#but she was very surprised i was an engineering major

[arc-misadventures]

Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom.

Within the frozen tundra stood a small flag, it's red cloth gentle waved in the cool, Atllas air. Around the flag it was peace, it was silent, it was tranquility incarnate. A tranquility that ended in a plume of fire, and metal shrapnel.

The peace of the frozen tundra had ended. The peace ending with the deafening cries of war.

The gun's of, Mantle were ready.

~~~

: Direct hit!

Jaune watched through his binocs as the red flag they had planted in the frozen fields of, Atlas evaporate into a plume of fire, smoke, and snow. Jaune put down the binocs, and turned to look at the newly promoted, Colonel Kian, shouted triumphantly as the howitzers hit their intended target dead on.

Colonel Alden Kian, in charge of all the newly built artillery batteries, and weapon emplacements upon, Mantle's walls. Jaune liked to think he developed a good relationship among fellow officers, even if, Jaune really felt like one.

Col. Kian: And, with that, all weapon emplacements have been built, and properly calibrated.

Jaune: Well done, Col. Kian, and to you as well, Maj. Skender. The forces under your command managed to compete the wall, ahead of schedule at that.

Maj. Skender: Thanks, Jaune, Yeah, I'm glad we listened to your suggestions. Honestly, I'm surprised that we got this done far sooner than we expected.

Jaune: It was just a suggestion, Felix. I will tank none of the credit, it was all you, and your men's work that finished the walls ahead of schedule.

: A duty well done at that.

Jaune, Maj. Skender, and Col. Kian all turned to see, General Ironwood as well as, Specialist Schnee approaching them. The trio as well as any other soldiers on the wall saluted the, General as he walked upon the ramparts.

Ironwood: Well done, Maj. Skendor, thanks to your efforts, the new fortifications for the walls of, Mantle have finished well ahead of schedule. With that in mind, how soon can your forces return to building the new, CCTS?

Maj. Skender: Uhhh... We should be able to start in a we...?

Skender was about to answer, General Ironwood, but he saw, Jaune holding up a single finger, giving him a clear sign of what he had to say.

Maj. Skender: In a day, Sir. We just need to reorganize, and require all of the necessary equipment. This should take no longer than a day, day, and a half tops.

Ironwood: Oh, that's good! That's very good to hear, Major, I look forward to hearing your progress in the coming days.

General Ironwood then made his way to leave. As, Jaune watched him leave, his eyes locked on with, Winter's, who shot him a wink as she left. Jaune watched them until he was out of earshot where he let out a tired sigh, followed by several others. But, most noticeable, Major. Skender was cursing up a storm.

Maj. Skender: Gods fucking dammit, Jaune! It going to take me at least a week to grab all of our gear to start working on, Ironwood's pet project! Why the hell did you tell me to speed things up?!

Jaune: Because, General Ironwood wasn't her to celebrate the walls completion, he was here to make sure you got back to work on his stupid project. Besides you just need to divide your forces; half starts working on the CCTS, the other gets your gear.

Col. Kian: He's right, Felix. The generals sole focus was on his project, he doesn't give a damn about the wall. If it wasn't for, Jaune donating his winnings, it never would have been built!

Maj. Skender: I know that! I'm just blaming him for all the shit they're going to give me now!

Jaune: Wait, hold on. Why are you saying I'm the one donated the funds, the winner of that game donated the funds.

Col. Kain: Yeah, but everyone knows you're the one who managed to convince, General Ironwood, and you're the one whose been presenting, Robyn Hill as the one who really got this thing going, but everyone in the, Engineer Corp, and the Gunnery Crews know it was you.

Maj. Skender: Yeah, this was the first time, General Ironwood ever showed his face around here. He only agreed to this thing as a PR stunt. He's only focused on his stupid 'secret project.' You're the only one in the upper brass that gives a rats ass about the wall, and Mantle.

Jaune: ...

Jaune: Okay, it wasn't my idea, I got the idea from, Robyn Hill. But, how the hell did you even know I was the one who donated the funds for the wall?

Col. Klen: My wife is a secretary, and secretaries like to gossip. One of them heard the donation was from one of the, Specialist, and that, Specialist also convinced, General Ironwood to build the fortifications on the wall. And, since you're the only, Specialist who's shown to give a damn about the wall. It's gotta be you.

Jaune: ...

Jaune: Haa...

Jaune: Does everyone know it was me?!

Jaune looked around, and saw several of the gunnery, and engineers all nodding their head, and making sounds of agreement. Jaune just slapped a hand to his face as a tired groan escaped his lips.

Jaune: Gods dammit...

Jaune: If the secretaries know it was me, everyone in the whole of, Atlas, and Mantle probably know it was me.

Maj. Skender: Yeah.

Col. Klen: Pretty much.

Jaune: Haa... Do you know any of my other secrets?

Col. Klen: You, and, Specialist Schnee are a thing... of some sorts.

Maj. Skender: Rumors say, Robyn Hill has got a thing for you, since you saved her from that assassin fellow.

Jaune stared at the two officers, his face was a blank, the only thing showing any emotion was the way his eye was twitching aggressively.

Jaune: ...

Jaune: FUCKKKK!?!

SK: ...

Col. Klen: I hope he, and Specialist Schnee become a thing... They look good together.

Maj. Skender: Wife is rooting for him, and Robyn Hill. She thinks they look cute together.

Col. Klen: They do look cute together.

Jaune: Shut up!

SK: Sorry, Sir!

~~~

Robyn: Wait... Members of the, Atlas military know about your thing with, Winter Schnee, and about our thing too?

Jaune: Yes, it seems the well kept secret wasn't that well kept enough!

Robyn: It was a secret?

Jaune: Not anymore, because secretaries like to gossip! And, the blooming romances between a pair of, Specialists, and a Specialists, and a politician seems to be todays latest hot topic!

Robyn: Oh, is that so?

Robyn: ...

Robyn: Am I winning?

Jaune just stopped to stare at, Robyn, giving her a blank stare as she cheekily smiled back at him.

Jaune: I liked you better when you were this cold, politician who hated me because I was a, Specialist working for, General Ironwood. Not this cute, blushing, teasing girl from a high school romcom!

Robyn: You think I'm cute~?

Jaune: Shut up!

Jaune sighed in defeat as, Robyn was laughing at his expense. He decided it would be for the best if to change the topic back to what he had originally came here to inform her about.

Jaune: Ahem! Anyway, I am here to inform you that the wall's fortifications have been finished, and we will be going back to work on, General Ironwood's secret project. And, with that, the elections for a new council member will be held in just over a week. So, are you ready, 'Councilwoman' Robyn Hill?

Robyn: I am most looking forward to it! The polls that have been going around saying that I am a sure in to win the election! Hey, Jaune?

Jaune: Hmm?

Robyn: You'll keep your promise; you'll tell me what, General Ironwood's secret project is if I win, right?

Jaune: Unless by some miracle he tells you himself, I'll keep my word, Robyn, and I'll tell you what he's up to.

Robyn: I'll hold you to that, Jaune. Well, I still got to keep my guard up, just because their already setting up the voting booths doesn't mean I've already won.

Jaune: Voting booths? Why do they need to set them up, they're just boxes you put paper into.

Robyn: They're electronic, it takes them a few days to take them out, and set them up.

Jaune was walking about, his mind running with ideas on how, Robyn could challenge, Ironwood's authority. But, all these thoughts were brought to a screeching halt when, Robyn said that one word.

Jaune: They're electronic? The voting boots are electronic?

Robyn: Yeah, been that way for years.

Jaune: Do you know where they keep these voting booths?

Robyn: Not originally, but I do know they set them up at one of the community halls near here.

Jaune: If you'll excuse me, Miss Hill.

Jaune quickly turned, and made his way out of the, Happy Huntresses Headquarters.

Robyn: Wha...? Jaune, where are you going?

Jaune: To win you this election.

~~~

Community Hall #7. Aka, the Dust Miners Den.

Jaune had entered the community hall flashing his credentials as a, Specialist to gain entry. And, now he was, what one would call interrogate one of the technicians, grilling him on all of the operating's of the voting booths.

Jaune: Tell me, Jirina, how do this machine operate.

Jirina, a olive haired snake faunas, if one could assume so based on the scales on her forehead, and slit yellow eyes was fidgeting around nervously. It was understandable reactions, it should be expected when one of, Atlas's Specialist suddenly showed up, and demanded how to do their job.

Jirina: W-Well... The system works by simply tapping a name on the screen, thus counting this as a vote. That vote then gets sent to a datahub where the votes are all tallied up.

Jaune: The machine says, 'Yes,' and 'No.' You're not putting in the names of the electoral candidates until the day of the election?

Jirina: Yes, this prevents cheating.

Jaune: 'Prevents cheating?'

Jaune moved over, and tapped the yes button on the screen. It closed out, and a popup appeared saying, 'Thank you for voting,' then another screen appeared saying waiting for election official to reset.

Jaune: You have to reset it every time someone votes?

Jirina: Yes. After everyone votes, we, the voting regulators, have to swipe our id cards, and input a eight digit code to reset the machine.

As, Jirina did just as she said when she reset the machine, taking her no more than ten seconds.

Jaune: Interesting... Are you capable of knowing how many voted, and who they voted for on your tablet there?

Jirina: Ahh yes... See?

Jirina handed, Jaune her tablet, and he saw on the tablet a total amount of votes, five, and there was, two votes for, 'Yes,' and three for, 'No.'

Jaune: Are these numbers for each of the machines here?

Jirina: Yes, we have four voting booths here, and we 'vote' at least once on each machine to test them.

Jaune: And, all of the information of the votes is sent to a central hub that tallies up the votes, the location, and other such things?

Jirina: Yes, that is how it acts.

Jaune: So that's how he could do it...

Jirina: Do... do what?

Jaune: Nothing that you need concern yourself with, Ma'am.

Jaune was still looking at the screen on the tablet, when he heard the door open behind him. He turned to face them, as he saw someone enter the room. One, Penny Polendina to be precise.

Jaune: Ahh, Penny you made good time getting here.

Penny: It didn't take me long to get here. Now, you asked for my help?

Jaune: Yes I did; See this electronic voting booth here?

Penny: I can. But, why do you want me to do that?

Jaune: I want to see if it can be done, and if you can, what else you can do.

Penny: Okay.

Jirina: Wait, you can't hack these systems; They have been given advance firewalls, and cybersecurity to prevent such things fro...?!

Penny: I've hack the voting booth.

Jirina: W-What?

Jaune: That didn't even take you thirty seconds; Impressive. Now then can you change the text on the screen for who you can vote for?

Penny: Can I change it. Wat do you want me to make it say?

Jaune: It doesn't matter, I mostly want to see if you can.

Penny: Okay. I've changed it.

Jaune: Okay let's...

Jaune looked at the voting booth, the screen now read, 'I'm sorry for.' and 'forgetting you, Jaune.' He stared at the screen for a moment before hitting the one that said sorry, and then the reset banner appeared.

Jaune: Penny can you reset the machine?

Penny reset it in a flash, only this time it read, 'I had a virus,' and 'It was making me forget.' Jaune looked at the screen, then to the tablet in his hand.

Jaune: There are six votes in total, evenly split, can you make it five to one?

Penny: Okay.

Jaune watched as, Penny reset the votes were five to one. Jaune watch it, and as the voting was rewritten as, 'I'm sorry, Jaune,' and 'Can you please forgive me.'

Jaune watched this all happen as he handed the tablet back to, Jirina.

Jaune: Thank you for your time, Jirina. Penny, let's go. I need to have a word with, General Ironwood, and I need you there with me.

Penny: O-Okay, Jaune...

~~~

Ironwood: The voting booths can be hacked?

Jaune: Yes, Sir, very easily at that. It took, Penny her barely thirty seconds to hack the machine, and completely rewrite the system.

Ironwood: Is this true, Penny?

Penny. Yes, Sir. Specialist Arc asked me to come down to one of the voting stations, and asked me to hack the system.

Ironwood: And, why did you ask, Penny to do this, Specialist Arc?

Jaune: I heard that the election being held in, Mantle was being held in a week. I was curious about how, Atlas does things. When I went there I found out that you use electronic voting booth. I saw several posters of the people running for election, and I saw one of the posters was for, Robyn Hill. I remembered her assassination attempt, and how destabilizing her death would be for, Atlas, and Mantle. I think a similar effect would happen if she lost the election, not to the same extent, but nonetheless.

Jaune: After, Penny hacked the system, I found out she was able to manipulate the votes in several different ways; From changing the names, resetting the machines, and even alter who got the total amount of votes.

It was another partial lie, Jaune caught himself noting that he often gave, General Ironwood such answers when he asked him about anything. It got the job done in the end.

Ironwood: To what end did you do this for, Specialist Arc?

Jaune: If, Penny can manipulate the systems so easily, what can a person like, Arthur Watts do?

Ironwood: You're worried that he will rig the election in his favour?

Jaune: Yes, Sir. I recommend we replace the voting machines with paper ballots to insure, Salem, and her minions do not interfere with the elections.

Ironwood pressed his fingers together as he solemnly nodded his head.

Ironwood: This is a wise decision to make. I'll make the necessary arrangements. Well done, Specialist. You may have undermined, Arthur Watts in a way we did not expect.

Jaune: Thank you, Sir!

Ironwood: Now then, head to the meeting room, Specialist Ebi wants to discuss a mission with you. Your dismissed.

Jaune: Sir!

Jaune saluted, General Ironwood, and made his way out of his office. as soon as he was out of the room, a tired sigh escaped his lips. He stood there for a moment as he steadied his nerves. He had made a gamble to try. and get, General Ironwood to replace the voting booth with paper ballots. He knew, General Ironwood wouldn't give a damn about paper ballots considering it had nothing to do with his, CCTS project, but nonetheless.

He had to play his cards right with him.

Jaune: Okay... Let's go see what...?!

Penny: Jaune!

Jaune stopped in his place as, Penny came up to him, a nervous jitter in her stance as she looked at him.

Penny: D-Did I help you?

Jaune: Yep, you did precisely what i hoped you would do. Thank you for helping me, Penny.

Penny: Oh... t-thank you, Jaune.. I... oh?

Penny stopped talking as she felt, Jaune's hand on her head, gently ruffling her hair.

Jaune: I know you want to apologize to me for all that has happened, Penny, but you must understand: There is nothing you need to apologize for, Penny. I was never angry with you. I just felt sorry for you for all that happened to you. I was hurting because I lost, Pyrrha. And, you were hurting because she accidently killed you. She hurt us in ways we didn't expect, but neither of what happened to us was her fault. Cinder killed, Pyrrha, and she tricked her into killing you. It's, Cinder's fault, Penny. There is no one to blame, but her. Okay?

Penny was shaking as she brought her hands to her face, whipping away the tears in her eyes.

Penny: T-Thank you, Jaune.

Jaune: You're welcome, Penny. But, I just have one question for you.

Penny: W-What... (Sniff...) What is it, Jaune?

Jaune: Do you hate me, Penny?

Penny looked at, Jaune tears in the corner of her eyes as she smiled at him.

Penny: No, I don't hate you, Jaune.

Jaune smiled at her in turn as he took his hand off her head.

Jaune: You didn't hiccup.

Penny: I didn't.

Jaune: Well, I best get going, and see whatever it is, Clover wants from me. I'll see you later, Penny.

Penny: Wait!

Jaune: Hmm?

Penny: Can I... Can I come with you, Jaune?

Jaune smiled as he beckoned her with his hand to follow him.

Jaune: Come on, Penny let's get going.

Penny: Yes. Lets!

[theresa-of-liechtenstein]

not my southeast asian music professor thinking i'm a music major and then trying to get me to join the orchestra i am already in. lmao

[caimitos]

there has Got to be a way for review sessions to be shorter than 10 hours a day. please. cause i start off so strong in the morning but by 3 PM i keep losing focus and start spiraling and questioning all of my life choices

[compulsiveobsessing]

realized very suddenly the other day that my mother is trying so hard to hold on to her idealized version of me, which is. me as a child

not that i didnt already know she wasn't happy with me changing (i.e. growing up/coming into myself), but it hadn't felt like such a slap in the face before

she used to push me to grow out my bangs. i had them from childhood to about age 21. they changed slightly over that time but i never grew them out. until i did, and i now have curtain bangs framing my face. i happen to like that. apparently my mother decided she does not and suggested quite seriously that i get straight bangs again

she also asked if, when i get new glasses, ill get some colorful ones "like you had in third grade"

like damn dude i know you hate the way i dress and you hate it when i dont wear jewelry or makeup and you probably know im queer but are in denial but my fuckin glasses?? you're gonna make my glasses into a thing now too??

like ive considered coming out so many times but if the fact that i no longer have straight bangs and the same glasses i had when i was 8 is now a point of contention as well then there is no way you will accept my queer identity

[takumiraine]

Once Upon A Time Chapter 2

<prev> <next>

So Danny? 100% has PTSD. I do have a vague plan for this. And most of the next chap written. The Fentons may or may not be terrible parents. You’ll have to wait and see. I do have plans to break everyone’s hearts at least once. Anyways. This is considered my like…. Audience test before Ao3. Things may change. As a reminder all I know about dc is from fandom and wiki and everything I remember about dp is prob poorly remembered.

