is forbidden when there are credits to be had. Moraband is an untouched goldmine."

"It's full of tombs," she argued. "Corruption. Relics connected to the Dark Side of the Force. Even now, the Empire forbids travel there."

"Some senators love their tchotchkes." Eddie shrugged. "They buy, we'll fly."

"It's the ancient Sith homeworld, flyboy."

"Is that supposed to mean something to me?"

Thalia let out a noise of frustration before pointedly turning in her seat so she faced the others more than she faced Eddie.

"Anyway, shortly before...before the fall of the Republic, I got partnered with a Jedi Master named Eno Cordova, who'd been researching ancient force-sensitive civilizations. It wasn't much in the way of travel, so, yes, I still lived in the Jedi Temple to access the archives."

"And your lightsaber?" Jeff scooted closer in his chair. Everyone leaned a little closer, even D5-TN, who rolled off his charging station so he could join the others.

"Was the one that I built as a youngling, ahead of the Initiate Trials," Thalia explained. "It's back on Coruscant. Someplace safe."

"Wait a minute," Eddie butt in again. "Hang on. You're a former Jedi whatever, with a functioning lightsaber, who's in hiding from being hunted down by the Empire...and you live on the Capitol? Right under the Emperor's nose?"

The others made noises in agreement and concern.

"Hidden in plain sight," she offered as an excuse, along with a shrug. "It always made the most sense."

She got a faraway look in her eye then, worrying her bottom lip with her teeth.

"The Empire..." She squinted her eyes a little in thought. "They might be looking for whoever they can to make an example of now. But back then? After…” She trailed off for a moment. “Well, they weren't interested in someone like me."

Before the others could ask anything else, she excused herself from the table and practically ran out of the galley.

"You know there's nowhere you can hide that I won't find you. This is my ship."

"I could try."

"Well, you happened to pick the one place in the ship where I go to practice the guitar alone," Eddie explained. "So you didn't try very hard."

The escape pod was small, and if Eddie was honest, it probably wouldn't do much in the event of an emergency. It's why they weren't too concerned with blocking it with their cargo. He'd had D5-TN run diagnostics on the life support systems and controls many times, to no avail. And they'd always been so eager to move onto the next job or planet that there hadn't really been time to test it in the safety of a spaceport.

But it was a small little space, away from the rest of the ship, where you could be alone. And they'd all taken advantage of that more than any of them cared to admit.

G'areth had even come to have a little personal time once, back in the early days. That's when the "no jerkin' it in the escape pod" rule was enacted.

It was astounding how quickly Thalia had acclimated to the habits of everyone on the ship, though, if she was here. Either that, or she'd scraped the idea of it from one of their heads with her Force abilities.

"It doesn't work like that," Thalia spoke, as though he'd said the last part aloud, earning a skeptical look from Eddie as he sat on the small seat across from her. "You were projecting that one, Nerfhead."

"Hey," Eddie scoffed. "Bantha brains? Yes. But nerfhead? Absolutely not."

He grinned at the little laugh she let out.

He waited for her to talk, to say anything; usually, he'd be the first one to pry, especially when that thousand-parsec stare that she currently had, appeared on one of his friends faces. He took a different approach this time, though. More along the lines of something his uncle Wane would do when he was lost in his thoughts or his worries.

Usually, for him, it had something to do with his dad.

For Thalia, though, it seemed like the Jedi were the sore spot that sent her into a deep spiral of thoughts.

They sat silently for a moment before Eddie hoisted his guitar onto his lap and began playing a soft trill of notes. A lullaby Wane used to play for him when he was little, right after his mom died and his dad ran the first time, so he could sleep without nightmares.

He closed his eyes as plucked at the strings. He let the sound flow through him, resonate with the space around him. One note after another, time passed slowly but surely, and suddenly Thalia was humming along with the slow melody.

He opened one eye and glanced at her as she watched his fingers move, humming in anticipation of each note to come.

"Do you know this song?" he asked softly as he continued playing.

She made a non-commital noise in response and then shook her head. "I'm not very musically inclined either. Don't ask me to sing. But...there are echoes...in the force. Usually they're tied to objects. Sometimes they're tied to people. Your music amplifies your ties to the living force. It's hard to resist."

Eddie wasn't sure what most of that meant, but knew that he wouldn't try to cheapen it by making a joke about how irresistible he was.

Instead, he said, "That must mean I am a pretty good musician, if the force likes my playing."

She cracked a small smile, but stayed silent as he continued strumming.

"Do you want to know why I find it hard to trust people?" she asked, unexpectedly, after a beat. Eddie was about to answer, but she added, "I would've told you. Eventually. But...do you want to know why I couldn't, at first?"

"Because I don't seem the trustworthy type?"

"Because I've been betrayed by people I thought I could trust before." She looked down at her hands, folded neatly in her lap. "Because even I've betrayed people who've trusted me before."

"Well, I'm not a snitch. None of us are. My friends have kept quiet about worse things than someone being a Jedi before."

"I told you, I'm not a Jedi."

He ignored her, and instead chose to joke with her. "So who did you betray? Do I have to worry about you giving us up to the Empire, instead of the other way around?"

There was a sadness in her eyes when she looked up at him.

"G'areth asked what really happened," she stated, "when the Jedi betrayed the Republic. The Jedi failed the Republic, and were betrayed in return. Which only led to more pain, more betrayal."

"That's cryptic," Eddie whispered. He winced and stopped playing, setting the guitar aside. "Sorry, that was insensitive of me."

"It's ok," Thalia assured him.

She offered her hand out to him, palm flat and facing upwards.

He thought it was just a gesture of peace, so he placed his hand in hers.

And suddenly Eddie wasn't on the Dragonborn anymore.

He was in a library, surrounded by rows upon rows of shelves containing glowing holobooks. Thousands of them.

The last time he'd seen a library of this size...well, he couldn't recall. The Academy on Bracca had a small library, and he had always liked to read, especially when he was younger and looking for escape from his mundane life. But anything he wanted, he could load onto his datapad from the holonet. There was no need for holobooks and no real space for them in his and Wane's flat.

Whoever had amassed this collection must've been very interested in knowledge. Or power.

But how did he get here?

He spotted movement in the corner of his eye, the flash of a shoulder disappearing down one of the aisles.

"Excuse me," he called out. "Could you help me? I think I'm lost."

He tried to take a step forward, but through his body, another body emerged. As though he was made of mist. A phantom.

The figure, decidedly human, took a few steps forward and then stopped and looked back at him.

His heart stopped.

It was Thalia, but younger. Much less worry on her face, lips upturned into a gentle smile.

Her hair wasn't blue, instead an unremarkable, muddy brown and it was longer, pulled into a thick braid that fell over her shoulder. She wasn't dressed in the travel attire he'd gotten used to seeing her in, or the traditional robes that would immediately bring a Jedi to mind. She wore something that was a marriage of the two—a tunic with an unfamiliar emblem emblazoned on the breast, and fitted utility trousers tucked into boots.

"Come on," she nodded her head in the direction she'd been headed. "Keep up."

"Wh-where are we going?" he demanded, but followed nonetheless.

