#but this might save me a step or two in the future >8-D

[frodo-with-glasses]

Rhymezone saves lives by the way if you're ever stuck for rhymes! ~meg

Ooh, thankee! I might have to check that out. :-O

[bladekindeyewear]

HS^2 bloggin’ mainline 2024-08-16

(Previous post - current page 666)

We're continuing from yesterday inside Therapy Purgatory, and by checking out this second part with what looks like Mindfang's Journal, I'll finally be caught up on Homestuck^2: Beyond Canon and ready to liveblog any future updates as they come! :D Don't expect me to drop everything and blog immediately every time there's an upd8, but you CAN expect me to be ready to liveblog at least within a couple days of each one, I'll try to keep track of the Homestuck Twitter for updates to this section specifically too.

So, Mindfang's Journal... what will this represent in comparison to the others? Not Terezi, yet? It seems like her feelings toward Terezi would be either saved for the last part (the 8-ball) or not shown here at all, because her path to growth regarding Terezi is meant to be resolved outside the Plot Point's purgatory, not inside.

Will this deal with her relationship with her ancestor, and/or her mother? Is she going to see that she was looking up to a toxic role model in those journals? Are we going to see any hints of Vriska having been transfem or is that relegated to Pesterquest still, 'cause that would be nice to see? (I don't know much about Pesterquest other than that toblerone wish being fulfilled over there along with several other possible-trans identities hinted, no need to spoil me on any of it in case I have the courage to go through that content someday. It'd be too much work to LIVEBLOG it but I might go through it on my own and have commentary to share with y'all or something.)

Okay, clicking on Mindfang's journal now...

YEAR 4

WOW, she's going to have caught up to John (and/or Terezi in the (Meat) Timeline more like) in age at this rate? GOSH she takes a long time to psychotherapize but this is the best deus ex machina I could have ever imagined, getting her to have so much time without distractions to ACTUALLY work through her issues is fucking incredible.

But what is she working on this time?

Oh hi, one of the Nannasprites? Her "lucky mojo"... so she doesn't feel like she has her powers in this realm, which makes sense because there's no relevance or luck left to take/steal from here that isn't already concentrated inside herself?

HOLY SHIT SHE'S ACTUALLY GROWING UP IN THE SPRITEWORK, she's taller with longer horns and everything!!!!! Compare to this from the Flarp Manual section:

--although when you compare that to THIS from the very BEGINNING of page 666's sequence before the two year skip, there's not much change:

--so this NEW, MUCH TALLER sprite model is a huge step up in visual age that will likely last a section or two at least, or even serve as her final form aside from outfit changes.

Moving on...

Okay, so she's been trying to use her powers with everyone cheering her on, and it hasn't been working.

VRISKA: I don't want to 8ore you, it's just the same pro8lem as always. VRISKA: Finally I get my sea legs and figured out what this whole process is a8out, 8reeze through Eridan and John and Kanaya, only to get stuck all over again on HER.

Interesting... so is it Terezi, Mindfang, or her Lusus? I figure the Cueball section that isn't done yet is Doc Scratch, because Doc was someone who intentionally used and took advantage of her faults compared to almost anyone else, and fooled her into using the excuse of inevitability. Interesting that that's the next step after she's "cleared" lessons she's learned from her past relationships with the others offscreen. So who's this HER who's the step before this?

VRISKA: I'm not so sure........she's different from the rest of them. And no matter how I approach this, I can't figure out what the hell she wants.

Hm-- perhaps this one isn't about listening to them and what they want, but penetrating through to a way in which THEY wronged YOU and that you SHOULDN'T be listening to what they want, if we're going with Mindfang or her Lusus?

Ooh, it's weird and heartening to hear her honestly telling the Nannasprite Duo that they've made this "whole experience way more 8earable" and honestly thanking them. She's really in the process of growing up emotionally, not just physically, and it's SHOWING.

And now she's talking about having talked with John about Nanna and their shared experience of "connecting to our predecessors through their writings". Maybe "HER" IS Terezi, and she's going to try to take a detour to try and learn from Mindfang to help her with the process, only to figure out how to be somewhat disillusioned with Mindfang or actually learn from Mindfang's mistakes somehow?

VRISKA: What exactly do humans get out of these familial prim8 relationships, anyway?

Hrmm, maybe this IS about her lusus?

Ooh, Vriska asking Nannasprite why she had children (Dad Egbert). Never thought she'd ask something like that.

NANNASPRITE: I couldn't exactly bring that man [Sassacre] back from the dead, but I could put myself in his shoes and do the bang up job he never had the opportunity to do. Not to mention, I like babies! :B

Yeah, you would!

Hahah, of course Vriska doesn't understand why a human would want to raise a gross infant. So maybe this IS about her Lusus, and why her Lusus would really "want" to raise her and not eat her in part, not to mention accepting how her Lusus essentially abused and used her in ways that fucked her up?

Nanna talking about wanting to avenge herself against the Batterwitch once, before she'd vanished, of course.

NANNASPRITE: So many nights spent plotting that awful woman's downfall and making her pay for all the indignities of my childhood. For always making me feel like I was powerless to do anything.

OH THIS SECTION IS TOTALLY ABOUT VRISKA AND HER LUSUS ISN'T IT!!!

NANNASPRITE: Not to mention that now, after seeing what my younger self has gotten up to in this realm [Candy], I clearly underestimated the depth of my own desires.

Yeah, that must have been disconcerting. It's so easy for Life players, tied to the aspect of power and wealth and privilege, to decide they want IT ALL regardless of their class.

And Nannasprite realizes that if she HAD gotten revenge against the Batterwitch she wouldn't have been satisfied, that's a mature viewpoint; she can't fill the hole in her heart with it.

Wow, even watching Vriska these past few years has changed Nannasprite's point of view, she says?

NANNASPRITE: I had always wanted Betty Crocker to know what a mistake it was to steal my life, my potential, from me. NANNASPRITE: But the real issue was that not once during my childhood did I ever feel particularly wanted, or welcomed, into the world. I only had my brother, and even he ran off on me! NANNASPRITE: Yet despite that fact, and the anger and the disappointment, I still raised someone who knew what it was like to be loved.

And that pretty much SOLIDIFIES that this has to be about Vriska's lusus. We'll finally get to hear the version of her that TALKED to Vriska in sprite form, possibly! That would be the best way to work through the abuse that she was put through in part, and how unloved she felt in other-part where she felt if she didn't feed her lusus said lusus would easily have turned on her and eaten her to search out better food providers, Vriska likely always believed. Perhaps she'll also learn that her lusus thought teaching her to feed on and kill other trolls would MAKE HER STRONG, much like Bro's abuse of Dave was intended to make HIM 'strong' but weakened him in ways he's still reckoning with.

Nannasprite definitely feels that despite her hardship, she "indeed fulfill a path of potential to its fullest degree", lived a full and enriching life by doing what her own parent wouldn't for her for someone else, and doesn't regret it. And almost ("marginally") is grateful for the Batterwitch serving as counterexample, as learning NOT to live like her taught her how to seek true happiness through fulfilling others, not just herself. Vriska needs to learn this same lesson from her own experience with her lusus, it's being all spelled out here practically. Heck, it almost feels like we're speedrunning the part, except Vriska will need a bit more than the answer spelled out for her like this to get it through her thick head I bet.

VRISKA: I guess that makes sense. Weren't you worried, though? That you weren't following the right path, or living up to your destiny? NANNASPRITE: I never even considered that, hoo hoo! NANNASPRITE: Is that how you kids think these days? My lord, no wonder none of you go outside anymore.

(Pff)

Interesting, maybe Mindfang IS involved in this section too, maybe BOTH her lusus and Mindfang-- and the above is indeed an insecurity Vriska reckoned with through the very end of her plotline so far.

VRISKA: Don't p8tronize me, old lady! Destiny's the found8tion of my godhood!

Yeah, she still has a lot to learn.

Nannasprite contending that "destiny mostly fulfills itself" is nice, and also a very Life-player outlook I'd think.

Aw, Vriska's even apologizing for getting snippy!! She's come so far already!!!

Oh gosh, this WONDERFUL pose in this frame and Vriska's eye shining with emotion in it, that's so good.

{Choose Mindfang's Journal.}

Pure white...?

{????????}

Oh you overdramatic 8itch, Ancestor-version Aranea Serket! Mindfang being as overdramatic and insufferable as she TRULY MUST HAVE BEEN.

Now she's storywriting for her, setting a scene unseen, the way Mindfang's journals must have done for Vriska making her imagine her ancestor's setting and travels. Also interesting how her tangled spiderweb looked like broken glass...

As was the figure 8efore her. Though she had only ever seen it 8ehind her eyes, its form was shaped 8y words.

I have to admit, overdramatic as Mindfang can be, sometimes her writing is really damned good.

VRISKA: You can drop the ominous buildup, I already know the twist.

Hahahaha, even SHE'S getting impatient with Mindfang by now.

Oh? Had the thief 8een here 8efore?

Interesting to see the ghost/image that "shouldn't" know about the broader situation visibly deducing things about its recurrence, because both the real Mindfang would have and Vriska's image of her was smart enough to put it together.

--AT LEAST ONCE A WEEK FOR THE LAST TWO YEARS!??! WOW. When she said she was stuck at this part, she wasn't kidding! I hope some of what Nannasprite just told her helps her finally break through the web Mindfang's journal caught her in.

VRISKA: The whole endeavor usually ends with me either killing you or... feeding myself to you.

WOW

IT'S HER LUSUS *AND* MINDFANG COMBINED

HOLY SHIT

Talk about a tangled knot of insecurities to tackle together all at once!!!!!!

VRISKA: You were all like, "Surprise, 8itch. I'm 8oth the Marquise, and your lusus!" And I fell str8 on my ass, flipping the fuck out like a 8ig tool.

Of course, this wasn't the way it was back in her real life. It's the fact that the impact both Mindfang and her Lusus's expectations had on her was similar, and an intertwined problem she has to deal with all at once. (Also this is a more interesting way to hear her lusus "talk to her" than hearing however the fuck Spidersprite must have roared.)

Scene change to the feeding cliff.

VRISKA: Hi, Momfang.

That's a heck of a nickname that works so well right now.

Holy FUCK AAAAH!!! That's a hell of a clever jumpscare and artistic depiction, her lusus roaring from out of the shape of the back of Mindfang's HAIR!

Ew, Vriska got stuck in the web once and had to eat her way out? Not pleasant.

WOW THAT'S DISTURBING, Mindfang tenderly hugging the lusus's severed head from after Vriska mercy-guillotine'd her. HS^2 artists are going crazy good here, both visually and thematically.

The girl was 8linded 8y her pup8ed angst. As 8efouled as those we8s were, this gossamer carnage had 8een home, once. Her time here made her who she was.

Fucking indeed. Vriska has to come to terms with that, both the good and bad of it, in ways she's refused to confront fully.

Mindfang asking her to collaborate with "thespian vivacity" here in her melodrama.

Yeah, back then the satisfaction of FLARP as a game was short-lived because it meant feeding the troll who lost to your lusus, ending in screams.

VRISKA: Every win, I had to share with her. Every moment, I felt her w8ting for me. It feels 8ad, not getting a choice when you do all the fucking work.

Yeah, her lusus's relationship with her was abusive and PARASITIC.

VRISKA: Sure, the 8ooty was gr8, up until the point where there was no one left to play with. After that, it was all good as gar8age.

:CCC

Ah HERE we go. Vriska's now hearing the voice of her mother(s) speaking to her conviction that it was a GOOD thing to be raised as a killer, when parts of Vriska have learned that there are ways of growing up not shouldering that awful responsibility that could have been better... but needs to accept that in her own case, too.

VRISKA: I've already tried respecting you for making me the 8est, 8ut you know what I'm realizing? VRISKA: I didn't have to go through aaaaaaaall of THAT to 8e strong. Vrissy didn't! VRISKA: Even growing up in a f8ke world where no one has a spine, and with 8arely any guidance, her powers can do things mine can't.

HOLY FUCKING SHIT she's LEARNING FROM VRISSY ALREADY YESSSSSSSS

AND FUCKING CONFIRMATION THAT I WAS RIGHT THAT SHE WAS MANIPULATING HUMANS IN WAYS VRISKA HERSELF COULDN'T!!!

I don't think this is the right place for her to realize that the other Vriska has a different Hero Role, but she will eventually, doubtless, if the theory pans out, and I just can't wait for that if it's going to happen.

VRISKA: 8ut that's the point, right? VRISKA: There is no p8sitive spin, no learning to appreci8 you, 8ecause even by Alternian st8ndards you sucked! VRISKA: You weren't a cust8dian, you were a responsi8ility. VRISKA: I protected you, I c8red for you, and you would have happily killed me the moment things didn't go your w8y.

FUCKING PREACH

And?

FUCK YOU MOMFANG

VRISKA: Th8t's not fucking norm8l!!!!!!!!

YESSSSS GROW UP VRISKA!!!!

Oh wow, now LUSUS HEAD Momfang is holding MINDFANG's head.

VRISKA: I had one place I was supposed to feel safe. VRISKA: Why did you h8ve to 8e everything wrong with the w8rld, rolled into one terri8le monster?

😭

Yeah, the momspider was only acting according to her toxic nature. There's nothing to redeem about it.

VRISKA: I KN8W YOU'RE HUNGRY! What a8out me? My entire gru8hood, I gave and you took. F8r once, what a8out what I w8nt?! She has never considered this. And wasn't considering it now, to be clear.

😭😭

8ut the narrator was curious, what DID the spiderling want from the monster?

Here we go... open your heart and spill out its contents, Vriska.

VRISKA: What I w8nt is for you to go 8ack in time and pr8tect that fucking kid, like you were supposed to!!!!!!!! VRISKA: If you did, may8e I'd 8e a8le to relax and let my f8cking guard down for ONCE, instead of const8ntly ruining things and thinking everyone is going to turn around and kill me!

😭😭😭

VRISKA: Oh my god. VRISKA: Tavros was right!!!!!!!!

HOLY SHIT

YOU GO GIRL!!!!

VRISKA: Now I get why talking to all my friends finally led up to you. VRISKA: Y8u're the reason why I could never trust any8ody! VRISKA: Even h8r!!!!!!!! Especi8lly her.

Nooooo Terezi thoughts!!! 😭 I mean I LOVE that she's finally putting it together but it's also SO SAD OMG

This is the pain she needed to face.

And now she's even rolling it into following in the footsteps of the Marquise being wrong.

She taught her descendant so much, and in such lurid detail. VRISKA: It was 80% smut!!!!!!!!

LOLOLOL

Yeah, just as you're saying now Vriska: Mindfang's example helped keep you alive, made you a "wicked pir8", but also made everyone else hate you. :C

VRISKA: I could have 8een any8ody... and you took that aw8y from me. You made me afraid of it.

I'd insert another very appropriate sob emoji here but I'm afraid of overusing it. I'm so glad Vriska is coming to terms with all this, FINALLY, after two years of trying to confront her mothers' ghosts.

--Of course Momfang says she thinks she would be an idiot to trust anyone. She was passing along her own toxic mentality.

And Vriska says she doesn't want to think like that anymore.

"TRAPPED."

Vriska regretting not killing her lusus, saving herself from what she became, before it was too late.... christ that's heavy.....

8ut even as she said it, the Thief knew that was never an option. Emancip8tion couldn't 8e granted to either party, only mutually assured destruction. VRISKA: ........ VRISKA: I wish it had 8een different. Impossible. VRISKA: I wish I was 8orn some8ody else.

Oh honey!!! 😭😭😭

Another dead end.

STFU

Vriska deservedly blowing up and yelling at her to let her get out from under her, be her own fucking person for once...

What will you do?

Oh boy... the PROMPT appears again for the first time in this branch. What will you do. Do what you will.

I wonder... perhaps this time you can run from her. Live without her. Seek... some sort of sanctuary, like the one your friends could have given you. What if you had gone to live in Terezi's treehouse and just, never, ever come home again? Her sleeping lusus wouldn't have eaten you, and you'd have been just as protected as Terezi was. What will you do, Vriska? What will you do here and now?

VRISKA: Huh. "KILL." VRISKA: You know, every week I come in here trying to figure out what more you could possi8ly want from me, and every week it's the same shit. VRISKA: I really am suuuuuuuuch a moron. "FEED." VRISKA: Exactly. It was never any deeper than that, the answer was right in front of my face. VRISKA: Well. I'm not your free ticket anymore. M8tricide then?

No, she's just going to walk away. She doesn't need to CONFRONT her mother... she just needs to MOVE ON from her.

VRISKA: Nah. VRISKA: I never really wanted that either. Lest the girl forget, there were only two choices.

Nope. There's always a third option. Tavros's option, the one you used to think too cowardly. You can always simply flee.

VRISKA: 8ut that's not true. I'm not a wiggler anymore. Alternia is dead. VRISKA: For once in my life, I have options. And just what did the ungrateful upstart mean 8y that? VRISKA (that pose from earlier, hands at her hips, grinning and eye shining almost-wet, brilliant.): I'm glad you asked! VRISKA: It means I finally get to walk away from all this. And I'm not going to look 8ack.

YES, YOU GET IT VRISKA! You can finally MOVE ON from her! You can be who you want to be now, you're not trapped anymore!

The spider forgot her hunger, for a moment at least, as the reality of such a statement sunk in.

Whoa, you even gave THEM pause. :D

She was only a spider. She did not fear death, or feel regret, or hold any sadness. She never once loved the girl. She did not feel responsible. That said, the arachnid had grown accustomed to the smaller creature's presence. She extended one long, spindly leg 8efore her, towards the young troll.

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 fuck it I'm using as many of these as I want

As if to say, "HUG?"

😭

VRISKA: Oh, a8solutely not. VRISKA: Hell no.

Maybe. But if you held any feelings for her... what would be the harm, one last time? One first time?

That proved a good call, as the spider had 100% planned on eating the girl.

Okay I stand corrected. XD Get the fuck out of here Vriska, now that you finally know you never need to come back!

Instead, the long lim8 was retracted, placed 8etween the monster's own massive jaws.

What?

Crunch noise???

The spider would not notice when the girl turned to leave. And the girl would not turn around to see if she had. The 8ound cover was closed on our trusted narr8tor, as she whispered these final words. "Good luck, Vriska. 8e assured, you will need it."

🥺

And we hear the sound of footsteps, finally walking away.

{Level Complete!}

Lots of Fire motifs in the titles this time, ending in "FUNERAL PYRE". And that long candle... is it burning down a little bit each time? The lonely candle?

Perhaps representative of the trap?

Instead of going back and comparing it, I'll just take the easy route... and wait to compare it to how it looks the next time this game on page 666 updates. C:

Gosh that was so good. We'll leave things here. I'm finally caught up. I could speculate on what the last two that aren't the cueball mean... the feather doesn't make sense to me, and the 8-ball might just need to be BROKEN in order to escape the black Plot Point, metaphorically and/or literally, since Calliope did raise the possibility that the plot point might need to be "destroyed" and this candle of the time she's spending here might itself be burning it away, until she learns she has it in her heart to shine like the SUN and melt away the wax of the candle to nothing... but for once, instead of doing too much speculation on what's about to happen, I'd rather leave it for next time.

We might get to commentary at some point, or Patreon bonus panels, or even some of the Bonus Comics from before I might have missed the last tail ends of... in which case you'll get surprise posts about them from me, most likely. But for the moment, I'll just relax and see y'all again soon. At the minimum: talk to you next upd8! Or likely before then, since it seems these additions to Homestuck^2 might be weeks apart, and I'll likely feel the issue to delve into SOMETHING of the back-commentary before then in case this Mindfang journal update was anytime recent. <3

Note that if you didn't know already, the official homestuck twitter account is letting us know when the Plot Point page is upd8-ed (this last one was August 11th), and you might need to Force Refresh or clear your cache on the page if that Mindfang chapter or whatever new one that comes out later doesn't show up immediately. I'll be putting that twitter account on Notify for certain.

[zer0-is-me]

Chapter 2 - Izuku and Katsuki

Chapter 1, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5

A/N:

Hi there! This is chapter two of... I need a name for this. Uhm, nevermind, if this gets more attention we'll figure it out then. That's a job for future me. Anywho, this is literally for those few people who liked my work and that one person who commented (tysm that made my day <3). Um, here goes writing the next chapter :D hope you enjoy!

Previously:

Eraserhead took a step towards him, and Izuku started to accept that maybe he just wasn't made for vigilantism, when a small something fell between them, clanging loudly in the quiet night.

After a beat, Izuku cocked his head and began, " What the hell-"

And it exploded.

Let it never be said that Katsuki knew what he was doing.

He never claimed that.

Sure, it had been a conscious decision when he started his... nighttime activities, but that didn't mean he had anything actually planned or thought out. At first, the nights were just him wandering around, saving a few people, and going back home at, what, 12AM? 1AM? At first he thought it was late; he should have gone to bed at 8:30PM. But then he thought that maybe it was worth it. Honestly, he wasn't so sure about the whole being-a-hero idea anymore, after... the incident, so why should it matter so much?

But then heroes started to actually pay attention to him. People started to pay attention to him. And his name began to be the one people called out at night when they needed help. This also meant that heroes went after him, too (he found that extremely annoying).

Katsuki wasn't sure why he was doing it.

(Maybe it was for a bit of personal atonement.

For the harm he had done in the past.)

Either way, when he had wandered into another neighbourhood for the night, searching for a lead on a case he had caught wind about, he hadn't been expecting to find another vigilante.

Vigilantes like him were rare; vigilantes who did proper good and did well in the job too, not killing, bitter ones (*cough* Stain, *cough cough*).

He wasn't completely sure why he did it. Sure, he was softer and kinder at night, for some reason, but he still wouldn't help someone who was being targeted by heroes. Let alone a hero he, himself, had been targeted by before as well.

He had been scaling a building with one of his support items, when he realised that someone was already up there - correction; two were. He was about to scale back down, unnoticed, when he overheard a familiar voice.

Huh. He didn't think the hobo's patrolling routes crossed over to this neighbourhood.

" Look, just come peacefully, and you might have a shorter sentence in jail," he heard Eraserhead say. " I honestly think you're doing good, but it's still against the law."

Oh, so there's another vigilante here. Well, if they were gonna get captured by a hero, they probably weren't good enough to be a vigilante anyway. Although, if Eraserhead himself had said they were doing good...

A robotical, glitchy voice answered. Either a quirk or a voice changer, like him.

" Awww, I'm so happy the one and only Eraserhead appreciates my efforts!" Katsuki heard them coo.

They seem nice enough, for a vigilante, so far, he had thought. No killing yet, anyway. Though, he also knew that looks could deceive. He decided not to intervene until he deemed it necessary.

Eraserhead's voice came again, " Yeah, well, I've been on your case for a while now, so I know firsthand how helpful you can be."

The smile was evident in the vigilante's warped voice. The tone was softer, too. " Then don't turn me in. You and I both know crime rates have dropped since I've appeared."

It was silent for a moment, and Katsuki wondered if something had happened. He was about to climb up and check when Eraserhead finally spoke.

" I'm sorry, I can't do that and you know it. It's my job," Eraserhead genuinely sounded sorry. Katsuki heard a quiet slap on concrete, and his mind provided that the hero had taken a step forward.

Internally, Katsuki was having an argument with himself.

He should help them escape. They're doing good, it would be wrong to take a real hero off of these streets.

But, on the other hand, he didn't know this vigilante. He wouldn't save a random lawbreaker! What if he'd misinterpreted the situation? What if this was a villain, and not a vigilante?

Another quiet noise of a foot hitting floor made him groan quietly at how weak-willed he was against himself.

Fuck it.

He grabbed one of his home made smoke bombs from his belt and lobbed it over the top of the roof. It made a loud clang in the quiet night.

After a moment, he vaguely heard the glitching voice of the presumed vigilante say, " What the hell-"

But he was already scaling the last meter of the wall quickly and didn't pay it much attention. With the trigger for the smoke bomb in hand, he pressed the button and heard the bang of it going off.

He leaped onto the roof top and grabbed the vigilante's arm, pulling him away from the smoke and where Eraserhead was trying to wave it away.

When at first the vigilante resisted, he growled quietly, " Do you want to get away, or not?!"

" ... Fine," the vigilante muttered, letting Katsuki lead them away and towards the edge of the roof, behind the hero.

Not waiting for the other to catch up, he let go of their arm and leaped onto the next building, blunting the force with a roll. He began running to the side quickly.

If the other vigilante couldn't catch up, that was their problem.

And yet not a second later, he heard a soft thud and the shuffle of clothes behind him, then the thump of feet joining his.

He jumped onto another building roof and looked behind him, still running. The other vigilante jumped down behind him, their head down, hood covering their hair and eyes.

Behind them, Eraserhead was only just recovering from the smoke and had realised they were gone. He only looked out after them and didn't make a move to follow, however. He must've known they were already too far away. Katsuki looked forwards again and leaped onto the next building.

When he deemed them far enough, he slowed down on one of the taller roofs and dangled his feet off of the edge. When the other vigilante saw this, they slowed down, almost confused. Katsuki felt their calculating gaze on him.

When it had been a few seconds, Katsuki thought that they'd just leave him there in peace. But then-

They sat next to him, feet also dangling off of the edge.