—

Once upon a time, there had been a young boy who was happy. Once upon a time, there was a young boy who had dreams and a future. Once upon a time, there was a boy who had been alive in every sense of the word. Once upon a time, everything shattered. Once upon a time, there was a man who was filled with anger. Once upon a time, there was a man just as alive as he was dead. Once upon a time, there was a man who was haunted and hunted.

As the stabbed kid shuffled off, leaving Jason baffled, he grabbed the guy who he had slammed into the wall. His head was bleeding but his breathing was steady and Jason huffed. He knew he definitely cracked the guy’s skull, but he had survived worse.

“O, what do we know on this guy?” He asked the woman in his ear. Oracle’s answer would determine whether he took the guy in to the ER or let him roll the dice of fate.

“Rap sheet about a mile long. Pretty basic stuff. Armed robbery, possession with intent, B&Es, assault and battery, the usual.”

Jason shrugged then and dropped the guy against the wall. Rolling the dice it was. He turned away, looking towards where the kid disappeared around the corner “and what about the guy he was mugging?”

“That’s where it gets weird.” Oracle’s typing was coming through loud and clear. “It’s hard to get a clear picture of him. He has some sort of distortion on the feed. Everything else comes out clear but…. He’s a mess of pixels. Voice too. Scrambled. It’ll take time.”

“Think he’s a meta?”

“Wouldn’t surprise me, considering he got knifed and just…. Walked off with it. Wonder what his issue with B is though.”

“Couldn’t tell you. Think it might be time to update my armor if I’m being lumped in with people B and the bird brains have pissed off.” Jason took an evidence kit out of his pocket and swiped at the blood on his chest. Old habits and all. “Got a sample of the kid’s blood though.”

“Good thinking. Wonder if he’s in any databases. I’ve got a cleaned up picture now. Enough that it’s pinging in GU’s database. Dan Nightingale, Mechanical engineering major. It says he’s 19, it’s his freshman year and he’s in like every remedial class he can take, high school transcripts are mediocre at best. No other information about him really. Rogue in the making that one.” Oracle reported. Jason groaned, grapneling up to the rooftops to follow where the kid went off to.

“Someone should keep an eye on him. Ugh. This’ll be a conversation for B and the birds won’t it? Kid won’t like having a bunch of birds following him.” Jason flicked through the different visual modes on his visor, finding…. Cold moving through one of the apartment buildings. It was human shaped, but where he expected to find heat…. “Weird…. You seeing this?”

“Very weird,” Barbara agreed, tapping into his visor’s feed. “And hey, you could just…. Not tell him. You wanted a Lit degree right? Go to class, befriend him. Do some recon.” Jason knew Babs always walked the fine line between what Bruce needed to know about the rest of them and what she had to keep secret to keep helping them. He didn’t envy her position. Jason still wanted Bruce to hurt sometimes. Not as much as he used to, something about the sins of the father and all that. He just wanted Bruce to be aware that everything he had ever hoped for his boy to be was… out of both of their reaches forever.

“That sounds annoying.” He was 23. He didn’t have any interest in taking on a degree on top of his full time crime fighting and criminal empire running jobs.

“Yeah, but what other choice do you have? It’s go back to school, tell B, or wait for him to become a rogue.”

“I hate you sometimes.” He muttered, unsure of what made him suddenly so interested in that angry guy.

“Feeling’s mutual Hood,” She replied with what was definitely a fond tone. He grimaced.

—-

In the apartment, Danny was less than thrilled. That was his favorite shirt! Now not only was it covered in blood, it had a huge hole in it. His core still thrummed with the urge to fight, but he tamped it down. Slowly, as he pulled the knife out, he sealed the wound with a layer of ice, pulling his shirt off and throwing it into the bathroom sink. The knife was dropped into the kitchen sink. His keys and phone in his bedroom on the battered nightstand next to the bed.

He returned to the bathroom and turned the water on cold. He let it spray full blast before working on scrubbing the blood from his shirt. He looked up to eye himself critically in the mirror before noticing the waistband of his jeans were saturated with blood too. Damn it. He kicked off his shoes and pulled his pants off, throwing them into the now overfilled sink. The bathtub would probably be a better choice. Turning off the sink and turning on the tub Danny picked up the sopping clothes and dropped them with a wet thump into the basin of the tub. Carefully he lowered himself onto the floor, wincing at the way pain clawed through him.

He would need to actually eat food to heal from this at any reasonable speed. He thought of the two dollars he had, then the emergency stash of….he racked his brain to remember how much of the emergency cash he was left with once he got to Gotham…right. Twenty bucks…. That was all he had in the wall.

He missed the days when Sam would just throw money at him whenever his parents forgot to do things like pay rent or put food in the fridge.

As if agreeing his stomach rumbled loudly, demanding actual food to sate the expense of energy healing his injury would take. He thought about calling Sam. Seeing if she could arrange a prepaid card for him. He knew she would in a heartbeat.

Even cut off from family money she seemed to be doing better than he was. Wracking his brain, Danny thought she was working in Bludhaven as some sort of personal assistant. He wasn’t sure if it was the exhaustion that came from sustaining a human body on nothing but ecto or if he had been too distracted in the moment to pay proper attention, but he couldn’t remember if that was right. Getting the blood out of his clothes he wiped at the remaining blood on his body, getting most of it off. He grabbed the clothes and turned off the water.

Slowly, Danny pushed himself to his feet. He had survived worse, multiple times. But pain never seemed to stop being painful. It lanced through his side and he almost fell back to his knees with the way it stole his breath and doubled him over. He wished he could go back to the Zone and just… wait it out. But in order to do that without drawing attention he’d need a portal. The only ones he knew of were either destroyed or…. Compromised.

Maybe he should call Vlad. Danny shook that thought away almost immediately as he realized how silly it was. Vlad spent most of his teen years antagonizing him. Besides the GIW had probably gotten to Vlad too. If he wasn’t captured he would likely be compromised. Memories of Amity Park flooded in before Danny could stop them. Of asking for help. Over and over. Of the GIW storming in and locking everything down. Of Danny frantically telling his parents, only for their eyes to dart to the kitchen before they could stop it. Of the sound of energy. The smell of his flesh burning. Of pain.

Danny forced himself to take a breath. He focused on the wet clothes in his hands. On the tiles beneath his feet. Of the too harsh fluorescents in the bathroom that buzzed. The sounds of the people above him arguing over bills and needing better jobs.

Slowly he banished the memories back where they belonged. He’d… figure it out. He had to. Somehow. For now, sleep. Danny hung up the wet clothes over the shower bar, made sure there was a towel on the floor and shuffled into the bedroom. Double checking that his alarm was set, even though his class wasn’t until early afternoon, he didn’t want to miss it, he slid into his bed and pulled the pile of blankets up over him.

Almost instantly, he was out.

—-

“B,” Jason said in lieu of a proper greeting as he stepped into the Batcave, hood tucked under his arm.

“Jason,” Bruce looked up and turned the surprised expression into something more fond. “To what do I owe the visit?”

Jason leaned against the rock. Foot braced against the wall. “I know semester’s already started, but something came up. How hard would it be to start at GU?”

Bruce stared at him for a long moment and Jason knew it was his way of trying to figure out what buttons to press. Then he tilted his head and turned back to the computer screen. “Not too hard. It is early yet. Anything I should know?”

“Babs was lonely.” It was an out and out lie, but it seemed to soften things in Bruce further, reminding him of the two children that failed him within months of each other.

“Hm.” Bruce was silent at his computer for a long moment. Convinced that was the end of the conversation, Jason tightened his grip on the helmet he had tucked under his arm. “Either way. It is a good choice. Literature?”

The comment and question rankled Jason, the thing from the pit scratching at his carefully contained emotions. Pushing for any crack. Bruce was trying he reminded himself. Too little too late, but trying.

“Yeah. Going in in the morning.”

“Should I call ahead?”

“No. I can handle it. If not I have no business being there.”

“You will do fine.” The ‘you are a Wayne’ was left unspoken.

Jason snorted. “Right. Good talk.”

“Are you staying the night?” An olive branch. Jason wanted to burn it. He tempered the impulse to a spark.

“I have my own place.”

“Your room is still yours when you want it.”

“Yeah. The room of the worst Robin in history. Pass.” Jason turned and walked stiffly back up the steps. Hearing the soft growl of Batman behind him. The start of an argument.

He considered it a victory that he didn’t run into any of his siblings or Alfred on the way out.

[kookslastbutton]

Love's Remedy, On Fire ༓ jjk (m) l ch. I

✑ Summary: Jungkook is a romantic. He comes from a highly intelligent family who wants him to carry out the lineage. Being this way, he goes to college to be a pharmacist but his friends say college isn't just about studying! With a little persuasion, he goes to his first frat party thinking his hat will help him pick up a girl-or woman he means.

Pairing: STEM major!virgin!jungkook x STEM major!hot girl!reader

AU/genre: angst, smut, fluff, s2l, college au, mini-series

Rating: M, 18+

Word Count: 3,027

Warnings: jk is very cute and determined, jk a romantic, oc has philophobia (fear of relationships), oc is not mean here but she teases jk, feat Jackson and Jae-beom, if i missed warning lmk!

Now Playing: seven, summertime sadness, she’s kerosene, angels like you+

A/N: um ok I swear this was supposed to be a pwp crack fic about jk wanting to get laid with a hat on. This turned into a very angsty but fluffy series and I'm sorry 😬 lmk what you think and tysm for reading! 💞 I know title is sucky

ch. lI >> | series masterlist

Over the entirety of his nineteen years, Jungkook was pushed to prepare for one thing—college entrance exams.

It was a huge deal and getting into one of the leading universities in South Korea was a must for him. You see, the Jeons were nobody to laugh at with the bulk of them being high-ranking medical doctors, engineers, and lawyers. Continuing this legacy, therefore, was far from a choice, Jungkook had to follow suit.

When the results of the exams came back Jungkook passed with flying colors. It wasn't a surprise though since he spent all his time studying his ass off until the dawn. Jungkook indeed got accepted into one of the most prestigious universities in Seoul and his parents, teachers, and friends were quick to give their congratulations. He felt good too...no, he felt damn good.

Now he was here he was, standing in the middle of campus with his bag slung over one shoulder and a few orientation papers in his hand. It was still the first week of classes and he desperately needed to get to the science building. (He had chosen to follow his father's footsteps and go into biochem).

"Excuse me," he asks with nervous eyes and a wobbling lip. "Do you happen to know where the science building is? I'm late for class but I can't seem to find it."

The student he walks up to for directions looks about his age. He isn't sure if she's in her first year like him but she looks competent with the way she's standing, feet spread apart and a hand on her hip. The skirt she's sporting is incredibly short but the top is full length. She's smacking on hot pink gum as well, popping bubbles every now and then.

"Keep walking straight until you see the statue of President Kim, then take a right. The science building will be right there." You hardly spare him a glance but you make the mental note that he's cute with his fluffy black hair and big lost eyes. You consider asking his name but you shrug the feeling. He was cute yes, but he was too cute which isn't your type.

Jungkook gives a small thank you and walks off. Your directions are vague, but hopefully finding the statue will help him. After a few steps, he looks over his shoulder to see you laughing with your friend.

You have a gorgeous smile.

Probably the last time he'll see you though, he thinks. Jungkook isn't sure how he'd be with a woman given the fact he's never been with one. Surely he'd do better than half the dumbasses out there but guys like him don't stand a chance with a woman like you.

You look like you go for the experienced type and that wasn't him. He goes back to what he was doing, stuffing his hands in his pockets.

"Hey man, what's your name?" A young guy with bleached blonde hair slides into the seat next to him. Apparently, he wasn't the only one late. "I'm Jackson." The man goes in for a fist bump but stops when it's very obvious it won't be reciprocated.

"I'm Jungkook," he says, more concentrated on what his professor is saying than anything else. Jackson continues talking, however, despite his focused state.

"So, I'm assuming this is your first year?" Jungkook nods. "Me too. Where you from?"

"Busan."

"Cool cool, I'm from Hong Kong." Hearing this makes Jungkook shift his eyes over immediately. The last thing he expected was to meet someone from China. Was this Jackson dude just pulling his leg or was he being serious? Nevertheless, it intrigues him.

"I'm an exchange student." Jackson clarifies. "Always wanted to see what South Korea was like and I know Seoul's got a pretty thriving economy so..." He shrugs. "Figured I'd give it a go and my parents support it. As long as I stay on my doctor's track of course."

Well damn. A doctor was not what Jungkook assumed a guy like Jackson would be going for. This was a prestigious school but it's still a gen ed class they're in right now. Anyone from most majors could be taking it. If he had to guess, Jackson would be a businessman.

"Well enough about me though," Jackson quips. "What do you study?"

"Biochem. My dad works as a physician and my mom's a chemical engineer. I'm going for pharmacology."

"Shit bro," Jackson cusses freely. Jungkook doesn't mean to jump in response but he does. Being all formal talk at home, it's unventured territory. "You guys must be a family of geniuses. Wait...what's your last name?"

"Jeon?"

Jackson nearly falls back in his chair when he hears the name fall from Jungkook's lips. He covers his mouth with both hands to keep himself under wraps. "Are you serious? You're from the Jeon family? Fuck, man, I've been hearing about your family since I was a kid that's how influential your family has been in the medical industry."

Jungkook finds himself intertwining his hands. His family is well-established in what they do but it never occurred to him that they were that well-known. Sure his dad's been featured in a couple of magazines for his work and his mom's been given several awards for her research. But he didn't think they'd gone that publicly beyond their own town.

"Oh shit I'm sorry. Am I making you uncomfortable talking about this? Promise you I'm not a creep or anything!" The urgency in Jackson's tone stirs up the classroom, peers looking over at the two of them in annoyance.

"Do you mind shutting up?" A chestnut-haired boy is the first to speak up. He looks thoroughly pissed, to say the least with his cat-like eyes narrowing at the both of them. "Some of us actually want to graduate here."

"Chill out man. We're sorry." Jackson gives Jungkook a small tight-lipped smile. "We'll talk later."

"We will?"

Jackson gives him a slap on the back. "Yeah it's a given. You and I," he gestures between the two of them. "We should stick together. Being that we're both new around here and we both studying med. Also, was going to wait to tell you but I wanna go to this awesome party that goes on that kicks off the year. You'd think I'd be confident to go by myself but if you're free, I could use a buddy."

A party. Some blonde-haired boy who could very likely become the center of attention wants him, Jeon Jungkook, to go to a party? Jungkook spends most of his time playing video games, studying chem tables, and watching p—well he shouldn't say that part out loud.

"If you don't want to then I get it." Jackson scratches his head. "I don't wanna pressure you or anything. We did just meet and I just thought you looked cool so...."

"Okay." Jungkook accepts before giving it much thought. Besides studying, he was told college was a time to also let loose and have fun. Freedom and all that. That's what his friends back home told him at least. They also mentioned getting laid but...who would give him that fat chance?

If anything, maybe he'll get a friend by going to this little party. Jungkook shoots a small smile in return.

"Okay listen," Jackson says, opening the door to his black Lexus. "I heard this party gets crazy so just be smart and don't get into too much punch."

Jungkook hops in the passenger seat. "But I love punch." He straps his seatbelt in, totally unaware of the punch Jackson"s referring to.

"It's spiked Kook. And I'm guessing your alcohol tolerance is pretty low?" Jackson twists the key and pulls out of the campus parking lot. He doesn't mean to be insulting or anything but his new buddy doesn't look like the party-hardy kinda guy.

In fact, Jungkook decided to....well, wear a hat to this gig. It's not a baseball cap, beanie, or even a greasy cowboy hat.

It's a sunhat. Black at least.

"By the way Jungkook. I don't wanna sound like a dick or anything but can you explain the thing on your head? Because the rest of you looks great, black dress shirt and jeans."

"Oh um." Jungkook rubs his hands on his thighs. He's embarrassed to tell Jackson the truth but he's his buddy now, right? Maybe this can be a bonding thing for them. "I thought it was cute? I mean I wanna...ah." Jungkook lets out a nervous chuckle.

"What is it, man? I promise I won't judge."

"I wanna," he starts again. "Uhm you see I heard that if you wear something out of the ordinary that people will like you more or something. Like they'll be interested..."

"Mhm, cute and out of the ordinary things huh? What kind of people are you trying to impress Jungkook?" Jackson gives a knowing smirk. Who knew his buddy schemes these kinds of stuff.

Jungkook speeds through the answer. "Grs."

"Say it properly and slower."

"Wanna get a girl....woman! I mean...a woman." Jungkook sheepishly grins at Jackson. Please don't laugh at me, he begs silently.

"You dog!" Jackson pushes Jungkook's shoulder. "My little buddy is a man, well well well. So are you looking for a girlfriend or something else?"

"Wife!" Jungkook bugs out his eyes, no hesitation at all. Jackson struggles not to give even the slightest snort. Didn't Jungkook know what kind of party this is?

"That's very sweet but this isn't the place you're going to find a wife, Jungkook. That's more like if we were going to a speed dating thing....this, this is a frat party, little bro."

Jackson pulls up to the front of the giant, lit-up house. They could hear electronic music blasting outside and all over the lawn were shirtless guys and scantily-dressed women. Some were off making out while others were drinking in groups.

Jungkook tenses at the sight. He used to fancy black tie parties where everyone is dressed to the hill and drinking is moderate. Jackson is right, he is not finding a wife here. Dammit. But he really doesn't want to give up his hat.

"Yo Jackson," a guy with pitch-black hair greets the man with a fist bump. So that's how it's done, Jungkook observes. "Glad you could make it!"