Suddenly, there were more figures around. Jedi Knights and Padawans, he realized as he saw the lightsabers attached to their belts. Thalia had a lightsaber on her belt too.

They weaved in and out of the aisles, sitting at the tables in the middle of the room. The library, which had previously been silent, was suddenly consumed with ambient sounds of whispered conversations alongside the beeping and whistling of droids whirring around.

Was he...was this the Jedi Temple? On Coruscant? It had to be.

He was filled with that deeply-buried giddiness that he'd been trying to hold down since the truth about Thalia came out.

He was in the Jedi Temple. This was the place where the heroes of his adolescence walked and slept and ate and lived. Being able to witness inside the temple walls was everything he’d ever dreamed of.

He couldn't wait to tell the guys about this.

He tried to take it all in, but was quickly disappointed when the details, the faces, were all blurry. Unfocused and unimportant here.

In this memory, he realized.

Since exploring on his own was futile, he caught up with the younger Thalia, who spoke with an elderly woman in a set of decorated brown robes.

Their conversation meant nothing to Eddie, really, but he tried to keep up with unfamiliar names, places, and titles of books. Zeffo, and The Tales of Light and Life, and something about Master Cordova. Hadn't that been the Jedi that Thalia said she'd been assisting? Did this all have to do with him?

The older woman seemed to get irritated by the end of the interaction, though, as a tight tight smile stretched across her wrinkled face. She still kept her voice peaceful as she offered, "Perhaps if Master Cordova needs all of this information, he could be bothered to return to Coruscant himself, but I'll see what I can do, Miss Trieste."

"Thank you, Master Nu." Thalia bowed respectfully and then turned and continued on her way. Eddie figured that he was undetectable, but he also felt the urge to clumsily bow to Master Nu before he followed after Thalia.

They walked out of the library and out into a wide atrium with marble walls that stretched upwards for hundreds of feet to a domed glass ceiling.

"What did I say about keeping up?" Thalia questioned impatiently a few feet ahead of him.

"Excuse me for wanting to get a good look at things," Eddie scoffed, but closed the distance.

"You'll see more soon enough," she insisted. "We just need to get there first."

They walked through endless halls and down winding staircases. Eddie noted how Thalia would nod and greet certain Jedi respectfully, and how most of them ignored her outright. Only a handful had stopped for a word of greeting, most of them as young as she was—Padawans she must have trained with as a youngling.

"Why don't the others say anything back to you?" he asked.

"Because I'm nobody," she explained. "At least, it felt that way."

"But—"

"W-will you shut up?"

As the words spilled from her lips, a feeling descended upon Eddie, like an inescapable wave from an endlessly deep ocean. A rumble of building anticipation, like boots stomping in tandem, and then a sudden crash of emotion that nearly brought him to his knees.

Pain, fear, panic, despair.

Death.

An explosion as bright as a thousand supernova, then nothing, as uf it was snuffed out in an instant.

Ripples of catastrophic energy hit him again and again. Suddenly the vastness of the Jedi Temple that he had been in awe of began closing in on him as this world attacked him.

Then came the blaster fire.

Thalia seemed to have quick reflexes, and she was able to duck behind a pillar as that first bolt was released from the blaster of an approaching clone. But others weren't so lucky. Eddie, in his incorporeal form and frozen with the assault of his senses, remained in the middle of the hall.

He witnessed the relentless approach of the clones from an intersecting hallway, the flurry of sizzling blaster bolts, and the ignition of at least a dozen lightsabers as their owners quickly sought to defend the onslaught.

It didn't help though, and bodies fell quicker than Eddie could really keep up with. One mis-timed slash of a lightsaber, and suddenly a new wave of pain shot through him. One blaster bolt deflected, ricocheting off a wall, and found its way into the poorly protected neck of a clone trooper, and he was assaulted by another wave.

Screams and cries echoed around him, not just from Thalia or the surrounding Jedi...but from all directions. Every hallway, every corner of the temple.

Every corner of the galaxy.

It was a barrage of the mind. Of the soul.

And Eddie realized that he wasn't simply confronted by his own emotions, his own fear and despair, over witnessing all of this, but also those of beings surrounding him.

His eyes finally shifted from the massacre, to Thalia who was also frozen in fear as she cowered behind that pillar.

No. He wasn't the one being hit with those emotions.

Thalia was.

He only felt it because he was here in her memories.

Blaster fire, clones, and an attack on the Jedi Temple. He had a memory of this night as well, the horror he felt at the news. But his memory of this existed in the safety of his datapad screen. Thalia had lived this firsthand.

She had to survive.

He finally found the courage within him to move. He took several steps towards her and knelt down to her level to offer a hand.

"Come on," he urged. "Let's go."

She ignored him. Looked past him.

"I said let's go."

Her eyes followed every blaster bolt that passed until they slowed, and then stopped.

Eddie could feel the barrage of emotion start to lessen as Thalia took deep breaths and waited. After a few beats of silence and stillness, coldness was all that remained. Emptiness.

And an echo of fear.

"There is no fear," she whispered to herself. Or maybe to Eddie, as her eyes finally focused on him. "There is only peace."

"Well, I'm plenty scared," he whispered back to her.

She hoisted herself to her feet and slowly stepped back into the center of the hallway. She tip-toed over the bodies where Eddie just walked atop them. Through them. She didn't have the luxury of being a ghost here; this was real to her.

Thalia's booted feet toed at lightsaber hilts that fell from limp hands, and she paused in consideration, before she reached the first clone that had fallen in the hallway. She knelt down and pried the blaster from its hands.

"I thought you didn't like blasters," he commented.

She took another deep breath and began, lip quivering. "The force is everywhere. It binds us. Surrounds us. If we focus on it, it can help us find the answers we seek."

She pointed the blaster at him, through him, down the way the clones had arrived. "There are more of them down there." Eddie turned his head and then looked back at her.

"It doesn't take a Jedi to figure that out," he deadpanned, but she ignored him. Then she turned and pointed in the direction they came.

"They're also that way," she explained. "I can feel them. Can you?"

"I don't know, I'm not—" He stopped short as there was the slightest tickle in his mind. Outside of the cold emptiness, he felt the looming presence of danger. The despair, the pain that had assaulted him earlier. Not just the individual feeling of the clones themselves as they attacked, but the carnage they left in their wake.

Yes, if he and Thalia doubled back the way they came, towards the library, they'd encounter clones. But not as many as they would if they soldiered ahead.

"Lead the way, then." He gestured forward to young Thalia, and then followed her as she began to navigate through the sea of corpses. "Why don't you use your lightsaber?"

"I'm out of practice," she explained. "Members of the Service Corps still wear them, but they're more for show. I'm not a soldier, remember?"

"But you'll fire a blaster."

She ignored him again and kept creeping further down the hall. Until she came to a crossroads where several living Jedi ran past, scrambling for their weapons as they fled. Or maybe ran towards the attacking clones to try and defend...

Their home.

"Was this your home?" he asked Thalia.

"That's a stupid question." There was obvious annoyance in the way she flicked her braid over her shoulder and held her blaster at attention.