Well, not close to him, fortunately for Katsuki. They sat a few meters away, out of reach if either decided to try something.

A few minutes of silence passed, save for their quiet breathing and the occasional car driving past. Katsuki knew he should get up and carry on the reason he was here; to find clues on the case, but he couldn't bring himself to.

It- it was peaceful, for once. No villains trying to kill him. No suffocating adults or peers praising him not for he, himself, but his quirk. No yells or punches from someone he should trust and be loved by. No chaotic thoughts ripping through his mind, making him doubt and panic.

It was peaceful.

Well, for a while, at least.

" Why did you do that?"

The vigilante had finally spoken up, and Katsuki nearly missed it.

" Hah?" He sideglanced the other vigilante, looking at him properly for the first time.

His eyes were hidden by a dark visor and the shadows of his hood, the rest of his face covered by a black surgical mask. His hood was black with toxic green accents on the rim, and it attached to a black, obviously oversized hoodie. He had a belt which held small pouches and items, and what looked like a bow staff attached to his back. He wore black sweatpants and black trainers. He also wore tight-fitting combat gloves, like Katsuki himself.

" Why did you do it?" the vigilante repeated. " You don't know me, I don't know you. I could be a villain, for all you know. Wait, are you a villain?!"

" I'm not a fucking villain, dumb fuck," Katsuki grumbled, eyes sliding back to the floor all the way down. " And I don't know why I did it. I just fuckin' did."

The other hummed. " ... Well, thanks. I owe you one."

" Damn right you do," he replied.

" Are you always this rude?"

Katsuki turned his head and raised his eyebrows. " Are you always this annoying?"

They huffed a chuckle and crossed their arms. " ... So... What are you?"

Katsuki's expression pinched, as if saying, ' Wtf?'.

" What the hell is that question? What, am I supposed to say a motherfucking fairy?"

The other waved his hands about. " No, no! That's not what I meant! I mean, are you a vigilante? A villain? A hero?"

Katsuki gave him another unimpressed stare, then sighed. " You're fucking hopeless." ("Hey!")

" Let's see, I threw a smoke bomb at a hero and made sure the idiot who was about to get caught by him wasn't caught. I'm pretty sure I'm not a hero," he deadpanned. " And I literally just said I'm not a villain."

" Well, I mean, you could be lying," the other shrugged.

" If I was a fucking villain," Katsuki said, his patience wearing thin, " Then I definitely wouldn't have saved your hopeless ass. I'd say killing you would be a better course of action if I were a villain. I'm considering it now, actually."

The hooded figure ignored the last comment.

" A bit mean, but I get the point, I guess," they said. " So you're a vigilante. Cool, I haven't seen a decent one like me in ages. But, I haven't seen you around here before? Are you new?"

Katsuki scoffed. " Fuck, no. I've been in this for, what, two, three years? I'm from the neighbourhood nearby. Don't ask. What about you? Never heard of you before."

" You don't know my name, how can you be sure you've never heard of me before?" they deadpanned.

" Because I don't care."

The vigilante snorted. " I'm really feeling the love and kindness coming off of you in waves."

" Shut the fuck up," the blonde rolled his eyes. " Fine, what's your name, then, dumbass?"

" It's definitely not 'dumbass'," the other muttered (" Again, I couldn't give less shits."), before offering his hand and saying, " Kibo, the vigilante of hope! Pleased to meet you!"

Katsuki stared at the newly named, 'Kibo's, hand, before ignoring it completely. He stood up, stretching, and turned to leave.

He paused right before he was about to jump to the floor, and sighed.

" Name's Valour. If we're doing your cringe-y ass shit, the vigilante of courage and bravery."

As an afterthought, he added, " And, no, I'm not using your name, dumb fuck."

And then, he was gone.

A/N:

I have decided.

I'm keeping the second A/Ns, and you cant stop me. u dont fuckin control me.

anywayyyyy, this went on longer than I was expecting. Sorry bout that lol. Betcha didn't see Kacchan coming in all his explosive glory, tho.

Ugh i couldn't find a nickname for izu from baku without using his appearance (which, obviously, I couldn't do, even if i wanted to call him 'broccoli reject') so i just stuck with 'dumb fuck' :D It might change, it might not, who knows?

Remember to comment or do that heart thing-y-ma-jigy! Like it? Hate it? Tell me about it! I want to hear your opinions.

Alright bye byeee, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and remember that you deserve the world! Tell yourself that everyday, otherwise here's me saying it and hoping you'll remember it everyday. Because it's true :) Have a great day!! <3

Oh, and @mymanbakugou :D (if anyone wants to be tagged for future chapters, just say so! <3)

[imanativeofswlondondahling]

Becoming A Stark? (28)- Peter Parker x Stark!femReader

Word Count: 3395

Warnings: swearing, IW emotional trauma, the usual.

Author Note: There is some dialog from Infinity War used in this chapter. I don’t own it, but also there’s new stuff after it so don’t skip it. This is the final chapter. There will be a sequel that I’m not sure when will be posted but it will be coming. If you want to be tagged when it’s posted, let me know! Thank you for reading all of this and giving me so much love on my fist PP story. Let me know what you think of the finale.

Chapter One || Previous Chapter || Master List

“Mom have you seen my jacket?” You ask as you walk from the living room back into the kitchen. You’re already dressed in ripped jeans, galaxy converse, and a grey AC/DC shirt.

“Which jacket?” Pepper asks as she stirs the eggs she’s cooking for you.

“My denim one? I wore it yesterday? Or maybe it was the day before?”

“Have you checked your room?”

“I looked there when I was getting ready. I didn’t see it.” Instead of being dressed for the office, Pepper is wearing running gear. “Are you going into the office today?”

“In a little bit. Your dad wants to go to the park for a run first.”

“Dad running? Since when?”

“I think your birthday is making him feel O-L-D.” Pepper teases as Tony walks down the stairs.

“I can still spell even if I’m getting old.” Tony responds. In his hand he’s holding your Rolling Stones jacket. “You left this on the stairs kiddo.”

“Oh, right! I meant to take it up last night.” You shrug it over your shoulders before sitting down at the food that Pepper made for you.

“What’s with the pep in your step today?”

“Field trip. I don’t have to be at school today.”

“Field trip?” Your dad asks as he sits down next to you. “Where to?”

“MoMA. My art class is going.”

“Ah so you and the young Parker are getting out of school to go look at art. How sweet.” Your dad says with a teasing tone remembering how Peter ended up in your art class after switching in in the second six weeks. “With how much it cost for you to go to that school, I would think you would spend more time at school than on field trips.”

“It’s educational. I promise.”

“Sure it is.”

“What your dad is trying to say is have fun.” Pepper says with a laugh. “He and I are going to go so can you lock up when you leave with Happy?” You nod. “Perfect. Have fun, love you, see you after school.”

“Love you kiddo.” Your dad kisses the top of your head. Pepper places a kiss behind him. You munch on your toast as they walk towards the door. Today should be a fairly normal day, apart from the field trip.

“Slow down, slow down. I’ll spell it out for you.” Tony tries to get Pepper to listen as he tries to explain his dream from last night while they walk through the park together.

“You’re totally rambling.”

“No I’m not.” Tony throws back in his own defense.

“You lost me.”

“Look, you know how you’re having a dream, and in the dream you gotta pee.” Tony ties his jacket around his shoulders as he says this.

“Yeah.”

“Okay. And then you’re like ‘Oh my God. There’s no bathrooms. What am I gonna do? Oh, someone’s watching.’”

“Right.”

“‘Oh, I’m gonna go in my pants.’”

“And then you wake up and in real life you actually have to pee.” Pepper catches his drift.

“Yes.” Tony’s hand waves in agreement.

“Yeah. Everybody has that.”

“Right that’s the point I’m trying to make. Apropos of that, last night I dreamt we had a kid.”

“We have a kid. Y/N.” Pepper points out with a smile.

“No like a baby.” Tony explains. “It was so real. We named him after your eccentric uncle. Uh what was his name? Morgan! Morgan.”

“Right. So when you woke up…”

“Naturally.”

“...and thought we were…”

“Expecting.”

“Yeah.”

“Yes?”

“No.” Pepper smiles at him as she says it.

“I had a dream about it. It was so real.”

“If you wanted to have another kid, you wouldn’t have done that.” Pepper unties the sweater and taps on the nanoparticle home.

“I’m glad you brought this up, ‘cause it’s nothing. It’s just a housing unit for nanoparticles.”

“You’re not helping your case, okay?”

“No, this is detachable. It’s not a…”

“You don’t need that. Y/N didn’t need you to get that. I didn’t need you to get that. Your family needs you to put them first sometimes ok?”

“I know. I had the surgery. I’m just trying to protect us and future usses and that’s it. Just in case there’s a monster in the closet. Instead of, you know…”

“Shirts.”

“You know me so well.”

“God.”

“You finish all my sentences.”

“You should have shirts in your closet.”

“Yeah, you know what there should be? No more surprises. We’re going to have a nice dinner tonight. Hear all about Y/N’s field trip. Show off this Harry Winston. Right?” Pepper chuckles at his antics. “And we should have no more surprises. Ever. I should promise you.”

“Yes.”

“I will.” Tony leans in to kiss Pepper. “Thank you.”

“Tony Stark?” Pepper pulls away at the sound of someone calling Tony’s name. Tony on the other hand can only roll his eyes because this was exactly the kind of thing he was talking about. “I’m Doctor Stephen Strange. I need you to come with me.” Pepper grabs Tony’s hand at this. “Oh and uh congratulations on the wedding, by the way.”

“I’m sorry, are you giving out tickets to something?”

“We need your help. It’s not overselling it to say that the fate of the universe is at stake.”

“And who’s we?”

“Hey Tony.” Bruce appears by Stephen’s side, shocking both Tony and Pepper after so much time without him.

“Bruce.”

“Pepper.”

“Hi.”

“Oh.”

“Are you ok?” Tony asks as Bruce falls into hugging him. What has happened while he was away?

“Ready for this field trip?” Peter asks as he sits down next to you on the bus.

“I’m always ready. Getting out of school for the day? Hell yeah.” You nudge your boyfriend’s shoulder. “Are you ready to see MoMA?”

“I guess so. I haven’t been since Ben died so…” Peter trails off.

“Babe, you haven’t been to MoMA since then? Why?”

“Ben really liked seeing the new exhibits and he would take me with him when he went. It just felt wrong to go without him.” Peter explains as the bus takes off from MSST and heads towards MoMA. “But there’s a first time to do stuff since you lose people I guess.”

“It’s going to be fine. I’ll be with you the whole time.” You say as you take his hand in yours. Peter leans forward on the seat in front of you so he can look in your direction.

“Well that will make everything better.” Suddenly the hairs on Peter’s arm stand straight up.

“What?” 

“Something’s wrong.” Peter mumbles. “Spidey senses are off the wall.” His voice is no louder than a whisper.

“Something like a giant donut spaceship floating over NYC seem off enough?” You say pointing towards the window beside him. He turns to look and the recognition on his face tells you all you need to know. Looks like Peter may not be on the field trip after all.

“Can you and Ned create a distraction?”

“Of course. But you’ll be safe?”

“Always am.” He kisses you on the lips really quick before you tap Ned on the shoulder. Ned spins around to look at you. 

“Guy in the chair needs to distract everyone with me.” You say quickly, but as Ned turns he sees the ship out the window.

“Holy shit.” He then turns towards the back of the bus and yells, “We’re all gonna die! There’s a spaceship!” You follow him towards the back of the bus as people start calling out asking what’s going on. But your eyes catch Peter’s one more time before he opens the emergency exit window with his web shooter. While everyone else is watching the spaceship, your eyes are trailing out the back of the bus as Peter jumps off the bridge. You know he’ll web himself to safety, but it makes your stomach fall to your toes every time.

Peter swings into the park where he sees a big angry alien… if he had to guess, swinging a sword/ax at Tony. So he does the one thing he knows how to do, he grabs it. “Hey man. What’s up Mr. Stark?” 

“Kid where did you come from?”

“Field trip, to MoMA.” Peter screams as he’s thrown in the other direction. “Uh what is this guy’s problem Mr. Stark?”

“Uh he’s from space. He came here to steal a necklace from a wizard.” As the alien throws cars around and Tony tries to laser him, Peter webs the car and swings it back at the alien. Which might just make him more angry, but that’s half the fun. Right as the alien swings his ax down again, a red object zooms by. “Kid that’s the wizard, get on it.”

“On it!” Swinging across New York, he finally grabs the wizard when a blue light grabs the wizard and pulls them both up towards the sky. “Uh, Mr. Stark, I’m being beamed up.”

“Hang on kid!” Wong traps the alien in an icy tundra, slicing off the hand that reaches up towards them. “Wong you’re invited to my wedding.” Tony shouts before jetting off to rescue his daughter’s boyfriend, who happens to be climbing up the side of the alien spaceship. “Give me a little juice FRIDAY. Unlock 17:A.” His boots morph together to form one big foot thruster. “Pete you gotta let go. I’m gonna catch you.” He says over the comms to Peter.

“But you said save the wizard.” Peter pulls his mask off as he says, “I can’t breathe.”

“We’re too high up. You’re running out of air.” If your boyfriend dies in space, you might kill your dad, so he’s going to do everything he can to save the kid.

“Yeah, that makes sense.” Peter’s hands slip from the ship as he runs out of air. But the Iron Spider suit Tony had been working on arrives just in time to grab hold of Peter and save him from falling back to Earth. Instead he just hits the ship a time or two before having air to breathe again. Peter grabs a hold of the ship and stands back up. “Mr. Stark, it smells like a new car in here!”

“Happy trails, kid. FRIDAY send him home.”

“Yep.” A parachute deploys and pulls Peter off the ship.

“Oh come on!” As Tony cuts into the side of the ship, FRIDAY alerts him of something else.

“Boss incoming call from Miss Potts.”

“Tony are you alright? What’s going on?”

“Yeah I’m fine. I just think we might have to push our 8:30 res.”

“Why?”

“Just ‘cause I’ll probably not make it back for a while.”

“Tell me you’re not on that ship.”

“Yeah.”

“God, no, please tell me you’re not on the ship.”

“Honey, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I don’t know what to say.”

“Come back here Tony. I swear to God. I will take Y/N and I will leave for good. No more surprises. You promised.”

“Pep.”

“Come back here right now.” Static starts to crackle. “Come back.”

“Boss we’re losing her.”

“I’m going too…” Pepper’s voice breaks off as the call drops. While Tony is dealing with this call, Peter is climbing up his webs, back onto the ship he had been told not to be on. 

All he can mutter is “I should have stayed on the bus,” as the doors shut on the ship.

The ship is no longer in the sky. You watched it fly away. But you don’t know if that’s a good thing or not, because now you can’t get a hold of your dad or Peter. So you call the one person who has always had to be in the same position as you- you call your mom.

“Y/N? Are you ok?”

“Mom tell me Dad didn’t do something stupid and get on that ship.” Your school group is starting to walk into the first exhibit hall, but you need reassurance right now, not art pieces. Pepper doesn’t say anything for a moment, trying to figure out how to tell you that your dad is on that ship. “He’s on that ship isn’t he?”

“Yeah.”

“Why? Why would he be stupid enough to get on an alien space ship?”

“Because he’s stupid enough to think that saving the world falls on his shoulders and his alone.”

“I think Peter might have been stupid enough to think that too.” You say as soon as you know your class is out of hearing range.

“What?”

“I’ve tried calling him and he’s not picking up.”

“I thought he was on the field trip with you?”

“He was until he saw an alien ship in the sky. Then he decided that he needed to be a superhero. And now he won’t pick up the phone and he always picks up the phone, even when he’s in his suit.” You voice the concerns you’re having. “And my calls to Dad aren’t going through either which makes me think that Peter is with him.”

“He wouldn’t be stupid enough to take a fifteen year old with him on a space ship.” Pepper tries to reassure you.

“But just because he doesn’t take Peter doesn’t mean that Peter isn’t stupid enough to follow him.”

“Sounds like we both need to date smarter men.”

“They’re book smart. I’m just not sure if they’re life smart.”

“I think I’d agree with that.”

“But we also love them too much to let them go.”

“That’s also true.” Pepper doesn’t comment on the fact that you just admitted that you love Peter. “But I also know that your dad will do anything to keep Peter safe if he’s with him. So you just focus on your school trip and at the end of the day, they’ll all come home safe.” Pepper’s promise doesn’t hold much truth to it, but you know your mom is trying to calm you more than anything. “I’m going to send Happy to pick you up from the museum and bring you to SI.”

“Right now?”

“No, but he’ll be there to pick you up when everyone heads back to school.”

“That’s not necessary. I’ll just head back to school and then he can pick me up from school. But Mom, if you hear from Dad, can you tell him I love him?”

“He knows you love him.”

“But I didn’t say it to him this morning and if something happens to him…” You feel the tears welling in your eyes.

“Nothing is going to happen to him. He knows you love him.”

“You don’t know that. Every time he walks out the door to play Avenger, he could leave and not come back. He could die out there today. And I couldn’t take the two seconds it would have taken to tell him I loved him this morning.” The tears drizzle down your face as you mutter the words you feel in your soul. Out of the corner of your eye you see Ned waiting by the door leading to the next exhibit area. You wipe the tears from your cheeks. “So just if you hear from him tell him ok, Mom?”

“I will. Now just for now, don’t think about all of this. Just focus on the field trip and I’ll see you after it ok? Everything is going to be ok.”

“Mom? I love you.”

“I love you too Y/N. So much.” You hang up the phone and Ned walks over.

“Everything alright?”

“No, but the universe doesn’t usually ask me before it makes it’s decisions.”

“Have you heard from Peter?” You shake your head. 

“I can’t get a hold of him or my dad. My mom said my dad is on that donut that flew out of the sky, which makes me think if I can’t get a hold of Peter…”

“He’s on it too.” Ned finishes your thought. “Peter’s in space with Iron Man. That’s so cool.” Ned mumbles but then sees your face. “Ok, not the point right now. What’s our plan?”

“We don’t have one. We’re not Avengers. We just wait around until the rest of them hopefully show up.” And you do what you hope is the next best step, you text your aunt- SOS.

N:Don’t worry. Avengers are on it. Focus on school. 

Why does everyone think you’ll be able to focus on anything when your dad and boyfriend disappeared on an alien spaceship? 

Y:you all think i’m going to be able to focus on learning when my dad and boyfriend have just gone missing? that’s the stupidest thing i’ve ever heard of coming from two of the smartest women i know.

N:I’m not saying it’s going to be easy, but this isn’t on your shoulders. The Avengers will take care of this fight. I promise you, we’ll get them back. Anyway we have to.

“Anything?” Ned asks quietly, as your tour guide goes on pointing out different pieces of art. You shake your head.

“Apparently it’s an Avenger problem, not a me problem, according to Aunt Nat.”

“It’s still cool that you can just text Avengers.”

“Ned, my dad is literally an Avenger. It loses the coolness factor when your dad leaves on missions and you don’t know if he’ll come back alive or not.”

“That’s true I guess.” He looks at the art piece next to you. “But still you get to text the Black Widow! Isn’t that cool?”

“She’s just my Aunt Nat. I’ve hung out with her watching horror movies and talking about crushes. It feels different than saying I text the Black Widow.” You glance over at the statue, trying to take it in so you can write your report when you get home.

“They could have tried to put at least one blemish on it.” MJ mutters and you nod in agreement.

“Uh, Y/N?”

“Ned?” You turn from MJ to see Ned staring at his hand. It’s turning to dust in front of his eyes. “Ned, what’s happening?”

“I think something’s wrong.” His other hand starts to turn into dust and you don’t understand. 

“What is happening?”

“Something that can’t be good.” MJ says and you turn to see her hands turning to dust as well. “Y/N, something is wrong. Really wrong.” Your friends are turning to dust in front of your eyes. You can’t stop it, you can’t figure out what’s wrong. So you do the one thing you know to do when something is wrong- you call your mom.

“Y/N? Please tell me you’re not turning to dust too?”

“Mom, I don’t get what’s happening.”

“I don’t know either. But something isn’t right.” Your mom sounds stressed and worried at the same time you lift a hand to run through your hair and that’s when you see it. Your hand is disappearing before your eyes.

“Mom. Mom, I’m scared. My hand, it’s going.”

“Y/N, everything is going to be alright. It’s going to be ok.” Pepper doesn’t tell you that she has tears streaming down her cheeks. She needs to stay calm for you. You’re the one fading into nothing. She can stay calm for you in this moment. 

“Mom, Mom. I don’t want to go. Please. I don’t know what’s happening. Mom, please make it stop.” Pepper closes her eyes as she listens to your pleads.

“It’s going to be alright sweetheart. Everything is going to be ok.” You watch in horror as Ned fades into nothing but a pile of dust.

“Mom, Ned’s gone. MJ’s seconds away from going. I don’t want to go too. Please make it stop.”

“Everything is going to be alright baby. Just breathe. Everything is going to be ok.” Pepper lies to you.

“Mom, I love you. Tell Dad I love him too. I don’t want to go. Tell him that. I never wanted to go. Having you two as parents was the best thing that ever happened to me.” Your eyes look in horror as MJ turns into dust too.

“We feel the same about you.”

“I love you. I love you so much Mom. I’m sorry. I don’t want to go. I love you.”

“We love you too.” Pepper knows she only has seconds left with you so she wants to make sure you know this before it’s too late.

“I love yo-”

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[camelely]

TFATWS Spoilers under the cut

Literally the following is my thoughts and opinions, and there are probably some unpopular opinions lol. It's kinda really long lol.

Starting with some positives.

I loved how the two leads had storylines that mirrored each other. Sam needed to become Captain America and gain a title and Bucky needed to move on from The Winter Solider and loose a title.

Sam. Just Sam I loved him before but now I love him more.

Sam becoming Cap.

I loved Isaiah and his story.

I loved Sam's family, how they welcomed Bucky and the struggles Sarah had.

I really liked how they spent time with both Sam and Bucky and didn't forget the show was supposed to be about both of them. Often times shows tend to lean into the more popular or fan favorite lead and this show didn't do that. When Sam took center it felt natural and when Bucky took center it felt natural.

The Wakandans were great. I love Ayo and her friendship with Bucky.

Zemo was fine and fun enough.

John Walker was incredibly done. Wyatt Russell did an amazing job and the scene with the blood on the shield will forever be in my memory. Hands down one of the most impactful MCU moments.

I like the genderbend on Karl/Karli and the direction they took her character. People that go from sympathetic ideas to unforgivable means, make good villains. I think her more boring elements come from the lack of development she got.

Now on to the negatives.

This show could have been like two hours shorter and still told the same story with the same impact. Also earlier episodes, (maybe later episodes too I might have just gotten used to it and stopped noticing lol), had some weird ADR moments. IDK what happened behind the scenes but it was noticeable.

I would have loved it if one of the episodes was a flashback episode. The Sharon twist was obvious from the first episode she appeared in but like they thought it was good enough to save confirmation for the mid/end of the finale? Both her and Karli would have been benefited from a flashback episode.

Karli should have fought Bucky while Sam was focused on Walker. Sam could have had a moment where he tells him he will never be forgiven and Walker would responded with something similar to "I do what is right. I don't need forgiveness." Then when he becomes USAgent it lands more like the next progression in an arc rather than the redemption arc this could be interpreted as. I personally think this is a stepping stone and not a redemption but the MCU (and Disney) doesnt have a great track record when it comes to handling anything with nuance and the fans have an even worse track record when handling things that arent black and white. I guess my point is they could have handled the John Walker set up better.

Speaking of set up, this entire show was set up. This is my main and only real problem with this show. Nothing felt like it was resolved at the end. Karli even says she was part of a bigger movement. Killing her didn't change the fact a lot of people felt the un blip ruined their lives. People always shit on Tony for wanting to bring people back five years later instead of going back in time but like it had been five years, while some like Steve and Natasha hadn't moved on, others had. Some had better lives. Assuming everyone wanted to back to the way things used to be would also be a mistake. This has consequences too, as we see in these shows. But ruining the lives of the people who had bettered themselves would have been shitty too. And yea some people who had been bettered were worsened once again when the un blip happened but my point is going back and erasing the five years would have been shitty too. There is not really a right answer here as the right answer would have been to either stop the snap before it happened or to come to terms with the fact that the snap can never be undone. Leaving everyone as dead might have hurt, but it was the best thing for a community that had five years of mourning and moving on and counseling ETC. Ooof that was a tangent lol and I could probably write an essay so going back to my original point about set up. The flag smashers, or at least people who think the way they did still exist, Sharon Carter is the powerbroker but Sam and Bucky dont know and now shes back as agent 13, John Walker went from war hero to committing war crimes and his journey as USAgent is just starting, Sam has taken the Cap mantle and is ready to begin acting as Cap, and Bucky is both coming to terms with and moving on from his past. Nothing is actually resolved in this mini series. I know it's supposed to make you excited for the next movie/show/season whatever but have six episodes of little to no payoff IMO made for a flat show.