"Jae-beom, what's good man?! I wouldn't miss this party for the world. I brought a friend." He ushers Jungkook to come forward. "This is Jungkook. He's in my class."

"Nice to meet you Jungkook!" Jae-beom moves in for a fist bump which ends up making contact with Jungkook's fist. It's not as sharp as with Jackson but it's a fist bump. "I used to work with Jackson over the summer. Always stealing my tips this man!"

"Hey, I did not do that!" Jackson gives a hearty laugh and shoves Jae-beom hard enough for him to lose his balance a little. "You kept leaving for a smoke. I had to wait your tables half the time!"

"I wasn't going for a smoke Jack—woah hey baby. What's your name?" The man shifts his focus to the girl walking past them. She has bright red lipstick, a black crop top, and jean shorts.

"Fuck off." She snaps before looking at Jungkook. "Cute hat by the way."

Everyone looks at Jungkook at that moment who's motionless. They hope to god he says something back but he only stares. The girl smirks at him and quirks her head to the side. "What's your name? I gotta friend who'd be all over you in a heartbeat, though she'd never admit it."

Jackson throws a mouth over his hand, eyes wide in amusement. This girl did not just propose Jungkook, his buddy who's looking for a wife, to get off with her friend.

"Um...yeah no. No, it's okay but thanks." Jungkook can barely sound the words. This girl in front of him was really, really hot but intimidating. "Yes thank you but I'm looking for a..."

"Don't-" Jackson lunges forward.

"Wife." Jungkook smiles at the girl a little too angelically. "I'm Jungkook though. What's your name?"

The girl bites her lip. "Well, it's too bad then Jungkook. Because you're so fucking cute and I know you'd like each other. Why don't you meet her? Even if it's just to say hi?"

Jungkook looks at Jackson who only shrugs. "Up to you man."

Jungkook makes his way through the heavy crowd. He bumps into a few people on the way but thankfully he's able to still see the girl, apparently who goes by Crystal.

Jungkook isn't convinced it's her real name but if that's what she wants to be called who is he to dispute?

Once they get to the other side of the room, Jungkook spots a woman with a tight black dress on. It falls mid-thigh and has laced-up sides. When they near the woman Jungkook feels himself sweating bullets.

"__!" Crystal taps on your shoulder. "I brought you, someone, to meet. This is Jungkook!"

You turn around, drink in hand. You look fucking stunning. Jungkook can't believe it's you. He's seeing you again and he wishes he didn't wear this damn hat now! He goes to yank it off but Crystal stops him.

"Hey, the hat's cute. Keep it on!"

"I-but," he looks at you. "But it's making me hot." You're making me hot.

You give a shrug. "Do what you want Jungkook. It's your head at stake." You take a sip of your drink. You really did not expect to see the shy guy from this morning be at a frat party. "Good to see you again."

"Oh, you know each other?"

"We had a slight run in this morning. Baby had to get to the science building." You take a scan at what he's wearing. Black shirt that cuts at the elbows, denim jeans, and sneakers. Not bad compared to the sweater he was wearing this morning.

"I'm—I'm not a baby." Jungkook can't stop himself from feeling offended. Whether you meant it to be condescending or not, he doesn't want to be seen as a baby! Especially not to you. "I'm a man, okay? I go to the gym and stuff."

"Okay I'm sorry," you say. "I just call everyone baby. I didn't mean anything."

That doesn't seem to relax Jungkook. "I can lift a fuck ton of weights too." He stops once he hears himself cuss out loud. Usually, he does that in his head....goddamn it.

"Mmm," you step towards him, careful not to touch him. Usually by now you'd already be in the bathroom getting railed by some punk but not tonight. Jungkook has your attention. "Can you now? I'm not sure if I believe you. You're kind of a twig, not to be rude or anything."

Jungkook's face turns to a darker shade, eyes piercing into yours. "I can show you I'm not lying."

"Go ahead, do what you will." You fake a yawn until you find yourself suddenly in his arms. They're a lot stronger and more muscular than you thought. "Jungkook! Put me down!"

Everyone at the party starts staring over, giggling at each other. Jungkook gives a satisfied grin. "I have you in my arms, what are you gonna do now? Not believe me again?"

"I-" You're certain your face glowing with embarrassment. "Um no, I believe you Jungkook. Please, set me down."

"Not til you say it --." He challenges-brat. "Say I'm not a baby."

"Jungkook I told you I call everyone baby. It wasn't-okay you're not a baby. Obviously, you lift a lot now please put me down."

Finally, he does what you ask, a proud face on. His hat is a little crooked so you reach out and fix it. It's a reflexive response, you don't even know what you're doing let alone Jungkook.

"Oh, sorry your hat was just-"

"Please go out with me. On a date I mean?" He's so terribly timid but he can't help himself now. He had you in his arms and you're just so beautiful and charming. He needs to know more about you. It's a must.

"Well, I-" Everyone waits for your answer, very nosy clearly. You look at Jungkook with his big eyes and pouty lips. You don't wanna say no but relationships aren't your thing. And it seems that is defiantly all he's in for.

Jungkook's shoulders sulk. He isn't expecting a yes but he was hoping that maybe you'd give him a tiny chance.

"Come on __," Crystal whispers. "Look at him. Don't you think he's cute? Like really cute?"

You look at your best friend with weary eyes. He's so cute but, there's that but. That relationship but. He's going to be the type to want to do all the couple things and snuggle and everything. Jungkook needs someone who is willing to do all the stuff and you? You're not good at any of it.

"I'm sorry Jungkook," you start. "I don't know if-"

"One date __. If it's a no I won't bother you again. I just....I just think you're really gorgeous and I wanna get to know you. That's all." He takes the hat off his head, letting his fluffy hair run free. You kinda wanna touch it if it didn't makes things weird.

His words, however, make your heart thump the tiniest amount. The only time you've ever been called gorgeous is when guys try to get in your bed. It's all you've known other than maybe from a relative. Gorgeous is used pretty regularly, you know that, but this time it's used in an entirely different context.

"I'll tell you what," he says, pulling out his phone. "I'll give you my number and if you change your mind text me or call. I won't bug you and you can delete it right after this if you want, I promise."

You end up taking his number and Jungkook leaves to go back to his buddies. "You should go out with him __," Crystal says.

"I don't know." You watch him stride away. "I'll think about it."

A/N: what am i doing? Idk im running away now bye! lmk what you think and tysm for reading! Comment/ask to be on taglist 💞

Masterlist

no reposting, copying, or translating my work– © kookslastbutton

[spirit-lanterns]

I feel like. The majority of the Androids won’t have compatible parts of you know where I mean. There’s like. Literally nothing down there. Like a Barbie. And maybe. There’s an Android that ends up with Engineer that can get into her online stuff (computer, relevant accounts, etc) to order relevant parts. Maybe someone who can hack(?) if they know how to because it’s their original job before ending up with Engineer. But I don’t think we need to even go that far because it probably would be relatively easy to get Engineers password to her stuff from even just peaking over her shoulder (because Engineer doesn’t care enough that they’re looking, she doesn’t know this particular Android is self-aware, or both).

Cause I feel like, as an android engineer, she would have places to get parts from in cases where she needs to replace damaged ones.

And maybe she tends to always have lots of new parts coming in/ordered, she might not even notice the stuff the Androids snuck in to her next order.

Maybe a couple of Androids tend to help her sort through new shipments and put stuff away (cause there’s a lot) so they’re able to make off with their sneaky order without Engineer knowing.

It would be funny if they could figure out how to install the parts themselves (I’m sure there are online guides/how-to’s SOMEWHERE they can follow cause there’s no way there isn’t) (and maybe Engineer has an Android who’s job is also within the engineering realm so that makes things easier) but… it would be funnier if it’s harder than it looks cause Engineer makes fixing up the Androids seem easy.

Maybe they struggle with figuring out which tool would work for each one of them. Maybe there’s a specific tool/equipment that they need to use that Engineer would DEFINITELY notice them using and it’s not like. A small wrench they can make off with for a couple of hours.

It would be funny if they ordered the obvious parts but didn’t order the things that would actually make those parts attach properly (screws, etc. I’m not an engineer. I’m just yapping over here) or something. It would be funny if what they did order wouldn’t even work anyways without serious modifications to their current model (which basically means there’s better pieces that’ll go to how they already are. They don’t actually have to make huge adjustments. They ordered a size small shirt when they’re extra large, if that makes sense).

When Engineer inevitably finds them with their pants down (literally, mind you), surrounded by just a mess of parts and tools she’s like “what are you doing”

A: “Um-“

E: “Those won’t work.”

A: “What do you mean they won’t-“

E: “Those parts don’t even install correctly for your specific models.”

A: “Eh?”

Engineer isn’t even questioning about the… specifics of the part functions (right now, anyways. Once she’s out of ‘Engineer mode’, her brain will catch up to what she’s seen) but more of the installation.

Cue Engineer ordering the actually right parts and installing them herself. Face straight while doing it cause she’s in engineer mode and Not Thinking About It.

This is 100% a “and this is why we leave the installation and maintenance work to me” situation. It’s kinda like androids: no thoughts, head empty, engineer: the smart one (until the Androids get their hands on her. then it reverses).

Don’t bother figuring out who’s the girlfailure in this AU, Angey. Cause it’s all of them.

WOWIE. This is a very detailed and long ask, I’m pretty impressed :0

Anywho, it’s hilarious that the Android women want to fuck the Engineer so bad, they order additional “parts” (mechanical penises and vaginas) off the Engineer’s card and try to assemble it themself to surprise her. 😭😭

Unfortunately for many of them however, many of them lack the expertise in Android engineering, as they have no clue how to attach said parts to themselves without complicating things further. The only Android I can think of that would be pretty good at assembling their own parts, would be Serval. So now I’m imagining Android! Serval trying to teach and direct all the Android women on how to attach their new genitals, so they can surprise the Engineer when she gets home.

Well, things don’t go as planned because once the Engineer comes home, she just sees the Android HSR women sitting on the floor and various counter tops with their pants off, different mechanical parts scattered across the room with only Serval having successfully implemented her mechanical genitals on her own. The Engineer then proceeds to attach each and every woman’s parts correctly, and walk them through on how to do it if they wish to swap out in the future for something else.

She’s not even embarrassed because she’s entered “work mode” while attaching everyone’s parts, so the gravity of the situation doesn’t hit her until she gets in bed that night. And that’s when she realizes; “Oh my god. My Androids are planning to fuck me.”

I applaud the Engineer’s dedication to her craft, though 😅

[montymollusk]

i’m relistening to gtn and i caught something interesting

during the scene where gideon goes for tea with the eighth, silas comments that she might be originally from the third house because of the color of her hair (which is always described as outrageously and unnaturally red)

that plus the fact that corona and ianthe have violet eyes makes me wonder if maybe necromancy-fueled genetic engineering is a major thing on the third? it’s already canon that necros can give themselves bigger asses via necromancy, so why Not be able to alter their DNA to change the color of their eyes or hair the same way…….. or even do necromantic plastic surgery!! the third house is already written to be very vain as a culture, so it wouldn’t surprise me if cosmetic necromancy was developed there…. many thoughts.

[therealslimshakespeare]

Friends in the Crucible

MOTA PACIFIC THEATRE || FLIGHT SURGERY AU

1: Welcome to Hell Island

Requested by the sweet @forsythiagalt

AU NOTE: due to a long-standing crush on real life heroine Ensign Jane Kendeigh and her work on Iwo Jima, the current ongoing anniversary of the battle and a hope to not step on the toes of any existing Nurse!xBuck pairings -I’ve gone with what excited my imagination the most and created an entire Pacific AU with our MOTA boys. If this AU ends up being as interesting and stimulating to y’all as it was for me in writing it, I’d be terribly down for exploring more scenarios with everyone in their new and varied roles.

Main paring: Gale Cleven and OC Flight Nurse Ensign Maureen Kendeigh…cameos by “Doc” Egan, John Brady, Ken Lemmons, Harry Crosby and Benny Demarco…and maybe a nod to a certain Marine Captain named “Andy” who I refused to let die, even though he was never on this island. You neither need to have seen HBO’s Pacific or know about the history for this to make sense, in fact it might help my ignorant writing go down better without it 😏

Warnings: WAR?! Graphic descriptions of wounds, battlefields, gore, foul language, period typical language: use of the word “Jap” and a joking insult of “fish eater” for a Catholic. Hints that John Egan is a terror to his nurses, Cleven having to take his pants off for a wound to be examined, brief mentions and emphasis on his never having been touched by a woman intimately, a nurse positioning a man’s member out of the way to his surprise, strictly professional tho. No joke, really. But they’re having a bit of a moment.

Only proof read once. So many thanks to Bee, Christi and Ashley who all enabled me into going this rogue with a simple request and for giving edits and assurances. Hope y’all enjoy!

There were a whole lotta jolts in the descent. Of course there were. Why, there were jolts and bumps even coming down to the runway at Pearl or San Diego, and there had been far more than jolts on the training tarmacs in Kentucky. She had been in enough planes, experienced enough banging about, and had enough wheels up landings that Maureen felt somewhat entitled to her opinion on the necessity of jolts or none.

So far, Major Gale Cleven had piloted this monstrous tin can like a limo, smooth, steady and with full warning for each bank and turn. Maureen had not even had to catch a single falling bottle so far and the rows of empty bunks lining each side of the plane had hardly rattled except in the same low humming frequency of the ever thrumming engine.

But now there were jolts. And of course there were, they were flying straight into a warzone. Cleven had gotten them to Iwo Jima two hours ago, and since that time he’d been circling the island in a wide arc, casually waiting for a pesky air battle between fighters to calm down enough for him to land. Sure, the beaches had been wiped clean and a landing strip had been carved out of volcanic ash and marine corps blood -cleared for their use. But still, there were Jap bunkers, Jap planes, Japs themselves and Jap equipment in that smoldering mountain and so far, no word had come down definitely as to when the island might be considered secure.

It was all very historic, Maureen has been assured -allowing a woman into a combat zone. First time ever, so they kept erroneously insisting. That’s why there was a man armed with a camera and not plasma sitting a few lines down from her on the cold metal bench. Maureen had once had plenty of time to ponder the historicity of her mission and that of her fellow nurses back in Guam, right now she wished she could focus solely on her training and ignore the ominous crack-pop of something hazardous in the air and the resulting wobble of Major Cleven’s steering.

Stupidly she wished the Major’s low voice would come back on through the near radio system and soothe them all back down like frightened livestock. Gale Cleven had a way of managing that even with his face obscured, and while it made Maureen blush to admit she needed any calming, the facts were she was 24 years old, practically untried and desperate to be brave enough to be of use. Rattling on the bench seat between equally nervous girls and a hawk-eyed journalist was no match for the cuticle picking anxiety.

Maureen chose to forcefully look up from said bloody cuticles and was met by Major Egan’s gum smacking grin across from her. How many carriers had he been on when they went down? Kamikaze planes jutting out the side of them, ocean water pouring in, sharks abounding and hundreds of patients under his care, in his charge to tow to shore?

Mild, scattered, poor-man’s flack wasn’t remotely disturbing to their flight surgeon. “He’s great, isn’t he?” Egan yelled to her cheerfully, the jerk of his head suggested his praise was directed towards someone in the cockpit.

Maureen knew well enough that much as Egan respected the co-pilot Demarco, it was no match for the love affair between him and Cleven, an appreciation that had Egan’s special request yanking his friend from Air Force to Navy to Transit. Such a series of bounces in a man’s otherwise distinguished career, all to chauffeur one charmingly entitled flight surgeon, was enough to put anyone into a bad mood -it would explain Major Cleven’s initial coolness on meeting them all at the departure tarmac.

Or maybe he was just businesslike. Maureen couldn’t fault anyone for that. He had been prepped, perhaps not as much as she had, but he didn’t act entitled in any way, and he kept the plane steady. Except for this mounting series of jolts.

“Yes,” she had chosen to holler back to Doctor -Lieutenant Commander? Bucky No Shits? Johnny? Doc “Smirky”?- Egan, knowing he’d want a favorable report on his friend, “it’s been remarkably smooth.”

Maureen was glad truth aligned with diplomacy in this instant. Although if any man could handle the outright truth it was John Egan, no matter what they all said. And “they” said a lot, he had once had two marine squadrons under his care and to them he was a Marine, simultaneously he’d had three navy squadrons to take care of and to them he was a Navy man. He’d even switched uniforms thrice in a day before. And now he was being flown about by his best friend to tend carcasses on a foreign strand, oddly suited to terrible conditions and bad scenarios, offering medical aviation expertise and poorly timed jokes wherever he went.

He’d trained her group of specialized Evacuation Flight Nurses the last three weeks of aquatic conditioning in the states, and he’d culled eighteen out of the group for getting winded after towing full grown men seven laps in the San Diego surf -all while puffing on a cigarette himself, seated with sunglasses on in an motorized dinghy. Maureen had come to hate him that day, and every day after she’d come to want to be like him. Kathleen Martin got her wings pinned first and Maureen right after, “well done, Candy!” Egan had praised while his fist drove in the tack.

“It’s Kendeigh, sir.” Maureen had dared correct for the hundredth time that training week, “Pronounced like: Ken-Day.”

“Cand-ay. Got it!” he repeated with jovial affirmation and that was that.