"There are no such things as stupid questions."

"Just stupid people." It felt like an insult. It was probably meant to be one. "Don't try to distract me."

They kept walking, confidently. Thalia was able to take out a few clone troopers as she came across them, but she had been right. She wasn't a soldier. She was sloppy with her aim, but she was quick to anticipate their movements.

"Why don't you use the force?" he asked as she ducked behind another pillar.

"It doesn't work that way!" She shouted at him.

The momentary distraction led to a blaster bolt hitting the pillar, close to her head, and she fell to the ground as it exploded in with shards of marble and dust.

Eddie felt as disoriented as she was, heard the ringing in his ears that she must've heard. But when it cleared and she sat up, she was immediately alert and attentive.

Especially when she spotted the two figures dispatching of the troopers that had taken the shots.

"Steev! R'sshekh!" Thalia shouted and scrambled to her feet once the coast was clear. They both turned towards her—a young human man and a trandoshan, both with disheveled robes and lightsabers drawn—and started in her direction.

She pivoted, blaster in hand to make sure the coast was clear, before she ran to join them. The human padawan deactivated his saber and pulled Thalia into a relieved hug.

"You're alive," he said, words muffled by the shoulder of her tunic. "They...the clones...they're killing everyone."

"I know, Steev. I saw Master Pace try to seal off the East Wing. There was only so much blaster fire he could deflect."

R'sshekh said something in Dosh, unintelligible to Eddie, but Thalia and Steev seemed to understand. They parted from one another.

"You're right," Steev nodded. "We need to get to the hangar. Get a ship, go to the senate."

"Are you crazy?" Thalia practically screeched. "I'm sure they'll have the hangar guarded. And the senate? The clones aren't acting alone; someone ordered them to attack. We need to get out of the temple as quickly as we can."

"And how do you suggest we do that?" Steev asked impatiently, hands falling to his hips.

R'sshekh spoke again, but Thalia talked over him.

"The service ducts," she said. "The ones we used to explore. If we find the right one, it'll spit us out into The Works."

Steev wrinkled his nose in disgust and scoffed. "Those dusty old tunnels are full of the rotting husks of ancient droids. I'm not going down there again."

"Then do you want to take your chances trying to go out the main entrance?" Thalia asked, voice laden with sarcasm, as she gestured down an adjacent hallway. "I'm sure the coast is clear."

Steev and R'sshekh glanced at each other and then gestured for Thalia to lead them onwards. She looked past them at Eddie and then tilted her head to get him to follow as well.

As if he even could wander off on his own.

The journey was a blur. More winding hallways and stairs, more troopers firing, but Thalia could trust one of her companions to defend her. Especially that Steev kid, who'd jump to her aid and then scold her for being reckless.

At one point, Eddie skipped ahead and tried to whisper in her ear, "Is he your boyfriend?"

"Jedi aren't allowed to form attachments," she snapped at him defensively, then paused. "But yes, he was my friend. And R'sshekh. We were all from the same crèche."

"Well, Steev kind of seems like a jerk."

Thalia looked over her shoulder at Steev, and then sighed. "Yeah. He was."

Eddie noticed her use of the past tense, and he felt a pit open up in his gut.

"Are we there yet?"

"No."

"How about now?"

"No!"

"We've been walking forever."

"The kid has a point," Eddie piped up from the back of the group, earning a scathing glare from young Thalia. "We have been walking forever."

R'sshekh seemed to agree with Eddie and Steev as well, if their intonation was any indicator, and Eddie gestured at the Trandoshan in an "I told you so."

"Thank you, Thalia, for getting us to safety," Thalia said, deepening her voice to match the timber of...well, truly any of them. "Thank you for having the good sense not to follow us blindly as we got ourselves killed." She made a crude hand gesture to them all to punctuate her point and then kept going.

Eddie had lost all sense of direction by this point. Up, down, left, right. They were in a hallway that didn't seem like a hallway anymore. He wasn't even sure they were even in the Jedi Temple, but the distant sound of blaster fire and the ignition of lightsabers assured him that, yes, they were.

The three older teens had picked up some stragglers along their stealthy escape from the temple. Another padawan with a wounded shoulder, her arm now stabilized and tied to her torso with a ripped piece of Steev's robe. They’d also found two younglings cowering behind a pile of twisted trooper bodies. R'sshekh took to holding each of the small children's hands as they continued on their way.

Eddie felt aware of every step he took, felt each of their weariness and the sting of any injuries, because Thalia felt them.

And when fear suddenly gripped her, he felt it too.

"Go on ahead," she told the others as she stopped in her tracks. "The old tunnels start up ahead. And then we keep going until we hit the pipeworks. We can take a break there."

All the kids groaned but kept going.

Until it was just Thalia and Eddie.

"You wanna show me something?" he questioned.

"Not specifically," she responded with a sigh. "But I had noticed something then...so you need to see it, too, now."

She waved him over and revealed the vent she had hidden behind her. It was a small grate, big enough for one of the younglings to crawl through maybe, if that was the reason she noticed it. But as he got closer, he saw that it overlooked, what he believed to be, the vast Great Hall of the Jedi temple.

He couldn't even enjoy the majesty of it—the towering statues or aurebesh carvings that lined the ancient walls, or the way that the rising sun streamed in and made the marble pillars sparkle—because it was full of the dead. Jedi and Clones alike. And there was a whole legion of clone troopers spread throughout the hall, armed and ready for any living Jedi to be taken care of as they attempted to escaoe.

"Turns out these tunnels weren't such a bad idea, after all," Eddie stated lightly.

"Watch," Thalia hissed.

Two cloaked figures strode through the hall then, from the far threshold that led into the depths of the temple, back towards the steps that led out to Coruscant.

A cloud of darkness seemed to follow them, as dark as the cloaks that they wore. Eddie could feel it, even from the distance, with half of the Great Hall and the thick marble walls separating them. It slithered up his throat, grabbed him, choked him.

But he couldn't look away.

One of the figures stopped and surveyed the devastation, and they toed at the leg of a nearby body, before cackling. Twisted hands raised towards the sky in vile jubilation, and then returned to their limp position before the hooded figure.

"Good, Anakin, good," the familiar, rasping voice echoed through the hall. The other figure dropped to one knee, and dropped their head in deference. "You have done well, my new apprentice. Now, go and bring peace to our Empire."

Eddie felt a chill in recognition. He knew that voice. Everyone knew that voice—

Chancellor Palpatine...The Emperor.

—And he knew that name. Or maybe he didn't, not really. Not at all.

Anakin Skywalker, one of the greatest heroes of the republic.

Eddie recoiled from the vent and shook his head.

"No," he forced out through gritted teeth. "No. It can't be."

"I thought so, too," Thalia said sadly, and when she finally turned to look at him, he saw tears dripping down her cheeks. Kriff, he felt his own tears begin to sting the corners of his eyes. "But it was true."

Anakin Skywalker. General Skywalker. The poster boy of the Republic. The Hero With No Fear. How many interviews had he done on the HoloNet, how many times had Eddie and his friends hero-worshipped Anakin alongside his fellow Jedi? How many times had Eddie considered spending the few measly credits of allowance he got from Wane on a war bond just because Anakin's face had been plastered on every screen in the Terrace?