Building off the set up problem. This show had too much going on. Sam and Bucky each had their own personal journey (The A and B plot depending on the episode), Sam and Bucky being friends and their shared journey (C), John Walker and the Flag Smashers (the D and E plot depending on the episode), Zemo and the Wakandans (F), The PowerBroker/Sharon (G), The boat and Sarah which could be considered part of Sam's plot but since if you cut it out the only thing that actually effected Sam's journey would be the bank in the first episode and yet it still went on till basically the end I'm calling it it's own plot (H), Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, which might be part of John Walker's story but since it's all set up for her to take a bigger role in the future and his set up could be completed without her I'm counts her separately (I), then you have the big meeting at the end, the senators and policy makers making choices the vote that they keep mentioning and once again more set up... (J). 10 ideas by my count, all needed their own set up, follow through, and payoff. And yes some stuff like Valentina the pay off will come later but still... It's all too many plots! And thats not mentioning side characters that were new to the show that they wanted to spend time with but couldn't.

Even though I think the shows aren't comparable/two different genres WandaVision had two more episodes (and yes some were shorter but I already mentioned I think FATWS could have benefited from that), completed all the main plots and had Wanda's journey (A), Vision's journey (B), Agatha, Pietro/Ralph, and the citizens of the hex (C), Outside the hex Monica (D), Outside the hex everyone else and sure you can separate Darcy, Jimmy and Heyward but none of them were setting up future stories or had their own distinctive plot outside the hex thing like Monica so she is the only one I am separating (E), the kids who could be counted as an extension of the Wanda and Vision plots since they didnt really have their own arc or story (F). 6 total. And some of those could be combined. Like I think we should separate Wanda Vision and the kids but technically they are just an extension of Wanda. And same with Monica, her story was mostly intertwined with Darcy, Jimmy and the outside the hex stuff. I separated her since I think she had enough moments to herself and she set up secret invasion or whatever, but like Valentina being a part of John's story it is arguable. Of these plots only the missing witness Jimmy thing, Wanda's post credits moment a moment seperate from everything else, Monica's mid credits i think? moment another one separate from everything else, and white vision were unresolved. They gave Agatha an opening ending but it was still an ending. And yes Darcy Heyward etc will probably come back but the plot they had here was finished. So arguably they had 2/6 unfinished plots. And if you don't count Jimmy's witness as a plot and just count it as an unanswered question then 1/6. And technically white vision is just half a vision and the other vision got a complete plot so really it's 0.5/6 At best they completed 92(ish)% of the plots and left 8 (ish) % for future stuff.

In contrast FATWS only finished Sam's journey into becoming Cap, Zemo and the Wakandans, and arguably Sam and Bucky's friendship. You might be able to argue that Bucky had a full circle moment with the guy whose son he killed, but that is one guy and Bucky has been carrying around a list of people like that guy. It's not the end of a story it is the start of a journey. And maybe it is possible to say the boat thing had an ending kinda. 2/10 completed. maybe 3/10 if you wanna push it 5/10. IMO at best they completed 50% of plot set up.

Clearly FATWS is meant to be this way and thats why it bothered me. They want you to watch Cap 4 or whatever they decide to call the theatrical movie that will come after this. I guess I was just expecting it to stand on it's own, and other than Sam's journey into becoming Captain America, which was amazing and deserved in every way, nothing this show did felt like it could have stood on its own. I know it's arguable that was the main story and only story that deserved to end. But I've already pointed out all the other running plots this show had, and I think at least two or three of them should have had follow through in the show.

Someone who plans to never seen an MCU movie after these shows could have watched WandaVision and enjoyed it. That is not the case for FATWS. If you don't plan on watching any MCU stuff in the future you won't know how over half the plots of this show will end. THis isn't even how the movies work. They each tell their own story while also setting up other things, so it is clear they know how to do this.

I can see why Disney decided to submit it as a series and not a mini series. Not only do they not want to compete with themselves (nominating WV as a miniseries) but also this isn't a miniseries.

I guess to conclude I'll say I did really enjoy watching this show. It was fun and there were some great moments. It featured amazing character and amazing actors, but I wish it had bothered to finish more of what it started.

Thank you so much for reading till the end of a post that has surely become unintelligible gloop by now. If you disagree I'd love to hear why!

[tsukikoayanosuke]

7, 8, 9, 10, 13, 14, 16, 27, 35 & 39

[It’s a lot again 😅 hope you don’t mind :D]

I might be going way too far with these answers, so please bear with me ^^’

Sorry for the long rambles but these are my answers!

7. Share a snippet from one of your favorite pieces of prose you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

Oof. This is hard. There’s actually a lot of paragraphs that I like throughout the writing process. I can re-read and just pick which is my favorite, it’ll be different every time.

But, I think the thing currently going on with TW:OPT can be summed up in this Once Upon a Time… (I was being dumb and I thought prose is just poetry without rhyme)

So, this drabble is written on the run. There’s not really deep thought and I can’t even remember why I wrote it in the first place. From the date I posted it on Tumblr it was in the middle of Octavinelle Arc.

But, in this small crappy prose-poetry, it has one of the themes in TW:OPT: happy vs sad ending. This is something that I want to build since in the early stage. The theme of TW:OPT is second chances for the reincarnated villains, giving them a happy ending, something way better than the original ones.

So, if you look for example the two lines about the Queen of Heart:  

The Queen of Heart was forgotten by Alice like it was just a bad dream

The Queen of Heart will always be remembered by Alice as his dear friend and the greatest queen

The first line is what happens to the original Disney Alice’s Queen of Hearts, while the second line is what happens to Riddle, the current reincarnation of the Queen of Hearts. It’s a good change for Riddle’s life.

However, like everything, there has to be something to balance it. 

After all, good endings cannot exist without bad endings.

Can the good guys really live with the bad guys in harmony? After all, all Disney movie always has “good wins, evil lose” theme. If the “evil side” wins, wouldn’t that mean the “good side” loses? Is that even a good thing or even possible?

After all, the One-Eyed Captain found his happy ending to sail away once again. What will happen to him in his next life?

This line becomes the question. What will happen to the already-set happy endings? Would they just disappear to change into bad endings to keep the balance?

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8. Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

I’m debating between many dialogues, but I think the one piece I’m most proud of is in Chapter 97. I'm cutting a lot of the narration and just focus on the dialogues because it becomes too long.

Riddle: What happens that day? The day when everything went downhill. Azul: Didn't anyone tell you already? Riddle: I want to hear it from your or Jonah's mouth. What happened that you must curse him? Azul: Pretty simple, really. I told him not to come here that day, and he did To make it worse, that boy was stupid enough to go back against our agreement. Riddle: Just that? Azul: Oh, please, dear Crimson Ruler. I don't want to hear that from you. Have you forgotten about your reign before? Riddle: I know what I did was tyrannical, but I want to be better. Azul: Because of the captain told you too? Riddle: No. This is my choice to change. Just like it was your choice to curse him. He trusts you, you know? He knows that you wouldn't go back against your own words, which was why he was willing to sign another contract with you. Azul: If he trusts me that much, why is he against me? If he trusts me, why did he choose to save his stupid friends than agreeing with me? Tell me, Riddle Rosehearts...Why does he choose you instead of me?

We all know what happened during Octavinelle Arc and I don't deny that this sounds cheesy or slightly ooc. And let me just say this, there's no intention of this become a love triangle or whatsoever.

There are two things I want to highlight in this exchange: Riddle's growth and Azul's decline.

Riddle, after everything happened in Heartslabyul and Savanclaw arc, finally putting his foot down on where he wants to stand. He wants to be a better person, more than just the feared Crimson Tyrant. That's why he's helping them. Not because the boys are breaking the rules, not because someone tells him to, but Riddle is willing to risk it all, even his unique magic (as we see at the end of this chapter and the next) to save his friends. Again, this might sound ooc and I apologize, but from my perspective, this is a logical step of development for Riddle.

Meanwhile, Azul is showing more and more decline from this until the end of Octavinelle Arc even Scarabia Arc. For Azul who knows how easy people can leave and mock when you have nothing, seeing Jonah leave him and siding with the anemones is basically a betrayal. He can't think rationally when it comes to the betrayal and we see how brash he can be with anything related to Jonah throughout the arc where all of their interaction nearly kills Jonah.

If Riddle-Jonah is a coming-of-age story, Azul-Jonah is a broken friendship story.

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9. Which fic has been the hardest to write?

This is a hard one to write. You might think I’ll just answer with TW:OPT, but honestly, all multi chapters fanfic has their own difficulties, so I can’t choose which is the hardest.

For Twisted-Wonderland: Our Precious Treasure, where I do treat this as a novel-writing practice, keeping the consistency with the theme, plot points, and characterization.

For Private Tutor, Angel of Death, Philza Minecraft, actually coming up with new ideas is hard because I don’t based this on anything, and just write anything once a week. In addition that I’m still new in Dream SMP fandom so characterization won’t be the strongest thing.

For both TWST MC Hybrid AU and Magical Girl AU, giving the massive cast equal spotlight and actually not getting lost is quite a challenge. Both AU has seven main characters and I need to give them the same amount to screen time.

And don’t get me started with those smut. I won’t be talking about it because I’m keeping it family friendly. Those has their own problems XD

.

10. Which fic has been the easiest to write?

As I said, every fic has their own problems, even one shot. So, I’m looking through my works and trying to figure out which fic I wrote the fastest but had the most fun.

I think I’ll go with A Wish for a Proposal because the comfort in this fic with Ace going heads over heels for Deuce and being doki-doki all the time. And the kiss under a shooting star, AH! Poetic cinema~

I do enjoy when I wrote how Ace thought keeping a toy ring as childish but he ended up using it to confess to Deuce and thinking that it’s not as childish as he thought.

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13. What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across?

There are good writing advice that I had head, one of them came from On Writing: Great Character Descriptions! by Hello Future Me. He has so many good advices in writing and I highly recommend him.

He said that “when describing characters it’s good to focus on their movements that can tell the readers of who the characters are”. As someone who has many troubles in writing physical description, this is actually a great alternative, especially when you want to go thought the “show don’t tell”.

After watching the video I tried to write something. I ended up writing Jonah’s father, Benjamin, in Chapter 137

The owner of the inn was an old man who, coincidentally, also shared the 'Argentum' surname. Benjamin Argentum was a man with slouched back from the burden of the world, white strands on his reddish-brown hair and tired, but kind, black eyes. He walked slowly with his walking stick, claiming that his knees were never that strong since a cart accident during his younger days. The way he speaks was gentle like everyone's favorite uncle/grandfather, along with the delicious appetizer that he had prepared a few minutes ago on the reception table. The spices he used reminiscent of the spices Jonah used in his Ramshackle Kitchen. There was no way all of these were coincidences. Crowley wouldn't doubt if Jonah Argentum ever grew old, he would be looking exactly like the warm innkeeper.

I want to highlight how Benjamin is a kind old man ("He walked slowly with his walking stick, claiming that his knees were never that strong since a cart accident during his younger days”, ”The way he speaks was gentle like everyone's favorite uncle/grandfather”) but has his own problems (”a man with slouched back from the burden of the world”), and very similar to Jonah (”The owner of the inn was an old man who, coincidentally, also shared the 'Argentum' surname”, ”The spices he used reminiscent of the spices Jonah used in his Ramshackle Kitchen”, “Crowley wouldn't doubt if Jonah Argentum ever grew old, he would be looking exactly like the warm innkeeper.”)

It’s not the best descriptions, because most of the example used highlight only one most recognizable feature while my description highlight nearly everything. I still need some practice.

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14. What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever come across?

“Write what’s mainstream”.

Here’s my problem with it: sometimes anything that’s mainstream is not my thing. I like to challenge what we are given and give it a spin. 

I mentioned before that growing up with Indonesian TV Series that only centers around love, riches, and cheating, I grew tired of it. That was why I once tried to make a script for a group of friends creating a classical music band and mental problems. 

I’m not the first one to make an adaptation of TWST, but I think I’m one of the first, at least in AO3, that make an adaptation with Male MC. Among the Female MC or Female Readers story with a hint (or too much) of Romance, I want to give something for the small group who wants Male MC or something more platonic to read.

I always want to push slightly further, trying something that I haven’t seen at first glance, giving varieties. I will admit that would always doubt whether me writing something different is even worth it or not. But when I saw that yes, this is worth it, I gain more confidence and become bolder in my twist.

Going against the mainstream is risky, but we'll see whether it's worth it or not.

.. 

16. If you only could write one pairing for the rest of your life, which pairing would it be?

Oh no... Does it have to be a romantic pairing?

Okay. I don't really have an OTP. I mean, I like ROnah and JonAzul, but I don't think I can't live with writing only about them.

So, romantically, I don’t know. But, this doesn’t help with platonically either because I find enjoyment in writing all relationship. Just pushing the limit of my writing, you know?

So, I don’t think I can answer this because I’m a coward XD

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27. How do you feel about collaborations?

A mixed bag.

So currently I'm in at least 2 collab projects: TWST MC Hybrid AU and Arisu in Alternate Wonderland. In the former, I'm the group leader, while in the latter, I'm just a writer.

Both sidea are different experiences. With AiAW, it's definitely lighter because this is basically retelling TWST but with seven Yuus. However because of this freedom and the possibilities of anything, I cannot predict whether my oc action will affects in the future or how they would interact with other ocs in the project.

With Hybrid AU, since this is a fantasy au, anything can happen. Plus as the main writer, I can see and plan clearly which event will be important and setting the characters' arc. It's definitely harder to organize because of the various idea that we want to write.

So, yeah. Collaboration can be two things for me: a scripted roleplay or a freestyle roleplay

.

35. Would you ever kill off a canon character?

*looking at draft for TW:OPT Book 2*

Maybe...?

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39. Do you ever get rude reviews and how do you deal with them?

I remember when I was a kid, I wrote a fanfiction where it only features OCs, and someone gave a review, ranting about the lack of canon characters. I, of course, sulked a bit but then just keep writing.

However, what I usually do when it comes to comments is take them into considerations. During Scarabia Arc I got a comment that the Jonah-Azul therapy moment is kinda weak, and rereading it, I can see that. Which was why the next part of the therapy Arc I tried to connect them further. So compare the JonAzul scene in the last part of Chapter 124 with the first part of Chapter 126. At least for me, I prefer the latter because there's more intimacy.

[anxiouslymalicious]

Losers Club Plus One Part 8

 A Richie Tozier x daughter!reader series

Read the previous part here or go here for the complete Masterlist!

A/N; Hello everyone, I’m sorry for the long wait, but I have been struggling with this one a lot and still don’t feel like it’s as good as it could be, but this is the happiest I have felt about any of the versions I have written for this chapter.  Anyway, this is about 3.8k words. I hope you enjoy!

“What do you mean you don’t know? Weren’t you there when she was born?!” asked Ben, stressed out beyond belief over the whole situation. He, Bev And Richie had settled in his room while Eddie got cleaned up and Bill sat in front of Y/N’s and Richie’s room, trying to get her to open up to him. He had arrived not long after the situation escalated and had been sat before the room ever since he heard what happened. Well, after giving Richie shit for never bothering to find out. Richie wasn’t mad at Bill though. He was giving himself shit for never bothering to find out, for taking her with him, for being so careless.

“I mean that I never made a test. There was a birth certificate with her, the mother’s name wasn’t readable anymore, but it had my name on it. So, I assumed…” Richie drifted off, another painful sob racking through his body. His chest was aching more and more with every sob. He hid his face in his hands again, like he had countless times in the past half an hour. The shame was too much for him. 

Richie felt the bed dip beside him as Bev sat down on his right, laying a hand on his back, her head resting against his shoulder. She was shaken up to say the least, not expecting anything like that. When she first encountered Y/N, she had thought about how little physical similarities there were between the girl and her father, but she never would have thought that there might be a bigger reason to that than genetic randomness.

Ben, meanwhile, was still pacing the room, not sure what to think of the whole situation.

“Do you want to get tested?” Beverly asked carefully. Her voice was soft and hesitant, eyes travelling from Richie to Ben and back to Richie as helplessness took over her. And not only her. None of the Losers knew what to think of anything that was going on.

Richie looked up a little, chin and mouth still covered by his hand that he never fully lifted from his face. Then, he shook his head vigorously.

“I’m scared.” He finally uttered, voice cracking and barely more than a whisper. The two Losers easily heard how rough his voice sounded, like his vocal cords had turned to sandpaper. Beverly sighed, along with Ben who ran his hand through his hair before settling his hands on his hips. He had stopped his nervous pacing and instead stepped closer to the two Losers on his bed.

“Listen, Trashmouth. You really fucked up. We all know that. But sitting here and wallowing in self-pity won’t make anything right again. You need to do something.” Ben said, kneeling down before his friend. Richie nodded as yet another sob escaped his lips.

“I’m just so scared. Did I just lose my little girl?” Richie asked, teary gaze moving from Bev to Ben. Both of them felt tears of their own stinging in their eyes. Beverly shook her head.

“I don’t think so.” She replied, trying to put as much confidence into her words as possible although she really wasn’t sure if she believed herself. Ben nodded a little, agreeing with her.

“You’re shit, Y/N knows that too. She’s hurt but I don’t think she hates you.” Ben rested one of his hands on Richie’s knee, hoping to provide some form of comfort as he looked up at the broken man. Each of the Losers had witnessed the others breaking down before. It was completely out of character for most of them, almost like an out-of-body-experience, but Ben and Beverly silently agreed that they had never before seen Richie that low.

It was hard on the other Losers too, though. It wasn’t only Richie whose heart was breaking.

Beverly was actually deeply worried for the girl. After all, Bev had never had a good relationship with her father. He had been abusive, good for nothing, but she still loved him. She still came back time and time again. And she saw herself in Y/N. She knew that Richie never meant to hurt her and wouldn’t ever dare to lay a finger on her, but if Y/N felt that being hurt by her loved ones was alright, would she find herself in a relationship like Beverly’s in the future?

Ben’s heart was aching for her. He knew what it was like to be the outcast. He knew what it was like to find people you adored dearly only to be ripped away from them again. He was sure Y/N felt that way now. Like her safe place, for both alike, the Losers Club, would be taken from her, but most importantly, the man she thought was her father, her only family, was in some ways taken away from her. It was cruel and Ben was scared that she would feel equally lost as he did when he had to move away as a kid. He never really recovered from the hurt his mother caused him back then.

Eddie was silently breaking down in his bathroom. To him, Y/N was such a little sunshine and she didn’t deserve any of this. She didn’t deserve a hurt relationship with her father like he had with his own mother growing up. Richie didn’t deserve that either, but Eddie knew just how much this loss of reality can affect someone. He himself had felt as though he had lost his grip on reality when he spent time in the hospital after breaking his arm. When he pushed his mother to her limits. When he too felt as though he was about to lose the only biological family he had left.

Lastly, Bill was desperate. He had pushed Georgie away and never got the chance to apologise. Time was ticking. What if she or Richie wouldn’t find back together? Bill couldn’t let that happen. His mind was set on saving them the eternal heartache of knowing that it was your fault that a loved one died, the heartache of knowing that the other died feeling unloved. He felt that this was his opportunity to make things right. To not give IT the satisfaction of tearing another family apart.

Which was why he was still, after half an hour, hammering against Y/N’s room door, trying to argue with the girl who mostly replied with hums and groans.

“Y/N p-p-please… This is n-not real. I p-p-promise you.” Bill tried, now growing desperate. Impatient. He felt like he was running out of time. His back was leaned against the door, teeth gnawing at his lips.

“How can you promise that?” Y/N sobbed. The hurt she felt was inexplicable. It was just too much. Her world had been torn apart, nothing made sense anymore and she felt like she just couldn’t go on.

“B-because I c-can.” Bill said, then sighed, knowing just how stupid he sounded. “W-what are we t-to you? W-w-what does the L-Losers Club mean to you?” That sounded better in his ears.

Silence. Then, “I appreciate you.”

“W-we do too. And t-the second R-R-Richie introduced you as h-his d-daughter, I d-d-decided that, to m-me, y-you are a part of this f-f-family.” Bill replied.

“I’m not Richie’s daughter though.” She said, followed by another heart-wrenching sob echoing through the door. Bill winced.

“W-What is a f-father to you?” Bill missed Stan terribly in this situation. He would have done a much better job. He had usually been able to clear everyone’s head out, bringing people closer together again, or at least he was able to talk some sense into them. A single tear managed to escape Bill’s eye, rolling down his cheek until he caught it, wiping it away with the back of his hand. He was mourning for his friend.

“I-I’m sorry, k-kiddo. Stan w-would have been much b-better at this. Sorry. I’m t-trying here, please b-bear with me.” A dry chuckle escaped Bill’s lips. “J-just… what does a p-p-person have to do t-to be a father?”

“I don’t know.” She replied. “I really don’t know. Be there for their kid, I guess. Be honest. Take good care of them. Love them and show them that they’re loved every day. Spend time with them… That stuff.”

Bill smiled a little. “D-Didn’t Richie do m-m-most of that? I mean b-besides the honesty-part.”

She sighed. “But it’ll change so much…”

“W-what exactly would it c-change?” Bill knew that he had finally cornered her. He knew that he had Y/N exactly where he wanted. Suddenly, he felt the door move, but he wasn’t quick enough to adjust his balance and fell flat on his back, met with Y/N’s tear-stained face peeking at him shyly from behind the door. Hastily, he got up as Y/N pulled the door a little further open to grant Big-Bill access to the room. He didn’t waste a second and embraced Y/N tightly, closing the door behind them.

It felt good to be held. Y/N whimpered and winced, broken sobs and shallow gasps racked pained her airways and throat, but she felt. And that was nice.

“Shhh… Y-you’re safe. E-everything will b-be alright.” Bill mumbled, hoping to calm her, but not only her. He, too, needed some support, he needed to hear those words, even if they were his own. Otherwise he knew he would go insane.

“Promise?” Y/N mumbled. She knew it would be a lie, but just for a moment, she wanted to embrace the naïve trust of the child in her. She wanted to blindly follow what the adults told her to do and what they told her would be the truth. She didn’t want to think and decide for herself, but rather go back home, to the safe distance that separated Derry from LA, that separated Derry from the rest of the world, really.

 “I p-p-promise.” Bill replied. He looked at his best friend’s presumed daughter and felt utterly helpless. Could he really promise that? He wanted her to be alright, yes, but were lies the right way?

“Can you… uh…”

“Want m-me to call R-R-Richie over?”

Y/N nodded. Bill, feeling a little at ease, grinned and left the room only to reappear a few minutes later, a shaking Richie under his arm. Dried tear streaks besmirched his paler-than-usual cheeks. Richie looked tired. Mentally exhausted, yes, but it seemed almost as though he has aged about two decades in the past hour.

“I’m r-r-right outside if y-you n-need me.” Bill told the two before stepping out, closing the door behind him. Y/N remained quiet, just like Richie. He was slumped over, hands balled in the pockets of his jacket. Y/N could see how hard he was gritting his teeth, trying not to let more tears fall. Richie looked defeated.

Y/N, however, was ready to fight. Her body was rigid, tense, and Richie thought that not even that stupid bitch of a clown would survive a fight with his little girl. Not in that very moment. There was blood on her thumb, Richie assumed she had excessively bit down on it, accidentally tearing it. Richie saw the unshed tears in her eyes and dried tear streaks stained her angrily blushing cheeks.

“Y/N, I,” Richie started, but the words caught in his throat, “I’m so fucking sorry.”

She remained quiet.

“I just… Someone left you on my doorstep. They rang the bell and just took off. I had no chance of finding out who it was. But there was a letter. I still have it at home. Couldn’t throw that stupid piece of shit paper away.” A dry chuckle escaped Richie’s lips as he stepped closer to the bed, where Y/N was standing.

“It was from your mother. I can tell you what it said, or I can give you the letter once we get home. But something about it made me want to trust that unnamed person. And you were crying. So loudly and desperately, it made me cry too. I was so fucking scared. I mean, I still am, but back in the day, everything happened so suddenly and I was still living in my fucked up one-room apartment. Fuck, I still wrote my own shit.” Richie ran a hand over his face, up to his hair, then looked at Y/N. Her arms were crossed in a defensive manner in front of her chest.

“But you looked at me with those fucking huge eyes and it was like you told me that we could do this. And I trusted you. And when you grew older, you were so much like me. I never felt the need to do a paternity test. I’m so fucking sorry, Y/N.” Richie couldn’t hold his tears back any longer. His voice sounded shallow, pained, even. Y/N just sighed, but she could feel her own tears fall, shoulders relaxing in the slightest.

“If you want me to, I’ll take the test the second we get back home. But to me you are and will always be my daughter. Fucking biology can’t change that. Please, please forgive me, little one. Please. I’m so fucking sorry.” Richie ‘Trashmouth’ Tozier was full-on pleading now. Pure fear had taken over his body, fear of losing the most important person in his life. The little girl he had taken care of, taken in, cared for and given all his love for the longest time of his life. He couldn’t lose her.

“It’s okay, Richie. I’d just like to know if you’re my biological father too on top of being my psychological dad.” Y/N muttered before finally letting loose, allowing her body to break down again. She knew that it wasn’t just okay. She, as much as Richie knew that it would take time to rebuild their trust, to get back to where they were. She knew that she couldn’t just forgive him for basically lying to her all her life, but he couldn’t help it. He had been blind with trust and now he would have to pay the price. 