Major Cleven had given her the respect of calling her ‘Ensign’ as he shook her hand, a quick and firm squeeze and on to her next companion, she’d have judged him as too pristine in everything from mannerisms to features were his war record not ample justification for his bearing. The low cadence of his voice over the coms came in as a slight pitch to the plane and a swoop of decline in altitude became apparent under her—

“All personnel prepare for landing.”

Cleven was nothing like those pilots during training, barking orders laced with frantic warning in their voices. It was a cow pasture back in Kentucky and there they’d had no good reason for alarm. Here where there was real reason, Gale Cleven crooned to them and John Egan smiled opposite her as he took in the effect his chosen pilot had on his nurses.

“Like soothin’ a baby,” Egan sighed as he lounged a little deeper on his bench, long legs deceptively braced for impact, Maureen had long ago learned the man was nothing but smoke and mirrors of his actual intentions, “isn’t he great? In danger of fallin’ asleep with that guy at the wheel.”

To emphasize his point -or more likely to distract “his girls” from the imminent prospect of landing on a battleground, Egan leaned back all the way and tipped his cover over his eyes, pretending to fall asleep. Maureen caught him as he cocked one sharp eye open to see if she was still watching. She gave him a hopeless smile of recognition of his disguised kindness before forcefully suppressing a gasp of shock as the plane hit Amtrak smoothed gravel and ground its way down the beach. Egan hadn't budged by the time the momentum ceased and the plane became bizarrely still after hours of vibrating travel.

“Right. That’s us.” He straightened up, his cover and his posture, rising up in his seat and slapping at the metal ceiling of the plane, “Good job Buck.” he hollered and got no reply. “He’s still crabby about flying a C-47.” he divulged to no one in particular as they all rose and prepared to disembark, drilled for ages in this routine and finally let loose to practice it. Egan’s nonchalance was almost disorienting for such a momentous occasion.

The large cargo door was opened and a irreverently pleasant tropical breeze funneled through the plane, bearing with it the sounds of crashing waves and popping, far off gunnery. There was also a smell that came with it, sulfur and sweet. It was sickening from the first, and Maureen dreadedly wondered if it was from volcanic fumes and rotting vegetation or something more heartbreaking. With her kit on her back she followed her companions out the cargo door, finding Major Cleven blank faced and unphased on the tarmac beside it. Nothing but a smidge of sweat around his hairline to suggest the hours of flight he’d just clocked and the wacky landing he’d managed so well.

“Welcome to hell island, ladies.” he greeted in a droll monotone and Maureen’s gait stiffened without her permission.

There was no true tarmac, as they had been warned, just a strip of cleared back sand churned up by Cleven’s wheels. Lapping waves were on the left side and then a field of sheets to the right. It was the oddest sight. Rows and rows of camo tarp and white sheets blotted pink, hardly a spot of sand to be seen between. They’d been warned it was havoc here, the situation so bad that they’d finally allowed for this exception, allowed the sending in of specialized units to evacuate by air as the boats could hardly ferry enough of the wounded out in time to save them. But this -this beach of corpses was so daunting a task it seemed impossible to choose where to start.

“John,” she heard Major Cleven address Lieutenant Commander Egan as he dropped down beside her, “you’ve only got so many births, do what ya need to do to fill them, but I’ve got my orders. You’re not settin’ up a hospital. When we get the supplies off, get this plane full -we’re takin’ off. Full stop. I’m not gonna have us here like sittin’ ducks for the mortars while you fuss.”

“I hear ya.” Egan assured him in that remarkably unassuring way of his and lit a cigarette. “Alright nurses, gather round.”

Triage was crucial for such a mission, the prioritizing of wounds and necessary services essential for prolonging the lives of those in imminent peril, versus those with the likelihood of surviving on only the essentials found in a corpsman or medic’s arsenal. They’d be back tomorrow with another flight, and the day after that. Cleven was right that they weren’t here to establish a hospital, yet still the idea of how many would perish from being left behind, even by this first flight, was a sickening probability Maureen has been trained to ignore.

“Where are all the corpsmen?” Egan asked one pharmacist's mate who came to greet them, picking his way through the rows of groaning men. The boy couldn’t have been a day over seventeen.

“Up there,” the kid had nodded up to Mount Suribachi and its ominous veil of smoke, “or dead. Lost so many in the first week they started sending us in to substitute. We’ve done what we can. Sure glad to see you guys.”

“What’s your name, boy?”

“Lemons, sir.”

“Hell I can’t call someone a lemon, now can I?” Egan’s grin was infectious and the boy grinned back like he was seeing his first friend in ages.

“Then it’s Kenny. Sir.”

“Yeah alright Kenny, let’s get to it.” Egan had drilled you all so thoroughly you could have performed even without the aid of the grounded pharmacists and their mates, yet still it was odd to see such a mass of wounded and so few to tend them. The desperation and chaos was tangible.

Maureen had barely set off out from under the plane wing when Gale Cleven’s brusque reprimand arrested her steps as forcefully as a tug to her flight suit would have, “That bunch don’t need your help.”

The terse judgment in his tone gave her sharper eyes to notice that the particular section she was headed towards all had sheets pulled over their faces. Her own face blanched at both the misstep and the sensory overload of so much sorting to do. She wasn’t going to feel sorry for herself, not here, not when faced with the easy part of all this, and she wasn’t going to be crippled by criticism while enduring her first trial by fire. “Right, thank you, Major.” she agreed with him as stoically as possible and ground her heel back around on the sand and tromped off towards the direction of sheets that were visibly alive and writhing in misery.

That changed as soon as they saw her girlish form walking amongst them. Sounds of dying anguish changed to cheerful wolf whistles and happy greetings. It made Maureen’s heart swell with pride at the unbreakable spirit in each of them.

She spent the next hour and a half amongst those men.

Gruesome was a word that Maureen swore to herself that she would never use lightly again. She wasn’t one given to hyperbole anyway, and her years apprenticing in the hospital in Manilla and her most recent training for exactly such wounds as these, understandably led her to believe she knew the mettle of such a word.

But no.

Gruesome, she decided as she began her task again and again, applied only to this: the way the tiniest slip of her hand on any part of this poor boy took skin with it, charred and soupy flesh squishing off meat and sinew like the flaky crust on a prime bit of brisket. It was the only comparison fitting. His own flamethrower had bitten him as he tried to take a countless next pillbox. He’d said it like a joke even as his teeth chattered too hard from pain to deliver the punchline.

Maureen wasn’t here to contemplate ironies, or the unfairness of war, she was here to find some intact vein through which to stab her needle and begin giving him back the blood that was slowly leaching into the black sand beneath him. Ensign Smith was holding up the bottle, throwing a shadow over his charred form that helped Maureen discern a bit better, giving the boy a kind word or ten of reassurance about home and pain relief. Maureen bit through her own tongue when she finally slid the needle home, deep and pulpy, she could only pray it would hold the blood they gave back.

“Alright, bandages, Smith.” Maureen decided and did her best not to jump as a mortar thumped on the sand, hundreds of yards away, but still, they were getting ever closer, proving Major Cleven’s grim prognostication to not be unfounded. He was confirmed that the Japanese didn’t give two shits about red crosses, much less cargo planes carrying in supplies and taking away wounded. Maureen tried not to dwell on it as she and Smith began cutting away filthy uniforms and wrapping their patients' flesh in the Vaseline soaked bandages. It was a terrible business for the first few minutes before the interlaced numbing agents in the gauze took affect and made their care something less like torture for the poor men.

Some of them could walk, a missing leg being a mild injury comparatively, they just needed the helpful shoulder of a technician and off they went to amble into Cleven’s plane. There the Major met them despite it being beyond his purview, handing out cigarettes even though he himself abstained and kept an eye on the Navy mechanic refueling his plane from a bullet riddled jeep. When he wasn’t doing that he was scanning the sky, aviators turned up and reflecting a cloudless sky. Maureen’s mouth grew chalky at the thought of what he was looking out for.

Once wrapped and tended, the men were ready to be hoisted on stretchers and taken to the plane. But those men were select ones, ones that Egan had decided upon. He had a particularly odd way of triaging, one that upon initial observation appeared rather callous and aloof to his nurses who had been trained as much in medical practice as in solicitous decorum.

Doc Egan moseyed through the ranks of wounded, keenly aware he was not as popular as his pretty faced nurses, but making up for it with such easy-going banter that chuckles followed him wherever he went, making the men forget that he was deciding who got relief and who did not. Who were to be permitted the cooling sheets of Elysium by nightfall and who were to be left burning on the sand. Puffing a cigarette and making small talk, he clocked each injury and each likelihood of recovery without giving a bit of it away.

Nearing Maureen’s own patient of the moment, she felt him crouch down beside her and take in the hopeless gut wound she was ineffectually trying to stuff with bandages. A sturner superior would tell her not to bother, to move on, save such determination for someone with a longer life expectancy than five minutes. Maureen found it hard to make that call herself when met with the pleading eyes of someone’s dying son.

“C’mon Candy, move over, lemme try.” Egan murmured and his hip knocked hers gently as he crouched over the boy, perfectly aware of the futility. “Hey bud, breathe for me, breathe. You wanna smoke?”

Egan’s now bloody fingers reached up to his own lips and plucked his fresh and third cigarette of the hour and brought it down to the boy’s chapped mouth, shifting until he was fully seated on the sand, arms around the kid’s shoulders, gently taking the refreshment away when he puffed out, then replacing it for another inhale.

Maureen knew better than to linger. Beside this scene of brotherly last rites was another dying man and a hundred more beside him, so she moved on, seeing only vaguely the way the kid coughed blood as he laughed at Egan’s conversation. The topic seemed to be on the boy’s dog back home. The Sergeant she was tending added in a bit of teasing over the name -who names their dog “puppy”?!

Maureen had barely managed a tourniquet on the sergeant's arm before she could suddenly hear Egan’s gentle chatter turn to low shushing.

The sergeant looked away to the other side.

Maureen noticed the discarded cigarette laying on the sand, it had been smoked to a stub.

The heaving rattle of panicked breath beside them stopped.

Egan shifted onto his knees again and his long, bloody fingers dragged those sightless eyes closed. There was the brittle clink of dog tags being checked.

The sheet was tugged up all the way.

That triage was over.

Maureen politely ignored Doc Egan’s harsh sniff beside her -it was dusty here- but clocked the way he rose to his feet, a rough brushing off of his flight suit and his brusque inquiry regarding her morphine distribution in sector 2.

“All tended-“ she had begun when a shout from the far off plane rang out-

“-JOHN!” That was Cleven’s unmistakable bellow and Egan, despite being in a human sea of potential Johns- responded like he’d been made to hear that one voice alone. “Incoming, west!”

“Shit.” Egan spun westward and sure enough there were fighters with a blazing red sun, rushing straight down at them.

They were such a distance away still, Maureen doubted Cleven’s sight for all of fifteen seconds before horror set in. “They wouldn’t-?” she looked up at Egan whose bitten lip suggested that they would indeed strafe these poor men given the chance.

“Stretchers!” Cleven yelled again, “Get ‘em under the wings!”

There was a callous logic to it. Those men already prepped to be saved might as well be prioritized this much more. Fairness wasn’t something promised in war and Maureen chose to hate Gale Cleven instead of some ephemeral “war” for verbalizing the awfulness of that necessary.

“Do it.” came Egan’s agreeing order and Maureen and Smith took their respective sergeant down near the waterline at a run, fifteen other nurses and the various techs mimicking them. They deposited their men under the relative safety of the flimsy wings and dashed back out for more, leaving two techs behind to hoist the poor fellas into the cargo hold and deposit them in their respective bunks.

“Come onnnnn.” Cleven’s warning yell was drowned by the commencement of allied anti aircraft higher up the beach, trying to pick off the fighters before they reached the landing strip.

Maureen hardly noticed the closing drone of the fighter’s approach, nothing but her heart beat and memorized lines of her training on repeat in her ears. She’d been trained to fight hand to hand if necessary, her folks knew the risks of their daughter volunteering for such service but there was a sour dampening of resolve at the idea of being picked off from the air, not even allowed a bit of struggle to go out with.

All she could do was lift, hoist, run, deposit, do it all again.

They were getting near to full. On one pass through she saw Cleven counting berths and scolding poor Ensign Courter for her rushed method of securing her charge- “five feet drop to the floor on my first bank, oughta be just what that chest wound needs. For God’s sake, I’ll do it!”

He had a cold sort of fury to him Maureen found obnoxiously potent, and she felt a judgment rise in her for his obvious haste in wanting to get out of there. To his credit, when the planes did go by and everyone hit the ground, he was still standing yanking on the straps to secure the top bunk. Bullets punctured the side of the plane and riddled it, tiny specks of light flooding into the dark hold. One man was grazed as he lay in there.

“John!” Cleven warned again after they’d gone by.

“I know, I know damnit.” Egan snapped back from yards away, “There’s just not enough corpsmen -let me finish my damn job.”

“By the time you finish yours I won’t be able to finish mine.” Cleven retorted and the obvious finally occurred to Maureen -perhaps it was not his own safety that preoccupied him but the fragile capability of his riddled plane being able to evacuate once full. That, was indeed, his job. Still, such sentiments expressed as they were from the shelter of the cockpit and from a man who favored a silk blue neck scarf identical to the shade of his eyes, rankled Maureen.

The returning buzz of the Japanese fighters coming back around only cemented her futile rage. Her arms were aching and the sand caught at her boots and her mouth was dry with dust and there were so many, so, so many more left to help. Ensign Smith had been called away to assist with lifting another, and Maureen was knelt beside the man they’d managed onto a stretcher, doing her damndest to find how many bullets were embedded in his left leg and how deep the shrapnel was on his right. There was so much blood and filth it was impossible to tell and Andy, as his name was, couldn’t give her much help besides informing her it hurt like hell and she sure was a sight for sore eyes.

“Egan! At your three o’clock!” There was Cleven again.

Maureen grinned back at Andy and forced it to stay on her face as the buzz of the approaching fighters grew imminent and the dreadful thwump of machine gun fire thudded into the earth yards up the beach. It hit the section of the dead first, a further injury and dishonor. Maureen felt a lump in her throat at the realization she had no one near to help her lift this stretcher and that Andy himself hadn’t a usable leg to spare.

“Go.” her patient told her with a clear look of realization on his face as the leaden spatter of strafing began to elicit responses from those wounded men still alive enough to react.

“No.” The refusal came out of her mouth about as naturally as taking the next breath.

A shadow threw over them for a second and Andy’s facial expression grew surprised, but, stubbornly focused on her patient’s face, Maureen assumed it was the plane passing by at last and chose not to spend her last seconds watching what was going to kill her. “Ensign Kendeigh, lift.” Major Cleven’s voice was so close so suddenly it spooked her flat on her backside until she saw him, squatting down and casting a shadow at the head of the stretcher, poles gripped in both hands, ready to hoist. She scrambled to the foot and took the wood in hand, lifting for the twentieth time that day and running towards the plane.

Time was slow and fast all at once. Cleven’s shadow had come before even the first fighter. But as they ran it zipped by, bullets flinging up sand into their eyes, a near miss. The second one was close behind and as they ran near to the wings, they saw no room was left under them, as crowded as an awning at Coney Island during the height of summer.

Maureen squatted fast and lowered the foot of the stretcher, feeling Cleven mimick her movements behind her. Before she could turn ‘round and enact her training, there their pilot was, body draped over the battered Marine captain, his back as stalwart and protective as the wings of his plane. Maureen threw herself to the ground as well, propping herself over Andy’s battered legs. Together they made a turtle shell of sorts and, damned to be caught cringing when death took her, Maureen kept her eyes open and stared back at Gale Cleven’s gentle face as the -thud-thud-thud- passed them, a micro expression of assurance twitching his mouth and eyes as death passed over.

Who needed to look at the sky when you could find God in those eyes his mother gave him?

For as long as she lived, Maureen would never forget the gust of his spearmint scented breath on her face, the first sensation she registered as soon as the planes were past and they yet remained, alive, locked together above a man they’d both risked dying for.

“Major, you shouldn’t’ve.” Andy’s rough voice spoke Maureen’s own dazed sentiments as they straightened up, Cleven picking up his fallen aviators from the sand, “You gotta fly us outta here, you die an’we’re all sitting ducks.”

“Eh, that’s why we have co-pilots, Skipper.” Cleven grinned before glancing back at the sky, his face morphing into anything but carefree.

“Is that how Lt. DeMarco feels?” Maureen teased wearily.

“I’d never presume to know how Benny Demarco feels.” Cleven replied levelly but the corner of his mouth quirked up in amusement, “Ensign Kendeigh, give me a task.” he demanded.

“Sir-“

“I want us outta here in ten.” His tone held no room for argument, “What’s somethin’ even a dumb pilot can manage? Egan!” He yelled as the Lieutenant Commander approached them at a jog, his dark face the picture of rage for the men in his care being further hurt. “Out in ten.”

“Not gonna happen, still got supplies to distribute-“ Egan was visibly inscenced.

“-one more pass on my plane and we’re not gettin’ up. Look at that back wheel” Cleven replied, nodding at the deflating tire. “Hand me your shit, what’re we supplyin?”

“Aren’t you queasy for needles?” Egan balked, finding time for teasing despite himself.

“Hand me the damn syrettes.” Cleven stuck his hand out.

“You're under Candy’s orders.” Egan stipulated, pointing to Maureen and Cleven nodded.

“Yup, and we leave in ten.”

“Okey Buck, go, go, go.”