"He wouldn't betray the Jedi."

"He did."

"He was a hero."

"He was seduced by the Dark Side."

"He wouldn't do that...the Jedi were his family. His friends."

Then there was an echo in the air, as Thalia spoke to him through the Force.

"Anakin betrayed his friends. And so did I."

He was about to ask for clarification when was thrown from the tunnel, and the world swirled around him. Images flashed before his eyes of the ragtag group of kids climbing out of a filthy pipe in The Works on Coruscant. Their slow trek across the city to CoCo Town where they found refuge at a diner. Dex's Diner. The days and weeks that they stuck together to care for each other.

He felt like he was going cross-eyed at the sheer speed and volume of the information being filtered directly into his mind; it was almost painful, and Thalia was in control. He didn’t understand what she was trying to convey, until he followed her younger self through the day her world changed.

The moments leading up to it were deceptively quick. A day as uneventful as any, as she volunteered to venture out alone and find supplies. But she’d made a stupid mistake. Sympathetic to the cries of the younglings who missed the only home they’d ever known, she’d ventured back to the Temple through the tunnels they’d escaped through to fetch belongings that couldn’t be replaced. And upon her return? She was chased down winding streets by the Coruscant Security Forces and captured.

Then he was in a room, lit by only a faint, red light emanating through the grated floors. He couldn’t move, no matter how much he thrashed and shook. His arms and legs were locked in place; he could see Imperial interrogation droids floating in his peripheral vision, and a scan grid hanging menacingly overhead, waiting to be lowered onto him.

“Let me go!” He tried to yell, but the voice that came from his mouth was not his, but Thalia’s. “Help! Help me!”

A blast door opened and clone troopers filed in, along with a ghastly figure dressed in black and red. A Pau’an male who looked sickly and monstrous, but grinned menacingly as he approached.

“You’ll tell us where they are,” he droned in a terrible voce. “It. Is. Inevitable.”

More images flashed before Eddie’s eyes, of this same man. Healthy and friendly, Hen-ri, a Jedi Temple Guard that had known Thalia and her friends; how had he become…this thing? Corrupted by the Empire? A slayer of the Jedi, instead of a protector of them.

Just like Anakin had been.

“You’re gonna have to kill me,” he…Thalia…spat.

“If that’s what it takes,” he droned and waved to the troopers.

He couldn’t dwell on his emotions for much longer because pain was the only thing he felt. Shocks and burns from the scan grid, injections from the floating interrogation droids.

They starved her, beat her.

Until she begged them, whimpered for them to stop.

Until she gave them the location of her friends.

Eddie felt the hot, burning pain in his heart as he felt the words fall from her lips; for a second, he couldn’t blame her, as his head drooped weakly and the world went dark.

But when his eyes opened again…there stood a beaten and bloody Steev standing across from him. Across from Thalia. He was being held back by troopers, Jedi robes drenched in blood, as he thrashed and screamed and bared his teeth.

Thalia blinked once. Twice. And then her gaze shifted back down at the ground, and saw the bodies of the children–the younglings and R'sshekh–strewn about the floor. Dead.

There was a flash of light, burning and hateful and shockingly red.

And Eddie was thrown from her body as she screamed, as chaos reigned as her control of the Force became untethered. The sight of the walls of the room caving in on themselves was last thing he saw before he returned back to the real world.

He gasped for breath as he was shoved back into his body in the escape pod. Back with Thalia, the real Thalia, older and wearier and with blue hair. Tears streamed down his cheeks and he immediately rubbed his eyes to get them to stop.

He felt sick, the images of those kids burned into his eyelids. The sound of Steev and Thalia’s screams echoed in his ears.

"What was that?" He barked out the demand, voice scathing and viscous. "Why did you show me that?"

Thalia pulled her hand back to her lap; she cradled it in the other hand, as though she was protecting it from further harm.

Maybe she was...but not harm to herself. Harm to him. Harm that she caused him; he still felt the phantom pains of her torture. And he didn't want to snap at her again, after feeling the barrage of her anguish, but he did.

"Thalia!" She jumped at his bark. He demanded answers. "Why?"

"Because you had to know!" She snapped back at him. "I betrayed them."

"You...you survived." He shook his head incredulously. "You had to survive, you were just a kid too. But why would you show me that way?" he questioned. He got to his feet and stood over her. "Why would you take me though the day that the order fell...and then..."

"How else could I tell you about the most shameful days of my life?" she asked, getting to her feet as well. "I've relive those days enough. Constantly. My mistakes. My weaknesses. You think I just survived? I…I chose to survive rather than die for those kids…for my friends. Look me in the eye and tell me you wouldn't die for your friends?"

She breathed heavily and stared directly into his eyes, daring him to lie to her. When he didn't answer, she grabbed the front of his jacket desperately.

"Your friends trust you. Just like my friends all trusted me. And I let them down."

"It's in the past," he muttered. "You have to move on. You can't fix it...can't change it."

"And that's exactly what I'm doing," she nodded. "It's what I do next...how I fix those mistakes...that's important.

"I showed you that day because I needed you to...to know. You found out what I am before I got the chance to tell you anything, Eddie. I wish...I wish I could've told you the truth but I needed to know I could trust you with all of it. You're still...you're still angry, still confused abut why I couldn't; I can sense it in you.

"But I need you to understand that the capability for betrayal lies with more than simply trusting someone. I betrayed my friends…I brought them to certain death, even though I said I would die for them. Which is why I did it this way, why I had to make sure I could trust you with my secrets before I revealed them to you."

Why would she do that? Why would it matter?

He was not a jedi. He was just a smuggler. He was nobody, nothing, a stranger. He wasn’t a part of her journey, wasn’t a part of anything. And she'd deliberately put him and his crew in danger. Even more danger, now that he knew that she'd escaped...not only the purge of the Jedi Order, but the clutches of the Empire itself.

So why had this experience shaken him as badly as it did?

He took a breath, swallowed, and steeled himself; he still wasn't comfortable with Thalia being able to read him as easily as she was able to.

"Well, thanks for trusting me with that," he said dismissively. "It's been nice to meet the real you, Thalia. It'll just be a few more days until we'll arrive on Coruscant and you'll be on your way."

"Eddie, please—" She stared at him with pleading eyes but he refused to look, refused to understand what it was she was trying to convey.

"And you don't have to worry about me or any of my crew keeping this a secret. We know how to keep our mouths shut."

"But that isn't enough," Thalia snapped.

"What do you want then?" He shook her hands off of him and stomped out of the escape pod. "Do you want...absolution? Is that what you're looking for? You can't forgive yourself? Well newsflash, I can't forgive you either; I don't even know you. You know what? You want my help? I've heard there are cults in the Unknown Regions who do things like that. We can change course right now."

"I need you to listen to me!"

"I think I've heard enough!"

There were aggressive beeps and the sound of footsteps walking down the ramp to the lower deck.

"What's going on down here?" Dayv demanded.

"It sounds like you let a bunch of Rancors fight," G'areth added.