Richie hesitated for a moment, not knowing if she wanted distance between them to sort out her feelings or if she was craving the comfort from the man she considered her father throughout her whole life. Ultimately, he decided against his gut-feeling and shot up from the bed, wrapping his arms around her crumbling frame.

They cried. It was raw and real and painful, but it was just as relieving. Wet, desperate sounds of hurt and heartache crawled up their throats, echoing in the room. Struggling breaths and hurried gasps. Cries for help from above. Cries for the past.

Eddie, in his room, could hear the wailing sounds. They pained him. They made him want to cry as he cleaned himself up. Eddie didn’t want anything more than for the two to be alright. He wanted the man he loved to be alright and he wanted for that man’s daughter to be alright. Eddie’s creeping hopes of going home with them rather than going back to Myra felt as though they had been shattered. He felt guilty for not wanting to go back to her, but Eddie wanted to be happy. And he felt more than just happy when he was with the Tozier-Trashmouth-duo. He felt free and accepted and loved whereas with Myra, he felt oppressed and stuck in the same vicious circle every day of his life.

He appreciated her, he appreciated how she cared for him, how she reminded him of all the meds he had to take and how he could unwind a little with her after a long day at work. Eddie did have actual romantic feelings for that woman years and years ago, but now, he felt that all those feelings had faded and since arriving in Derry, the thought of going back to Myra made him feel uneasy more than anything.

He would much rather go home with the chaotic Toziers. Get to know how they live. He could help Richie manage his life. He could help Y/N whenever she was struggling in school. Maybe, just maybe, Eddie could stay at home, make sure that everything was cleaned and cared for, cook and plan out little weekend trips. Maybe he could pick up a small job to support the duo, or he could keep working at his job, it wasn’t something he couldn’t do elsewhere, and save whatever was left of his income for Y/N’s later education.

Eddie smiled, a blush on his cheeks, as he wet the cloth, trying to get the dirt off himself. Only seconds later, his happy daydreams were rudely interrupted by the most terrifying nightmare.

Ben had checked in with the Toziers as the cleansing cries ebbed off and were replaced with soft, uneven whimpers and whispers.

“We need you two right here with us.” He had told them, eyes moving from one tear-stained face to the other. Ben looked closely, examined their faces in the most detailed way, searching for similarities between the two and ending up a little satisfied as he found a few. Like the way their noses were curved. The fine lips, the gentle eyes. Ben found that they had more in common than they might have seen. He hoped that it wasn’t just mother nature and his own mind playing tricks on him.

“We’ll stay, don’t worry.” Richie replied as he watched Ben. Little did Ben know that neither Richie nor Y/N planned on staying in Derry. Ben had closed the door behind him, his steps outside growing quieter as he was on his way downstairs, unintentionally interrupting the kiss between Bev and Bill before proudly explaining to them how he managed to get Richie and Y/N to stay.

“Let’s leave.” Richie said hurriedly, back in the room. His heart was clenching in his chest at the thought of leaving his friends, most importantly Eddie, behind to fend for themselves, but fixing his family was more important to him. The blankness of Y/N face, the emptiness of her eyes, the lack of emotion in her facial features scared Richie more than IT ever could.

Y/N nodded. She was too exhausted to interact with Richie any longer. She felt empty, almost as though with all the tears she cried, she had cried out her heart and soul and every last emotion in her brain. She felt like something had been ripped away from her. Like she was incomplete. Although she knew that Richie wasn’t really gone. He was still there, still her father, but she still felt… Strange. Because everything she had believed as she grew up might have been a huge misunderstanding. And that was a lot to take in.

 Richie smiled a little. Then, he gave her a gentle clap on the shoulder, the last non-frantic movement he would make for the next few minutes. What ensued was Richie, a constant stream of swear words leaving his lips, hastily searching the room for any items that might belong to them, carelessly throwing what was left in the room into the bags. He then grabbed both bags, gently pushing his daughter to the window where a fire escape led them outside, to the comfort of the expensive car.

Y/N climbed into the back, stretching her legs across the seats while Richie threw the bags in the trunk, slamming it close, then struggled to get in and start the car. The second the motor started, Richie seemed to be a little at ease, his shoulders relaxing further the more distance he put between his little family and the hotel of horror.

Richie had turned on the radio, a random rock song was playing, and he anxiously bopped his head along to the beat. The song sounded vaguely familiar, but he couldn’t be bothered to strain his brain for the name.

Y/N had curled up against the backseats, legs spread out over the seats. She wasn’t comfortable, but it felt better than facing the world and sitting up. She felt too tired to do that. Instead, she looked out the window, simply watching as the world passed by.

The car came to an abrupt halt, shaking the girl halfway out of her trance. She sat up a little, confused as to where the pair might be. She spotted a synagogue and let her eyes travel to Richie who now seemed to be in a little trance himself. His vision blurred with tears and he suddenly looked back at his little girl.

“Uhm… Would you- do you mind if we-“ Richie sniffled a little, pointing at the synagogue just outside. Carefully, Y/N shook her head, silently telling the man that it would be alright. And so, Richie parked the car and climbed out, leading his daughter inside. He hadn’t been there in years. Not since the bar mitzvah. Not since Stanley’s speech.

His nose filled with the typical, slightly musty smell of the place. He knew that warm but kind of old smell from the time he supported Stan when no one else would.

Richie and Y/N sat down on one of the benches and Richie’s gaze wandered through the room. In his mind, he tried to think of how it had looked back in the day. He tried to remember the decorations, how he and his mother were dressed, what Stanley wore.

How he acted. Richie’s mother had felt embarrassed that Richie couldn’t keep his Trashmouth in check for once. But not only how Richie himself acted, admittedly quite tame compared to what his teachers usually heard from him. This was about Stanley.

How he acted up against what was expected from him. How we said that he was and would always be a Loser.

How Stanley reminded Richie of who he was and would always be. That he was alright just the way he was. That he didn’t need to be afraid of who he was.

How Stanley reminded Richie that his friends needed him.

And how much he needed his friends. ‘Because Losers stick together’.

“Thank you for showing up, Stanley.” Richie sniffled in the quietest voice he could muster

And with that, Richie grabbed Y/N’s hand and pulled her outside again, ready to go meet Mike at the library. Ready to stand by his friends. Ready to fuck the bitch up who dared to lay a finger on his little girl and tried to tear them apart. And, lastly, ready to face Eddie. Because Richie really needed Eddie to know how he felt about him.  

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[moon-antics]

I NEED a sequel to the one-shot you did with "I thought I could trust you" "then your trust was misplaced" with Poe x force sensitive!reader. PLEASE, I N E E D I T

redemption ( continuation of betrayal )

authors note : you ask and shall receive. i really liked the idea and setting so i’m glad you enjoyed it as much as i did while writing !

character / ship : poe dameron x reader

summary : even after everything you’ve done, poe still loves you, and he wants to have you back

word count : 2176

warnings : not really following the events of ‘the last jedi’ at all.. oops, and swearing

 “Poe! Hey, oh shit! Hey, what happened to you?”

Finn’s voice only slowly pulled Poe out of his haze, his head and back hurt like crazy. What had happened?

“We need to leave, now! This ship is about to be nothing but space trash!”

A pair of hands hastily pulled Poe to his feet, his eyes adjusted, and he saw a worried Finn standing before him. His friend was right, the ship shook, and the alarm was still blaring through the halls. The smell of smoke rose up his nose, making him pull his shirt up to cover it.

“Then let’s go!”

Poe tried his best to keep up with Finn’s pace, but the dull pain thumping at the back of his head was making it harder.

Soon after, they arrived at the transports and cramped into the one that was still left. Before the blast doors closed, Finn turned to Poe: “Wait, where’s (Y/N)? We can’t leave without her!” “Forget about her..”, Poe spoke through gritted teeth. Finn frowned, but didn’t question it further, not while they’re still in immediate danger.

Finally, the transport took off, without you.

Poe watched the command ship get bombarded by the First Order fleet that you had led here. He couldn’t believe it. You betrayed the Resistance, you betrayed him.

He sat down on the ground, back leaning against the wall by the window. He didn’t want to watch the ship explode.

He couldn’t imagine what Finn would think when he told him, or BB-8. That droid adored you. Wait.. BB-8!

Poe sprung up, looking around in panic to find his little companion. Before he went to search you, he ordered BB to go to the X-Wing and get ready for take-off, but that never happened.

He walked around the small metal box he was stuck in until they landed on a planet, seeing many familiar faces but not the signature white and orange droid. Did he lose him as well?

Desperately, he turned the last corner he yet had to explore and saw him accompanied by Finn and Leia.

“BB-8!!” The pilot rushed to the droid, which beeped happily and rolled to his owner. Poe dropped to his knees, hands holding the rolling droid in place and examining him for any damage. He let out a sigh of relief when he was sure the droid was fine.

BB-8 let out a few happy beeps, Poe cracked into a small smile. “I know buddy, I missed you too.”

He patted the droid’s side before getting up. Going over to Finn, he hugged him, also relieved he was fine. “Thank you for helping me..” “I couldn’t just let you lay there. What happened anyways?”

Finn, Leia and BB-8 mustered him with expecting glances. He didn’t want to tell them; he knew how dearly Leia held onto you like a daughter. She loved you, she had helped you with your training, guided you to understand your place here and in the force. Telling her that you betrayed them and turned to the dark side would break her.

Poe took a deep breath, prepping his hands on his hips. His gaze was aimed at the ground when he started speaking. “I caught someone transmitting our current location to the First Order, that was how they found us.”

BB-8’s surprised beeps were accompanied by Finn’s disbelieve. “What? They betrayed us? Who did it?”

Poe’s eyes drifted to Leia, who was uncharacteristically quiet. Did she know?

“(Y/N)..”, his voice was dripping with venom, that name burned on his tongue.

The room fell silent. Leia shook her head, one hand laying on her forehead. She was in disbelief, so was everyone else. Hell, even Poe himself, who witnessed you do all of this couldn’t fathom you actually doing it. That just wasn’t you, in any way.

Finn walked over to Poe, laying a comforting hand on his arm. “Poe.. are you sure it was her? I mean, maybe Ren was pulling tricks on yo-“ “It was her, I saw her with my own eyes! She did this, for what reason I don’t know.”

His friend nodded as he dropped his hand.

“Poe.”, Leia’s voice made the pilot look at her as she beckoned him over. He stood before her, he could see the disappointment in her eyes, how she tried to stay strong. She had felt the balance in you shifting before, but she didn’t think much of it. You were strong, determined and always had a clear target. Unfortunately, they were the target.

She took his left hand in both of hers, smiling sadly as she spoke. “I know how you felt about her, but the dark side is strong. Saving her won’t be an option, you have to let her go.” “No!”; he yanked his hand away, “It might have been her body that did it, but this isn’t her. She would never do that, and you know it!”

“The temptation of power makes people do many things, Poe. She might be too far gone already..”

--

The first nights on the transports felt like pure hell for Poe. Not just the hard beds made it hard for him sleep, even though his eyes screamed for rest, his thoughts couldn’t stop running around you, around what you did.

But when his mind did decide to shut up, he didn’t fall into the dreamless sleep he badly craved.

He dreamed of you, the real you. The you he fell in love with.

All the mornings he woke up next to you replayed in front of his inner eye. The feeling of his skin against yours felt all too real. He was still truly and utterly in love with you, even after what you did. How could he not be? You were beautiful, perfect in his eyes. When he thought about the future, you were the only consistent aspect in it, it was always you.

Poe woke up as a painful sob ripped through his throat, his hands instantly clasped over his mouth, muffling the sounds that threatened to escape. The realization of everything just settled in now after he saw what was and probably never will be again.

 His throat hurt as the harsh sounds left his body. His feelings pouring out through the tear streaming down his cheeks. His body curled up under the thin duvet. The small room felt so cold, so empty. Like he was all alone, for good.

--

When they finally arrived on Crait, the First Order was already close on their heels. All the few remaining members of the Resistance could do was hide in the abandoned outpost and do what they could to hold them off as far as possible.

But the battle didn’t go well for them.

Everyone watched anxiously when the troops started to draw closer and the Resistance defenses were defeated. “We have to go deeper into the base! There must be another way out of here!”

“Wait..”, Poe held up one hand, making everybody stop in their tracks and look out onto the battlefield. A hooded silhouette emerged from seemingly nothing. The General stepped forward; she knew who it was. Luke, her brother, he came to aid them in their darkest time.

Meanwhile you stood next to Kylo Ren as you both watched him appear. You could feel Kylo’s anger that started to boil his blood.

“Aim all firepower at him!” And so they did.

After a few long seconds of every weapon shooting at the man standing in front of their troops, you could feel that he was still there. So did Ren.

You both looked at each other, thinking the same thing. “We’ll go down and kill him ourselves.”, Kylo said before you both exited the vehicle.

Why Kylo wanted to kill him, you partly understood. But you yourself had no hatred against this man, not even after the foolish stories that Kylo had told you. Leia had also told you about how Luke really was.

The moment he attempted to kill Kylo, that didn’t define Luke Skywalker, not for you. His heroics and way of using the force had always been an inspiration for you, even now while you were with the First Order.

Kylo’s steps reached further than yours, the distance between you two growing bigger with every step he took. He really wanted that man dead at his feet. The sound of his lightsaber igniting scared you every time, it sounded so wrong, so broken. You ignited yours as well, the green blade reflecting off the white salt on the ground. Much to Kylo’s dismissal, you had not managed to achieve a blood red blade just yet.

And you didn’t want to, but he didn’t need to know that.

Being apart from everyone you loved at the Resistance, from your friends and family, you realized that the life you were living right now wasn’t what you wanted. All that was promised to you didn’t come and wouldn’t, no matter how hard you worked for it, you were sure of that. Your love for Poe might be able to blossom but he was the enemy.

Those dismissive thoughts were buried deep down in your mind, preventing Kylo from seeing them and killing you.

You didn’t listen to the conversation between Kylo and Skywalker until the elderly legend looked at you.

“You don’t belong here; we can both feel it.” Your eyes widened at his words, staring at him in disbelieve but also with.. hope. Hope for a second chance, a second chance with Poe.

“You regret it, you’ve realized the madness of his actions, haven’t you?”

You wanted to nod but felt Kylo’s eyes glued to your face. He studied you closely, waiting for your reaction. A mistake was not allowed, you couldn’t slip up now.

“There’s still light in you, I can see it.” “Stop with this nonsense! You have already dealt enough damage!”, Kylo roared as he attacked Luke, who swiftly dodged every of his attacks.

Your lightsaber didn’t move towards him. It dropped to the ground with a dull thud, the salt flying through the air around it. Everything around you seemed to slow down.

This was wrong, the right option is right there in front of you in that base. He was there. How could you have been so blind?

Your legs carried you past the Kylo’s rage and towards the base, you knew he was still there.

And he watched you run to him.

At first, he wasn’t sure if this was real or if he was dreaming, maybe you were coming to them with bad intentions.  In that moment, he didn’t care much. He just wanted to hold you again, even if that would be his last act.

The speed of your heart-beat increased with every step you took. You missed him so much. Would he still love you as well, despite everything?

Poe didn’t notice the others stepping back when you reached them, the First Order closing in behind you as well. They didn’t trust you anymore, how could they?

You both stopped in front of each other. Soft hands slowly wrapped around yours, pulling you closer ever so gently. His beautiful brown eyes were glossed over with wet tears, tears full of hope.

His lips quivered, his voice barely above a whisper as he spoke :

“(Y-Y/N)?”

The hesitant way he asked made your heart clench but hearing your name drip from his lips made your stomach churn with adoration. A nod was all you could offer as an answer, tears of pure happiness were streaming down your cheeks, if you opened your mouth, you were sure a sob would have escaped.

Finally, after days of guilt and sadness ate you up, he engulfed you in a warm, familiar hug. And it made you break down; everything broke out of you. You cried against his chest, mumbling “I’m sorry” “I love you, I’m so sorry..” over and over while Poe ran a hand through your hair.

His soft lips touched your head, his cheek leaning on it soon after. “It’s okay.. I forgive you..”

You pulled away from him slightly and just kissed him. His tears mixed with yours, the kiss didn’t last long due to you two being a crying and smiling mess.

“I missed you so much.. I know I can never undo what I’ve done, I thought it was right, I thought I did it for us..”

Poe planted a gentle kiss onto your forehead, his hands squeezing yours gently. “What matters is that you found your way back..”

You scoffed at his comment, a smile creeping onto your lips as Poe wiped away your tears.

“We need to go..”

You fled with the rest of the Resistance; Poe didn’t let go of your hand for the entire journey. He knew he wouldn’t be able to forget what you had done, but he could look past it. The real you came back to him, like he had always hoped.

There is always hope, no one’s ever really gone.

[brax-was-here]

Scarlet Briar: The Redemption of Ceara Chapter 8

Written by: Braxxus

Chapter 8: She Was One of My Best Students

Sometimes the future leads to the past

     “The hall of records is on sub level D of the college administration sector.” The golem spoke in an electronic voice.

     “Ok, but how do I get there?” Amaranda asked it.

     “Follow descending ramp D to Elevator 3C, then follow descending ramp B-“

     “That doesn’t tell me anything!” she said raising her voice. “You asura have nothing marked here! How in Tyria does one find their way around in this city?” She slapped the information golem on top of its chassis.

     “Alert…repeated assault will result in alerting the authorities.” It barked.

     She closed her eyes and shook her head. “I hate these places.” She sighed. She looked around the immediate area. The Asura were everywhere, running about, showing off their latest inventions to each other, talking of gadgets and theories that Amaranda didn’t have the slightest knowledge about.

     “Will someone please help me?” she asked out loud. “Anyone!?” Her pleas went seemingly ignored by the general populace. Sighing, she started walking through the city, looking for any other Sylvari, human or any other race that might be able to offer some assistance since it seemed the Asura were too preoccupied with anything and everything. It wasn’t long before she found a rampway that descended to the lower level of the city.

     “The golem said descending ramp D…” she said to herself looking around for any kind of markings. There were none. “Well, I guess I’ll take my chances. I’ll either find what I’m looking for or I’ll be be lost in the bowels of this city forever.” she said as she walked down the ramp. The ramp exited out into what looked like a small market area.

     “Oh, thank the pale tree!” she exclaimed as she spied two humans together near one of the stands. “Excuse me! I’d like to talk to you!” she exclaimed as she hurried over to them.

     “Yes?” one asked turning towards her.

     “I hope you can help me. I seem to be lost in this twisted maze of a city.”

     One of the humans chuckled a little. Amaranda’s face went deadpan. “What is so funny?” she asked.

     “It’s easy to get lost here. What are you looking for?” the other asked.

     “I’m trying to find information on one of the students that studied here. I’m told that there is a ‘hall of records’ that would give me such information. Do you know where it might be?” The duo looked at each other momentarily with puzzled looks. They turned back and shrugged a little.

     “I’m sorry, Miss, but we don’t know where that might be.” Amaranda’s glimmer of hope was quickly extinguished. Again, she closed her eyes and let out a sigh, slowly shaking her head. “Did you try one of the information golems?” one of them asked.

     “Indeed, I did. It was of no help either.” she said walking away.

     “I’ll help you” a gruff voice said from nearby. Amaranda turned to see an older Asura walking up to her.

     “I thank you. Can you take me to the hall of records?”

     “Indeed I can. Follow me.” He started walking away from her.

     “Finally.” She sighed and followed behind him.  “Can you tell me your name, kind sir?” she asked.

     “Varvar.” he responded. “and yours?”

     “Amaranda.”

     “And what brought you to Rata Sum?”

     “I’m on a search for information about one of the students that attended the schools here.”

     “Oh?” He asked. “Well, who might this person be?”

     “Well, My sister.”

     He stopped walking, pausing for a moment before slowly turning towards her. “Sister?”

     “Yes, sister-”

     “There’s only been one Sylvari who attended these colleges.” He interrupted, a look of disdain on his face.

     “I know, and…she’s…”

     “She tried to fit a square block into a round hole and it drove her mad. Why are you looking for her information? You should know everything about her already, shouldn’t you?”

     “I need to find her teacher.”

     “Omadd is dead.” He responded.

     “Yes, I know. But she had others. Please help me. It’s very important.”

     He nodded his head and took a deep breath. “Ok, come on.”

     “She wasn’t a bad person before…” Amaranda started. “She just…just…just got lost somewhere…”

     “On her way to the Eternal Alchemy, and ‘lost’ is an understatement, but I’ll take your word for it.” Varvar replied. “But her actions speak for themselves. The things she did. I can guarantee they’ll never be forgotten nor forgiven.” Amaranda fell silent, sadness passing over her as she thought about how Ceara may never have true peace after her traumatic ordeal. It wasn’t long before they approached a teleport tube.

     “Here we are. This will take you down to the proper level.”

     “What is this?”

     “It’s a teleport chute. You haven’t used these before?”

     “I’m sorry, but not in a very long time. I do not spend much time in the cities.”

     “A country bumpkin, are you? Just step in and it will instantly take you to where we want to go.”

     Amaranda thought about the warp gates she had to use recently. “I hate these things.” she said out loud, stepping into the chute. In the blink of an eye she was standing in another part of the city, somewhat unsteady as she looked at her new surroundings. Varvar appeared next to her.

     “See? Not so bad.” He quipped as he started walking. “Come on, this way.”

     “Are we close?” she asked taking in the sites of the area. Glowing holograms floated in the air around various kinds of terminals. Asura working relentlessly on their gadgetry, surrounded by equipment that beeped and chirped constantly in a myriad of tones.

     “We’re getting there.” Varvar replied.

     “I can see why she was fascinated with being here.” Amaranda quipped. “All this…this equipment and technology.”

     “We’re always on the move. Everyone is looking for the next big thing. Trying to be the next big name. I gave up on that a long time ago. Too stressful. Decided to just be me.”

     “I see.”

     “Your sister could have been something great…well…great in a good way, had the council listened to her.”

     “What do you mean?”

     “She studied the Eternal Alchemy in such great capacity, that she was able to ordain information that no Asura had ever determined. She presented her findings to the Arcane Council, and they accused her of blasphemy. They rejected her findings. And yet, now they use her research to their advantage.”

     “They stole her research from her?”

     “Yep. And put their names on it. Those stiffs at the top couldn’t stand the fact that a Sylvari, who they consider to be somewhat primitive in thought, could actually glean more information about the Eternal Alchemy than any Asura.”

     “That explains why she turned to the Inquest.”

     “Possibly, but they didn’t help either. They betrayed her as well, and that got her ejected from the colleges.”

     “I see.” Amaranda fell silent as she thought about her sister. “It seems all your life you were met with tragedy and disappointment. Your search for a better understand of life seemingly always lead you down the wrong path. Ceara…I promise it won’t always be like this. It will be better.” She thought to herself.

     “You’ve become awfully quiet back there.” Varvar grunted.

     “I’m sorry. Just a lot on my mind at the moment.”

     “Mhm. Anyway, one entrance to the hall of records is just up ahead. It might be a little tough to convince them to let us view her records, though. They don’t let just anyone access the record files, but I might be able to persuade them if they are reluctant.” As they approached the entrance, one of the guards stepped forward.

     “Varvar, what are you doing here?” the guard asked.

     “We came for tea and bread. Didn’t you get the invite?” Varvar retorted sarcastically. The guard looked at him, obviously not amused.

     “What do you really want?”

     “We just need to check some records. Why else would we be here?”

     The guard eyed Amaranda momentarily. “Alright.” he finally replied. “Just don’t cause any trouble.” The duo entered the facility. Amaranda looked around at all the Asura technology lining the walls. Varvar approached an Asura wearing large glasses sitting behind a desk. Large screens floated in the air around him.

     “What is it this time, Varvar?” he asked.

     “Nice to see you again too, Krugg.” Varvar retorted. “We need to see the records of a certain student.” Krugg looked up from the desk at Amaranda.

     “A sylvari? If this has something to do with who I think it is, that is off limits. Those records are sealed permanently. Only Councilor Flax can order those files unsealed.”

     “You can’t even give us a peek?”

     “Please, sir. It’s of vital importance. More people will suffer and die if we are not allowed to see that information.” Amaranda interjected.

     “No can do. Now go away. As you can see, I’m extremely busy.” Krugg said sternly, turning back to his screens.

     “Psshh…you won’t even help save the world? Imagine the fame and notoriety you will gain!”

     “What are you talking about?”

     “Imagine the fate of the Tyria hanging in the balance on this very moment.” Varvar said slyly. “But then the world erupts into flames because you refused to allow us to view those records. But if you did…why you could be deemed savior of Tyria!”

     Krugg glanced at Varvar, who was smirking confidently.

     “I think you’re lying.” Krugg retorted. “Now get out of here before I call security.”

     “Oh?” replied Varvar. “How about I make you a deal. You let us see those files, and I won’t reveal your nightly activities.”

     Krugg looked at Varvar, slightly concerned.

     “That party. It’s not wise for college personel, especially members of higher caliber such as yourself., to partake of…what did you call it?  Wing Dings?”

     “I never…” Krugg’s sentence was cut short by Varvar’s finger on his mouth.

     “You let us see those files and no one will ever know.”

     “How did you know!?” Krugg asked exasperatedly, trying to keep his voice down.

     “Eyes and ears on the street, my boy.” Varvar replied smugly, his smirk growing on his face. “Now is our ‘paperwork’ in order?”