The nurses that had gone before them had tagged and labeled each, making it easy for Maureen and Major Cleven to squat along the rows and complete what help could be given. Her other companions were doing the same, each staggered at a few yards and assisted by Corpsmen and pharmacists. And despite the tension from the strafing and the dismal prospect of having to leave so many behind, the hum of chatter soon picked up again on the beach.

“Shit, shit, shit, no-I hate needles!” Marty, eighteen years old but with eyes that had seen a little too much, bore his dressing with tired stoicism until Cleven pulled out the morphine syrette.

“Son,” Gale murmured with barely concealed amusement, “your side looks like a bear cub teethed on it, you’ll be fine. And this’ll help.”

“Don’t ‘son me’ you baby faced glamor boy.” Marty spat back, marine corps superiority coursing through his admittedly impressive veins.

Gale was midway through a good natured snicker at Marty’s venom when the heavy shock of lobbed mortars began to thud the beach again. “Jesus.” the Major sounded more annoyed than surprised and had the wherewithal to place a restraining hand on Marty’s chest as the kid began to scramble up in panic, displacing Maureen’s dressing on his ribs.

“Cleven, they’re chewin’ up our strip!” Demarco yelled to them from the cockpit and sure enough, craters were beginning to form at the end of their taxi-able stretch of beach.

“Don’t leave me! Don’t leave Major!” Marty suddenly clutched at Cleven and the Major had to wrench his arm free. “Calm down, private, you’re on a stretcher.” he then ducked his head as he moved round to seize the poles, “And if there’s one thing you should know,” he went on in a low murmur just for Marty’s benefit, “it’s that Doc Egan doesn’t waste his stretchers on dead men.”

Carrying Marty’s stretcher to the plane was Maureen’s last jog down the beach. She ran up the cargo ramp and Cleven was after her, handing over the task of racking the private into a bunk to one of the nurses before sternly ordering a path for himself through the crowded belly up to his cockpit. Demarco had the full radio system on, the better to communicate with the nursing personnel as they prepared for take off, and everyone aboard could hear his exasperated greeting as his reckless officer took his seat.

“You really game enough to try to get this Goony off the ground with less than a thousand feet of strip?” Benny’s broadcasted doubt made most nurses pause in their work and Maureen met Andy’s eye from the third bunk halfway along the plane wall.

“I thought he said that’s why they have co-pilots.” Andy joked to her quietly.

“Mm,” she agreed mischievously, “I guess co-pilots are one thing, co-Clevens are another.”

“Should find a way to mass produce.” Andy sighed, “War would be over in five seconds.”

Gale Cleven hadn’t even refuted Demarco’s concern verbally and already the crew shrugged it off, if Major Cleven couldn’t get them off Hell Island then no one could, and that was that.

“John Egan, get your ass onboard, it’s wheels up.” Cleven’s yell out the window blasted through the radio, too, and the girls grinned at each other -Major Egan wasn’t one to get bossed about. But, as if to challenge everything they knew about life and their own superior, mere seconds later, John Egan was hopping up into the belly of Cleven’s plane with his empty sack dangling and sweaty hair in disarray. “We’ll be back Kenny!” he yelled to the young pharmacist’s mate left on the sand as the cargo door was hastily wrenched shut by Brady.

“Honey I’m home.” Egan yelled up to the front and Demarco’s snicker echoed along the walls of the tin belly.

“Everybody stow your gear,” Cleven’s order came through, the pounding vibration of nearby mortars shuddering the plane even more than the engine’s revving, “we’re gettin’ outta here now. S’gonna be bumpy.”

“That’ll be one word for it.” Demarco snarked, “Death by bumps.”

The human cargo in the plane, those not groaning or insensible, let up a unanimous chuckle. It helped to have been to hell and back, a quick death as a plane failed to get air and plowed instead into a sand bank was hardly the worst prospect these men had faced.

“Believe, Benny, believe.” Maureen could hear Cleven’s soft smile in his voice as the wheels began to roll.

Brady, their engineer, navigator and the lone crewman besides the pilots aboard this transport, kindly manhandled Maureen to a seat between his legs on the rattling floor beside Egan’s built-in desk, his hand fisted in the back of her jumpsuit collar like she was a kitten. They kicked their legs out together and braced as they gained speed and the plane began to jostle into the milder craters at an ever more intense pace.

Shell fragments made a series of charming bangs off the side of the wing nearest her and Maureen could hear Brady whispering behind her in repetition “God spare the oxygen, God spare the oxygen, God spare-“

“50-“ Demarco’s countdown was unfortunately broadcasting like some morbid game announcer and Maureen could see Egan’s jaw ticking in stress under the harsh overhead lights.

There was a terrible blast in front, the sound of shattering glass or metal and a jarring shudder went through the plane, “Damnnit.” Cleven hissed but the acceleration remained.

“You hit?”

“No. Read me, Benny-“

“80-“ Demarco obligingly resumed counting.

“C’mon Buck.” breath gusting on Maureen’s neck behind her, as Brady had begun to direct his prayers to the Major now and as if in answer, the stomach swooping feeling of flight took over them seconds later as the cargo plane let out a mighty roar of strained endurance and lifted with a wobble that had more than a few bunks puking their guts out. There’d be over five hours to clean the plane floor and attend to housekeeping if they could just level out and stay up long enough to get out of range.

Down the way from them Egan was still seated, one hand holding aloft a not yet hung plasma bottle and the other gripping a support bar. But his head was starting to nod like a dancer keeping pace with the band’s ever growing tempo. The engines had a beat, if you’d been personal with a plane long enough to pick it up, and Maureen paid attention to Egan’s stippling fingers on the cross bar as they mounted and mounted, little bursts of enemy gunnery causing a comparatively mild wobble to the plane body every few seconds. She figured a veteran like Brady would know when it was safe to let her go; judging by the grip on her collar he was still highly dubious of their lasting success.

“Fighters, -everyone brace.” Cleven’s voice warned about as cooly as if he was pointing out the drip of ice cream slipping down a cone.

“Ice man.” Andy praised from his bunk to the agreement of his companions as the fighter zipped by without so much as a shudder from Cleven’s steering.

Plenty of the passing bullets had punctured the belly and one man got a direct hit. “Candy!” Egan commanded from his place checking the unfortunate man’s pulse, “Go remind Buck that we haven’t got the oxygen to go full bomber, he’s gotta keep low and -Candy! When ya come back, time to start throwin’ on blankets. Brady, get our pumps going. This is as steady as it’ll get.”

“You got it, commander.”

More than a little sure her mission was more provoking than necessary, Maureen still obeyed and followed Brady up the length of the plane and towards his electrical station, then past it to poke her head between the pilot’s seats.

“Well, well, this is a pleasant surprise, getting car sick, kiddo?” Demarco joked, “Hey, I get it, I’d find it hell back there with no windows to look out.”

Their front window was partially shattered and the metal on Cleven’s side was gnarled.

“Those mortars obligingly made a few.” Maureen joked back.

“Anybody hurt?” Cleven asked, and to her surprise, he turned from his panel to look at her with unmasked concern.

A joke was ready made there about everyone quite literally being shot to hell but she sensed he’d not appreciate it and following some uninterpreted impulse of desiring his good opinion, she hardly wished to repay his earnestness with flippancy. “Only one.”

“How bad?”

“He looked -dead.” Maureen admitted. She hadn’t gotten a good look at the man moving past him but she’d seen Egan’s treatment of the body and it wasn’t promising.

Cleven’s jaw worked overtime at the news and something snapped in his mouth, followed by a soft curse from lips too full and soft to always be so stern. Maureen thought he may have broken a tooth with all that tension but he spit out two halves of a blooded toothpick instead. It fell to his pant leg.

“Major Cleven, sir, you’re bleeding.” It had drawn Maureen’s attention to his wet lap.

“That’s what I said.” Demarco agreed.

“It’s somebody else’s.” Cleven shook his head.

“You know if you pass out on me-“ Demarco warned, completely ignoring Cleven’s denial.

“-that’s why we’ve got co-pilots.” Cleven finished for him with a maddening smirk that made Benny Demarco throw his hands up.

“Can you check him?” he asked, “I mean -you are a nurse!”

“What? Hell no!” Major Cleven spooked for the first time all day at the suggestion, glancing quickly from his reddened trousers, behind him to Maureen Kendeigh, and back again. “I’m fine.” he declared in a firm tone that dettered her almost as much as the challenge of getting over the instruments and a steering column to pull down his pants and look. “Ensign Kendeigh, was there a purpose to your visit?” He redirected, resolutely ignoring Demarco’s unabated concerns.

“Yes sir,” she replied, meekly as she could, “Doc Egan asked me to remind you that you’re not flying a bomber. To mind the oxygen, sir. And that it’s cold.”

Cleven let out a mirthless little laugh. “We’re full of holes Ensign, of course it’s cold.”

“I know sir.”

“Yeah, ‘course you know,” his eyes lightened for a moment and Maureen almost deluded herself he was being chummy when he murmured next, “you’re smart like that. Tell the Lieutenant Commander I’ll keep her nice and low, so low the Jap navy gunners can blow the floor out without a sweat.”

“Much obliged, Major.” Maureen chirped, pleased to have been trusted with a bit of morbid humor -it was the truest test of being taken seriously a woman could hope for in the service.

“Thank you, Ensign.” And with that she was dismissed.

By the time she got to the belly again her assigned job of doling out blankets had long been accomplished by her fellows. Brady had the place lit up like an operating theater and there was the added drone of medical equipment added to Cleven’s engines. She liked to think of them as his now, Maureen realized, a tiredness seeping in now that the rush was over, now there was just six hours of the same until they touched down again in safety. His engines stayed with them, consistent, steady, dependable yet a little absent, just like the man himself.

“Major Cleven said he’ll keep her low, Doc.” Maureen reported dutifully but whatever humor Egan once held when sending her to the cockpit was now gone, a bloody mess on his hands as he and Ensign Dormer worked over a head wound.

“Good.” Egan gritted out, “I need a monitor on vitals and I need new gloves, c’mon Candy, c’mon!”

The hours passed like this, no way of telling time in the artificially lit tube of metal. Some men needed a cup of water and a kind smile, others required every bit of grit and intelligence to keep even the faintest pulse discernible above the hum. When one of them passed away in the anonymity of the top bunk, Egan didn’t bother to cover his face, the man looked to be sleeping and it suited the morale better if his fellows were not disillusioned on that score.

It was impossible not to think for a split second on the unfairness of it all -live to be finally evacuated and only die before getting safe. To think how someone else less tore up might’ve been given that bunk and survived the trip.

“Can’t dwell on it.” Ida Brady, their headmistress back in Manila, had said -and she had been right. But seeing her brother Lt. Brady cross himself now in recognition of a soul passed did something to Maureen’s own spirit, a grieving sort of fury possessed her which matched Egan’s own as they worked on the next unsalvageable man until he became a likely contender for seeing his wife and kids again.

She had been up for nineteen hours, flying for ten of those, nursing for four. She was bone tired and yet there was always someone to be tended and the thought of leaving one of these poor men without even the slightest of their needs met felt impossible. Maureen didn’t even think to pause or lag in her expertise, neither did the nurses around her and up there at the front somewhere, Cleven’s eyes were sharp and focused as ever, she knew it, and knowing it brought a calm over her that made her sympathize with Egan’s own superstitious preference for the man.

Brady came through with coffee, an abnormal duty he picked up as a result of trusting no one else with the process or the electrical requirements to make it. “Figured our pilots could use it.” he explained before passing out a passel of paper cups to the girls filled with the peppy stuff, belying his practical excuse, before taking two to the cockpit.

He came back out with a funny look on his face- “Benny says he needs a pan.”

“What the hell for?” Egan balked.

“Or a condom.” Brady dutifully amended the petition.

“I repeat -what the hell for?”

“They’ve drank a lotta coffee sir.”

“Any of you fellas got condoms?” Egan asked his patients with a laugh and got a series of predictable replies. “Gale Cleven sure as hell don’t.”

There were light hearted moments like that, many of them in fact, but six hours of flying with wounds as bad as the ones they were tending was no joke, there were bits of laughter and there were times of quiet and there were restless sleepers whose terrors not even morphine could dim.

“Forty minutes out.” Major Cleven had gone quiet over the coms for so long it was like hearing from God again when he came on, gentle and steady.

Those they couldn’t get comfortable were at the height of their groaning as the cold and the endless buzz got to them. Helplessly the nurses offered pillows and water and irrigated the burns with saline and checked needle positioning. Maureen had taken to charting, something too often neglected in high stress environments but something that proved terribly crucial as soon as they landed and handed over their charges to a new set of professionals. On the left side of the plane she held one man’s wrist after another and noted their pulse. On the right side she did the same, one man’s left hand after another, wedding band or sans wedding band, in her notes it was only ever:

“94, 57, 88, 91, 63, 82”

The lights had been dimmed, hopes were some rest could be gotten by those in any shape to manage sleep. It made for a drowsy atmosphere, only the flashlight in her teeth illuminating the veins under her fingers and her co-workers faces, Egan’s face was a shiny mess of freckles in the torch light despite the chill, exhaustion seeping out of him but not a hint shown in his workmanship. It made the dull chorus of groans in the dark all the more ominous and Brady remarked to Smith on one pass that maybe they should have brought a record player.

“Twenty minutes out.” Maureen and every other soul on board was living for those little updates from Cleven.

Men told to hang in there and not die before they could be gotten to surgery suddenly had a goal in mind and the suspense was growing brutal. Stashed and stowed, secured and checked, landing preparations were already done and it was last minute tending before taking seats. Maureen found herself nearly piddling by one young private, trying to soothe him with a washcloth as sepsis fever wracked him when over the intercom came the oddest lulling hum, like a far off jazz intro.

It was too soft initially to be recognized but the surety picked up, something about the tone unmistakably belonging to their pilot, his hums about as characteristic of him as his laconic speech.

“Is that whadda friend we have in Jesus?” Demarco’s voice overtopped the gentle melody.

John Egan was wheezing in a chuckle beside her as Maureen shook her own head in disbelief.

“No,” Gale murmured, humming paused only briefly, “it’s ‘Leaning on the everlasting arms’ -you fish eater.”

“You gotta be jokin’.” Benny was wheezing too but Cleven was back to his gentle humming, words actually forming this time and filling the tired plane with a timbre that could put Bing Crosby out of a job.

“What have I to dread, what have I to fear

Leaning on the everlasting arms?

I have blessed peace with my Lord so near

Leaning on the everlasting arms”

It worked, the sickening drop in elevation was -if not noticed- bravely pushed aside for a hymn sing, Brady leading from the back and Cleven from the front. And for a brief moment, men from Kansas to Florida, Oregan to Rhode Island, strapped in a flying coffin of flickering souls, were seated back in the pews of their childhood, trusting something larger than themselves. Even if that something was Gale Cleven’s steady hands or the justness of a cause worth dying for or God Almighty, it was something big and above the pain of right now.

“Leaning, leaning

Safe and secure from all alarms

Leaning, leaning

Leaning on the everlasting arms”

The Navy station at Gaum had a runway, in fact there were five Cleven could have picked at whim, and there was no feeling so beautifully civilized and sure as the smooth roll of plane tires on asphalt after what they’d just left. “Flaps at quarter!” and they were slowing, the deflated back wheel only causing some slight disturbance, and then they were stopped.

That bizarre stillness settled again as the engines were cut. Egan gave Maureen a smile so soft and telling that her heart about seized in realization -they’d managed it. “Well that’s us.” he repeated for the second time that day, voice gone raspy with cigarettes and fatigue. “Welcome to American soil, boys.”

There were so many lights outside the cargo door, searing white flashes in the nighttime, jeeps and ambulances and all manner of medical personnel at the ready, it was overwhelming in the exact opposite way the beach at Iwo had been. Maureen hopped down onto the tarmac with Ensign Mann, ready and prepared to stay with her charges until the transition could be made. Clipboard in hand and kit on her back, she’d go in with her select five until they’d been admitted and charted meticulously in the various wards.

“How’s it feel to make history, Miss?!” -some of those lights, Maureen realized with a dull throb behind her eyes, were flashbulbs. Journalists were thick as thieves, snapping and hollering, others respectfully keeping a distance, “You're the first woman to step foot in a combat zone-“ Maureen kept her hand on her stretcher even as she watched Cleven limping over to a jeep and piling in after Demarco. Her mouth set in a sour line of suspicion regarding his claims of being unscathed. He’d be in interrogation and she in the wards for the next hour, she’d have to find out later.

A couple of hours later John Egan was sat with Captain Crosby in the administration office, nothing but a small alcove at the front of the ward, his legs spread wide in his chair and good scotch whisky being slurped from a cleverly injected orange while reviewing the charts. Croz was a whizz at this, meticulous and careful to a fault and John adored him for it because men who gave a damn were scarce after this many years of grueling loss and, also, because it allowed himself to wind down sooner than he was technically free to do so.

“Two men lost, that’s -that’s still good odds.” Crosby couldn’t manage an upbeat tone, he felt those two lives as deeply as Egan did, but facts were facts and over all, this experimental mission had proven beyond successful. Now to tell that to the families of the two men now being carted to the morgue instead of surgery and salt baths.

“Yeah, my girls were Trojans out there.” Bucky sucked his teeth, the squint in his eyes beginning to relax with a boozy sort of calmness. “Speakin’ of Trojans! —Candy!”

