#champios

[bubu44f1]

I bring a video of Max a little drunk where he is simply beautiful!!! Sue me I have a certain degree of madness when it comes to Max

In the original video he is simply singing Queen

We are the champions, my friendsAnd we'll keep on fighting till the endWe are the championsWe are the championsNo time for losers'Cause we are the champions of the World

[heckcareoxytwit]

A preview of Ironheart: Bad Chemistry #1

IRONHEART: BAD CHEMISTRY #1

A NEMESIS RETURNS SENDING SHOCKWAVES THROUGH RIRI’S WORLD!

She’s already attacked Chicago once and made off with a valuable artifact from the DuSable Black History Museum. Now the alchemical transformer Khem is back for another bite of Ironheart’s city — and this time, she’s not alone. What is Khem’s connection to a classic Iron Man villain — and can Riri stop her before all of Chicago burns? It’s an action-packed flurry of blows in the Windy City!

Ironheart: Bad Chemistry #1

Written by: John Jennings Art by: Jethro Morales, Andrew Dalhouse Cover by: Eder Messias Page Count: 40 Pages Release Date: April 2, 2025

[digimontamerrichie-tcg]

BT14-045 | Kuwagamon Champion | Virus | Insectoid Common | Green

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BT14-046 | Togemon Champion | Data | Vegetation Uncommon | Green [Featuring: Numemon]

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BT14-047 | Dokugumon Champion | Virus | Insectoid Common | Green [Featuring: Kodokugumon]

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BT14-048 | Leomon Champion | Vaccine | Beastkin Rare | Green | Fave

[rmbaloncesto]

.

[volleytimes-com]

Champions League: Trento destroy Berlin to take last ticket for semifinals!

🏆| Champions League: Trento destroy Berlin to take last ticket for semifinals! February 29, 2024 | Semifinals Second Leg: • Trentino Itas (ITA) - Berlin Recycling Volleys (GER) 3-0 (25:19, 25:20, 25:22) Read more here 👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼

More to follow ____________________ 🏆| 2023/24 CEV CHAMPIONS LEAGUE | Quarterfinals FIRST LEG Wednesday February 21, 2024 • 18.00 (Local Time) | Halkbank Ankara (TUR) – Cucine Lube Civitanova (ITA) 1-3 (21:25, 21:25, 27:25, 22:25) 📍TVF Ziraat Bankkart Volleyball Hall Ankara / A • 19.30 (Local Time) | Berlin Recycling Volleys (GER) – Trentino Itas (ITA) 0-3 (18:25, 17:25,…

[merenguehastalamuerte]

Análisis | Real Madrid - Napoli | Líder Bellingham

[criskelgamers]

¡Semifinal de la CHAMPIONS LEAGUE! Parte 4

[affyboss6]

(via Fantasy Football Champion Classic T-Shirt by Affyboss6)

[dustisus]

Imagine you are Erik Klose. You get an exchange student who is obviously not doing alright, but you and your family show him that there is nothing wrong with him. Over the year he comes out of his shell and you are so in love with the vibrant person who has been hiding in there all year so you tell him you love him and he tells you he loves you too.

He goes back home but he returns (for you) when there is nothing left for him there, and your family is so ready to embrace him as one of their own. You catch him and your grandma in the kitchen, and she's teaching him the family recipe for Spätzle and he's teaching her the ingredients' names in Spanish. When the winter comes he is always the first one to volunteer to shovel snow with your father. When warmer temperatures come you wake up to his voice streaming in from the window where he always has breakfast with your mother. Your family loves him, so when he decides to move away again to take care of his own family (we are your family, too, you tell him, and he just smiles) they cry just as much as you do. The night before he has to wake up early to catch his plane you ask him to marry you, in the future, when it's legal, and he says yes. Still you wake up from his alarm early in the morning and his kiss goodbye.

At first you speak on the phone every day but then a job takes you across the country and takes all your time, and when his first job doesn't make him enough money for a three-bedroom house, he gets another one, and then another, until you have to schedule calls days in advance and most days you just text. But he tells you again and again that those boys need him, and from the sound of it, they do need someone to love them. And who will love them like your fiancé will love them? You have never met a person so capable of love, of engagement, in your life.

The call comes one early morning and he says that one of the twins has been arrested, that he has gotten into a fight, that it was to defend him, and doesn't mention until several minutes into the frantic call that it was him that he was defending. He says he has a smarting rib but is okay but what will happen to his cousin? I don't care, you don't say.

Finally the twins turn 18 and you start a countdown until they graduate in the spring, but come March he calls you and says they have all been offered full-ride scholarships, on the term that they all play Exy. The coach says he needs to keep an eye on Andrew, and maybe that would be for the best? he asks, and then when can start a life together I'd have a degree, and... and... By the time the call ends, he's convinced, and you could never step on his dreams.

Over the first year he calls you and tells you about his asshole teammates, and of how he answers on Andrew's beck and call to make sure things run somewhat smoothly within the team. You hear him pause slightly before choosing his words, consciously choosing the most innocent ones for his twins and the most incriminating ones for himself.

In the summer he comes home to you, but the summer is too short.

The next year, his texts dwindle and on your calls he sniffles but says he's not crying. He calls and says he did something bad and whatever comes to him it's his fault, but won't elaborate. This sounds like what he was saying when he first met you, so you comfort him and says it isn't. It's just been difficult, he says, when a teammate's died. You want to tell him it's so simple here, so simple to you, but you don't. It's not what he needs to hear.