     Krugg breathed in deep. “Fine.” He said through gritted teeth. “It seems your ‘paperwork’ IS in order. Follow me.” He said loudly.  Varvar winked at Amaranda and gave her a thumbs up. Krugg lead them to another room with a terminal similar in design but smaller than the one he was using. He started typing on the glowing keyboard.

     “You better be right about this saving the world business, Varvar.” He said agitated.

     “Oh I am. You just wait and see. The fate of the world hangs on this moment.” He turned to Amaranda and winked again. She smiled back lightly and then gasped as an image of a younger Ceara appeared on the screen. She brought her hand up to her chest.

     “Something the matter?” Varvar asked confusingly.

     “I…I didn’t realize how adorable she was with roses in her foliage, that’s all.” Amaranda replied.

     “Yes, adorable. Krugg, we need a list of the teachers that taught her.”

     Krugg typed in a command and text started filling the screen. “Hmm…Stigga seems to be the teacher you want.” Varvar said reading over the information. “He has the most knowledge of what she studied here.”

     “You mean the Eternal Alchemy?” Krugg replied snarkly.

     “No need to get uppity, Krugg. Remember you’re saving the world here.”

     “I thank you.” Amaranda replied. “Where I might find him?”

     “He’s at the College of Synergetics. I’ll take you there.”

     “Oh thank you!” she quipped.

     “Don’t mention it. And Krugg, remember you just saved all of Tyria. Good job!” Varvar said pointing finger guns at the younger Asura.

     “So what are ‘wing-dings’?” Amaranda asked as they left the building.

 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

     Ceara wasted no time travelling through the countryside of the human kingdom of Kryta. She was heading east towards the Shiverpeak Mountains to visit a familiar cave that lay underneath the Durmond Priory in the hopes of finding anything that might help her. A kind farmer had given her a lift part of the way, taking her into the rolling hills of Gendarran Fields. She could see the piled wreckage of the gateway to Lion’s Arch in the distance when she decided to disembark from the farmer’s carriage.

     “Thank you, farmer.” She said quietly, handing him a few coins.

     “Anytime, stranger. I appreciated the company. Be safe out there. Centaurs and bandits are all around.”

     “I will.” She replied as she started walking towards the Lion’s Arch gate. As she approached, she took pause, looking over the refugee camp in the distance. An emptiness filled her chest as she looked down at her hands.

     “I did this…” she said to herself. She pulled the hood of her cloak in close and started walking towards the camp. She could make out an asura gate on the far end. She circled the edge of the camp, keeping her distance, watching the refugees and Lionguard move about. She paused as a child’s laughter caught her ear.

     “In times such as this, there is still joy to be found by innocence.” She closed her eyes and sighed deeply before continuing towards the gate. Looking at the Lionguard members guarding the portal, she quickly thought of a plan to get through. She pulled the scarf up over her mouth, holding it in place, coughing sporadically.

     “Halt.” One of the Lionguard ordered. “Where are you going?”

     “Durmond Priory.” She coughed, holding her hand over her mouth. The Lionguardsman looked concerned.

      “Were you exposed to the gas?”

     “Yes.” She coughed. “But I got out before it got too bad.”

     “Then you should be resting. Not out moving about.”

     “I know, sir. But I need to pass through. I…I have family on the other side.” She coughed.

     The guard paused a moment before sighing. “Ok. Just be careful.”

     “Thank you, sir.” She said quietly as she passed through the gate.  

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     Varvar led Amaranda through the halls of the College of Synergetics. It was almost too overwhelming for her. Asura were everywhere, talking about things she had never heard of, showing off their inventions to their classmates.

     “How in Tyria can you asura tolerate all this…this…this chaos?” she asked Varvar.

     “It’s easy if you just ignore most of it.” He replied. He led her into the administration area of the college. There was an asuran female tending to a console.

     “Yes?” she spoke in a snide tone as the duo approached, barely acknowledging their presence.

     “We’re looking for Professor Stigga. Is he in?” Varvar asked rather cheerfully.

     “Yes, fourth office on the left.” Her voice rather monotone.

     “Thank you!” he replied. They started moving past the console.

     “Wait a minute!” the clerk said raising her voice. They turned to see her tapping at another screen, still staring at her console. “Sign in please.” Varvar quickly typed in their names before continuing on their way.

     “She didn’t even look at us. It’s as if we just ruined her day by coming here.” Amaranda noted.

     “When you’re stuck at a dead-end job as a clerk, it sort of ruins your perspective on life.” He replied. “Ah, here we are. Stigga’s office” Standing in the doorway, they could see an older asura sitting at a desk, various holographic screens floating around him. A small golem hovered nearby. The asura turned to them, looking over his glasses.

     “Can I help you?” he asked in an authoritative voice.

     “Hello, Stigga. How’s it going?” Varvar asked in a jolly tone.

     “What do you want, Varvar?”

     “This Sylvari is looking for information on one of your former students.” Varvar replied. Stigga paused from typing on of the screens for a moment before slowly turning towards them.

     “Is this about who I think it is?” He asked sternly.

     “It’s about Ceara, sir.” Amaranda replied. Stigga took a deep breath.

     “You best not bother about that one. She was very bright, one of my best students, but her ways were very unorthodox.”

     “But sir, we’re trying to find out what happened to her in that machine. What did she see?”

     “We all know what happened to her in that device. It shattered her mind. That’s common knowledge.”

     “Yes, but…her ghost…I’ve seen it. It’s powerful, with some plan to do something terrible. We need to figure out how to stop it. Please sir, can you help us?” Amaranda pleaded. Stigga stared at her for a moment.

     “Very well, follow me. I’m going to introduce you to two of my students who I am sure would be glad to help you.” Stigga lead them to another part of the college nearby. They entered a small lab that was filled with gadgets and paperwork everywhere. Two asura, a male and a female, were working at a workbench in the middle of the room.

     “Front and center, you two.” Stigga ordered. The two asura looked up at him.

     “What did we do now?” the male asked.

       “Just get over here. You’re going out in the field. This sylvari has a ghost problem and you two are going to help her solve it.”

     “YES!!” the female one exclaimed excitedly. “This lab was becoming a bit too stuffy!” They walked over and stood in front of Stigga. Stigga then turned to Amaranda.

     “Shikijo and Joujou will be more than willing to help you in whatever you need.” He said to her. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have matters to attend to.” He left the lab.

     “Well, now that you have the help you need, I’ll be taking my leave as well.” Varvar said.

     “Thank you, Varvar. You have been a great help.” Amaranda said.

     “It was nothing. Good luck in whatever it is you are trying to do.” He said as he walked out of the lab.

     “So, sylvari, what is your name?” asked the female.

     “Amaranda. Nice to meet you.” Amaranda replied.

     “I’m Joujou, and this is Shikijo. So, what kind of ghost problem do you have? Seems unusual for a sylvari to have a ghost problem.”

     “It’s Scarlet Briar. She’s gaining power through the use of chaos energy and has some kind of plan to use it to strengthen the jungle dragon. We need to figure out how to stop her.”

     There was a long silence as the duo looked at Amaranda somewhat dumbfounded. “THE Scarlet Briar? The Terror of Tyria? The same that destroyed Lion’s Arch? Are you sure?”

     “Yes, quite sure.” Amaranda replied.

     “Um…oh, this is…is a lot bigger than we anticipated.” Shikijo said, thoughtfully rubbing his chin.

     “We accept the challenge!” Joujou exclaimed excitedly. “Let’s get this show on the road!” The duo ran through the lab grabbing up equipment.

     “Grab the spectrometer.”

     “Got it, what about the psychoenergetic analyzer.”

     “Yes, we need that. Where is it?”

     “Um…in that box maybe?...What about over there?”

     “Found it. Oh hey. I also found that lost photon reversal thermodongler we’ve been looking for.

     “Well put it someplace where we’ll find it.”

     “That’s what we did last time and we still lost it.”

     When they were finished racing around the lab they approached Amaranda. “So where are we headed!?” asked Shikijo.

     “Um..well, it moves around a lot. It’s been in Lion’s Arch, Kessex Hills, Divinity’s Reach for sure. Other places as well it seems.” Amaranda told them.

     “Hmm…Lion’s Arch is where she supposedly died. Let’s start there.” Joujou said. “So, Amaranda, anything we should know about this ghost?”

     “It’s very hostile. It’s as if….” Amaranda paused.

     “As if?” Shikijo asked.

     “As if…Ceara’s madness gained its own sentience and manifested itself.” Amaranda said quietly.

     “Ah, so it’s not so much a ghost, but a part of that sylvari’s mind.” Joujou said thoughtfully.

     “Uh…yes. I think so.”

     “Ha, this will be a cakewalk.” Joujou replied confidently. “Let’s go bust us a ghost!”

 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

     Ceara exited the asura gate led to the old dwarven ruins that now housed the Durmand Priory. The Priory was a studious institution that collected, researched, and stored magical artifacts and texts in large underground storage chambers to protect them from the dragons, or anything else with malicious intent.  In the mountain side below the Priory was the cave that led to her lair where she stayed while under the control of the jungle dragon. She pulled her cloak in close as the wind in the mountains whipped by her. She was thankful she had built in a small portable heat unit in the power pack to her armor to keep her warm when needed. She paused a moment as she looked over another refugee camp that was set up below the base of the Priory. She closed her eyes for a moment, a tear running down her cheek. She took a deep breath and made her way through the camp cautiously. People hundled together around campfires, wrapped in blankets, eating food from tin cans.

     “I’m sorry…” she whispered to herself. She passed by a post that had a wanted poster of her stuck to it. Various knives and other sharp implements stuck in it. She pulled her cloak closer and made her way to the entrance of the cave. She paused, a flood of memories flashed through her mind. Memories of a time she called this cave her home.

     “This would be so much easier had my teleporter not fried.” She thought entering the cave. “I remember there being a lot of beasties in here. Especially that giant ice worm.” She cautiously made her way down into the cave, which was surprisingly clear. She felt a tad uneasy about it. “Something or someone has been through here.” She murmured to herself as she struck up a small light from one of her satchels. She made it to the edge of the frozen pond that was deep within the cavern. The entrance to her former lair was on the other side. She could hear the ice worms slithering about under the ice.

     “1…2…3!” she darted across the ice. It groaned and cracked under her feet as she ran trying not to lose her footing. The ice exploded behind her as one of the worms crashed through trying to have her as a meal. Mere moments seemed to be an eternity when she finally reached the far side, clamoring as fast as she could up the rocky incline.

     “Well, that was easier than I thought.” She said catching her breath. She was cut short by a noise behind her. She turned to see a figure in the darkness up ahead, holding a torch. It grunted and snarled as it approached her.

     “A troll. I seem to remember they had a dwelling nearby.” She pulled out the pistol she took from her aetherblade assaulter and fired a shot at it. It howled and ran back the way it came. She hurried to the small alcove where the entrance to her lair was located. She paused, noticing the fake holographic wall that hid the entrance was inactive, and the heavy steel door sat opened. Cautionsly, she looked around the entrance before slowly stepping in. The room was dark, activating the switch that powered the few lights did nothing.

     “Thorns…” she whispered. She adjusted the small lamp she held to be as bright as possible. With its light, she was able to make out most of the small cave. Most of her things were gone, with only the rough furniture remaining. All of her notes and drawings, all of her equipment, all missing. Looking up at the ceiling, she saw the red painting of a serpentine dragon that she had painted in her madness. Omadd’s picture still hung in the corner, though the daggers she had stabbed in his eyes were long gone. She slowly raised her hand and lightly dragged her fingers down his face, a mix of anger and sorrow forming in the pit of her stomach.

     “Because of you…I saw it…I saw the Eternal Alchemy…” she remembered that fateful day. Overzealous to finally be able to see the subject of her study. Not knowing what lay in wait for her within it. The face of her creator. She breathed in deeply before she turned to her chair, which still sat in its place, though the console and screen she had were missing as well. She put her hand on the armrest and stared at it before looking over at one of her workbenches. She smiled at the fact that they had even taken the drawing of the rocket propelled dolyak she had wanted to make.

     “I really wanted to make that thing. I could have made it work.” She muttered to herself. “Well…there’s nothing of use to me here.” She sighed as she thought about what transpired in this room months prior. “Just nightmares…and painful memories.”  She walked towards the door, thinking of her next option.

     “It’s a long way to Prosperity.”  

[zecretsanta]

Fic: Glimpses Between the Past and Future

To: @schrodingersorrow​ From: @zeroiv4​

Merry Christmas, @schrodingersorrow​! You asked for Akane and Junpei’s second meeting, so I decided to write a few scenes from their time in D-Com, and what better number than nine? Hope you enjoy!

——————————————————

‘Sorry I’m late!’

With those high pitched words, the entire room turned their attention to the doorway. In it stood a woman. Tall, with long brown hair draped over one shoulder. Her body was almost disguised by the warm, dark blue jumper she wore, that was at least a couple of sizes too big for her. She looked just like she had a year ago.

‘I’m Akane.’ She began making her way around the other 8 participants, making introductions with them. I watched her closely as she did. She was still acting cheerful and bubbly, still a little shy, and still eager to get to know everyone around. Still a liar.

As she made her way around to me, I decided to play it cool. We were living together for nine days; it wouldn’t be difficult to find a more private time to have a conversation.

She held out her hand to me. For a moment, our eyes made contact. Her expression was difficult to read, but she almost looked… scared? Whatever it was, a moment later her face softened back into a calm smile. But her eyes were avoiding mine.

‘Nice to meet you!’ She said. It took me a couple of seconds to respond.

‘Junpei.’ I forced out coldly as I limply took her hand. It was warm.

I reluctantly let go, and she moved on. What the hell had that been about? Why was she acting like she didn’t even know me? It wasn’t there was any point in hiding it from the others. Wouldn’t people realise we were childhood friends just by watching us speak? Unless she was trying to tell me… to stay away.

‘Now that you’ve all met each other, we’ll take you out to the test site, ok?’ The man in charge of the experiment drew me out of my thoughts. ‘And from then, you’ll be on your own.’

He led us out into the hot afternoon and onto a bus, which our things had apparently already been packed into.

When I stepped on, I took a window seat near the back, making sure there was space next to me, and watched the others enter.

Akane sat at the front, next to two of the other participants. Sigma and Phi, as I recalled. I turned away, and leant my head against the window. I stared blankly at the endless sand until we arrived.

——————————————————

The test site was a series of strange, dome shaped structures, half buried in the sands.

As I stood there, under the hot Nevada sun, I felt the urge to laugh. It was just like a year ago; only this time I was stepping into a mysterious building. And, of course, this time I already knew the truth about Akane.

I was really regretting wearing a dark jacket out here. But then again, I barely owned any other clothes anymore. The only few items of my old, colourful wardrobe that still remained were those I had worn during the second Nonary Game. I couldn’t bring myself to throw those away.

‘What’s with that expression, Junpei?’ Carlos asked me. Mira was also staring at me. I realised I’d been getting caught up in my memories.

‘Oh, nothing. Just… psyched to be getting locked up in there.’ I responded semi-sarcastically.

But to tell the truth, I still was a little afraid to go inside. There were nine of us, entering a building in the desert after all. It was hard not to consider the possibility of this being a trap.

But I’d done some background research on the people running this thing, and none of them had any connection to the Crash Keys. And… Akane has already achieved what she wanted to. She wouldn’t force people into another game without a reason. Well, that’s what I thought, but…. did I even know Akane anymore?

And if something did happen, I had to be prepared. There was no way I was going to let her disappear in the confusion again.

I wondered how she felt, stepping into a building like this again. It must bring back some rough memories from ten years ago. You wouldn’t think she’d be willing to go back into an enclosed environment. Assuming this wasn’t a plan of hers, of course. I had to keep that in mind.

When the door was open, I waited for everyone else to enter before I did. I was keen to get out of the heat, but I wanted to see something.

As Akane stood in front of the imposing entrance to the test site, I noticed her hands fiddling with her long hair. Nervously. But a moment later, she took a single deep breath, and calmly strode inside.

——————————————————

When we’d all had time to settle into our rooms and look around the site, we ate. As one of the last to arrive, I found that only one table, with the couple on, had a seat left. Q was with Diana, the nurse who’d mostly taken charge of looking after him, and Carlos. Akane was sat with Sigma and Phi.

Eric tried to make small talk with me over our meal, but my mind was elsewhere. It wasn’t like I ignored him, but I kept my answers as short as possible. I couldn’t find the energy to elaborate. And all through the meal, I kept glancing across the room at the others.

I noticed his girlfriend wasn’t much for conversation either. And even when she did speak, her face remained just as cold and unchanging as it had been before. There was something weird about her. Although, who was I to talk?

Akane, Sigma and Phi were talking in hushed tones. It was impossible to make out what they were saying. While Sigma seemed to be getting more and more frustrated by the second, she maintained a calm outward appearance. Just what was going on with those people?

Frustrated, I turned my attention back to my own table, now sitting in slightly awkward silence.

‘So, why’d you two come to D-Com?’ I asked.

‘I signed up because Mira said she was going to.’ Eric replied first. ‘I wanted to do it together.’

So he signed himself up to be experimented on just because she did? Geez.

I looked at Mira quizzically. For a couple of seconds, she just stared back at me.

‘So why did you come?’ I finally asked.

‘Oh, well… I have to admit, the payment is helpful, but it was mostly curiosity. I wanted to see what would happen here.’ She answered quickly, but relatively bluntly.

‘What about you, Junpei?’

‘Oh, I… have kind of the same reason.’

‘You’re curious?’

‘Yeah, I guess. Y’know… it just seemed interesting.’

Of course, that wasn’t the truth. My real reason for coming here was more similar to Eric’s. Hopelessly following a woman into whatever situation she entered.

Of course, his situation was different. Mira and Eric were together. Just normal people in a relationship. No lies, no running away, no kidnappings and murders.

But no matter what she’d done, I had to be here. Partially to confront her about it, but also because I’d made a promise. Whatever was going on here, I would save Akane Kurashiki.

And just as I was thinking that, Sigma stood up from his table. He began to propose a toast; the usual boring stuff, hoping we could all get along and the experiment would be successful but then:

‘And… I also want to ask everyone to stay vigilant over these few days. Even if this is just an experiment, there’s still danger. And if we do let something bad happen, it could destroy humanity. All 6 billion humans could die out if we make a mistake here.’

Uh… what?

The rest of us all looked similarly confused. Then, after a moment of stunned silence, Phi tugged Sigma back into his seat and began to admonish him in a hissing whisper. I couldn’t make out any words, but she certainly wasn’t happy.

Shortly afterwards, they got up and left. The rest of us were still staring awkwardly at him. And a moment later, it was Akane who got stood up to apologise for him.

‘I think Sigma just has a weird sense of humour.’ She explained. ‘Phi’s telling him to try to tone it down.’

Nobody seemed to completely buy that explanation, but I was particularly sure he wasn’t just joking. Not that I believed him, exactly. But there definitely was something suspicious going on here.

‘Anyway, I think I’m going to go to bed as well. But it was really nice to meet you all!’

She left; her demeanour just as cheerful, and just as fake, as ever.

——————————————————

I didn’t get much sleep that night.

We’d all gradually gone back to our rooms last night, after sharing a quick muttered discussion and collectively deciding that Sigma was just being weird. Nothing that happened in here could directly affect that many people.

But still; it was becoming more and more clear to me that something was up. And I was pretty sure that something had to do with Akane.

But what could she be after? She’d already done what she wanted back in Building Q. Akane was alive now. And she wouldn’t endanger people like that again without a reason. I believed that.

But if Akane wasn’t the perpetrator… was she about to become a victim? If someone else was going to do something during this experiment, had she really just been caught up in it? Maybe she’d come here knowing something would happen. Trying to stop it. If she was instrumental to something about to happen, that might help explain why it was so important to save her-

I always did this. One day I was angry and resentful, the next I was trying to justify the Nonary Game. One minute Akane was the mysterious kidnapper who’d forced nine people into a deadly game, the next she was an innocent, quirky girl, heroically saving the life of a powerless child.

After all the horrible people I’d met over the past year, the powerful faith I’d held had been eroded. But whenever I thought about her… I knew she was different. I’d met charismatic criminals, of course, who’d put on an innocent front. But none of them could truly convince me. Akane could. Deep down, she was the girl I’d met at Building Q; the same girl I’d known in my childhood. I just knew that.

I was awake for hours more.

——————————————————

Sigma didn’t appear at breakfast the next day. Maybe he was worried how people would act around him now. But hey, it was his own fault anyway.

I decided to make use of the opportunity to sit with Akane and Phi. They both looked surprised as I sat down, probably expecting to see Sigma there instead.

‘Sigma still in his room?’ After a moment of silence I addressed the elephant in the room.

‘Yeah.’ Phi casually responded. ‘He’ll give in and come join us again soon. He’s just stubborn.’

Akane sighed, slightly.

‘What’s the deal with him and you guys anyway?’ I continued. ‘I mean, I know you and Sigma said you were friends, but what about you, Akane? You two secretly dating or something?’

‘What?’ Akane was flustered. ‘I wouldn’t- …no. We only really met here, but… it turns out we went to the same high school, so I’m sort of familiar with him. But we’re definitely not dating. I think Phi would be more likely to do that…’

As Akane added that final comment with a playful smile, the other girl scowled.

‘Not likely.’ She muttered.

‘What, are you three in some kind of love triangle? Sigma too into the aloof Phi to pay attention to you?’

‘Junpei.’ Akane pleaded me with her eyes. ‘I was only joking about Phi. And anyway, I wouldn’t want to date someone unless I planed on marrying them. And… I couldn’t see Sigma being that person. I don’t even know him well.’

Looking at her, I almost felt bad for poking fun of her. But… she must be hiding something about her relationship. Everything she was saying was just an act. She sure had been happy to flirt with me for nine hours before disappearing for an entire year. Even after I’d saved her life, and… how connected we’d felt during the game. But apparently I wasn’t good enough after all.

‘How did you end up here anyway, Junpei?’ Phi asked, clearly in an attempt to break the tension that had suddenly developed in the air. ‘You don’t seem like someone who’d be interested in a scientific study.

‘Does anyone here?’ I responded with a question of my own. ‘I was just curious. I saw an ad, and I signed up.’

Although I made it sound like something I’d done on a whim, getting into D-Com hadn’t been easy. I’d tried recruiting a certain mutual friend of my boss and I to hack their systems, but apparently it was pretty secure, I guessed. She’d kind of just spouted tech babble at me. I’d had to embarrass myself by asking one of her daughters for a translation on my way out.

I wasn’t proud of the method I’d used to actually get in here. The “intimidation” I’d had to use on one of the scientists was pretty bad. Still, it wasn’t like the dirt I’d found on him was false. And I’d been willing to do it for my goal; to see Akane again.

I felt like I was going in a circle. I wanted to see Akane, but I didn’t know what to say to her, and I didn’t trust her, so I didn’t confront her, so I started to believe her again, so I wanted to speak to her, but I didn’t know what to-

Suddenly, lost in my thoughts, I made eye contact with her. And I could tell she knew I was lying about why I came here. She looked… not sad, but regretful. Like she was mourning.

A sudden burst of irritation washed over me. I stood up and walked away.

——————————————————

Days at D-Com were boring. We had a few simulated tasks, like equipment repairs, to work on, but mostly we were just left to kill time.

It wasn’t too bad; there was a gym, a rec room, a shelf of books in one of the storage rooms. But none of it really interested me.

I spent a lot of time in my room. It was nice enough. Definitely better than a lot of the places I’d slept in before. I guess I probably should have been with the others. The point of the experiment was for us to interact, after all.

But I’d become used to being alone. After dropping out of college and becoming a detective, I hadn’t seen any of my old friends again. And it wasn’t like my job gave me many chances to socialise.

I remembered the last time I’d been like that. At the end of elementary school. Over that summer, Akane moved away. When I joined middle school, I found that everyone had already established groups of friends, back when I’d been spending all my time on one person.

Of course, things were a lot easier with children. But the real difference was that back then, I’d tried. I’d been enthusiastic to integrate myself into a group of friends. But I wasn’t really interested in other people anymore. It was just so tiring.

But on most days, I eventually got bored of sitting around waiting for time to pass. I would wander through the facility, almost automatically keeping track of what everyone was doing.

It was a few days into the experiment. Sigma was working out in the gym. Since our third day here, he’d rejoined the group, with agreeing to just let him be. We’d discussed locking him up that first night, but decided against it. Nobody brought up his weird speech; it would probably just upset him.

Carlos and Eric were playing pool in the rec room, with Mira watching from the room’s bar. Carlos has been getting along pretty well with everyone here. He was an alright guy, though definitely naïve. On the other hand, the couple spent most of their time with each other. Not that anybody seemed to miss their company much.

Phi was talking to Diana back in the dining hall. Q’s chair was next to them. The two girls had been spending a lot of time together over the past few days. Although I had noticed that Sigma avoided speaking to Diana much.

Finally, I ended up in the greenhouse, where I saw… her.

Akane was watering the plants, one of the regular duties we had to take care of in the test site. She’d really taken to it. Guess gardening was a hit with the ladies even when it was food more than flowers. Diana had liked it a lot too, hadn’t she?