Maureen approached the little alcove at a tired gait, not above reprimanding Egan for his loud voice with all those occupied beds just feet away. “It’s late, Commander.” she reminded with hinting softness that only made him crane his head back and grin sloppily at her.

“It is, it is.” he agreed, reaching up to pat her arm and she squinted at the smell of whiskey, Crosby’s sudden and transparent busyness with the charts confirmed her suspicions. “You should get some shut eye, Candy! Back at it tomorrow.”

“So should you.” she hinted kindly.

“Mm,” he hummed in negative, “apparently my ‘specialty’ is needed elsewhere before then.”

“And so the booze?” she struck back and Crosby’s pen briefly dragged along his tidy line in shock at her daring.

“Steady hands, Candy darlin.” Egan responded, lifting two sticky palms up and showing, indeed, not a tremor. “I’ve got a surgery in less than an hour -working with Brady’s old sister, of all people, the one who snuck out of Manila after?- anyways, she’s 90 pounds of spit and vinegar. Starved for two years, but she takes three weeks off and a round of anti-parasitics and she’s all ‘let me back at ‘em.’ Hell of a dame. Anyway, surgery with her. I need this.”

“Well,” Maureen Kendeigh knew when to let go of a fight with a man who’d as yet never failed her or anyone else, despite his habits, “I can confirm it does nothing for your eyes bags.”

“Kiss ‘em better?”

“Not in my purview, sir.” she couldn’t help but smile, “Perhaps lieutenant Brady will be obliging?”

“She scares me.” he objected.

“And I don’t?”

“Only in the ways I like, Candy Darlin’.” he insited.

“Ah Major!” Crosby’s strained greeting drew their attention away from this over rehearsed banter and Egan straightened up fast upon sight of his friend.

“Buck!”

“John.” Gale Cleven was in the same uniform he’d been in for hours, flight jacket undone and scarf hanging loose. He must have come straight from interrogation and standing in front of the administrator's desk he was turning his cover over and over in his hands. Maureen was certain that were she to devote two hours a day to brushing her hair she could never bernish it to the golden brilliance that twelve hours of flight-sweat gave his. On a more concerning note, his was pale as death except for those lips. “I came to check in on everybody. Load of journalists out there.” He thumbed back behind him at the public area, “Mostly curious about you, Ensign.”

“Historical.” Egan affirmed and sent Maureen a sly look as she sighed over the fuss being made of her mission.

“I’m one of twenty.” she reminded.

“I hope you were nice about her.” Egan goaded his buddy and to her confusion, Gale flinched as if that were a remarkably successful mode of attack.

“O-of course.” he frowned severely and Maureen had a desperate urge to thumb those lines away. “I told them the truth.” he defended, mildly heated.

“Which is?” Egan was enjoying this and neither Maureen nor Harry Crosby could seem to puzzle out why.

“They did remarkably.” Cleven didn’t budge.

“Better than you thought.” Egan prodded.

“Yeah. Admittedly, far better than I thought. Jeeze, John.”

“But were you nice about her?” Egan insisted.

“What?”

“You said they were particular about Candy.” Egan said, “So what did you say?”

Maureen grew concerned that with such a level of fluster in the Major’s face not a stitch of blood seemed able to raise a blush.

“How ‘bout you read it in the paper.” Gale replied, coolly mean before clearing his throat and straightening up, back in possession of himself. “I came to see how many -how’d we do?”

“Twenty eight.” Egan confirmed.

“Outta thirty?” Cleven asked for confirmation.

“Yes sir.” Crosby answered him.

“Alright.” The Major accepted that, hat still whirling in his hands, a strange contrast to his perfectly contained posture. It drew Maureen’s eye to his hips and that deep red stain running down his pant leg.

“How’s your hip Major?” she asked, seeking to break the silence before Egan did so with some new and regrettable subject.

That did bring a flush and a sheen of sweat broke out on a face Maureen knew would be feverishly hot were she to touch it. He looked peeky, truth be told. “It’s fine, ma’am.”

“Hold up,” Egan stood from his chair and leaned over the desk to glare blearily at Gale’s trousers. “You're hit.”

“It’s a scratch.”

“Scratches don’t keep bleedin’ like that.“

“Well, mine do.”

“Hey, I don’t go tellin’ you how to fly your planes-“

“-you do though.”

“-so you don’t go tellin’ me what’s a scratch and what’s a wound. It’s still drippin’, that makes it a wound.”

Cleven moved his boot to the side impatiently and only succeeded in proving his friend’s point as a line of fresh blood smeared the white tile. “I was gonna just -“

“-What?”

“-Clean it in the shower.” Cleven sighed, defeated but with an edge that suggested he might yet do it .

“Oh, just gonna rinse mortar fragments outta of your thigh, yeah?”

“It’s not that bad. Dunno if it really got hit.” He protested, “Might be scratched.”

“Or you might have a piece of your instrument panel snuggled up to an artery.” John affirmed sarcastically. “We’re goin’ up again tomorrow. I need you fit, I need you good.”

“I am.”

“You’re gonna get checked.” Egan commanded and Gale looked back at the double doors leading to freedom and a pack of journalists and sighed. “You’re on the ground now, flyboy, I call the shots.”

“Ok.” Cleven mumbled, “If you’re so goddamn eager to pants me, do it.”

“I am, I am but I’ve got even better things to do.” Egan rounded the desk and flung an arm around Gale in parting, bringing him in close despite Cleven’s stiff necked antipathy that hid only the deepest seated endearment, “Like putting a left lung back where it should be and trying to get Lt. Brady to smile at me.” Egan expounded, letting go and beginning to actually leave, much to Cleven's sudden concern, “Which is, naturally, on the left -the left lung, that’s where it goes.” Egan went on.

“Wait, aren’t you gonna-?” Cleven called after him.

“Pantsing is more of Ensign Kendeigh’s purview.” John replied cheerfully. “Don’t look so appalled, I'm sure she’s seen smaller.”

“John!” Major Cleven and Maureen both inflected his name like twin, scandalized parrots.

“You deserve each other.” John laughed, “Ensign, do your duty.”

“This is the kinda behavior that has you gettin’ write ups for bein’ a terror to your nurses!” Gale growled after him in remonstrance but it did nothing to slow Egan’s tactical withdrawal.

“Bulshit, everybody on this ward loves me!” John dared to claim even as he was berated on his way out by more than a few wounded marines for being a little too jovial at two in the morning.

Cleven didn’t wait for the doors to fully close on Egan or for Maureen to collect her professional demeanor and clipboard before he was leaning over Captain Crosby at his desk, large hands splayed on the fresh paperwork, assuming the pose of a supplicant before a lawyer. “Harry, Captain, do me a favor this once and take a look fo-“

“-Major Cleven sir,” Harry Crosby interjected levelly and with the utmost respect, “I’m an administrator.”

Maureen composed herself, the sight of this stoic man losing a grip on himself due to the prospect of lost modesty was surprising, it was also motivating to find her own professionalism and put him at ease. “Major, if you’d follow me?” she nodded her head towards the ward and started clopping down the dim aisle toward one of the last empty beds. He didn’t need to lay down for it but she needed her instrument tray, an isolated light and, if his shyness was so severe, drawing the sectioned curtains would hardly be amiss.

When she arrived and turned round to instruct him, he was obediently there to obey. Something about that dogged respect for authority he possessed and his compliance with her own profession filled her with an odd protectiveness and she motioned him into the space gently, tugging the curtain closed behind him. He was taller than she realized, made more apparent as he took the initiative and tugged off the bulky weight of his flight jacket, methodically laying it out in a half fold on the bed, nothing but a lean line of him left in olive green.

Lanky, her mother would call him, a long drink of water. He looked all of twenty four, suddenly, soft and in need of a meal. “Your leg, yes?” she reaffirmed, jotting it down in the chart. She had found that men found it easier to talk of injuries when she wasn’t making eye contact.

“Yes.” His voice was low as the grave and hushed too, “And -I think maybe my hip.”

Maureen’s eyes flicked to the place in question, recalling how she had suspected his lap in general on the plane. “Right.” she made the customary jot down of the detail and then an arguably unnecessary note beside it, the longer to give him a chance to cool himself. “Your pants Major, if you would.” she filled in the date and the time, cursory information so as not to be idle while he undid his belt, the clank of the flat uniform clasp deafening in the space where he seemed to hold his breath.

She was used to discerning the moment when it was safe to look up. Often there was a brief period after the sound of pants hitting the floor where one might have the misfortune of catching a man adjusting himself to a preferred side. She was prepared to give him that moment in peace but his voice called her to attention.

“Is this?-“ he didn’t finish his sentence and she looked up to see his vague gesture as he stood in briefs and boots, jacket hung open, too.

“Yes I think we can manage with those on.” she smiled reassuringly, discerning his query. His skivvies were blood stained on the right and clinging to him but the wounds appeared to be above and below their coverage, “I’ve always got scissors if need be.”

“Scissors.” He repeated with a nod, teeth savagely dug into his lip.

“Jacket off, this could get messy.” She ordered and something about her decisiveness seemed to soothe him like she knew it would, he shrugged it off gracefully and laid it beside the sheepskin, and yanked at his tie to relive his bobbing throat. “Please, sit Major.”

He sat down on the bed, a little stiffly, and she reached above her to turn on the large overhead lamp, shining it down on them both and in the harsh glow of it she wasn’t sure she’d ever seen something so beautiful as Gale Cleven’s blushing face fixed upturned towards her own.

“You’ve lost a lot of blood, looks like.” she attempted to make conversation and got a mere nod instead, once she stepped nearer, his eyes devoutly focused themselves somewhere to the right of them, on the floor.

She rinsed the area first, wiping away the crusted blood until his smooth, lightly haired skin came into view, little jagged tears visible in it with small fragments embedded. It wasn’t bad at all, but deep enough to keep it bleeding.

The touch of cool water made him jolt in surprise. What it didn’t do was make him shrink. She saw his hands curl, white knuckled around the mattress pad beside him as she gently dug out the metal, and she had a suspicion it wasn’t from the pain.

As unabashedly as her profession had taught her, Maureen tugged up his boxer leg until she was satisfied she’d uncovered the last little shard and did what was necessary, reaching atop the wet fabric and moving his heavy member up and away. He about bucked off the table at that mere touch of positioning and Maureen backed away out of pure animal instinct to avoid getting reflexively kneed.

“I'm sorry!“ he rushed out, his chest suddenly tight like an elephant were sat on it and his blood thudded in his ears, “Ensign, I apologize, I don’t know why-“

“It’s fine.” she insisted, stunned and pitying at the realization she probably was the first woman to touch him this way. To touch him at all. “I’m sorry this requires it.” she admitted.

“Please don’t -“ he took a large breath and began again, actually managing to meet her eyes out of sheer willpower, “-I’m the one who’s sorry. You’re doing your job, i don’t know why I get- it’s unprofessional of me, I'm sorry.” he repeated firmly and straightened his spine as if he could discipline a most human reaction away.

“It’s not at all uncommon.” She whispered, feeling compelled to be unprofessional herself if only to make him stop berating himself, “We nurses deal with this all the time, quite normal after combat, particularly.” Maureen paused for a moment and weighed the joke on the tip of her tongue as she dabbed iodine on a cotton ball and prepared to go back into the dreaded zone of his thigh crease, “It’s to be expected, the manual says; your blood is quite literally UP.”

Stood there in suspense between his legs with the iodine swab waiting mid air, Maureen waited until she saw a flicker of amusement twinkle his sad expression and a snicker escape that sober mouth. “Tell me about it.” he rasped, exasperated at his own body. “Every damn time.”

“That’s what I’m doing,” she teased, bringing the swab down and ignoring the sizable jolt his whole body and appendage gave at this dab to his thigh or the way his belly caved in with his deep intake of breath, “I’m telling you it’s normal.”

“Damn, you are sweet.” He declared suddenly with gut wrenching emphaticism that finally broke Mauren’s own precarious composure. “Not just to me,” he hastened to add in response to her melting expression so close to him, “to everybody out there. You were incredible today.” He paused and Maureen swallowed hard and tried with great difficulty to find the capability to thank him for the compliment. Before she could, he added with youthful honesty, “But you are -sweet to me.”

“Right back at you. Major.” she insisted, daring to stay that close and look back into those eyes she thought would be her last sight on earth for a second there on the beach earlier. His shuddering breath suggested he was recalling it, too.

“It’s nice to have friends in the crucible with ya.” he explained and Maureen felt her heart glow.

“Your poor hands.” she whispered, dropping her swab to gather his shaky hands in hers, the large palms engulfed her own even as she tried to cradle them. Never a hint of this anxiety while flying them, yet here he was shivering with it afterwards. “Probably blood loss.” she gave him an out, some men weren’t ready for talk of flight exhaustion or strained nerves.

“Then why’s it wasting all I’ve got to spare on…that?” He actually managed to joke back and Maureen actually allowed herself to laugh -god help her, she laughed at a man’s joke about an ill timed erection.

“John would say something about hope springing eternal, right about now.” she wheezed even as he groaned, his hands still placidly jittering in her grip, “I enjoyed your singing, by the way.”

“Mm, yeah, well,” he cleared his throat, “you didn’t see the hole in the wing or the busted flaps all the way home. That landing didn’t promise to be as pretty as it was.”

“But it was pretty.”

“Yeah. Not too bad.”

“A gorgeous landing.” she insisted and his eyes started to water under the harsh light. Impulsively, and in an act of unprofessionalism she would have never recognized before today, Maureen Kendeigh drew his hands close to her chest and pressed a kiss to his lined forehead. The way he sagged against her in a shuddering lunge suggested her impulse was a good one. “Doc Egan insists whiskey is good for this.” she whispered into hair that smelled so strongly of his musk and the wool of his cap she about buckled from it.

“Mm, but is it g—good for him?” he responded rhetorically, a gust of moist breath against the open throat of her flight jacket, his usual irony still remained with only a hiccup of nerves interrupting his speech. Maureen wasn’t sure anymore, what saved a life, well, it had saved a life, so why demonize it? She was here to force things to keep living in environments so hostile wildflowers gave up. Some men needed their booze and some men needed to be held in the hospital ward at two in the morning until their shakes calmed. As if he could read her mind, she felt Gale turn his head to the side a little for breath, face still pressed to her chest as he uttered quietly, “This is working. For me.”

“Good.” Nose buried in his hair she took a few measured breaths herself, feeling that odd calm still radiating off him, even as his body was shot to hell and giving off the overtaxed jitters. “You bring people calm, you know that, Major? It’s why Egan picked you for this, deep down, you make a plane load of dying men hang in there. That’s a gift. But when you’ve got a cup you keep pouring out of, it’s bound to go empty. Gotta refill yourself, sometimes, yes?”

“I thought this was blood loss.” Gale replied softly and it took Maureen a beat to recognize the sad mischief in his blue eyes.

“Alright. I’ll speak for myself.”She conceded with a huff.

“You must be exhausted.” he noted, suddenly as sober as they come.

“A little tired.” she admitted, questioning the way she instinctively tightened her hold on the back of his neck as he stiffened to pull away. Entirely unprofessional, she wasn’t a medicine spoon or a needle, he had every right to pull away.

“So what would fill your cup back up?” he asked in that low voice that sent a million varied undertones crashing through her, whether he intended it or not.

Too tired to be much more than plainly honest, or as honest as a woman should be with a half undressed patient cradled to her chest, Maureen admitted the half of it, which in many ways was the whole, “This is working for me.”she repeated his own words to him and watched them take effect.

Like a sudden reanimation had occurred, Gale Cleven untangled their hands with emphatic surety and then, in an act of kindness Maureen never expected, brought them to her shoulders and tugged her down for a solid embrace. “A hug and a nap then.” He prescribed, his solid shoulder beneath her cheek and his legs parted for her to step between. Only the bandages kept him from bleeding further on her.

“Not a nap,” she smiled, an inexplicable warmth and calmness flooding through her in his hold, his back was broad and lean under her hands, “we should go to sleep.”

“No such thing as going to sleep in the military, Ensign.” Gale murmured, “Sleep -that’s what happens when your mama tucks you in and you’ve got a whole night to waste. Naps. That’s what we take.”

“Alright, a nap, and a hug.”

“Alright.”

“You know,” Maureen dared with a little smile as some part of her slotted back in place and gave her the boldness to be a little too much, “there’s this thing people came up with ages ago where you hug and take naps at the same time.”

Pink cheeked but with a jaw clench that had defeated warzones, Gale Cleven pulled his head away and gave her a heavy look of admonishment, “Marriage.” he stated unamused.

Well, she had meant sex, and she wanted it, always had after danger -but Cleven had a point too.

“Uh, yes, that’s the most common-“

“-If I were to marry you, Maureen Kendeigh,” his voice took on a teasing lilt that was somehow more devastating than all his commanding earnestness, “there’d be no nap taking.”

“Oh.” A single utterance was about all she could articulate in the face of that smirk and gentle refusal. Both flattering and painful all at once. “Well, that’s not for us then.”

“No.” he pondered, full lips twitching downwards in disappointment, “At least, sounds like a decidedly post-war endeavor. No naps.” he clarified.

“Oh -yes.” she caught on, well used to the code of superstition all around her that didn’t allow men to spell out any sort of lasting, long term hope. “A postwar endeavor.” she agreed, never having heard marriage so smartly categorized.