D5-TN rolled over to Thalia and questioned if she was ok through a series of gentle whistles.

"If she's ok?" Eddie scoffed. "What about me? I'm your captain."

"Hey." Jeff crossed the short distance and slapped a hand on his shoulder then shook him a little bit. "It'll be ok, just take a few breaths. Why're you so upset?"

"Let Miss Mind Meld over there take you on a journey across time and space and you'll understand why I'm upset," Eddie scoffed and threw a hand out at Thalia. "But I'm sure if she did, you'd all want to toss her out into deep space. I think we were better off when she was still keeping secrets!"

"Did she tell you what's in that container?" Jeff asked.

"No!"

"I was about to, actually," Thalia cut in. Her brows were raised expectantly and she had her hands on her hips in a stance that, Eddie recognized, mirrored Steev's.

"Well, I wish you wouldn't," he told her weakly. "I can't deal with anymore...emotional turmoil today."

She muttered a few choice words under her breath and then began walking down to the cargo bay. D5-TN was hot on her heels, and Dayv and G'areth were soon to follow.

"C'mon," Jeff urged Eddie lightly. "It can't be worse than...whatever that was."

"Somehow, I doubt that," Eddie grumbled, but let his friend push him forward.

"The day the Republic fell," Thalia recounted as she stepped around the container, pressing seemingly unassuming panels at random intervals until a small panel slid aside and revealed a Datapad. "I led a bunch of younglings and initiates to safety. And a few weeks later, I was the reason they were captured and killed by the Empire. I would've died too...but...you know, when you witness something so harrowing as your friends dying...something inside of you dies, too."

She tapped the screen of the datapad over and over, typing long strings of code into it.

"I escaped and I honored my friends by surviving. But I vowed never to use the Force again. The thing about that is that the Force has other plans for you sometimes. So, a year ago...I was presented with a new...opportunity. Not only to live, but to do some good. To protect force-sensitive individuals, the way that I couldn't do when I was younger."

The front of the container hissed and then popped open. It slowly creaked forward, like a door.

"And so, I smuggle things...along with a network of other freelancers," Thalia continued, striding towards the front of the container. "Taking precious cargo, like this cargo, someplace safe."

She stopped at the opening and waved her hand towards herself.

"It's okay," she said softly. "You guys can come out now."

The crew of the Dragonborn stood frozen as almost a dozen figures emerged from the cargo container.

Two adults, a short togruta woman and a towering Nikto male. And then...kids.

Two adolescent togruta boys who hovered behind who was obviously their mother. And a little Zabrak girl who held the Nikto's hand. A twi'lek boy and girl, obviously siblings if their coloring gave them away; the older sister held the boy back when his eyes lit up at the sight of D5-TN. After them stomped out a short Theelin female with bright red hair and an awful attitude if the expression on her face was anything to go by.

And then humans. Run of the mill humans. A brother and sister who seemed to be bickering. And a tall girl who was probably more of an adult than a child, but her gangly limbs and round cheeks gave her more of a childish quality.

They all stopped and stood under the scrutiny of Eddie and his crew as Thalia went to each of them and reassured them that everything was safe and they were going to be ok.

"They have food and other supplies in there." She then turned to the group of smugglers. "And they've all traveled a long way, along this...thing...called the Hidden Path. To keep surviving Jedi and other force sensitives safe from the Empire. They could've been sent anywhere but they, unfortunately, got stuck with me for the last leg of their journey."

She held her hands out beside her, as if to say Here I am, take it or leave it.

Everyone turned and looked at Eddie then, who stood there in silent shock. He, of course, was a mess of conflicting emotions. Anger lingered, confusion, relief that this was what they were hauling across the galaxy, and then, deep down, fear. Because, as he had pointed out earlier, they were heading to Coruscant.

The seat of the Empire.

Teaming with Stormtroopers and, oh yeah, The Emperor.

And suddenly he wasn't just faced with the reality that Thalia was the one they had to keep safe from possibly being found. But all of these people, too. People he hadn't even realized had been on his ship.

People who were packed into that container like a can of burra fish.

He couldn't put any words to what he was thinking, so he simply raised a hand to cover his mouth, and he shook his head...confused.

"I have some friends and a ship waiting for me on Coruscant to take them to their final stop on the journey," Thalia explained. "To this planet...Bogano. It's an abandoned planet that Master Cordova had...rediscovered. Before the fall of the Order. Before the Purge. The only others who knew about it were his assistant...and his datapad. Both of which are conveniently on this ship."

She smiled a cheeky little smile at her own joke, then went somber.

"Master Cordova...well, he's one of the Jedi who are still unaccounted for. But...I have hope."

The gangly girl laid a comforting hand on Thalia's shoulder and gave her a shaky smile.

"We have hope, too," she said softly.

Thalia patted her hand thankfully and then looked back at the guys.

At Eddie, specifically.

"It's not much," she said with a sense of finality. "But it's a start to fix what it is I did...all those years ago. I have a list of people that can be saved, and I will do everything in my power to save them. To honor the ones I couldn’t."

"Wait a damn minute," G'areth piped up, voice laden with confusion. "If you had another ship...a crew on Coruscant, why couldn't they have just met up with you and the Assob's on Nar Shaddaa? Taking these guys straight to this...Bonago."

"Bogano," Thalia corrected him.

"Whatever." G'areth rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, and does this really mean we're not gonna get paid?" Jeff added.

"You're going to get paid," Thalia assured him.

"Then I don't see why we need to ask anymore questions," he joked. "We're on course to Coruscant, end of story."

"Well, I wanna know," Eddie finally spoke. He stepped out of the group with his friends and eyed each of the newcomers—if you could call them that—aboard the ship, then at Thalia. "I want to know why you needed our help with this. Why you sought me and my crew to help you haul a bunch of...runaways halfway across the galaxy, incognito. Instead of using your own ship. Your own crew."

"They're not really my crew," Thalia argued, but Eddie's brows jumped as high as they could and he grit his teeth impatiently as he waited for an answer. "Alright. I did my research, I sought you guys out. I sought you out, Eddie, because these kids...are not the only people I'm trying to keep safe from the Empire. They're not the only Force sensitives I'm trying to save."

She took a step closer to him, putting them practically nose to nose, and dropped her voice low.

"You told me on Outpost 86 that you'd always dreamed of a day that the Jedi would come and tell you that you belonged with them. That they'd take you away from your miserable, boring life," she whispered.

His heart dropped into his stomach, anticipating what she might say next.

Still, he had the audacity to whisper back, "I don't think I used the word miserable."

Thalia, of course, scoffed and rolled her eyes.

Then she said, "Eddric Reckless Moonsun. Consider yourself rescued."

Next Chapter: When Ambush Come to Shove (2/25 at 7PM CST)

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#eddie munson #eddie munson x oc #eddie munson x OFC #star wars AU #stranger things x star wars #stranger things fic #eddie munson fic #eddie munson big bang #embb #luminous beings st au

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add1ctedt0you · 1 year ago

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Sucker for pain

That's for all the writers who look at jiang cheng and decide to put him through other unimaginable woes. <3 As if his life wasn't rough enough lol.