Making an effort to seem casual, I walked in and picked up a bag of fertiliser. As I did, Akane turned and noticed me. Her momentary surprise quickly faded as she spoke.

‘I already did that. But thank you, Junpei.’ Her reply was nice enough, but there was a robotic undertone to it, like she was forcing it.

‘Weren’t you supposed to have a partner here anyway?’ As I recalled, her and Sigma had agreed to do the gardening sometime today.

‘I don’t mind doing it all. It’s relaxing here.’

‘He knew you wouldn’t snitch if he wanted to bunk off, huh?’ Watching her taking care of the plants brought back an old memory. And although I tried to suppress it, the hurt was clear in my voice.

‘Junpei, what do you-?’ She sounded concerned. But… her words were still just as forced.

‘Oh yeah, sorry. You wouldn’t know what I’m talking about.’ I quickly shot back. I couldn’t bear to listen to her any longer. Just listening to her say my name was enough to show just how much of a charade it all was.

‘You could at least stop pretending when we’re alone. I’ve let you get away with it in front of the others, haven’t I? Are you just trying to tell me to get lost? Or do you have some plan?’ When she didn’t respond, I added. ‘If you want to knock me out, a good hit with that can might do the trick.’

When I said that, her demeanour completely changed. She opened her mouth for a moment before breaking eye contact with me and staring at the ground.

She took a shaky breath, before looking up again, still avoiding my eyes. I could see that hers were beginning to brim with tears.

��I… I’m sorry… Junpei.’

Suddenly, she darted past me and fled the greenhouse. A moment too late, I made a movement to stop her. It was futile.

——————————————————

Our eighth day at D-Com. I was having a drink in the rec room.

I’d built up quite a bit of tolerance over the past year. Which was a shame, because I really would’ve loved to just get hammered.

Sigma was with me. He’d tried to get me to play a game of pool with him, but I’d declined. Just didn’t have the energy.

We drank in silence for the most part, with the occasional bit of small talk thrown out by him. Credit to him for trying, but I really wasn’t in the mood for a conversation.

After a while, we were interrupted. It was Akane. She entered the room, but completely ignored my presence.

‘Sigma, can I talk to you and Phi later?’

‘Oh, yeah, sure.’

She nodded at him before quickly making her exit. A couple of seconds later, a laugh erupted from beside me.

‘What the hell?’ I turned to Sigma.

‘Sorry, Tenmyouji. You just had such an big scowl. It wouldn’t hurt to lighten up, you know?’

I turned back to my drink.

‘Why are you and Akane acting so weird anyway?’ Apparently he was going to continue. ‘I thought you two were old friends.’

‘Huh?’ How did Sigma know anything about the two of us.

‘Oh, Akane mentioned it one time. But you two aren’t being very subtle about avoiding each other anyway. So tell me; what happened to you guys?’

‘You’re really not gonna quit, huh?’ I replied. ‘Look, there’s nothing to tell you. We haven’t seen each other since we were kids. She’s a different person now. And not one I want to get to know.’

‘Haven’t you too though? I mean, you’re not exactly acting normal, are you?’

‘Excuse me? We don’t know each other, man. How do you know if I’ve changed or not. And hey, you’re one to talk about acting weird with all your “apocalypse” nonsense. You’re just lucky we decided not to lock you in the confinement room.’

That seemed to silence him for a moment. He looked just as serious as he always did when saying his “fate of humanity” crap. There was seriously something wrong with the guy.

‘If you want to find out the problem, go talk to Akane. Maybe she’ll tell you what she’s really doing here.’

I stood up, leaving my now empty bottle behind.

‘I have spoken to her. She sounded like she was worried about you, Tenmyouji.’

With one foot out the door, I scoffed back.

‘Yeah, you’d think so.’

——————————————————

Our ninth day at D-Com was when our isolation started. Since there was a lunar eclipse happening, we would be left without any communications from the researchers for a couple of days, to simulate transmissions being blocked.

Not like they’d been much help anyway. Apparently they hadn’t even noticed whatever was clearly wrong with Sigma.

Still, everyone did have the sense that it would be a different atmosphere. But I guess some of them wanted to celebrate it. Get off to a positive start, or whatever.

So, after eating that evening, we’d gathered in the rec room. Well, Q had been left in his room; it wasn’t like he could drink or celebrate anyway. But as the rest of the group drunk and talked, everyone was in a good mood. Sigma’s whole “fate of mankind” speech, which he made yet again for some reason, even got some laughs out of Diana and Phi.

The light hearted atmosphere didn’t spread to me, however. While none of the others were exactly close to each other, I couldn’t even call myself an acquaintance to most of them.

And… I still didn’t feel comfortable here. Though nothing had happened for all the time we’d been here, my suspicion hadn’t ceased. But at the same time, I didn’t know who to be suspicious of. The scientists hadn’t done anything yet despite having us locked up, Sigma was too blatantly strange, and Akane…

Well, she just didn’t seem like she would do something. She’d looked so sincerely hurt when I’d last spoken to her. But, honestly, I wouldn’t know what she was really feeling. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d trusted her too much.

But still, I…

‘Junpei, you alright?’ My thoughts were interrupted by Carlos.

‘Uh, yeah. Why?’

‘You were staring off into the distance. I just wanted to make sure nothing was wrong.’

‘Nope. All good here. Thanks for looking out, Mr. Hero.’

‘Huh?’

‘Never mind.’ I probably should have seen it coming that he couldn’t take a joke. And it wasn’t like I really wanted to make fun of him anyway.

‘Well, anyway,’ He continued,slightly awkwardly. ‘We were all starting to make toasts while you were zoned out, if you want to join in.’

‘I think I’m good. I mean, what is there to say past “working together” and “good luck”, or whatever?’

‘Oh! Speaking of luck…’

To my surprise, Akane followed on from my speech. Despite the fact that she’d been avoiding me for days, well, and basically the whole time we’d been here.

‘Do you know the meaning of four leaved clovers?’

‘No.’ I responded after a moment of hesitation. It wasn’t true, but… I didn’t want to be forced to sit here explaining all that nonsense.

She looked around the room, but the others didn’t seem to know either. So apparently she took it upon herself to explain it.

‘Well, the story goes that the four leaves are supposed to represent faith, hope, love-‘

I suddenly stood up.

‘You know what, I think I have heard this one before. And I’m pretty tired anyway, so I’m just gonna go.’

‘Oh, uh…’

I ignored Akane’s feeble attempt to protest and got myself out the door as fast as I could. I made a beeline for my room.

Once inside, I didn’t even bother to take my clothes off before flopping onto my bed and closing my eyes.

I lay there for a long time, thinking. After a while, I heard the others going back to their rooms, but after that it was silent.

I kind of regretted storming out of the rec room just now, but I couldn’t bear listening to her… and thinking about clovers. It was so hypocritical. That was the exact story we’d had to use to survive the game she put us through, and here she was trying to use it on these other people.

But that wasn’t true. I knew it, but… I could never admit it. I mean, she’d been trapped in a Nonary Game long before I had. And her game… was necessary. If I’d known what it was for, I would’ve joined it willingly. I could understand Akane. There was no reason for me to hate her, or distrust her. I just told myself that I did, because… it was easier.

The truth I’d hidden from myself was that I was scared. When I realised what she’d done last year, I’d been shocked at first, but after that I’d just wanted to speak to her. So I could understand what had happened to her… and then I could forgive her.

But when she disappeared with her brother… I didn’t know what to think. I still wanted to find her. But as I searched, my desire to confront her and my desire to forgive her both kept growing, and fighting each other.

When I finally saw her again, my emotions were too strong for me to know what to say to her. And now I’d ended up here, too lost and afraid of my feelings to even be in the same room as her.

I was sick of this. Sick of going back and forth, of not reaching out, of not lashing out, of letting this chance pass by.

I had to make a decision. And deep down, I knew what I wanted. Akane Kurashiki had done bad things, things I couldn’t let go. But despite everything she’d done, I… I loved her.

I rolled over onto my side, and opened my eyes. I reached into the drawer of my bedside table, and took out a ring. It was simple, small and silver, but I’d kept it so polished that I could see reflections of the room in its surface.

That was when I noticed it. I whipped my head around and confirmed it. A cloud of thick grey smoke, sneaking in around the edges of the door.

Gas. The same type that had been used on me a year ago. It couldn’t be…? No. It wasn’t her. It had to be somebody else. But that meant she-

I ran to the door in panicked desperation. As I began to inhale the gas, I became certain that it was soporil. Was Cradle Pharmaceutical involved in this? But there was no time to think about that. I had to stop this.

As I burst out of my room, I glanced around, looking for a trace of where the gas was coming from. But the world was becoming clouded… and so was my brain. What little consciousness I had left was filled with fear. Why… why was this happening again?

Suddenly, a shape leapt at me from the smoke. A dark silhouette. I tried to summon my remaining strength, to fight them off, or at least get a glimpse at their face.

But as it got closer, what appeared wasn’t a gas mask.

Akane Kurashiki stumbled vaguely towards me. As she came near, her body gave in, and she fell straight into me. I was too weak to resist the force; we both toppled to the ground.

The sharp exhale brought on by the impact forced me to take a deep breath. I forced my eyelids open.

Akane’s face was just above mine. Hadn’t this… happened before? When I’d been… so happy to see her… and we were both victims… again…

Maybe it was just the smoke, but… her eyes… seemed to move. And I thought… I heard her… fading voice… unconsciously let out a word.

‘J-jumpy…’

She didn’t say… anything more. But… that was enough. As my own… mind went black… I reaffirmed a vow… I’d once made.

Whatever… is about to happen…

I will…

I will save Akane Kurashiki.

[shinneth]

What was ‘that scene’ for Gem Ascension?

You sure you don’t know this one already? :P

Okay, really it was a little earlier than this point. Also, GA spoilers for anyone who’s still not read this giant-ass series but still might one day.

I’m sure I mentioned this a few times before, but this is something I’ll gladly talk about as many times as anyone asks. :D 

So! Depending on which version you read, that scene for GA is the climax of Act II (vanilla Gem Ascension)/the climax of Act I, Chapter 8 (Gem re:Ascension). 

Namely, the part where Peridot very nearly succeeds to pull off a “fuck you, destiny!”, only for her clumsiness (largely absent for this entire mission up till this point) to fuck her over at the worst possible time, which leads to Peridot getting separated from the Crystal Gems and abandoned on Homeworld, where White Diamond apprehends her shortly after and we don’t hear from her for a while. 

Gem Ascension, besides being inspired by other great Stevidot works, first came to life in a dream I had one night. Change Your Mind hadn’t aired yet, so my imagination cooked up a bit of the above scene as a possible “what might the finale bring us/what I want the finale to bring me”, only with a lot less context and detailing.

Basically, I just dreamed up the Crystal Gems in an escape sequence where they had rescued Steven and Connie and the OG-CGs, and they were all fleeing down a tunnel (I was imagining a super-elaborate airline-like tunnel); White Diamond was giving chase some great distance away, but she’d catch up soon. 

Peridot was bringing up the rear, and just as she was about to reach the jump-off point/safe zone, she tripped and fell super-hard. Poor Steven saw the whole thing, but he (nor anyone else) had the time/opportunity to help her out, so she ended up getting forcibly separated from the CGs. Peridot, knowing she’s well and truly fucked, just smiles at her friends and tries to shrug off her fate to make sure they all escape rather than be dumbasses trying to save a lost cause. 

Next thing Peri sees is White Diamond’s face in a Slenderman-style static-filled close-up before everything fades to black. 

...

Yeah, that alone is what drove me to write Gem Ascension. Well, beyond wanting to contribute for Stevidot and all that, this dream just kept persisting in my head while gradually becoming more coherent and detailed and I decided to just bite the damn bullet and write a whole story around it.

You might (not) be shocked to learn that in order to get to that scene I dreamed up, I’d have to write over 70,000 words of set-up.

Mind you, the entire GA trilogy is collectively around 190,000 words.

Yep! A solid 70k later, I finally got to write the scene I dreamed about: the one that actually started it all. And thanks to said set-up, the scenario was much more dramatic and fleshed out compared to the original dream version. With the 70k setup, I structured this around Peridot stepping up to become a legit leader figure and learning what that truly meant. I added the element of Peridot’s misfortune being the result of a very stubborn future foreseen by Sapphire: one that technically had many varying outcomes, but the only variation was in which singular Crystal Gem got left behind. The cause was never determined, but apparently fate was hellbent on making sure someone didn’t finish the mission.

Peri nominated herself, as this was her rescue mission she was heading, and she couldn’t tolerate letting anyone getting left behind on Homeworld. She’d only compromise with her own life, but being her stubborn and logical-minded self, Peri also refused to give in to fate and vowed to fight it as best she could. 

And she came close. Damn close. 

Got to add some cool stuff like the cruelest Hope Spot I ever created, shattering Peridot’s visor to reveal her heterochromia (something that became its own major plot point in later acts), circumstances not allowing Peridot to properly speak to Steven or Garnet (the only two witnesses to the in-story version of the scene) and only communicate her farewells with gestures (including the forced smiling, as well as laughing), and... the pose in her pic here? This is after she manages to get Steven and Garnet to leave without her, but their ship ends up unable to escape and White Diamond’s almost right on top of them.

Peridot, fighting a goddamned concussion, uses the last of her strength to free the CGs’ ship using her metal powers. 

So yeah. The definitive that scene of GA will always be Peridot’s botched escape/heroic sacrifice. 

And it’s since become my measuring stick for my effectiveness as an author. If I don’t make you feel like utter dog shit after reading it, then I’ll consider myself a failure. Because I put my heart and soul into making that entire climax hurt like a bitch. Just like it first hurt me to dream about it. :D

[the-silly-hippy]

Can you afford being healthy?

So let’s say my goal is to have optimal health, both physical and mental, what should I do? Off the top of my head I’m thinking gym, organic food, green smoothies, psychotherapy, social life, maybe supplements. All of which sound very expensive compared to staying at home watching TV and eating corndogs. So for a long time, I thought I couldn’t afford taking care of my health. But then I had to, so I got creative.

Health is an investment

The first thing to keep in mind is that taking care of your health now will save you money (and trouble) in the future. Being sick is expensive: medication, hospital bills, missing work, etc. I try to remember that every time time I want to go for McDonalds instead of.. anything else really.. to save a buck.

Time to hang out with friends

Taking care of your mental health also means having a social life and leisure. What do you need for that? Time. Why don’t you have enough time? Mostly because of work. Why do you have to work so much? Because life is so fucking expensive. So my logic is: if I need less things, and if I spend less on things I have to buy, that means more time for me. I’ll summarize this in two words: thrift stores and simplicity.

First, go for simplicity

Try to buy less stuff and when you want to buy, ask yourself if you really need it, that’s basic. To avoid feeling in a place of scarcity and lack, think of something you really do want, and make it your goal, your reward. So instead of thinking “I shouldn’t buy this, I don’t absolutely need it. That sucks, I can’t have anything nice

” You could shift that to: “If I don’t buy this dress that I probably wouldn’t wear much, it means I’m $45 closer my trip to Bali :D”. Consistently doing this keep you exited about your goal because, how often do we want to buy things we don’t really need? That’s right, you’ll have your reward in mind very often.

Simplicity in your products

I think that a good first step to take towards health is eliminate toxicity. To do that, what often makes sense is to simplify: go for foods that have the less ingredients, or that are totally unprocessed. Same goes for cosmetics. Look for products that only contain a few ingredients that you can recognize, or if you’re so inclined, you can even make them yourself, thus, saving more money. So, weather it goes on your body or in your body, a healthy and cost effective solution is to buy ingredients in bulk and start cooking.

Save on food and reduce food waste with apps

Get this: you install an app on your phone (Flashfood is one but I’m sure there are a couple others), and it shows you products that are close to expiration date that groceries near you are selling at a discounted price. I can’t stand seeing food go to waste, and my cheap ass just loves save 50%, so this concept really is pure gold for me. These apps allow me to have access to meat that I couldn’t normally afford, which allows me to pursue my quest for the best diet for my body (I used to be a vegan, I’m now on an API diet, what’s next?!). You can find vegetables, bakery, seafood, anything. I’d say I buy 80% of my groceries through these apps now. Buying in bulk and cooking? Well that is possible with the apps. Having a truck load of bell peppers will sure spark your creativity, as you have to use them before they go bad.

Freeze food

That brings us to the freezer. If you can get a second-hand freezer (I suppose some models consume less electricity, you might want to look for these), that might be the best investment you make this year. Because if you’re half as obsessed as I am about health and simplicity, there’s just not enough room in your standard freezer for all that healthy food you’ll buy at a 50% discount. See where this is going? Buy basic ingredients in bulk, cook huge batches, freeze portions. You saved time and money and you get to eat as healthy as you want to.

DIY your skin and hair products

You’re lucky there is a big trend on DIY products right now, so recipes are easy to find for pretty much everything you want to make. There are some ingredients that have multiple uses, like castille soap or baking soda for instance, so these are a good choice for a starter kit. I tried making solid shampoo and I must say it’s very satisfying to successfully wash your hair with a shampoo you made with your own two hands! And to know you’re not sending chemicals in the water, and in your scalp. And not buying another plastic bottle. And throwing it away when empty. The shampoo bar cost approximately $7 and will last for.. I dunno like ten million showers. I also make my own face serum with two ingredients: jojoba oil and tea tree. Speaking of oil (sweet almond in this case), it’s the best and cheapest makeup remover, period. I used to buy very expensive natural face care products but I was frustrated that there was no visible improvement of my skin. I wanted to test them on half my face for a couple months to demonstrate how ineffective they actually were but I never had the required discipline. If you don’t see noticeable improvement in your face after using a product for a while, stop buying that shit and just rub your face with oil. Because the one you’re buying probably contains mostly oil anyway and the rest of the fancy ingredients are probably in traces amount and completely useless. And don’t even get me started on the non-natural products. Ew.

Get rid of plastic

They say (the same “they” I always talk about when I don’t have sources) that if you store food in plastic containers of drink out of plastic bottles, plastic gets in your body and can cause health problems, hormone imbalance and whatnot. A good alternative are glass containers. The tupperware style with lids can be pricey if you buy them new, so the strategy here is: no stress, buy just a couple at a time when you find them at the salvation army and gradually eliminate the plastic ones. When I say eliminate I mean re-purpose or give to good will. As good hippies, let’s try to produce less waste! There’s also the very trendy mason jar, so practical to store food and – Pinterest shows us every day – anything you can think of.

Drink the best possible water

I’ve heard that tap water contains traces of birth control pills, antidepressants, antibiotics, etc. I don’t have the expertise to know if it’s true but it did scare me. I’m the kind of hippie that will avoid taking a small innocent ibuprofen if I can. I don’t want drugs in my body, unless it’s going to be fun and psychedelic. I certainly have a lack of scientific evidence about traces of drugs in the city’s water supply but my nose and taste buds tell me that chlorine isn’t something I should drink. There’s also fluoride in the water, that is arguably bad for you. These are the reasons I decided to stop drinking tap water. What are the alternatives? I had a Brita but it doesn’t eliminate much of the bad stuff. Plus, it’s made of plastic. The high quality water filters are just ridiculously expensive so my only option was to buy bottled water. Not small bottles, the big ones that are reused when you bring them back to the store. It felt weird to buy water when there’s plenty in the tap but, my god, does it taste better. And I’ve read it hydrates you better too. Hydration is a key component of health, that’s for sure, so if you can’t afford to buy water, still, drink a liter a day, you’ll be healthier than if you let yourself dry like a raisin. I hesitated to make that water bottle move for a bit because I thought I needed to buy a water dispenser, but it turns out I don’t need it at all. I just leave the bottle on the counter and I got used really quickly to flip that giant heavy thing. Now I can pour myself a shot glass of water without spilling a drop. No need to buy a machine. Also, it’s best to drink it at room temperature, and it’s empty within a week of two so I figure it doesn’t have time to grow bacteria, or algae or whatever happens to water when you let it sit.

Sleeping is free

We underestimate the role that sleep has to play in our health so we often neglect it, but a good sleep hygiene can make a huge difference in your energy level, I’ve experienced it. I was always tired, couldn’t get through the day without a nap, couldn’t concentrate, I was unable to get up in the morning. Then a doctor prescribed that I take melatonin every night at 6 pm for two weeks, go to bed at 10, wake up at 7 and blast a light therapy lamp in my face for half an hour every morning. I did that and guess what? It. Worked. I didn’t follow the exact hours he prescribed and I’m not sure the melatonin had a good effect on me so I only took it for a couple days. So I think what does the trick is consistently waking up at the same time each morning, regardless of what time you go to bed. Occasionally I get only four hours of sleep and usually the next day I’d be unable to function. Now that I wake up at regular hours, I can go through the day and have so much energy that I even forget I got only 4 hours of sleep. A phrase he said about staying in bed later to catch up on you sleep stuck with me: it’s too hard for the system. It had not occurred to me that it could be difficult for the body to change its sleep schedule. I thought “as long as I get 8 hours I’m fine” or even “the more sleep the better, I’ll sleep 12 hours today”. So if you happen to have sleep problems, irregular sleep pattern or fatigue, set an alarm and get some light in the morning, see what happens. Hopefully your body will adjust to the schedule and you won’t need the alarm after a week, and your mornings will be less painful. Another thing I didn’t take seriously was avoiding blue light in the evening. But it turns out it’s serious, it really does mess with your natural sleep hormones. So I installed f.lux on all my screens. It’s an app that will cut the blue light out of your screen according to the time of day. My screen is yellow right now because I’m too silly to go to bed at a normal time, I prefer to write a blog post. I used to binge watch TV on my computer very late in the night and not feel tired. I realized after installing the app that it was the blue light that was keeping me up. Now I watch an episode and start to yawn, so that’s a good thing, less TV.

Meditation is free

According to every damn article I read or podcast I listen to, meditation is one of the healthiest thing you can do. Good news: all you have to do is sit there and breathe. Now that, you can afford. No time? A minute a day is still better than nothing. If you need a little help to begin, there are tons of free apps you can install. I use Breathe and Calm, which also has some nice sleep stories.

Functional training

Exercising at home requires more discipline, at least in my experience, but if you can pull it off, it means more money in your pocket. You don’t necessarily need those machines to have an effective workout. The weight of your body will do. Remember those good old push ups? Yep. YouTube will help you find some exercises ideas for what part of your body you want to work out. Weights can be found easily at thrift stores. Elastic bands offer multiple possibilities and are not too expensive. Cardio is important too so if running outside isn’t an option, because breathing smog will annihilate any benefits of working out, for instance, maybe look for a stationary bike in the ads.

You can still party

Even if you’ve decided that for health reasons, alcohol, sugar and carbs are to avoid, you can still allow yourself to have them every once in a while. Just don’t binge, and limit the damage. For example, I drink on rare but meaningful occasions and I choose low sugar and gluten free drinks like vodka-soda or gin-soda. That’s the protecting my health part, now for the protecting my wallet. Go to the liquor store and find the best value alcohol. Not the will-make-you-go-blind kind of alcohol, because that’s not healthy. Usually a big-ass bottle of average quality vodka will be a good price to quantity ratio, and will give you an occasion to let go of what the cashier thinks of you as a person. Vodka is pretty much tasteless so that leaves you more drinks possibilities. (plus, you can DIY perfume using vodka: avoiding chemicals on your skin and saving $200, yay)! Sugar in food now. It’s always best to choose natural sugars like honey, instead or refined sugar, or use stevia. Man, stevia is the best: it tastes like sugar, but it’s not. It’ll make your food taste sweet and do zero damage. Buy in a giant bottle to save money. Hell, you could even grow your own stevia plant! Let’s go crazy! You can also pour a drop in your vodka. Now that’s starting to look like a party to me! The use of the word honey and saving money just made me think of a fine browser extension you can use for online shopping. It’s called Honey and it can notify you when a product you watch goes on sale. It can also find and apply coupon codes for you. Here’s the only referral link in this article: my link to Honey. So, where were we. Sugar. When I stopped eating sugar, I bought dark unsweetened chocolat in bulk, thinking it would taste like dark 70% chocolate. Oh, was I wrong. It tastes bitter. That’s the only thing you’ll taste in sugar free dark chocolate. But it’s cheap to buy in bulk and I can control what goes into it, so from time to time I like to melt some in a pan, add stevia and eat that with bananas.

Let’s talk! What are your secrets to stay healthy and how do you afford it?

[70swonderpoisonstark]

Wait, you survived?

// You and Steve survive the plane wreck and end up seventy years in the future. Everything’s different and the only person that understands the confusion and pain of losing your entire world is your now dead husband’s best friend. When the two of you are forced to adapt to the world around you, things can get complicated. //

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I've gotta put her in the water.

Please don't do this we have time- d- we can work it out.

Right now I'm in the middle of nowhere, if I don't put her down now a lot of people are gonna die. Peggy, this is my choice. Peggy?

I'm here.

I'm gonna need a raincheck on that dance.

Alright, a week next saturday, at the stork club.

You got it.

8 o'clock on the dot, don't you dare be late, understood?

You know I still don't know how to dance?

I'll show you how, just be there.