“Uhuh,” his hands trailed up from her ribs to squeeze the sore muscles of her deltoid, “for now -naps. Back up tomorrow.”

“Alright.” she agreed, stepping a small distance back and looking him over, this time his presence didn’t shrink, in fact if anything he expended in the small room and it made her chest ache, “You're alright?” she made sure one last time.

He held his palms flat up and Maureen could attest they were indeed steady, terribly large, too, and his watch on his wrist was careening towards three o’clock. “Looks like it.” he rasped. “But you’re in charge here. Can I go, Ensign?”

Regretfully Maureen nodded, “You’re dismissed, Major.”

When he stood up from the bed he was by necessity in her space, looking down at her rather fearlessly as he yanked up the waist of his trousers and gathered the belt closed around his lean waist. Maureen felt her cheeks burn but couldn’t look away, if she were to glance away from those eyes she might see something even more tempting before he’d secured the fabric.

“Got any more duties after this?” he asked, breaking the moment as he bent to arrange his trouser hems over his boots.

“No.”

“Then I’ll walk you to your billet.”

“For naps.” she clarified cheekily.

“For naps.” he agreed with mirthful vehemence, finger pointed at her with almost paternal caution to not push his patience.

“Do you want your shell fragments?” she rattled them in their dish, the pieces she'd pried from the shallow muscle of his hip.

Cleven paused with his hand on the dividing curtain, shaking his head in amusement, “Give ‘em to Egan,” he suggested with a wicked little smirk, “knowing him he’ll make a talisman out of them or something equally useful.”

Hope y’all enjoyed! Feedback is a writer’s life blood, lemme head your thots or screams! Xoxo

Taglist (let me know if you’d like to be added for my MOTA fics)

@stylespresleyhearted

@ab4eva

@earth-to-lottie

@suraemoon

@blurredcolour

@steph-speaks

@crazymadpassionatelove

@rubyfruitjungle

@taestrwbrry

@storysimp

@javden

@sexualparkour

@jointherebellion215

@sunny747

@ask-you-what-sir

@xxanaduwrites

@pretty4u

@yorkshirekiwi

@waitedforlove743

@elvismylove04

[whore-era]

collage!ellie x reader hcs? <3

a/n: im gonna assume u meant college!ellie so HERE IT GOES just for you anon friend <3 sorry for how short it is kfkdkkd

tlou 2 university: college!ellie x reader headcanons <3 18+

i have a feeling ellie is either a biology major, engineering major, or a physics/astrophysics major (cuz our girl loooves space), meaning she's extremely intelligent and does very well in class!! she's always answering the professor's questions, taking notes, paying attention. when you struggle with any science/math related subjects, she's ALWAYS willing to tutor you. but, this doesn't mean she's just gonna give you the answers, she's gonna make sure you actually learn and study, even using any means possible — like having you strip off a piece of clothing every time you get an answer wrong and making it a fun time for the both of you.

when you have important projects/papers/quizzes/exams to do that day, she'll make sure to send an encouraging message. don't get me wrong, she always does, but on especially important days like these, she'll always make sure to send an extra special one <3 'good morning baby! you're gonna fucking KILL this chemistry exam babe! you worked your ass off and you're gonna do amazing and get the highest score ❤️ i love you my smart girl let me know what you get when you're done' 'ty els <3 i love you most babe ! i'm abt to start talk to u laterrrr 🏃🏻‍♀️'

ellie will always fulfill her girlfriend duties and walk you to and pick you from classes! even tho she's always a tiny bit late because your class was all the way across campus from hers, but she wants to make sure you're protected and safe so she doesn't care either way! and she'll always carry your books for you, making sure you don't strain or 'hurt' yourself (her words not yours). "els, i have two, capable working arms!!" you whine, as she takes the textbook off your hands, "and so? what if you get a muscle spasm? or you sprain your hand?" she retorts, "by a two pound book?" ellie shrugs, "the possibility is never zero, babe."

when ellie has a project or an essay to work on, it'll be a little difficult to reach her as she gets in the zone when she's working. you'll probably send her some texts throughout the day to check in on her, but as the day progresses you'll find yourself worrying and thinking about stopping by her dorm with dinner because you already know she hadn't ate all day from being cooped up in her room typing away:

you - 9:30 am: els! just got out of class!! gnna go get some lunch w jesse :) hope ur doin okay <3

you - 11:45 am: miss u babe hope ur work is coming along great !!!

you - 2:21 pm: havent heard from u......kinda worried....hope u have been eating n staying hydrated missy >:(

you - 5:56 pm: ok i'm On my way! to ur dorm rn w/ dinner i already know u haven't ate yet n ur gonna feel my wrath

you - 5:56 pm: ignore that extremely enthusiastic On my way! it autocorrected im still mad at u

hearing the booming pounding on her door, ellie takes off her earbuds and walks to the door, opening it. to her surprise, you're standing there, take-out in hand, and a grumpy expression gracing your face. "do you know what time it is? have you even ate yet, ellie williams-miller?" ellie grimaces at the sound of her full, government name leaving your lips. "i'm so sorry, babe. i was working all day, i didn't even realize how much time had passed 'til you showed up," ellie mutters, her stomach grumbling on cue. you hand her the take-out from her favorite spot on campus, and she graciously takes it from your hands. "you better be thankful you have a very caring and worrisome girlfriend, els," you say, "i really missed you today." a smile curls on ellie's lips, "i know, baby. here, let me take a little break from my paper, and i'll make it up to you, yeah?"

and that night, ellie was extremely thankful she worked on most of her paper, as she completely disregarded anymore work as she decided she'd rather fulfill her appetite by eating you out instead. leaving her take-out cold and untouched. but hey, she held her part of the deal and indeed made it up to you.

that was also how 5 papers ended up taped up against her dorm-room door, complaining of the 'fucking loud ass moans' the morning after.

"how'd they even know it was us?" ellie queries, reading over the complaints. "oh wait, it says here 'please tell your girlfriend to keep it down. she was screaming your name all night. thank you for reminding us who lives in dorm 114.'" needless to say, you were red as a tomato and it gutted you to leave her dorm, feeling everyone's eyes on you as you walked down the hall.

let me know if yall would like more college!ellie hcs!! <3

[wexhappyxfew]

crash landings and all

(a/n): to my annie x brady girlies, here is the piece i’ve since promised and since fallen in love with!!! featuring annie, brady, coffee cups and the rising sun + some heartfelt talks about reality. and of course all those emotions annie doesn’t really need but feels instead. enjoy!

It was 0600 and she couldn't sleep.

But this had been happening far too many times in the past few weeks for her to ignore it and call it nerves, or worry, or any other bothersome symptom that would have one of the girls nudging her and asking her if she was okay.

Which she was, alright?

Or she was at least trying to tell herself that.

When there were mornings without missions, that's usually when she would come and sit out, just outside of the mess hall, and stare out towards where the B-17s sat, silhouetted against the purple and pink skyline as the sun began to appear. She'd usually sit there for about an hour, before she started seeing people moving about, and then she'd disappear inside, grab herself a coffee, avoid one of Major Egan's horrible jokes in the morning, and then be on her way to her crew, or to Silver Bullets, or to anything really - to distract herself, get her mind active, get her brain focused on something other than the worry.

This morning was no different - beautiful as the early dawn was, it was also incredibly reflective. She'd sit in the silence, the only noise the breeze in the trees and past her ears, the birds beginning to wake up and sing. It was usually a lot of her convincing herself things were fine and that everything was okay. That she was okay. But usually that didn't last very long and she was off worrying about one of the girls, or that one damn engine on Silver Bullets, or better yet if Lemmons had screwed that one bolt in enough. It kind of ate her alive at the worst of times.

"Hey." Annie looked up and found, stepping down onto the step, and nestling in beside her was Brady, an outstretched hand with a steaming mug of coffee opposite her, and a tired smile on his face.

"Hey," Annie said, trying to hide her surprise and current spiral that she thought was normally drawn across her face, "you're up early. Thanks." She took the coffee and watched as he settled beside her with a sigh, sipping at his own cup of coffee and glanced her way.

"I could say the same about you." he said back, his voice still waking up it seemed from sleep, knocking her shoulder gently. Annie watched him, the first rays of the morning son painting his face a beautiful golden with his eyes and she nodded.

"Couldn't sleep." she told him honestly, "Haven't been sleeping too well anyway, so. What's not to lose with a sunrise, you know?" Brady watched her for a moment, his lanky knees bent up to his chest, the mug resting on his kneecap and his expression quiet.

"Something worrying you?" he asked her, seemingly the first assumption of many on this base - was something worrying her? The sun would shine and she'd be worried, she'd be sat at a table and someone would cough and she'd think she'd have to get the doctor, someone would come in with a headache and she'd assume the worst. So, yeah, maybe there was something wrong, but she wasn't about to spill that to Brady at 0600 in the morning.

"I just worry about the girls, you know how it is. Making sure people are sleeping, eating, feeling okay, not feeling too homesick they're bedridden. That their letters get sent, get read, they get comforted, listened to." Annie said, "Just making sure they're keeping what smiles they can on their faces." Brady caught her gaze as she glanced his way and she found a small smile lingering on her lips.

"It's just what I have to do. Make sure things work like a well-oiled machine." she told him honestly, sipping at the coffee, "I must say, you know how to make a coffee taste good." Brady smirked slightly, a bit of a laugh escaping his mouth, before he looked at her.

"I'm glad you like it," he told her, his voice tender, "but don't try to worry yourself over your crew. They're a good group of ladies flying a B-17. And they've got a great pilot to lead 'em."

"Thanks, John."

"Just make sure you keep an eye on yourself, alright," Brady said, leaning into her side a bit, causing her to glance his way, "you're a part of that crew and just as important." He spoke with a gentle ease of tone, but equally just as serious, like he was coaxing someone to calm down.

"John Brady, you are full of compliments this morning." Annie said quietly, sipping her coffee and peering at him over the edge of coffee cup, just in time to watch his ears flame red a bit and he gulped and smiled at her.

"I don't lie." he told her and Annie grinned and held his gaze for a moment.

"Humor me then," Annie said and a brief moment of reflection passed over Brady's face, "Croz sort of let it out, about those 'mechanical failures' when he mistook France for England…..what was that about…..?" Annie watched him expectantly and Brady's ears flamed a deeper red to the point it spread to his cheeks.

"Supposedly you covered for Croz, real gentlemanly, too, I must admit." Annie said, "Lying to Major Egan of all people, John Brady, I wouldn't suspect such a thing." Brady chuckled at her words and shook his head.

"I was putting it how it was," Brady said, "God, it was embarrassing though. In front of both Buck and Bucky. Land the plane on its belly, Croz vomiting just below, the thing about to blow up but it doesn't, our first introduction to the base. You do what you gotta do for the crew. I was a bit of a shithead to Croz, but to be flying over France -Nazi-occupied France - it wasn't the most pleasant." Annie smiled, watching him as he spoke.

Knowing how he cared how he flew, how he coped. He was so fluent in what he thought and believed, right and truthful. Caring, gentle, but firm and purposeful in his speech.

"The worst was that belly-landing though," Brady said, shaking his head as he sipped his coffee, "that was horrible." Annie watched as Brady seemed to relive it for a moment. She bit back her lip and then reached a hand forward and placed it on the sleeve of his wrist, the touch warm and welcoming and causing their eyes to meet.

"I crashed an AT-6 when I was doing hours for my license." Annie said - she had never dared to tell a soul such a thing, she wanted to take that to the grave, bury it, hide the humiliation. She'd jumped out of it like she was losing her mind, a lunatic sprinting across the base, with her hair ends crispy and black, her blonde hair suffering from the smoldering smoke, looking more monster than woman in that moment. Not her finest, but it had taught her a whole lot of lessons. Brady watched her for a moment, surprised.

"You?" Brady said with a nod, "Crashed not only a plane, but an AT-6? No, I don't believe you." Annie could get his joking tone pretty solid by this point and instead laughed at his words, leaning back to wrap her slightly cold fingertips around the mug and nodded.

"I did in fact crash-land it. Crazed eyes, hair-on-fire and all." Annie said and Brady watched her as if amazed.

"I must admit, it's hard for me to picture that because you're one of the best pilots I've ever met." Brady said and if she were honest, they both looked surprised as that came out of his mouth, but he was quickly talking next and she took a moment to relive those words.

"I mean, you look so calm and collected….what…what happened to warrant that?" he said, leaning a bit closer, evidently interested in the tale that had her losing her mind for weeks after.

"Truth be told, me learning to fly was like telling a fish to live in a tree," Annie said watching as Brady chuckled, "I wasn't always….this." She pointed to her face and Brady smirked.

"Oh c'mon, you're a goddamn good pilot, Annie, really." Brady said, and then smiled, "Go on though." Annie sent him a look with a playful smirk.

"You, asshole." she said and nudged his shoulder, "Don't try to get back at me with that or something in the future."

"Never, my lips are sealed." Brady said, sending her a wink - why would he do that at six am when she's somewhat still fogged with sleep and brain exhaustion.

"Anyway," Annie said, catching his smile again, "all the engines crapped out on me as I was coming in for the landing, the tower was telling me to eject, ejector was jammed, and the wheels were stuck at 45 degrees. So, I did what I could, braced myself and the thing slid across about hundreds of feet of sand before tilting to the side, me pouring out like Ma's soup for dinner. It was so bad, and horrifically embarrassing. God."

"Hey," Brady said, leaning into her peripheral, "'least you can say you know how it's done." Annie let out a laugh at his words then and there, her heart feeling warm for one of the first mornings sat out here; usually alone and now in good company.

"I mean, it wasn't the first time I even crashed landed." Brady offered with a shoulder shrug. Annie stared at him, trying to keep the smile from her lips.

"You're joking."

"Wish I was, Annie," Brady said, "back in training, went down, Croz could tell you all about it. Became pretty well-known among the base and the training groups." He smiled.

"But," he said, "'least I can say I did it." Annie let out a laugh, clasping a hand over her mouth as she glanced at him and watched him chuckle, his eyes glowing in the morning sun that was slowly peaking its way over the horizon line.

"You should join me for mornings like this more often," Annie said quietly, looking out towards the sunlight, "get some things off your chest. It's why I do well….usually alone, but it helps me think. Through things like that." She looked over and met his gaze and smiled. His expressions in the early morning were so much gentler than at dinner, and it almost made her wish he could stay like that forever in some selfish way. All of them, truth be told.

"I think I will," Brady said, "I'm glad you like the coffee. I wasn't sure what you went for, but….you seemed like a cream type of person."

"You either are really good as guessing or someone snitched." Annie said, catching Brady smirking.

"Nah, Bessie was in there the other day getting coffee for you two. I know she drinks straight black and was wondering who the hell she'd be getting a coffee full of creamer for so…." Brady admitted, glancing her way, "I hope you enjoy it." Annie looked to the cup of coffee and took another lingering sip. She wanted to stay like this for a while, freeze time maybe. But that would never be such a thing in their lives.

"We should take a spin together some time," Annie said looking towards him, a smile growing on her lips, "if you ever wanted to be in Silver Bullets when she gets going in the air. You could be my co-pilot." Brady watched her, his face still for a moment, held in a graceful balance of seriousness and surprise and then the corner of his lips ticked upwards.

"I think Francis would drop-kick me from the cockpit." Brady whispered quietly to her and Annie chuckled.

"She'd be fine with it, I swear to you," Annie said, "maybe not anytime soon, as long as we're going up, dropping bombs and all. But maybe when this whole thing ends. And we just get to be. When we get to go home." Looking over, she found Brady already watching her. Home, seemed to echo in her mind the longer she held his gaze.

"Hey! That you Brady?" Annie watched Brady turn away from her face and glance behind her, her own gaze following to find Crank coming towards them, waving an arm, "Buck's been trying to get a-hold of you!" Brady nodded and then looked back at her, a sudden shift in whatever it was that existed between them. He slowly got to his feet, brushed off his pants and then stopped to lean down towards her ear.

"I'd love to be your co-pilot," Brady whispered, sending chills up her neck, "ma'am." Then, he was up and off, sending her cheeks flaming red, her eyes going over her shoulder, as he went and caught up to Crank, shaking his hand and nodding to him, exchanging all the pleasantries. Annie caught his eyes one final time as he glanced back at her. He winked.

[racefortheironthrone]

MAWS Episode 5

I was a little surprised at the discourse coming out of Episode 5, because I thought the episode (and also major elements of Episode 4) did a very good job of setting up a conflict in which both Lois and Clark's actions make total sense.

For Lois' part, the stairwell scene in Episode 4 did a very good job of elaborating on her main drives and motivations: Lois grew up with a father who constantly lied to her and kept secrets from her, and she has defined herself in reaction to that. She dedicated her life to an occupation that's all about exposing the truth and uncovering secrets. Not only does she have a point that someone with immense power should be held accountable to the public, but she does have a legitimate beef in that her co-worker and partner has been both withholding information about big things (his secret identity) and lying to her constantly about small things (the bagels).

Handcuffing herself to Superman and throwing herself off buildings is an extreme reaction, and she should probably talk to a therapist about her disregard for her own safety, but to be fair, it's not like she hasn't tried and failed with more normal methods, because Superman has been avoiding her and deflecting her questions.