#Like. Most of wwx fic I have read were like:' everyone should be sorry for wwx and acknowledge his grief to the point of being ooc'#'We just want people to love and protect awu innocent xianxian'#And then there are jc fics where authors are like: ohhhhhhh. The stages of grief are five???? Good. jc is going to expiriece 12 stages #of grief!!!!#You blink and the jc is put through non-con. calamities. deaths. tortures. trauma. rough times. in particular wwx-related-rough-time #authors are like: 'he didn't suffer enough: we'll make him experience every pain and woes known to humankind'#And at the end of the fic jc is almost always like: 'time to get up from this puddle of my own blood and see how jl is doing'#It's wild tbh. I've few theories why this happens lmao #If it wasn't clear: keep it up you all!#*mgifs #*stp #jiang cheng

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obnoxiousarcade · 8 months ago

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I have a longing to be understood more than anything else i think

#someone very recently acknowledged something that usually goes unseen and it wasn't even that great of an acknowledgement but ive just been #staring at the messages every once in a while. its great. not really i sort of feel like a real weirdo #im very lonely. i cant say why but let it be known that i am very lonely #ok i have a question to those who lie their eyes upon this post: tell me what you know about me please?#so much lies in my social perception and i am just. not being perceived. at all. darn #i have a lot to cry about but morally i dont think i should-- specifics would mean being mean to the people i love #talking to anyone anymore just makes me feel horrible. doing anything anymore makes me feel horrible..tmbg has my back though ill live for #another.week or a few. and then my birthday will happen and rhen um #.Well. it sucks that sucks man. i dont want to disclose my age but to elaborate on why ACTUALLY HOLD ON #the thing i am about to say is not true; it is a metaphorical thing: it is my 21st birthday soon.#i decided that i wouldnt live past this age around 5 years ago and the only reason ive lived five years is being killed this year. i dont #think every thing ive been desperately clinging on to for the past 2 (?) years can keep me alive past then..i think im going to die. i have #to #NO MORE BEING A DOWNER #fox (vulpes vulpes) on the Internet for the first time #okay maybe a little more..i dont know who im talking to in this post. my friends do not read my tumblr and. i dont know anyone else.really.#uh #I'm listen to tmbg right now i love them #hey reader; i can only think of 3 people who see enough about me to check my blog. so i have separate questions for the each of you.#one of you likes (liked? school came in and i couldnt see your blog much past then; idk if its changed) tmbg. what do you think of The Else?#and uh you there... the guyyy. Google john flansburgh..i dont have a reason to this one ive just not been able to stop thinking about askin #you what you think of him.#um third person..... um #okay theres nothing iecan ask. i do want to apologize to you though: im sorry.#iThis is bullshit #im gonna delete this soon #Um also sorry if my wording here is. really wack. i tend to do that #i dont think anyones going to see this as is always #i think i just like talking to the hypothetical beast. yeah

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thecollectter · 2 years ago

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OK, I'm totally ret-coning the DC lore because I don't have the mental energy to research and make this accurate. Plus I don't normally write for prompts but this one seems to be taking me somewhere so we'll see where this goes lol

BTW I have no idea where this is going or how long it will be. Lets' see where this story takes me. I'll try to include the bits and pieces from other reblogs but no promises. My writing tends to get a mind of its own once it gets going

After-writing edit: This was longer than I planned. Then again I didn't really plan this at all haha. 3733 words total for the story lol

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The discovery of the hidden lab was purely by accident. The Young Justice team had been in the area on a recon mission gone wrong and had stumbled upon the facility during the ensuing fight. It wouldn't have seemed suspicious at all if not for the giant green energy shield that sprung up around the facility when superboy came close. Honestly, the only reason the team didn't investigate themselves(upon checking that the energy field didn't seem to do anything) was because of the large group of weapon smugglers working for the light they had taken down. It wasn't safe enough to leave them and investigate, especially with all the weapons lying around.

So they reported their findings to Nightwing and the Justice League. Red Robin managed to sneak inside(which was surprisingly difficult) and managed to snag a few files from their systems. He couldn't get very far in, as their computer security was unlike anything he had ever seen before. The little he did manage to get was worrying, though.

Nightwing told the team to finish the cleanup from their assigned mission, and pull back. He wanted a look at the files Red Robin gathered before doing anything.

It was concerning to Nightwing how little information RR was able to gather, especially since what they did have was very concerning. Lots of secret code names for agents(the number alone was worrying), projects and more, plus some alarming terminology that brought Nightwing back to his Robin days when they found Superboy. Plus, the new information coincided with some whispers they had been getting from the Light about a new CADMUS operation in the works.

Whatever the operation was that they had discovered in Illinois, it was big, and waving some red flags. Plus, they had tech unlike anything Nightwing had seen before. So, the information was brought to Batman, and then the Justice League. If this was truly the CADMUS operation they'd been worrying about, it was better to act now with force, then wait for them to further develop whatever they were working on. Plus, they most definitely had security that definitely picked up the YJ team nearby. So the faster they acted, the less likely it was that the building would be empty and the project gone in the wind.

And if it wasn't CADMUS, well something concerning was going on that needed to be stopped either way.

For this particular mission, the main members of the Justice League was going, along with Nightwing and the Young Justice Team. Red Hood and Red Arrow of the Outlaws had heard of the raid and demanded to be let in on the mission, due to Red Arrows history with Cadmus and Red Hoods general dislike of secret science organizations. So they were let in on the mission under the condition of no killing. Plus, the Facility was Massive, so the more heroes involved to do crowd control the better. That meant it was less likely for someone to escape with important information. So, only a day and a half after the discovery of the Facility, The Justice League made their move.

They were expecting a battle, but the battle they got was nothing like they expected. First, the tech this group possessed was unusual and extremely destructive. Second, they seemed to multiply like ants swarming out of an ant colony. A seemingly endless flood of agents in white suits. All wielding the futuristic looking silver and green blasters that shot an explosive green energy. Green energy that was a worryingly familiar shade to members of Batman's brood. But despite the tech and their numbers, the agents were awful shots. Not that getting shot was much of a worry once the league discovered that the weapons didn't do that much damage to people. Until one stray blast hit Red Hood.

He went down hard, a shot to his side, while the Agents seemed to zero in on him. Not that they managed to get anywhere near him. Any Hero's nearby were quick to cover him while he recovered. The pit rage, which had been simmering just under the surface barely under control since he had first seen the Lazarus green energy beams, rose to a full boil. It overwhelmed his senses, sending him back into the fight with a vengeance few had seen in recent months. It took every bit of self control he had left to not kill anyone.

Agents went down left and right as Hood plowed a path into the building. Batman, Nightwing, Red Robin, Robin, Wonder Woman, and Red Arrow all followed in his wake, taking advantage of the path he was creating. They plowed their way through the facility. Once the numbers were reduced, it was pretty easy to take the agents out.