We'll have the band play something slow, I'd hate to step on your-

--------

"Steve, we lost comms." You say, sniffling as you dive deeper towards the icey plain ahead of you. Steve takes your hand in his, holding back tears not for himself, but for knowing you had to die too. He best friend's girl, too stubborn to wait for Hydra to be taken down that you forcefully threw yourself into the howling commandos. He could live with sacrificing himself, but you? The closest thing he had to Bucky himself? It sent a knife straight through his heart.

"I'm so sorry, (Y/N). I never meant for all this to happen. I just, I"

"It's okay, Steve." You squeezed his hand as you cut him off, fighting the tears threatening to fall. "It's okay, Steve. We're gonna go see Bucky, everything will be fine." You kept your hands together, the warmth between the two of you the only comforting part of this entire ordeal. You pulled the metal chain out of your shirt with you free hand, smiling fondly as you read 'James Buchanan Barnes DOB: 03-10-1916' knowing that you'd finally be able to see him again. You softly ran your finger over your wedding band and engagement ring. Remembering that sweet moment when it seemed like you had all the time in the world with the love of your life, no earthly idea of the pain you'd endure a few months afterwards.

"We're going to see Bucky." Steve squeezed your hand firmly, the ice was dangerously close. You both closed your eyes, refusing to let go of the other, relaxing as the ice hit the metal of the plane with a crack, knocking you both unconscious,and into the icey tomb that would keep you both for all eternity.

~70 years later~

After the initial shock of waking up seventy years later, Steve went with Fury back to headquarters and was further explained his situation.

"So you see, the serum made you resistant to the cold. You froze, but not the way the average person would. The serum functioned as a shield to your vital organs and cells, allowing you to freeze slower, keeping your cells from-" Steve jumped up aggressively, his memory returning to him in fleeting glimpses, all he saw was you hair, a red ribbon, and a gleaming smile.

"(Y/N)! Where's (Y/N)? Mr. Fury, I went down with a-a friend, a woman, we went down together, in the plane. Where is she, please tell me you found her too?” Silence followed as Steve mind raced. THoughts flying about at a million miles an hour as he tried to find a way that you might have survived, knowing his heart couldn’t take the loss of another dear friend. “

Oh god, she's dead isn't she? She's dead? You said it yourself a normal person couldn't-" Steve knew, but saying out loud was a whole different monster. He couldn't lose them both, losing his entire way of life was tragic enough, but you AND Bucky? Nothing could prepare him for the intense sorrow that overcame him in those few seconds of speech. He lowered his head to his hands, slinking down to the cold floor, and sobbed, knowing the people who knew him best were gone.

"Captain Rogers, she's not dead. We found her right next to you. Our team can't explain how she survived, but she did." Steve's head quipped up, putting his tears to a halt. Could you really be alive?

"I need to see her, right now, please." Nick Fury was known as a cold and calculated man, but the way this American legend looked up at him, crushed his soul. He could see the hurt, the desire for you to be alive, the hopeful gleam in his eyes. He was praying for you to be alive, begging, pleading with God for you to somehow still be breathing the same air, not daring to believe it before he saw it himself. So Fury obliged, and took Steve, not the Captain, straight to you.

All it took for Steve was a single nod and he ran into your room, opening the door faster and louder than he'd intended.

You jumped, frightened at the loud SLAM of the door as it hit the plaster wall on it's right. You looked up at the source, ready to attack, when the sweet baby faced Steven Rogers was standing right in front of you.

"Steve! You're alive! What-" You ran up to him, embracing him in the warmest hug, crying into his large shoulder as he lifted you off the ground.

"(Y/N) I can't believe you're here, I don't, I'm so, God, (Y/N) ." He pulled away slightly, looking at your beautiful face as you wept happily. He took your face in his hand, wiping away tears of his own, and looked into your eyes.

"Steve, what are we going to do, they have portable phones, I could barely work a radio back home and.." More sobbing, you hugged Steve again, body shaking with every sob you made. Steve knew this was a lot, it was a lot for him too, but at least somebody would be learning everything right there with him.

"Hey, hey, it's going to be okay (Y/N), it's going to be okay." Steve rubbed your back, gently caressing you hair as you cried into his chest. When he felt like you'd calmed down enough, he tilted you chin up with two of his fingers, gazing deeply into your eyes so that the effect of his words would resonate. "As long as I'm alive, you'll never have to worry about a thing, okay? I'm going to take care of you, you're my best girl all right?" You hated that line, even when Bucky used to say it, but hearing it right here in this moment, looking in his eyes, helped ease the ache in your heart, and you believed him fully. Fury cleared his throat, clearly wanting to break up the scene in front of him.

"It's not much, but we've got a decent place for the two of you in Brooklyn, figured you two might need some time before you get back to work."

"Work?" Your voice was almost a whisper, what work could the two of you possibly be good for? You're only superpower was your stubbornness, and Steve's his inability to be careful. In the forties, yes you two were apart of a formidable team, but now? The common cold could probably kill the both of you.

"Yes, both of you have jobs here, at SHIELD, whenever you're ready. We had our historians find and read all of your files in order to gauge where and what you'll be doing. Steve was easy, but you Dr. Barnes, were tough. But even with the times, a weapons expert like you can be very useful. Until then, rest, relax. The world's a very different place now, take some time before you come back." Fury led you to a car, a very fancy, futuristic black Honda Accord (What's a Honda, Steve? Is that like our old Ford, do we know if this is even safe, look at all those buttons.") When you were dropped off at your already furnished apartment you were given credit cards, per SHIELD to 'get your life together', and books and magazines to catch up on the times. You were given fashion magazines, because apparently tan and grey were not as fashionable as you thought, and Steve couldn't read one of those things to save his life so you had to find a way to conceal that you were both from a time of button ups and showing knees was scandalous. Great.

Steve tried to figure out the TV, and sports, and holy- there were so many things to watch on the tv. And you could actually watch them, not just listen in. You could see the athletes run and bat and hit. It was so much, and all in color too.

You had figured out the internet pretty fast. You just told it what you wanted and it listened, kinda. It had a very skinny typewriter attached to a screen, it was called a 'Laptop'. You found clothes, common topics for conversation, current events, and ways to research all the time you and Steve had missed.

"Steve! Look, it's an article about us!" You read quietly, blah blah blah, Captain America, blah blah blah, Steve Rogers, "Okay mainly an article about you, but still!" Blah blah blah, American hero. Whatever nevermind. It's not like you were one of the few people that could handle and rival Starks ingenuity, but yeah let's worship the guy on steroids sure. You closed the laptop, knowing you had plenty of errands to run you yelled out, "Steve! I'm going to buy clothes and food, you want anything?"

"Liquor, lots of it. And plaid, please tell me I can still wear plaid!" Chuckling, at least he hadn't changed. You stepped out the front door of your apartment, happy to get out into the new world and try and adapt. You were always up for a challenge in the 40's, why should this be any different? You wandered around the streets of New-New york, glancing at the windows with ridiculous amounts of color and materials. The skirts and dresses were so short, you couldn't imagine walking home in something like that back then. But wearing a floor length gown wasn't going to be very casual either. You have to get with the times, you told yourself. Maybe the shopkeepers would be of some help. You walked into the first store you passed, very casual, laid back. The second you walked in you were met with two smiling faces and a "Can I help you find anything in particular?" You nodded and explained your situation (Except for the fact that you were from the 40's, were frozen for 70 years and were now living with your dead husband's best friend who just so happened to be Captain America((Okay so you completely lied and didn't tell them anything, whatever)).

You walked out of the shop hours later, walking in and out of every store you liked buying what looked good on you. It was nice having this luxury, you usually made your own baggy clothes at home, now it seemed like everything was perfectly tailored no matter what. You walked into the liquor store, knowing Steve would try to get drunk as best he could you grabbed the strongest stuff you could find, 96% Vodka, and Everclear. Should do the trick, or at least kind of. You smiled at the guy at the register as he checked you out.

"Can I see your ID, ma'am?" You froze slightly, your ID, for what?

"Uh, sure." Nobody's ever asked for your ID when you bought alcohol, what was he even going to do with it, you were obviously of age, what a pointless thing to ask for. You handed him the thin piece of plastic. All it says is (Y/N) (Y/L/N) DOB: (Y/DOB/1919) Oh shit. 1919? He wouldn't believe that at all! Shit shit shit shit shit!! You sat there anxiously as he read over the typed letters on your ID. The cashier shrugged, "Cool, thank you for your service. That'll be $65.78" He handed you your ID back and bagged your liquor. You paid and left, astonished he wasn't thrown of by your date of birth. You pulled out the ID to look at it, "WHAT?" You yelled.

"(Y/N) (Y/L/N) DOB: (Y/DOB/1994) Ninety-four? That's not even close to accurate! What..." You pocketed the ID, not wanting to open up another can of worms that could be taken care of later.

You were thankful for the new clothes, Steve and you were going to fit in perfectly, you had already changed at one of the stores and were now in a high waisted body fit (You can't remember the exact term she'd used to describe it) black and white plaid skirt, a black turtleneck sweater tucked in, paired with knee high black boots and a very stylish black purse. You liked the new look, and felt very modern wearing such revealing clothes, people could see your figure, what a crazy idea these future people had! Your hair was straight, and one of the makeup ladies had fixed you up with a very casual, modern, look. ((Which was just a rip off of what you used to do anyways but)) You dragged all the bags and alcohol up to the top floor of the apartment building and yelled into your apartment as you unloaded.

"Steve! I got the goods!" You turned around and started filling the shelves with food and alcohol, leaving the clothes for later. "You'd been so shocked, they asked for my ID, to make sure I was old enough to buy alcohol!" You heard him clobber his was into the kitchen, "Me! I've never had that happen before, it was so crazy I-" You turned around to see Steve, frozen five feet away from you, jaw on the floor. "Are you just going to stand there and watch me do all the work?" You turned your back, amused at his reaction. He was always such a dork when it came to food, it wasn't even that much and there he was pretending like you'd just bought a buffet.

Steve was down for the count. He always knew you were stunning, but whatever new-age clothes you were wearing solidified the fact that Bucky always knew how to pick 'em. For the first time in Steve's life, your unique body wasn't covered in baggy tan and gray military clothes. It was beautiful, a sudden ping of jealousy and guilt poking him in the side as he mindlessly looked you over. The only thing he'd ever seen you in that was even close to being this fitted was the bulletproof corset Bucky got Stark to make for you as a wedding gift. Forcefully, Steve refocused his attention on the food, trying his hardest not to try and compliment you. His words never came out right, and with other girls he could mess up and be fine, but you were Bucky's girl and that wasn't a line he was willing to cross, even by accident.

//Special shoutout to @lunathepettuna who asked for a Steve related something! Love ya girl! //

[thebeethathums]

Home - 8

Pairing: John Watson x HolmesTwin!Reader

Warnings: The reader in this fic is a TWIN to Sherlock Holmes and as such shares some physical features to him. Please read at your own discretion with this in mind.

A/N: Bolded text indicates John’s Blog Posts

You practically fell down the stairs just as John was wishing his date a final good night, grabbing the door and flinging it open so you could pull the women inside by her upper arm, “Did you kiss her?”

Mrs. Hudson popped her head out of her apartment to see what all the noise was about and you snapped, “Back inside, Mrs. H.”

She disappeared quickly, knowing better than to question you, and John floundered, wondering what the hell had gotten into you. To any sane person, including John, this looked like a rather violent fit of jealousy as you pinned his date to the wall and demanded again, “John, did you kiss her?”

He bellowed, “Bloody Hell, (F/n)! Get off her!” and you let out an exasperated growl as he moved to pry you away from the petite blonde who was beginning to panic under your forceful grasp. He only got so far as to reach for your arm before he wobbled back dangerously and you hissed, “Dammit! You did.”

Trusting your brain and it’s rapidly created solution, you let go of the woman to grab the front of John’s jumper, pressing him up against the front door to block her from leaving as you attacked his lips with yours. He tried to fight it at first but after a moment he kissed back, even stopping you from pulling away when you’d deemed you’d successfully transferred enough of the antidote from your lips to his. Getting caught up in it, you momentarily enjoyed the way his lips fit perfectly against yours before he ran his tongue along your lip in a plea to gain entrance to your mouth and snapped you back to reality. You shoved him back into the door in order to pull away, gazing at his extremely befuddled face for only a split second before turning to find that you were looking down the barrel of a gun. Fantastic.

The blonde’s grip on the weapon was firm in an attempt to keep her hand from shaking and you ascertained that she preferred impersonal ways of killing since she didn’t have the stomach to get up close and personal- too much blood and gore. You blinked as she stumbled, “W-What did you do? H-He should be d-dead.”

You held up your hands as John slid to the floor breathing heavily and cheekily offered, “A kiss to make it better...Isn't that what they say?”

She glared at you as you sidestepped so you blocked her from taking a shot at John, “T-Tell me what you did or I’ll shoot!”

You smirked numbly, “Go ahead. My twin’s already dead. You’d be doing me a favor.”

This threw her for a loop, having not been the answer she’d expected, and you huffed a little tauntingly, “You can’t do it, can you? You only like knowing that you’ve ended a life but not actually seeing it. Pathetic.”

She waved the gun at you wildly, “You’re wrong! I will!”

You just chuckled darkly, “I wish you would but you won’t. I can see why he left you.”

“What?” she whispered, eyes going wide with panic and confusion.

“Your fiancé. He left you because you are weak and dull and now you kill men who remind you of him with a clever mix of the chemicals you use in your work as a toxicologist. Weak and pathetic. You couldn't even stomach murdering him, only men like him… A sad example of revenge if you ask me. I’m impressed you thought to put it in your lipstick though. Doing so made its origins almost untraceable… almost. Too bad your fiancé was right about you being a dull idiot and you made the mistake of going after John. He and I are going to have to have a serious talk about what he puts in that blog of his after this.”

She made a sort of flabbergasted noise in her throat as she gaped at you and you took a few steps closer, “I mean sure, I was getting close to figuring it out and his death would have definitely been a distraction but until now I really had no way of finding you. So thank you for literally showing up right on my doorstep. Makes my job so much easier.”

By the time you were finished with you little deduction rant, she was crying and wobbling pathetically, allowing you to easily grab the gun from her hand and turn it on her, calling over your shoulder, “John? Are you alright?”

Still a little hazy from both the kiss and the poison, he carefully pushed himself up off the floor as he puffed, “I think so.”

You yawned, “Good. Now would you please call Lestrade? I’d very much like it if your date was no longer in our flat,” completely calm despite what had just happened. John did as you asked as quickly as he was able and once Lestrade was on his way, you lowered the gun to look over at him, idly tossing your captive, “Move and, unlike you, I won’t hesitate to shoot.”

Giving John your full attention, you scanned his person worriedly, noting he was pale and still looked a little stunned, and then ordered, “Go lie down. All those chemicals provided a nasty shock to your system and you need to rest.”

Looking between the two of you, he opened his mouth to protest but you shook your head, “I was a soldier, John. I think I can handle one petite blonde for a few minutes, don’t you? Now shoo.”

Reluctantly, he climbed the stairs and you fidgeted, silently fretting over him, before knocking lightly on Mrs. Hudson’s door, your eyes still locked on your captive. She opened it a little warily and you offered her a signature Holmes smirk, “Would you be a dear and go make John a cuppa? He’s had a bit of a scare.”

“Of course, dear… I'll take care of him for you while you get that tart out of here. You two make such an adorable couple.”

Instead of correcting her you just let the corner of your mouth twitch up and then watched her climb the stairs, it wasn’t worth effort to try and explain.

Untitled  

She just saved my life by kissing me. Is it bad that I enjoyed it?  

You climbed the stairs after convincing Lestrade that John would come to give an official statement in the morning and found John on the couch with tea and Mrs. Hudson in the kitchen, trying to clean your mess.

John’s eyes snapped to you when you walked in but you just trudged to your room, flatly offering, “Be more careful in the future, John. You were fortunate I finished the antidote when I did… oh and we need milk.”

The door clicked shut before he could respond and he sighed, wondering what exactly he’d expected from Sherlock’s twin, and you flopped on your brother’s bed to look at the ceiling, thinking over everything that had happened as the grief and despair began to settle in again.

There was no way you were going to be able to sleep, even being as tired as you were, so you huffed and thought about kissing John. It had been the only solution- you weren’t supposed to like it. Maybe before Sherlock, before you were alone, the two of you could have had something… That might have been kind of nice. You’d always been a hopeless romantic, despite growing up being told that caring and love were weaknesses you shouldn't bother with.

It used to drive Sherlock up the wall and Mycroft certainly disapproved but you didn’t care. You’d read all those books about classic romance, about love prevailing and such, and you wanted that in your life. Sherlock had always blamed it on your lack of a Y-chromosome- for which of course you promptly punched him- but now… you considered that your brothers might have had a point. You’d cared about and loved Sherlock with all your heart and look where it had gotten you.

Curling up into a ball as the sadness you'd been keeping locked away while you worked got the better of you, a sob escaped your lips and you let yourself get lost in the memories of happier times.

The Kissing Conundrum  

When I went out on a date with Tracy Miller, I never expected the night to end with a gun pointed at me and a heated kiss from (F/n). It seemed so normal and actually quite pleasant. We went to a fun restaurant over in West End, had a few drinks, and then she offered to let the cab drop me off first since Baker St. was closer than her home. I thought finally a nice woman that I connect with- this could work- and then she tried to poison me. Yeah. That kind of put a damper on things.  

(F/n) figured it all out before I even knew… which lead to a tense moment where she pinned Tracy against the wall and I thought she was jealous. Before I could do anything, I started to feel woozy and next thing I know (F/n)’s shoved me up against the door and her lips are against mine. Her very soft and warm lips. It was actually a little fantastic. Even with the gun pointed at us after.  

Everything beyond that is kind of a blur but Lestrade informed me that (F/n) broke Tracy’s nose or rather ‘She fell’ as (F/n) claims. It would seem that’s another way she’s like Sherlock. He always protected the things he cared about… no matter what people said about him not having a heart or being able to care. So I know she cares but how much? Is it just as a friend of the brother she loved? Her friend? Or something more?  

It's difficult to tell. She seemed to enjoy the kiss but she hasn’t left his room since then and that was two days ago… not to mention her response to the whole thing was to tell me to get milk. I thought things were getting better. That she was letting me in. Perhaps I was wrong.

[lady-griffin]

Will the Game of Thrones Ending be the same for the books?

In short, yes and no. And no and yes (a very GRRM answer).

Honestly for me, the biggest problem I have with D&D’s ending is I don’t think they put in the work nor earned that ending. It felt rushed and it felt like they wasted time on things that didn’t really matter and not so much that they left things unfinished or ambiguous for the future, but just didn’t take the time to finish their own story.

Certain endings don’t make a whole lot of sense, because we don’t know a lot of the details nor does it line up with what they’ve changed in the story or have previously set-up in the show, let-alone this current season or the final scenes themselves.

But I can imagine that the show’s endings are the bare notes for the books. Hitting the same points, but lacking the more complicated and nuance aspects to those endings. 

This turned out to be more of a rant and longer than I ever intended. 

King Bran

I don’t see D&D making Bran king, unless it’s GRRM’s ending. I just don’t. I just can’t see that.  

I don’t want to speak for them, but it’s in my opinion, that they cared very little for Bran’s story. Or at the very least, struggled with adapting it from book to screen.

I could see Book!Bran becoming King. Not for the reasons the show give us.

Saying he is the best choice because he has the best story, is complete bullshit and a terrible reason to elect someone into a leadership role. Just terrible.

Especially since Show!Bran’s story, due to D&D, was one of the weakest of the show. Since they written him out in season 5 and it seems like we barely spent time with him as an actual character, since he became the Three-Eyed Raven.

And to be fair, it’s not a clear fit for Book!Bran to become king. Right now, it’s unclear if Book!Bran will be as emotionless as Show!Bran. So, there’s that. And Bran is going down a very dark path as the Three-Eyed Raven, in the books, so him becoming King, also depends on how dark that path goes and how dark Bran gets.

There’s also the snag that within the show, Bran’s story seems incomplete.

What did warging and seeing the past and more importantly being able to affect the past have to do with Bran’s story? Or the entire story, in general? 

We don’t see Bran do anything (except warg into ravens during the battle) actively against the NK or even to get the position of king. So, what’s the point?

It feels incomplete, because Bran affecting the past has been building up to something…

1. His father heard him and turned back, but nothing more. A small ripple.

2. Bran wargs into Hodor, while he’s still connected to the past, completely damaging Hodor’s psyche to the point he can only say Hodor. This is a horrifying and traumatic event, but on an individual-level, not that big of a ripple

…These incidents are building up, so logically the third one will be a big thing….

But nothing. 

Was Hodor the culmination of Bran’s powers? Because then what’s the point? It feels like there should be a third time Bran goes to the past and affects it, either with severe consequences (Mad King Burn Them All theory) or Bran being in complete control having learned from his mistakes and does exactly what he intended to do. 

But nothing.

Bran uses his powers to see the truth about Jon, but in the show that almost barely matters. So, there’s just this big disconnect with Bran’s journey and what he does in seasons 7 & 8 and where he ends up.

Also, because we were cut off from Bran’s POV and how they executed the Rise of Bran & the Fall of Daenerys, Bran comes across as an amoral to evil mastermind, who at worst orchestrated all of this so he could be king or allowed everything (thousands and thousands of deaths) because “fate demanded it.”

Either way it’s not good. And on top of that.

Either Bran did nothing to become King, which feels unearned. Or he did a lot (or did nothing purposely) to become King, which again, is actually terrifying.

Bran’s magic may not be as overt or destructive as Daenerys’ dragons, but they’re just as all-powerful, which makes the story end on a weird note when you start to think about it and the implications and themes, particulary “power.”

We can argue that Bran doesn’t want power, like Daenerys. But he has it. And still accepted it, to be king. And indicated he knew it was going to happen...so, it’s a weird place to end when you start to think about it. 

D&D were likely not trying to make Bran come across in the end as evil or at the very least not a terrifying amoral monster, but because they basically abandoned the actual character of Bran and focused on Three-Eyed Raven creepiness, it feels sinister.

There’s also the weird hiccup, that in GRRM’s work, knowing your future or a prophesy about yourself or believing you have a prophecy entirely figured out, basically dooms you. Especially if you’re in a position of power or seeking it. 

So, it’s weird that basically the one person who kind of becomes omniscient in this world, get this coveted position of power with no doom on the horizon…that doesn’t sound like GRRM.

So, there’s a lot of snags with the idea of Bran becoming King.

But again, I just don’t see D&D making Bran king unless it’s GRRM’s ending. Like I can’t see them doing that. I see them making Tyrion King on their own or literally anyone else before Bran.

How exactly he becomes King and where the remainder of his journey takes him up to that point, we’ll have to see. 

I can definitely see GRRM making it feel more than earned and fitting. Unfortunately, I can also see GRRM naming him Bran the Broken, so there’s that.

Dragon Pit Council

I can see the Dragon Pit Council or a form of it happening. And I think it will be more fitting and more touching for the readers, especially when you consider who will be on the council in the books. And I can see those book versions wanting to stay part of the 7 or 6 kingdoms.

Arianna Martell will most likely be on that council. And she will likely feel guilt and regret and possibly traumatized for her role as a Queen Maker with Mycrella and the death that awaits her and possibly Arianna’s role with F!Aegon. It’s also highly unlikely she will be a supporter of Daenerys (due to Viserys, Quentyn, F!Aegon). She might be more than willing to work with and within this new system due to her own previous lust for power and wanting to make amends and build a better world.

Willas or Garlan Tyrell will most likely also be on the council, representing the Reach. And due to the unknown future fates of their own family due to their pursuit of the Iron Throne, the Tyrell representative might want to take a step back as well. Especially if it is a similar to the fates of the Tyrells in the show.

Asha Greyjoy (Book version of Yara) could likely be part of the council (if Theon is also dead in the books), but she is more difficult to pin down, mostly because my memory is lacking (it’s been awhile since I last read the books). But it will most likely make more sense than Yara’s whole purpose in that scene.

And most likely… Robin Arryn will represent the Vale. Edmure Tully the Riverlands.

It’s highly unlikely Gendry will be part of this, but I can potentially see Edric Storm being a part of the council and representing the Stormlands.  

I can see the council existing in the books.

It’s also possible that, in the books, the 7 Kingdoms afterwards might not be so much a single kingdom under one ruler. It might be more of the separate kingdoms working together, with the guidance of Bran. 

Overall, though I think we will definitely get into the nitty gritty of how this new kingdom will work, with some strained tension and potential conflict and future struggles of making this kingdom work. Peace isn’t easy.

The actual scene itself happening...no.

Tyrion literally tells us why no one in this scene should listen to him, half of them hate him for helping a Tyrant who slaughtered an entire city and the other half (barely) hate him for helping to kill the rightful Queen who saved them from a tyrant. So, it makes no sense that they listen to Tyrion and it’s frustrating that Tyrion has to tell them to make the choice.

Also why does Tyrion who we were told just a minute ago is a prisoner and doesn’t get to speak, but than in a hot second, he gets to make a speech and decide the future fate of Westeros. Don’t get me wrong, I can 100% see Tyrion talking his way into making the decision, but that’s not what happens. They just let him talk, because the writes need Tyrion to be clever and smarter than everyone else in that scene.