For Clark's part, he's right that he has a right to privacy and that his secret being exposed could put the people he loves in great danger - even more so now that he knows that Task Force X is specifically coming after him as an alien threat. As we saw with his childhood, his Kryptonian heritage is something that frightens him and makes him question whether he belongs. Moreover, in her statements about publishing all of Superman's secrets and calling Superman a liar, Lois didn't give him any reason to believe that she would understand his motivations or prioritize his interests when it comes to his secret identity.

I would argue that the ending of Episode 5 only works because both sides have a point. If either Lois or Clark were completely right or completely wrong, the scene wouldn't hit as hard as it did and we wouldn't get the right emotional response.

To use a TV Tropes term, this episode is the Darkest Hour beat, as the bonds between Lois, Clark, and Jimmy have been frayed because of their conflicting drives. We're supposed to be upset about it, and we're supposed to want the band to get back together - because that's what's going to give the emotional payoff when Lois and Clark rescue Jimmy and come to a reconciliation by uncovering the reverse-engineered alien weapons program that Lois' father (a confrontation with whom Lois' arc is clearly building to) and Amanda Waller have been running on an unsuspecting public, thus recommitting the group to truth, justice, etc.

[eretzyisrael]

by David Collier

Amnesty International has long denied supporting the Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) campaign that seeks to destroy Israel. They play evasive, denying BDS is harmful but stating ‘Amnesty do not take a position’.

But behind the scenes it seems that things are very different. In this exclusive, I show that the Amnesty Marketing and Communications Director didn’t just support an official BDS campaign – she even created the toolkit for it.

The Boycott Chevron Campaign

Chevron has been a target of BDS since 2022, but the latest BDS ‘escalation’ started in January 2024 – when the BDS National Committee (BNC) issued a call ‘for a consumer boycott of Chevron-branded gas stations’:

The Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC) that issued that statement is the organising body behind the BDS movement. It has long been established that BDS is a movement seeking the destruction of Israel, and the organising BNC is closely tied to terrorist factions.

I have personally described BDS as akin to the siege engines used in medieval battlefields – a means of choking a fortified city and breaking down their defences. BDS is part of a war machine that denies Israel’s right to exist – and seeks to weaken, and eventually overrun it. No genuine human rights NGO would be going anywhere near it.

On September 25, the BDS account on X posted this call to support the Boycott Chevron Campaign.

What is of real interest to us is the link to the toolkit advertised by the offical BDS account.

The BDS toolkit

The document is explicit in its support for BDS – and opens with an explanation that this boycott is in line with the BNC’s ‘escalating campaign’.

This makes it absolutely clear that this campaign is a BDS campaign – which perhaps is not surprising, given that this is the same toolkit that was posted by the BNC on its official account.

The toolkit provides information and resources to people wanting to engage in the Boycott Chevron campaign. It gives ideas about what people can do, provides links to follow – and even provides graphics to download.

If we search the history of the website, we learn that the domain was created on the 13 March 2024.

This date is important, as the toolkit was also created on 13 March 2024 – exactly the same day as the domain was purchased:

Which means that whoever created the toolkit, did not do so as an afterthought – or as part of a personal mission – but instead, must have played a leading role in the BDS advertised ‘Boycott Chevron’ campaign.

Luckily for us – the campaign toolkit is hosted on Google Docs, which means we can search for the document’s owner.

The Amnesty International BDS host

Looking at the details of the Google hosted document, we learn that the email of the owner of the toolkit is ‘Vanessalouiseserna@gmail.com’.

And that email address, leads us straight to Vanessa Serna, who just happens to be the US based Director of Digital Marketing and Communications at Amnesty International.

This is clear evidence that despite Amnesty’s protests – key figures are working behind the scenes to support the extremist BDS movement – and promote the destruction of the Jewish state.

Busted.

[weirdowithaquill]

Traintober 2024: Day 10 - Flora

Flora and the Great Waterton Flower Show

Flora the tram engine works on a small logging tramway on the eastern side of the island of Sodor. It begins at Vicarstown before heading inland to Great Waterton, the site of a major waterworks. The line mostly transports the water from the waterworks or logs from the numerous small timber plantations that surround the little town. During harvest season, Flora would even take the produce from the farms. Her little line travelled along a road, so Flora needed cowcatchers and sideplates by law – but the road was unpaved, and so very few people liked to drive along it.

The only engines Flora really met were the few who spent time at Vicarstown. She’d made good friends with Bear the diesel and the Scottish Twins, but she avoided the big engines. They were just too pompous for the little sunshine-yellow tram.

One morning, Bear rumbled into the yard to see Flora looking even sunnier than usual! “What’s got you so excited?” asked Bear. “The Great Waterton Flower Show is on tomorrow,” beamed Flora. “And I’ve just been given a new coat of paint for the celebration!” Bear had never been to a flower show before, and thought they sounded rather silly when flowers grew everywhere already, but he decided to support his friend.

“Are you going to see it?” he asked. Flora practically whistled with glee. “They’re holding it at the station!” she exclaimed. “And I’m even going to be decorated! I’m going pull so many passengers in Moseley.” Moseley – Flora’s sleepy tram coach – stirred at the mention of his name, opening a bleary eye. He was getting cleaned for the celebration, and there was a workman polishing his stair railing.    

“See, he’s so excited!” chirped Flora. Bear wasn’t sure what was different about Moseley to hint at excitement, but was happy for his friend anyway.

Flora was so excited that she could barely sleep – but sleep she did, much to her shedmates’ thankfulness – and soon she was being steamed up for her first trip so the Great Waterton Flower Show.

Gordon met her at the platform with a train of his own. Passengers flooded from his coaches to swarm Moseley, who was quite stunned at the turn of events! “I can’t hold this many!” he spluttered. Flora chuckled and went to fetch a couple spare coaches from the carriage sidings. When she returned, she found Gordon staring at her consideringly.

“So you must be Flora,” he said. “I am surprised we have not met properly before.” “Ah, well I am busy,” Flora replied, not wanting to admit that she avoided him. “Well,” hummed Gordon, “that’s alright. Though I do think it mustn’t be that important – you’re tucked away on your little insignificant branchline, after all.” Flora glared, but just trundled away with her heavy train of passengers. She didn’t want Gordon’s dismissiveness to spoil her day.

The flower show was stunning! The various gardens were spotless, with flowers in all shades of the rainbow. Some were tropical, and had special sun lamps to keep them warm and snug while others were from the furthest winters, and were in special pots that kept the soil cool for them. Flora was in love! She spoke to every gardener who would listen, and her driver managed to get a couple to agree to redo the flower boxes at Vicarstown sheds.

Then, Flora went to pick up the special guest. She wasn’t sure who it was, but considering how nervous the mainland diesel looked when he slowed to a stop it was someone very important. Flora had even been given a special, ultra-luxurious coach for the guest, and there was a red carpet!

Then, the guest stepped out and Flora couldn’t hold in her stunned gasp. It was the Queen! “I’m about to pull Her Majesty!” hissed Flora in astonishment. “But I thought the Queen only went to the Chelsea Flower Show?” “She’s come to judge some of the gardens apparently,” her driver replied, equally as stunned. “Let’s give her a grand ride.”

Flora was extra careful as she made her way down her little tramway, wincing at every little bump she felt in the rails. As much as her little line was beautiful, it was also not meant for such important passengers. Flora hoped the Queen was enjoying the scenery more than the track!

When they arrived, there was a great reception waiting! The mayor and the local councillor and all the guests, contestants and locals were waiting for Her Majesty, and had prepared a special high tea for her. But instead of following the mayor, the Queen turned and made her way up to where Flora was standing.

“Thank you very much for a smooth ride,” the Queen said. “You are perhaps the brightest and most cheerful little tram I have ever met. Do you enjoy flowers too?” “Y-y-yes, Your Majesty,” gulped Flora. The Queen chuckled. “There’s no need to be nervous,” the Queen said kindly. “I just noticed your nameplate – were you inspired by the flowers, by any chance?” “I was,” admitted Flora. “I really like daffodils.” “I do too,” replied the Queen, and for the first time, Flora got a chance to see Her Majesty’s outfit – it was the same shade of yellow as her! The Queen waved to someone, and they walked over. It was a photographer. “Would you take a photo of us?” she asked. Flora blushed bright red! “With me!” she squeaked.

The Queen just nodded. The pair posed for the photographer, and then the Queen turned to Flora one last time.  

“I hope you also enjoy the flower show today.” And with that, the Queen headed off for her special tea. Flora felt faint. The rest of the day seemed to just flash by, and all too soon she was backing into the sheds. Both Gordon and Bear were there.

“How was your little flower show?” asked Gordon, smirking at the little tram. “Fabulous!” grinned Flora. "I heard you had a special visitor," said Bear, looking excited.  "Who?" snorted Gordon. "Aslan of Narnia?!" Flora was about to retort when her driver ran over. “Someone’s here to see you again!” he exclaimed excitedly. He nodded his head, and all three engines looked over. Gordon’s eyes widened to the size of serving platters as he spotted The Queen stepping over the rails towards the shed.

“Your Majesty?!” he spluttered. “What an honour!” “Indeed,” replied the Queen. “It is an honour for me to present Flora with a special award: the RHS President’s Award for Best Flora.” She pulled out a large medal and placed it on Flora’s lampiron. Flora was beside herself with excitement! “I also wanted to personally thank you again for such a smooth ride today – your little line is absolutely stunning, Flora, and I wish you many more successful years.” She turned. “As for you, Gordon – well, maybe next year.”

And with that, the Queen strode away, leaving behind a speechless Gordon, a cackling Bear and one very proud Flora!

Back to the Master Post

[soupgoose]

New Year's Kiss

Just some simple, sweet Captaineer fluff to start off the New Year!

Word Count: 979

:] 

A/N at the end.

The old ship was full of life for the first time in nearly a year. Colorful lights were strung across its hull, hanging limply as its former passengers cheered all around and inside it. 

The colony had long since outgrown the ship, leaving it docked in the center of their established city; And while very few still needed their old offices and work spaces, the Invincible was well taken care of. 

She hadn’t seen the majority of her passengers for months, and now, as the live-streamed feed of Earth’s New Year’s countdown filled almost every screen aboard, each and every one stood somewhere inside or around her. 

The joy and excitement surrounding the Invincible was palpable and warm. They’d have their own celebration here in a couple months, marking the colonies first full rotation around their new star on their new home.

Many years had passed on Earth throughout the Invincibles journey, including a couple more as the colony had struggled to establish solid and instant wide-spread communication with their home planet.

However, at the moment, everyone was excited to celebrate the New Year; despite having not been on Earth for decades, they knew where they came from. Where home was.

Laughter and music filled the hall, the sound flooding in as Gunther slammed open the door, Mark cringing at the abuse of its automatic opening mechanism.

“Are y'all joinin’ us or what?! Midnight’s comin’ in fast!” 

The gaggle of his lackeys chimed excitedly in agreement behind him, holding what looked to be a concerning amount of explosives.

“We’ll be there in a second! We’re just finishing up this meeting you were supposed to come to.”

Celci retorted, rolling her eyes at the man’s usual disregard for professional occasions, as Burt shook his head in similar disappointment. 

The Captain’s short laughter pulled their attention back to their end of the table. “Oh hush! it’s alright you two; we can reconvene later.” 

“Are you sure, Cap’n?” Burt asked, surprised.

“Yes! Now, get out of here! Go enjoy yourselves, get some drinks! Enjoy the holiday!” The warmth in their Captain’s voice was enough to ease any lingering hesitation; and, for better or worse, only encouraged whatever inane plans Gunther and his lackeys had in store; Their crazed laughter could be heard as they disappeared down the hall.

Celci and Burt groaned tiredly, worried for their immediate future, before bidding their Captain a Happy New Year and following the group.

The Captain watched proudly as their closest friends left, seeing a solid happiness in their eyes. 

“Well, Captain? Are we heading out too then?” Mark mussed from behind them, his hand resting against their shoulder as he approached.

Pulling the rest of his arm across their body, and leaning into his side, the Captain chuckled. 

“Nah- We’ll join them in a bit- Let Gunther get the majority of his pyromania out before I have to deal with it.”

“Before we deal with it. After all-” He gently reminded them, taking their hand in his “-We’re partners aren't we?”

They chuckled again before agreeing warmly, squeezing the engineer’s hand back comfortingly, “That’s right.”

The countdown neared closer to 0 on the deck’s console screen, the cheering both outside and in growing louder with excitement. The Captain’s eyes lit up happily, watching the scene playout outside on the deck below. The two could almost make out Gunther’s voice from the deck as he happily barked orders at the people below.

A large ring around an impressive display of explosives formed, the distance between the people and the center set by Gunther’s group. 

10! The crowd exclaimed, beginning the final countdown.

“I think,” the Captain began slowly, “Yes, this might be my first New Year’s.” they hummed. 

“Here- Like this I mean.”

9! The people prepared their party crackers and sparklers.

“Yeah? Hmm, yeah me too. I think so anyways.”

8! Gunther finished fiddling with the makeshift display. 

“Considering everything, I think everything’s finally working itself out.” Mark’s tone grew slightly sadder, a melancholy smile taking place across his lips.

7! Celci watched worriedly from a safe distance away with Burt, chewing at the inside of her lip. 

The Captain smiled, nodding into his embrace. “I think we’ve done just fine, Mark.”

6! The fuse sparked to light as the gunner dashed away, a crazed look in his eyes.

They turned in his arms, standing face to face as they wrapped their forearms around his neck.

5! The spark disappeared into the cardboard casing as Gunther dashed away.

Their eyes met, filled with adoration and pride. A smile pulling at their lips. 

4! Gunther appeared at the sides of his coworkers; Laughing happily as he shook the shoulders of the shorter woman.

“We’ve done just fine.”

3!

A soft blush dusted their cheeks as their foreheads rested against each other.

2!

After millions of attempts, countless lives, and endless searches for the other- 

1! 

They had finally done it right. This was finally it.

Happy New Year!!! 

A collection of booms and crackles erupted violently from outside, lighting the dark sky with vibrant colors. The main deck of the ship was illuminated by the display, silhouetting the forms of the Captain and their Head Engineer.

Their lips met his, soft and warm. A gentle pull to their reality. One unbothered by the USA or converging timelines. One where no one was to blame for things outside of their control. One where everyone was safe and sound on their new planet. 

One where they were in each other's arms. For good this time.

They pulled apart after a moment, laughing warmly to themselves as they did.

A hopeful sparkle shone in the Engineer’s eyes as they looked at them.

“Happy New Year. Captain.”

A soft look filled their eyes, their smile widening across their face as they returned their forehead to his.

“Happy New Year, Mark.”

Happy New Year everyone! I hope this year brings good fortune and happiness to your life.

I won't make any grand promises of posting more, but it is one of my goals to make more time for writing more often, so take that as you will!

Side note, it appears that I've gotten a few asks but I can't view them, neither on desktop or on mobile so I hope I haven't missed anyone. If I have please feel free to send me a DM! Life is pretty busy in collage but I will try my best to get to them.

That being said, Happy New Years and I wish all an amazing 2025! Thanks for reading!

-Soup :]

[transmutationisms]

Her first task: assemble a team of development executives to rummage through Mattel’s toy chest and identify I.P. that could be fodder for Hollywood studios. Mattel would help match properties with writers, actors, and directors; studios would provide all the funding. The brands, and audiences’ familiarity with them, were their own form of currency. Brenner told me, “In the world we’re living in, I.P. is king. Pre-awareness is so important.”

[...]

The gamble now looks like a smart one. The hyper-saturated trailers for “Barbie” have sparked endless memes, and interest in the film’s aesthetic sensibility, which mimics the look of Mattel play sets, is so intense that the hashtag #Barbiecore trended on TikTok for months. The movie, which opens in mid-July, is tracking to be one of the blockbusters of the summer. Meanwhile, Mattel has amassed a long slate of other projects. Daniel Kaluuya, for example, has agreed to produce a feature about Barney, the purple dinosaur. Thirteen more films have been publicly announced, including movies about He-Man and Polly Pocket; forty-five are in development. (Some of the projects have an ouroboros quality. Tom Hanks is supposed to star in “Major Matt Mason,” which will be based on an astronaut action figure that has been largely forgotten, except for the fact that it helped inspire Buzz Lightyear—one of the protagonists of Pixar’s “Toy Story” franchise.)

Barber told me that Mattel had figured out how to “engage with filmmakers in a friendly way.” Gerwig, meanwhile, was looking to move beyond the small-scale dramas she was known for. “Greta and I have been very consciously constructing a career,” Barber explained. “Her ambition is to be not the biggest woman director but a big studio director. And Barbie was a piece of I.P. that was resonant to her.”

[...]

Talk turned to a few recent pitches that had surprised the team. “Somebody just asked me about Bass Fishin’, which is, like, a toy fishing rod,” Bassin said. The pitch was for an “intense sports drama about this cheating scandal in competitive fishing”—an attempt, it seemed to me, to Trojan-horse a story that the writer actually wanted to tell into a conceit that might be green-lighted.

After the meeting, McKeon told me that it was possible to incorporate complex characters and emotions into toy-based properties, though not every brand could support mature themes. “Thomas the Tank Engine isn’t going on a bender with his friends,” he said. But “Major Matt Mason” could be reimagined as a “Close Encounters of the Third Kind”-esque drama for adults: “It’s prestige-y and asks really pointed questions about life and our place in the universe.” He went on, “Our top priority is to make really good movies—movies that matter, and that make a cultural footprint. Our second priority is to make sure that we do no disservice to the brands.”

found this article helpful in contextualising the medium piece that’s been circulating on here