They expected to find a CADMUS lab. What they actually found was worse. First was the science labs, filled with strange assortment of Chemistry and medical equipment, technology parts, and beakers upon beakers of a glowing substance in that Familiar Lazarus Green color. Everything that could be white was white. Next was the Medical wing, though the medical equipment there was definitely not used for the purpose of medicine. Once again, everything was white. They started sensing a theme. One of the surgical rooms still had yet to be cleaned, the table, floors, equipment and some of the walls covered in the now familiar substance, though it was duller in appearance.

Then they found the cell block. Once again white, the cell block was mostly empty. The few that weren't were buzzing with a now familiar green energy. In once cell was a green dog, wearing a green and silver muzzle, whimpering in the corner. A viscous green substance could be seen in splotches inside the space. Other cells held a similar sight, a green animal wearing a muzzle and various restraints depending on the danger it could pose. Then they found the kid.

In a cell set apart from the rest, behind a massive metal door, was a boy. He was huddled in the back corner, eyes glazed and staring into nothing. He seemed to be maybe 15 or 16 years old, black hair and blue eyes, wearing white clothes that were stained with red and green. Bandages peeked out from beneath his clothes, with one notable one around his neck, stained red and brown. His ankles had metal cuffs on them, one of which was connected to the back of the cell with a glowing green chain. A chain that was notably too short to reach the cot on the other side of the room. There were similar cuffs on his wrists that looked like they could be connected to other various chains on the walls. And he wore a muzzle. There was a plaque on the door labeled "Phantom".

Red Hood was shaking with rage, and had to be held back from killing one agent while the rest of the heroes took care of the rest of the agents in the area. With no more Agents to attack, he stormed off to cool down, Red Arrow and Nightwing right behind him to keep him under control. Red Robin was trying and failing to open the door and get to the kid while Batman went to the main computer console in the corner. He needed information on what this place was and what was going on here.

Getting through the computers security was no easy feat, and Batman had to resort to using one of the agents badges to get further access to the systems. What he found was horrifying. A secret government agency, called the Ghost Investigation Ward, or GIW for short, dedicated to the experimentation and eradication of beings known as Ecto-Entities. There was an alarming amount of documented research into them, and from the little he read in his skimming, they were labeled as non-sentient and unfeeling creatures. All the while keeping records of the creatures very sentient reactions to their experiments. The research was extremely biased, and the things they had documented for their experiments was horrifying. Worst of all, it was all legal.

The Anti-Ecto acts were cited all through their research as the laws that made what they do legal. Acts that violated the Meta-human rights acts, that somehow managed to pass beneath the Justice Leagues notice. Batman downloaded all the information in the servers to look over further later. The League had a lot of work to do.

Red Robin, meanwhile was making no headway in opening the cell door to the kid named Phantom. The doors locking mechanisms were controlled remotely, and his usual methods of bypassing it weren't working. it wasn't till he told Batman of his struggle that Batman found the proper command in the computer to open the door. Finally, the cell door opened, everyone else who was still in the room standing back to give Red Robin some room. Best not to spook the kid with too many new people at once.

Phantom, who had been unresponsive through the whole battle and Red Robins attempts to open the door, finally reacted at the sound of the door opening. He curled further into himself and the corner, making no noise but shaking like a leaf.

"Phantom?" RR spoke hesitantly, keeping out of the range of the chain on the kids ankle just in case.

Phantom flinched, hiding his face even more.

"I'm not going to hurt you." RR spoke, fighting to keep his voice calm despite the anger, disgust, and horror rolling in his stomach.

Phantom finally looked up, staring foggily at RR for a good 10 seconds before his eyes widened in surprise. His arms went slack as he sat up a bit straighter. His eyes never left RR

Red Robin waited for the kid to do something, but the boy just stared in shock.

There was a bang from somewhere in the facility, and Phantom immediately retreated back into his ball.

"Hey, calm down. I'm really not going to hurt you." RR said, pausing to see phantoms reaction. His eyes peaked over his knees and arms. "Whatever these people have been doing to you, it stops now. We are going to get you out of here, and get you somewhere they can never find you and hurt you again."

Phantom stared at Red Robin, suspicion slowly being overtaken with hope in his eyes.

"Can I come closer? I want to try to remove some of your restraints." RR said softly, holding his hands in front of him to show he meant no harm. Phantom nodded hesitantly.

Red Robin slowly made his way closer to the kid, trying not to spook him. Phantom let RR examine the cuffs and chain that tied him to the wall, and saw no means of releasing them. They were obviously more than just shackles, made of the same silver metal with green details. The chains themselves were literally glowing green.

"I can't get these off myself, but I have a friend who can. Can I go get someone else who can help?" RR asked, once he realized that he was not equipped to release any of the kids restraints.

Phantom hesitated a moment, and nodded, relaxing his posture a bit as the idea of freedom started to simmer.

So Red Robin retreated from the cell, to find Batman, Wonder woman, and Robin waiting. Nightwing and Red Arrow were probably still trying to calm down Hood. RR quickly updated everyone on the physical and mental state of the boy, and his lack of ability to undo his restraints.

At about that same moment, they received word that the last of the Agents had been apprehended, and members of the Young Justice team and Justice league had joined in searching the building with others were left to gather the downed agents. Batman relayed that everyone who had gone inside following Red Hood were alright. He also asked for Superman to join them.

In no time at all, Superman joined them and was quickly updated on the situation. Red Robin then led him to Phantoms cell, hoping the Kryptonian would be able to release the boys bindings. Everyone else stayed back though, not wanting to overwhelm him.

"Alright, I've gotten my friend to help," Red Robin said, entering the room and gesturing for Superman to follow. "He's really strong and should be able to break those things that are holding you here, ok?"

The kid looked hesitant, but nodded his assent.

Superman instantly noted the blood and the green spatters, and barely managed to hid his concern at the kids extremely low heart rate. It was then he noted that the other animals in captivity didn't have heartbeats at all.

Filing that information away, Superman crouched in front of the kid.

"My name is Superman, lets get these restraints off of you, alright?" he said, waiting for the kid to nod before gently grabbing the chain bound to his ankle. It buzzed with an unfamiliar energy, and took a surprising amount of strength to break.

He went for the anklet itself next, making sure the kid was still calm before snapping it off. The rest of the cuffs followed. Soon, only the muzzle was left. He'd left it for last to gain the kids trust before removing the biggest and worst one.

It took almost all his strength to break the muzzle, while trying to be gentle and not jostle him.

"There," Superman said, sitting back on his heels and smiling and the kid. "Is there any I missed?"

Phantom slowly shook his head, a look of hesitant relief on his face while he rubbed at his wrists and ankles. Superman swore he heard a low rumble briefly coming from the kid.

Red Robin observed silently at the door, noting the red scaring on Phantoms wrists and ankles after the manacles were removed. It was hard to tell the rest of his physical state due to his huddled position and the stiff baggy clothes he wore. He'd been here a long time though, that much was obvious. Tim just wanted to know what these men in white were so afraid of to treat him this way.

"Do you have a name?" Superman asked. "The plaque on the door say's your name is Phantom."

He opened his mouth to reply, but no sound came out. So instead, he sighed, a hand coming up to his throat, nodding sadly.

Red stepped forward, hand going to his utility belt and pulling out a notepad and pen.