Also, it makes no sense that Davos, Gendry, and Sam do not speak up for Jon. And even less sense that Jon would have to be punished, when the majority of the named characters in this scene, had a problem with Daenerys, had no feelings in particular towards her, or distrusted her because she was a Targaryen.

Also, why didn’t the Unsullied just kill Jon once he confessed or once they discovered him in the room? Why did they even keep him as a prisoner? They don’t keep prisoners for long. So why would they keep their worse prisoner alive? Why? And there are more things that just don’t add up in that one single scene and what follows.

But I think this is a bare bones and nonsensical version of what will happen in the books or some varying degree of it. Basically, a council of the major lords of Westeros seems very likely to be part of the future government of Westeros.

Tyrion, Hand of the King

I’m on the fence of whether that’s going to be part of the books or not.

To be clear, that’s not a punishment. It’s just not. If we really wanted to believe that Jon and Tyrion were being punished, they’ve should made Tyrion join the Night’s Watch and force Jon to be the Hand of the King. The two of them would’ve hated that.

And similar, to the reason for why Bran was elected King, I don’t see the reasons Tyrion was chosen being the reasons in the books.

1. Not wanting the position

2. No longer thinking himself so clever and wise

Are not good reasons for someone being elected into a position of power, they’re just not. 

They are nice subtext and symbolic reasons for an author, but not for the actual characters of the story. One major problem I had with this last episode, was it felt way too meta.

So, it’s possible Tyrion becoming the Hand of the King will be more of an actual punishment for him or his own way of actually trying to redeem himself. (what the show was saying, but struggling with executing)

One possible fate for Tyrion (actually shown in the show) is that he won’t be remembered in the history books or the stories in the future. A tragic and unfair fate, but also a fittingly poetic sentence for a man who wants to be recognized and acknowledged.

Tyrion and Oberon discussed (I think) how it was the hands of certain kings who were the pivotal key to the future, but yet are not recognized for their accomplishments as they are attributed to the King….so that being Tyrion’s fate seems possible.

So is Tyrion just going to be the real power manipulating Bran?

Bran barely matters in the Small Council scene…actually he doesn’t, so that begs the position, what’s the point of Bran being King? Tyrion making the decisions and Bran being nothing but a figurehead is weird and rather pointlessly frustrating. 

I can’t see Tyrion “manipulating” the closest person to be omniscient in this world. And the show is ending on an optimistic note. So, we can safely assume future nefarious deeds of Tyrion (intentional or not) aren’t been indicated by the creators in those finale scenes.

Tyrion’s fate still feels largely undecided for the books. 

Show and book Tyrion are more than a bit different at this point, to say the least.

So, it’s possible that GRRM’s own ending for the character is more than a bit dark and twisted for this lighter and far more sympathetic version of Tyrion and D&D didn’t feel like they could do that to Tyrion. Particularly with Dark Dany. And with Peter Dinklage just being a break-out star and fan favorite.

The difficulty I have with Tyrion being hand, is I don’t see Tyrion being in a position of respect or power in the end. Tyrion is quite the tragic character. He has been unfairly vilified and hated for being a dwarf and has never been accepted by the masses.

While we may want them to recognize Tyrion for all the good he has done, that doesn’t feel likely. With Tyrion being suspected of killing Joffrey, actually killing his father (+ Shae) and possibly bringing Daenerys to Westeros or being on her side when she arrives and unintentionally sowing the seeds of rift between F!Aegon and Daenerys, it seems doubtful the people of Westeros would ever accept Tyrion. And I think there is a debate to be had whether they should or not.

There are actual reasons why people shouldn’t trust or forgive Tyrion, but rarely are those people’s actual reasons. So, Tyrion, since the moment we’ve known him has been unfairly judged and cast aside. And then Tyrion wants revenge and as he seeks justice for the way he’s been treated, leading him to some terrible and awful choices and to a dark place. 

All of that only adds to the fuel of the vilified image of him that already existed, before he even did anything (since he was born).

Tyrion’s fate feels very up in the air and relies very much  on what he’ll do in these next two books. So, him being Hand of the King in the end, doesn’t quite match up with where we see Tyrion currently in the story, but I can’t say it would never happen. 

However, to be clear, the way it happened in the show was just complete bullshit.

Three Stark Endings

I’m not all that mad with Arya, Jon and Sansa’s endings. I can see those being possible endings for all those characters. 

My problem is again, I don’t feel like D&D put the effort into said endings, so it feels rather hollow and beyond rushed. 

It feels weird to end on Arya, Jon, and Sansa in that epilogue sequence. Because other than the Crypt teaser, the three haven’t really been framed together like that.

Bran, Arya and Sansa have been showed together way more than Jon, Arya and Sansa.

It’s one thing that the rest of the show doesn’t allude to that final sequence, but it’s even more out of place that this current season doesn’t have it. This finale seems very separate from the rest of the season and it’s so weird.

It just feels weird to end on Arya, Sansa and Jon when we didn’t even get Sansa and Arya’s immediate reaction to Jon Snow’s true parentage. So, it feels like an out of place ending for them.

Also, side note, it’s weird and so imbalance how we get so many different reactions of people learning about Bran being the Three-Eyed Raven or you know, just is that way now (despite how funny those are) and Jon being a secret Targaryen and heir to the Iron Throne (AND COMING BACK FROM THE DEAD) has become this interesting tidbit, that doesn’t really matter.

We really have been cut off from the Stark’s overall POV for this last season. And seeing the Starks go off on their own, separate from one another, is less sad and rather emotionally pointless, since we never really saw the pack work together as a unit.

Tyrion, Jaime and Cersei have more of an emotional connection and dynamic together. Which is fine and enjoyable to watch, but it’s weird that the STARKS who are supposed to be the HEART of the story, don’t honestly get the same kind of treatment.

And then there is just logical and emotional fallacies in this finale.

I’m not upset that the Starks are going their separate ways, but more so that we never honestly saw them together or even working together to get their “endings.” They’re also working individually, even screwing one another over by accident. 

Their endings seemed to fall into place for them, which is kind of disappointing. Or in Bran’s case, kind of sinister, especially with the implications of what happens to Jon.

Arya Exploring Lands Unknown

I can this happening or a version of it in the books. I do have a problem with Arya repeatedly saying she was never going to return North, though. I don’t know why they kept having her say that.

Also, clearly Arya had to get her Stark sails and Stark ship (with direwolf carved in) from somewhere. Did she just stay in King’s landing? Or did she return to Winterfell and leave the day before Sansa’s coronation? 

That’s not really important, but maybe if the emotions matched with what we’ve been given, I wouldn’t have these small nitpicks. 

Also, Arya not getting a pack in the end, her literal family or not, is just beyond disappointing and feels empty. Arya fully embracing the lone wolf idea, is just so bitter. 

Sansa, Queen in the North

Sansa becoming QITN honestly feels like the must genuinely bittersweet ending.

 The North is independent and she is queen and respected (sweet), but she’s alone (bitter). It’s hard to imagine Book!Sansa’s family, not being there for her big day, though. 

Why wouldn’t Arya wait to leave after her sister’s coronation? Why wouldn’t Jon be there to visit?

And in the books, if this scene or something akin were to happen, we might be able to picture some Northern faces. Such as the Manderlys, the Mormonts, the Karstarks, the Umbers and Glovers and the Reeds present, so it might feel less isolating. But in the show it’s pretty lonesome. 

And on the Jonsa narrative, the two haven’t been brought together in the books…so it’s hard to say what will happen or if anything at all. I still stand by the fact that their scenes in the show are really weird if the show was going for platonic siblings. Really, really weird. But one line from the books, sticks out to me…

“No one will ever marry me for love” (ASOS, Sansa VI)

Perhaps Sansa is right. Perhaps the one person who does genuinely love her and want to be with her, will never actually marry her. That seems very bittersweet to me and quite the tragic love story.

Sansa’s ending feels like it could be her ending in the books. But again, like everything else it doesn’t quite line up for Sansa either.

Jon living on the Wall/Beyond the Wall

Possible.

I am a big fan of giving a character what they always wanted, in a tragic way. And it brings Jon full circle. Back to where he wanted to be in the beginning, back to where he struggled to be, back to where he became who he is today, back to where he wanted to leave.

Why exactly he goes back to the NW is where the problem really begins (let alone there suddenly being one again). Jon being punished to appease the likes of the council (despite most of them not caring for Daenerys in the actual show) and the Unsullied, seems really just forced.

It does seem in-character for Jon to do it as a self-inflicted punishment, though. Or similar to Aemon Targaryen, giving up his right to the throne/7K to allow his younger brother to create a hopefully better place. Or perhaps, punishment for breaking his vows to the NW.  

But it’s not even up to Jon in the show. His agency in his own story is barely there (as it’s been for the past season). He’s not even there when the decision is made and the person who tells him is Tyrion, not his family, nor Davos his closest advisor nor Sam is supposed best friend.

The Council scene is all about Tyrion, despite the fact a good portion of the council likes Jon, is his family, he’s the true born son of Rhaegar Targaryen and he’s the one who killed Daenerys.

Don’t get me wrong, I feel like Jon’s “destiny and super specialness for being a Targaryen” will be undercut in the books, but in the show they not only undercut it despite going overboard with it explaining how Jon is the trueborn son of Rhaegar and Lyanna, but also undercut Jon’s own arc.

Jon will likely be the last official Targaryen, finally putting the dynasty and family to rest. And him rejoining the NW or going to live beyond-the-wall with the Free Folk is a way to do that.

But of course, there’s a lot more going on in Jon’s story in the books.

There is so much King emphasis for Jon in the books, so I’m not convinced. 

But perhaps Jon is the rightful King, but won’t be The King in the end by choice. 

Jon shouldn’t be the king because he’s the son of Rhaegar, but time and time again, Jon has shown he is a more than capable leader willing to make the difficult choice.

In the show’s own narrative, he killed his love for his duty to the realm. And he’s punished for it.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like GRRM doesn’t have this world punish people for doing the right thing, but this just doesn’t add up.

There’s a lot of talk and videos about how the show’s ending does fit into the prophecies (book & show) and Jon was the only one capable of killing Daenerys, because he’s a Targaryen (Drogon letting him pass). But that is a terrible take away. Jon shouldn’t be special or be the only one capable to save the world from Daenerys because of who he is genetically, it should be because of who Jon is as a person.

And in regards to a Jonsa narrative. Similar to Sansa’s ending, Jon and Sansa have yet to reunite in the books so it’s hard to say. But let’s say some feelings and so on do develop in the books, this time, him returning to NW might be with a much heavier heart. Now he knows what he’s giving up and losing, now he knows what he’ll never have. That’s tragic and an ending to talk and cry about.  

I can see Jon getting this ending or one akin to it in the books. But how GRRM goes about it is everything. Though honestly, just having Jon choose would be a huge improvement.

How they went about it in the show and Jon’s overall passiveness to his own narrative, just ruined it. He literally has to be convinced by Tyrion (and Arya) that Daenerys is a threat, despite already seemingly coming to that conclusion the previous few episodes.

Again, I know I’m repeating myself. The final montage of Jon isn’t the problem it’s how the narrative got there.  

Daenerys’ Death/Mad Queen

Probably won’t go down like it did in the show, but it will happen in the books. 

I’ve seen a couple of Essays and Videos of how to fix the final season, mostly with making NK being the big bad and Daenerys the true Queen of Westeros.

Which I think just shows how much people love Daenerys and how badly rushed Mad/Dark Dany was in the final season and I would argue how it felt like even the narrative wasn’t fully believing it.

Mostly with how Jon seemed to be frustrated, horrified and upset with Daenerys one moment and then in the next moment he’s willing to justify her actions and still somehow believe that Sansa and Arya would bend the knee or that Daenerys would allow Sansa to live after Sansa purposely told Tyrion the truth about Jon.

The build-up for Dark!Dany is there, people can’t just say it wasn’t. Daenerys has struggled with her two sides for quite some time. But, at the same time, if you need a whole meta conversation to explain and justify to your audience why this makes sense (Tyrion and Jon scene), you didn’t do a great job in sticking the landing.

The problem is that the show, in my opinion, has been building up to a different kind of Mad Queen. One who was absolutely ruthless, but wasn’t self-aware and starting to see any dislike or criticism as an act of treason. Getting increasingly frustrated, everytime she does the right thing or doesn’t use her dragons, she isn’t rewarded for it. And when she does use them, she gets her way (so why shouldn’t she use them?)

And to be fair, we did kind of get this…but also we didn’t. They kept “justifying” Daenerys’ actions. Or blame her ruthlessness on her mental state or recent events, but then they also back track on that. 

So, it just seems like the showrunners weren’t entirely sure with which Mad Queen they wanted.

They go all the way with it, but then they take several steps back, but that just leads to more problems. For showrunners and a show that really does love GRRM for those gut-wrenching twists (Ned’s execution, Red Wedding, Hold the Door), they seemed to be so nervous and hesitant with the big and final gut-wrenching “twist.”

When Tyrion is a prisoner, his and Jon’s scene just doesn’t work. In my opinion, it might’ve worked better if Tyrion was the speaker for the audience and Jon wasn’t.

Tyrion has been trying to justify Daenerys time and time again and has felt like that audience view point for quite some time. But honestly that scene just doesn’t really work. Neither of them at that point should need convincing.

Daenerys death will likely be tragic and sympathetic in the books as well be done by Jon. She is a tragic character. 

Unlike some of the other villains of the show, Jaime and Cersei for instance, where we first see them as villains and then with their POVs (and others) we see the humanity they’ve always had. They aren’t monsters, but complicated and messed up people who are more than capable of monstrous acts.

Daenerys is the reverse of that. We always had her POV, we always had access to her humanity. We see her as this sympathetic and abused princess at first and we see her grown to being this complicated character, who is genuine and well-intentioned, but also rather ruthless and is hardening herself for the Iron Throne.

We will likely see her as a ruthless villain in the end, maybe even mad, but I think GRRM’s intention is for us to also remember Daenerys when we first met her and see how far gone she is and also think of what could’ve been.

The throne room works and doesn’t work. 

I love the House of Undying coming true and us realizing what it means or getting confirmation for it means. See that’s how you tie your show back the previous seasons, you don’t just reference previous lines in current scenes, to make it seem like you had this all planned out. 

We see Daenerys as vulnerable and open, but also batshit crazy. She’s elated and happy she’s won, but completely oblivious to the death and destruction and villainy she just committed and had committed in her name. It works. 

But it doesn’t, because it’s also a different kind of mad queen to the one that they’ve building up to and also even a different one from “The Bells.”

And Daenerys being thrilled and happy to see Jon could’ve also work. 

Daenerys is so elated and happy she’s won now, that Jon’s claim doesn’t even matter to her, because she feels invincible So she’s more than willing to “rule together.” That could’ve worked… It really could’ve and shown how far gone Daenerys is.

But it doesn’t quite, mostly because Arya and Tyrion literally in the same episode tell Jon that he’s going to be next, because Daenerys will see him as a threat. Hell, Daenerys and Jon have a (not sexy) tensed filled moment, after her speech to her army. 

Forget the rest of the season (you shouldn’t as this should all feel like one whole story) but all the scenes in the finale should definitely feel cohesive and consistent to the narrative. But it still feels like they are trying to do multiple things and they can’t, they don’t have the time. 

Jon & Dany

I think their relationship will be complicated to say the very least in the books.

Daenerys with her desire for a true family and a true companion battling with her ever growing paranoia and lust for power and the Iron Throne. And more than likely her having encounter F!Aegon before Jon, which will likely go very bad, so her meeting another Secret Targaryen after that is just rife for conflict.  

And Jon, I actually see Jon turning a blind-eye or ignoring some red flags about Daenerys, not necessarily because he loves her, but because he thinks he needs those dragons to defeat the Others.

Only for him to realize that they weren’t the key to defeating the Others like he thought and him realizing what he’s given power to, was all for naught. 

The show has shades of that, but kind of just abandons it. 

Jon might struggle with killing Daenerys in the books, as well. Killing isn’t easy and we shouldn’t’ want our heroes to be able to kill easily.

And Jon might also love Daenerys in the books or see her as a sympathetic human who is not quite the villain others make her out to be, but certainly not innocent. 

Him seemingly flip-flopping from seeing her as ruthless Tyrant to the love of his life, from scene to scene, not so much.

I don’t see Jon killing Daenerys because of his love for her, if Book!Jon does love her, it will be despite it (what they were going for in the show, but not really succeeding with).

To be fair, their final scene is honestly the most romantic scene (stabbing aside) of these two. I believe that they both do love one another and it’s 100% doomed. If they had this level of feelings and consistency for all their previous scenes together, insead of Jon side-eyeing Daenerys and looking frustrated and unable to saying anything about her other than the vague “she’s our queen/she’ll be a good queen”, I would fully believe this tragic love.

Just to be clear, a fictional couple’s most romantic and believable scene being the very same one where of them kills the other is very bad.

But I think, Jon killing Daenerys in the books, is less “despite his love for her”, and more for the love of his (other) family, to protect them. Because that love is stronger. I think that will be more explicit in the books, than in the show.

Jon killing Daenerys not necessarily due to his feelings or lack of feelings for her, but because of his love for the Starks. It’s not so much about Daenerys (which is quite tragic), but the threat she poses to Jon’s family.  

Daenerys will be betrayed for love. Meaning the person will do it out of love, most likely not out of love for her.

Cersei and Jaime’s Death

Highly unlikely.

Book!Cersei is a lot more mad and more incompetent than Show!Cersei and I think will be far more desperate in the end. I do think Jaime will return to Cersei in the books. Even to save her in the end, but depending on where Cersei is mentally at the point, she might be 100% willing to set the entire city on fire with Wildfire.

I think if you combined the Throne Room scene of Jon and Daenerys (X) with the Jaime/Cersei scene in the dungeons/caves, you basically get show!Valonquar scene, which might be the case in the books. 

But it’s hard to say. 

Cersei is definitely going to die. Jaime is more up for debate.

This was a lot longer than I ever intended and far more of a rambling rant and tangent, so I apologize (in case anyone ever reads this far down). 

It’s not like some of these ending don’t or can’t work for the characters, it just feels like D&D didn’t put the effort into them and it feels like they learned that this was going to be the ending right before they shot the final episode. 

It shouldn’t feel like that. Other seasons aside (we shouldn’t, but let’s give them the best chance), this final season should be one consistent and cohesive story narratively. The characters changing their minds and perspetives on things, should make sense.

Sansa in season 1 goes from loving Joffrey to willing to do anything to stay with him, to fully willing to push him off a ledge. And it works. Because Joffrey beheaded her father. It makes sense.

Cersei in season 8, goes from apparently sending Bronn to kill Jaime and Tyrion to being so happy to see Jaime and scared that Jaime is hurt when she reunites with him. And I’m not saying, what Cersei is witnessing at that moment (burning of King’s Landing, castle crumbling down) won’t change her perspective, but it still feels very jarring and sudden. 

Daenerys goes from feeling threatened by Jon’s parentage to begging him (and implied threatening him) to keep it a secret no matter the cost to Jon and we have several characters repeat that she’s not going to want to rule with him, to her final scene being so happy to be with Jon and willing to rule together. And again, maybe her winning the throne makes her feel invincible even to Jon’s claim, but it feels sudden and jarring. 

And Jon...just all over the place. 

Okay I’m done. 

[krungle]

Flint Water Crisis or Lead in Your Pipes?

Flint, Michigan is still rolling around with these youngsters who think that the government has completely ignored the situation (especially Trump) and there is still a crisis there.

Here is the full story of Flint, which many people probably do not know:

After several years of thinking, in early 2013 the Flint City Council (which is broke) decides to save money by switching water supplies from Detroit City Water to Karegnondi Water Authority. The KWA needs a couple of years to complete work before they can supply Flint with water. Flint knows this.

April 17, 2013 Detroit sends the city of Flint notice that its water contract is going to expire soon. This did not mean that Detroit was going to cut off Flint. Like an Eviction Notice there would be many steps before the water was actually cut off, steps amounting to months or even years. The Flint City Council took this as Final Notice, however and panicked.

June 26, 2013 Flint contracts with Lockwood, Andrews & Newman, Inc to use the Flint River and retrofit the Flint Water Plant to supply water to the city. LAN had been in contact with the city for a couple of years already and had advised the Flint City Council that any water taken from the Flint River posed a substantial corrosion risk to pipes and had to be chemically treated to mitigate said risk. They also warned Flint that there needed to be testing of water that came out of the plant for 2-3 months before any of that water hit the city systems. However the city ignored LAN’s warnings and made a very limited contract with the company that excluded water treatment and testing. - source

At the same time KWA broke ground on their project to supply Flint with water from Lake Huron.

During this time (for a few years before and after) the Emergency Managers that are supposed to help Flint with their money troubles form a revolving door. It is possible that the LAN Risk Assessments gets lost in this shuffle as the contract with LAN gets narrowed further (to save money).

March 7, 2014 Detroit offers to continue to supply Flint with water until KWA finishes their project. The Emergency Manager refuses the offer.

April 9, 2014 State Environmental Regulators, who are assessing the effects of the water plant on the Flint River and not the safety of the water coming out of the plant, approve permits for the water plant to switch on. The switch from Detroit City Water to the Flint River happens on April 25, 2014.

Complains begin almost immediately from city residents. E. Coli is found in the water supply. In October the GM Plant in Flint stops using the Flint Water citing it is causing corrosion in the engines it is power-washing with it. January 2015 Federal Regulators find Flint to be in violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act. However the Flint Mayor Dayne Walling (D) comes out and insists the water is safe to drink. A few days later the University of Michigan finds high lead content in some of the water samples from campus areas; thinking the problem is isolated they close off some public water fountains. Also in January the Emergency Manager changes once again.

February 2014, high lead is tested in several homes in Flint. It goes down hill and back and forth from there for a couple of years. October 16, 2015 at a cost of $12 million the city of Flint reconnects with Detroit City Water. - source (NPR Michigan)

Since 2015 the State of Michigan has sent Flint over $350 Million to aide in everything from medical costs and health monitoring to paying for bottled water to supplying water filters to replacing plumbing in houses. After two years of the crisis the Obama Administration finally approved $100 million as part of the EPA Budget to go to Flint. That money was still unused in the EPA budget when Trump came into office and although Trump gutted many things, mostly regulations including language that classified rain water as a hazardous waste, the $100 million was finally dispersed (given to) Flint to continue the work the State of Michigan had already started.

Here is a graph of the lead testing over the years in Flint: - source

In conclusion to this part of the post the Flint Water Crisis is over but certain weaknesses in the water supply of most cities were exposed there (as are noted below) and the medical effects of the crisis will be felt for some time into the future.

The question that none of these sources gets into in detail is how the lead got into the water in the first place. Most people assume (wrongly) that the Flint River has high lead content. The truth of it is the lead came from old pipes, especially the ‘service line’ that goes into most homes built before the 1970′s (and some even later). Also the solder used to join metal pipes (both copper pipes and steal pipes) had lead in it before 1986. Brass Faucets had up to 8% lead in them up until 2014. - source

Let me explain a bit about the ‘service line’. I like pictures so here is one:

The orange is the service line, the blue is the city water lines. The city is responsible for the blue part, the homeowner is responsible for the orange part. This is standard for all of the USA (not sure about other countries). The is a similar arrangement (without the meter and valve) of responsibility on the sewer-side. That entire skinny part is often made of lead in older housing areas. This is usually not a problem, as 50/50 solder on metal pipes is not a problem, because cities treat their water with chemicals, specifically phosphate additives, that coat the pipes and keep the lead from leaching into the water. - source source

To add onto this, since almost no one on City Water tests their water (people on wells-water often test water especially when it is sold), most people have no idea if their water contains lead or not, for the lead is not coming from the water plant but from their own plumbing. Since the Phosphate levels in the city water supply is not always consistent, you could get periods of elevated lead in your own water supply, especially in dry periods in normally wet climes like anywhere east of the Mississippi, which is also the most likely areas one is to find houses with metal pipes and lead service lines.

Most filter systems today filter out lead and other bad things so it is recommended that one uses one for drinking water (or making tea/coffee, cooking, etc.). Note: boiling water does not remove lead, in fact it concentrates it. Use a filter always. Lead is only a problem when ingested so showers or baths shouldn’t be a problem ever, but if you have a baby you might want to use filtered water for its bath just in case it swallows any of the bath water; sponge baths shouldn’t be a problem. In fact if you have a kid I would make sure the plumbing all the way to the street (including the City part) is lead-free. but then I renovate houses as part of my living so tearing up a yard and walkways is no big deal to me.

PS -

I should note that on my houses in general with the plumbing I go by ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’ rule although I do often redo limited plumbing for bathrooms and kitchen remodels and will often add outdoor faucets. I will only test water once if there is a well involved and never test it if it is city water. Testing well water is just a bonus to help with the sale but even that is more than most people do.

I have yet to live in home that I plan on keeping for more than a few years but I do plan that once I do find a long-term home the home will most likely be a full renovation to the studs. In other words new plumbing, wiring, insulation, drywall, everything but maybe hardwood floors, from the Street Mainlines to the sockets and spigots. I even plan on moving walls, maybe even raising the roof to add livable attic space.

But to buy a flip that needs all that is rarely worth it.