"Can you try writing it?" he said, holding both items out to the kid.

He gratefully accepted the items. He carefully wrote something on the paper, paused and scratched something out, before presenting it to the two heroes.

Danny Fenton

"Nice to meet you Danny, I'm Red Robin. how do you feel about getting out of here?" he said, smirking at the teen.

Danny gave a small smile and clambered slowly to his feet. He wobbled, unsteady on his legs, and went to throw out a hand to catch himself on the wall. Instead, Superman caught him, quickly reaching out a gently hand and letting go as soon as Danny got his balance.

"Easy there," Superman said. "There's no rush. They can't hurt you anymore." Danny gave a sad smile and nodded.

"Now, fair warning," Red Robin said as they started leaving the room. "there's a few other heroes outside so don't freak out at the extra people."

Danny took a deep breath and followed the two heroes out.

Batman, having briefed everyone on what he had discovered, was back at the computer console making sure he had gotten everything they needed and working to wipe the systems. He was also trying to understand why their computer security was so confusing and hard to bypass. It almost seemed, alive somehow.

Robin was glaring at the cells that contained the other animals, probably told off by Batman that it was too dangerous to release them until they knew more. These animals that were probably alien or at least experiments were a very different unknown from the seemingly human boy. Though since Robin wasn't trying to open the cell's on his own, he must have been promised to be able to help with the animals once they were more prepared. Wonder Woman was conversing quietly with Nightwing, who had returned with Red Arrow and Red Hood sometime while Superman and Red Robin were freeing Danny. Red Arrow was muttering angrily to himself about crazy scientists while Red Hood was standing a distance away from everyone, fists clenched.

Everyone looked to Danny as they emerged from the cell, freezing him in place as he cautiously examined everyone. He seemed to be taking the new people pretty well, considering. Until he saw Red Hood.

As soon as he saw Hood, his eyes widened in shock, flashing a horrifyingly familiar Lazarus green as he let out a strange rumbling whine. A sound that was decidedly not human, accentuated by the fact that neither his mouth nor his throat moved at all. No one had any idea what it meant. Danny seemed a bit caught off guard by the noise himself, but was far more focused on starting at Red Hood.

Hood, meanwhile, had frozen as well, staring at this disheveled teen with Lazarus green eyes that had basically screamed the emotional equivalent of "What the f* happened to you?" at him.

"The f* you worried about me for?" he responded before he fully processed the fact that he knew what the strange noise meant. They had just rescued this kid from a creepy and messed up Government science facility, and he wondered what was wrong with Jason? So sue him for being offended. Plenty was wrong with him, but he would never admit that.

"And how the f* did I understand that..." Hood muttered.

Danny completely ignored everyone else and moved over to Hood, staring at him with an intense expression of confusion, worry and disgust.

"What? Do I have something on me?" Hood asked, thoroughly confused and worried now.

Everyone else was watching in confusion. This kid didn't seem that traumatized. That or whatever he saw in Red Hood was bad enough to make him forget what he had been through.

Danny circled hood, expression flicking between the same emotions. His nose even crinkling in disgust. He kept mouthing things and then huffing in frustration.

Red Robin moved forward.

"Danny, what do you see?" he asked tentatively.

Danny jumped, latching on to Hoods arm and hiding behind him. Hood had not been expecting this frighteningly small teenager, who had just been examining him like he was moldy food, to latch onto him. He managed to not attack the kid. Instead, following that instinct involving protecting kids, he maneuvered his arm and body so 'Danny' could better hide behind him.

After a few seconds of awkward silence, both Red Hood and Danny seemed to realize what they did. Danny jumped away, one hand rubbing the back of his neck. Hood staring between the kid and his arm. The kid was cold, cold enough to be felt through his armor in the short time Danny was holding on to him.

"You ok?" Red Robin asked, looking to Danny for confirmation.

Danny nodded, glancing around the place and growing visibly more uncomfortable. He also unconsciously took a step back towards Red Hood.

Batman stepped forward, taking control of the situation. He started giving orders to everyone in the room,

"Now," Batman continued. "Red Robin and Red Hood will escort Daniel out of the facility." Pausing briefly to note Danny's reaction to the more formal usage of his name, he continued. "From what I've already learned, Danny will need to to be taken to the Watchtower. That is the safest place for him to be until we can handle the situation."

He turned to address Danny.

"We mean you no harm. What has happened here is unacceptable, and I will find out how this escaped our notice." There was a finality to his tone, a dark assurance that only Batman could pull off in a comforting way. "In the meantime, our best doctors will be there to help you. I assure you that they mean you no harm, and if any harm should come to you at their hands, they will answer to me. You are safe. Understood?"

Danny had tensed at the mention of doctors, grabbing Hoods arm again in his agitation. But at the man in black's words of assurance, he relaxed the slightest bit.

The rest of those in the room echoed their agreement and assurances.

Danny gave a small smile, though it was strained.

Batman finalized everyone's instructions before turning back to Red Robin and Red Hood.

"I have already made the Watchtower aware of your arrival. Specific preparations are being made to ensure that Danny is comfortable and safe. I will forward you two the details."

RR and Hood nodded. Batman gave a small grunt of acknowledgement and returned the the computer console where Nightwing was waiting for him.

Hood and Red Robin turned to look at Danny.

"Now lets get you out of here. You ready?" Hood said.

Danny took a deep breath and straightened his shoulders. Then he nodded.

They started to leave, but Danny’s legs finally gave-out from under him. Hood caught him carefully, and after a brief hesitation, lifted the kid into a bridal carry.

“Don’t worry, kid,” Hood said, voice soft through the voice modulator. “You don’t need to be strong right now. We’ve got you. It’s all over.”

A second or two passed with both bat brothers walking in silence before Danny buried his head against Hood, and started shaking in silent sobs. Red Robin was silent on the exchanged, walking just ahead of Hood to make sure the path was clear and to warn any heroes off of asking questions. Making sure that the two weren't disturbed.

Hood simply walked, holding the sobbing teenager in his arms. Danny didn’t look to be that much younger than Tim. He didn’t know much of what Danny had been through, but it wasn’t hard to get an general idea. Normally the thought would make his blood boil and the pit rage take over. But the cold resonating from his contact with Danny seemed to be barely holding the rage at bay. Nothing had calmed the rage before.

Jason wasn’t complaining.

To be Continued? maybe? Not sure yet.

No one knew what to do with the boy. They had found him in a facility thought to be another Cadmus base but as it turns out, was a research compound for another group entirely. One that experimented on unknown beings while claiming to have affiliation with the government. That was already concerning in and of itself but the boy. The way that they found him.

His throat had been slit. As evident but the nasty scar and dirty bandages that covered it. If that wasn't bad enough, his mouth was also bound in some type of muzzle that took Superman applying most of his strength to break. It was almost as if the people of this facility were afraid of this boy's voice.

That wasn't even the worst of it though. Neither was the apparent fear and distrust in his eyes. Not even the small cell with the threadbare cot and no windows was the worst. No, the worst of it was the mountain of scars they saw when they finally coaxed the boy into taking off his shirt. Especially the giant y scar that split down his chest.

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