The next few months are a shitshow that you only hear about from his calls and texts, and then eventually some news articles that reach you from the other side of the world. It worries you to know that he is distantly involved with some of the people that are not mentioned by name in the articles, but that you recognize from his stories. Once again, you tell yourself that he knows how to manage it, has always been able to manage it.

The chaos culminates at the championship finals and you are there to see it all go down. He turns his head to you, shouts your name as you spot the opposite player come close to killing your fiancé's friend. He lives, but the opposite player doesn't, and there are no loud celebrations for you to take part in. That night you and your fiancé celebrate quietly, on your own. You have not seen him in almost a year, and it's as if some of the vibrancy has run out of him. His eyes lack a glint, his hair a shine.

You stay a week and you meet the twins in person for the first time. Andrew is more subdued now than in past stories, Aaron feistier. You don't care much for them, but they are important to Nicky, so you make an effort. Neither will talk to you.

It only takes two days until Aaron catches you cuddling on the sofa in the dorm and you overhear an ew. It bewilders you but Nicky is falling asleep so you just continue running your fingers through his hair. The next day all of the Foxes have gathered for a film night, and Nicky has talked about how excited he is for you to meet them and introduces you to them with a joke and a flourish. They tell him to shut up, and Nicky laughs it off as a joke. Maybe you just did not get it. The rest of the night they try to pull you into also harping on Nicky, and get bored when you just say that you love him.

A week into your visit, Andrew pulls a knife on Nicky, and all the moments you have shared with him, all the ones you have planned, flash before your eyes. Nicky doesn't even seem scared, and the Foxes around them watch you curiously instead of the crime before them. Before you know what you're doing you have grabbed Andrew to pull him off, pull him away, but you're quickly overpowered.

Nicky cries as he patches you up. You understand he had not wanted you to see that, and you don't know what to say. You pull up the edge of his shirt to find small scars patterning the bottom of his abdomen, and for the first time you see them as what they are and not as a result of the game. You ask how often this happens, and he says only when I deserve it. He says it and you watch yourself transported, sitting in Berlin with a boy who said I deserved it, and once again you tell him he has never deserved this. You tell him he needs to leave, to please go back home with you, that they are not his family, but he says he can't. You have not seen him so grey in years.

He sees you off at the airport when you leave. Once again you plead for him to come with you, and once again he says he can't. You know you can't force it, can only say that you'll wait as long as it takes.

[candy8448]

Thoughts on age of Imprisonment

Really long rant ahead:

These are me talking to my friend who very cassually plays zelda and knows generally the zelda lore and the older games

More thoughts:

Nooooooo i dont like thiss!!! I thought ppl were just speculation with a fourth wild era game but i thought it wouldnt happen, i REALLY DIIDNT WANT it to happen, im so tired of it. Nintendo is just milking it so painfully

This game has no character to it!

In botw, the great calamity was mentioned EVERYWHERE in the game, tied in at every moment, the world was affected and newly recovering from the great calamity, it was the biggest part of the game! The champions were super well fleshed out characters, their relationships with the new champions, as well as their relationships and impact on bith link and zelda were important, the game made you fall in love with the champion's characters, the champions ballad dlc made me cry. Each champion had a completely different and compelling personality and character development making you really care about them... the ancient sages in totk have no character to them at all. They are wise calm reagle people who apear in a single curscene each for like two mins. They have no personality, they all look the exact same with the same outfits which look boring, they have no connections to the characters apart for being the same races and the new sages, they all have basically the exact same script!! and we dont even know their names!!!

Totk's weakest point i think are the memories they were executed in the worst way possible that they felt completely detached to the actual game. The imprisoning war had no effect on the world, we learn nothing of it (the deapths and sky islands doesnt even connect to the story well, they are kinda just there "as a result of ganon" but it sucks! We know nothing of the imprisoning war! It happened IN ONE SINGLE MEMORY CUTSCENE AND THAT ALL WE GET OF IT

Botw had the great calamity so fleshed out, we knew so much of what happened down to akala citadel and the routes the champions took back to their divine beasts!

The themes of all the characters in botw are so good! The champio s had their entirely different styles and characteristics, totk has the same monotonous boring zonai rocks and patterns on everything its so boring

This is totk criticism but i never liked or cared abiut the zonai even in botw, it was cool seeing the ancient mystery civilisation, but thatw as all that the theorists were hyperfixationg like MAD on, like every channel and i couldnt care less. But totk came and cashed in on that and just made the zonai the most boring and least creative thing ever. All that mystery traded for meaningless who cares about them, no fleshed out, nothing. All we know is that they were the civilisation that founded hyrule but we dint actually know anything abiut them or their culture, the yiga who were new to botw had lore that tied in well with existing lore and tribes and had such fun personality, the bananas and ego, which the zonai completely lack anything. Also the style is completely different. The zonai ruins in botw have completely and utterly different architecture to the totk zonai that they may as well be different tribes, i dont like them, so playing them in aoi will be so boring cuz i dont care about them at all

We also dont know anything about the ganon's allies, they are all namelss gerudo warriors which is so boring. At least with astor, he was probably the person who provided the prophecy that we know so much about, at least the yiga were interesting characters, at leadt there were the corrupt divine beasts and blight ganons, there were so many interesting villians on that side. Totk/aoi will have what? Ganon... he doesnt even have any character or personality or goals other than main villian like that is so insanely boring, i dont have any motive to want to fight in the imprisoning war

And thats where i think the outlier between age of calamity being great and age of imprisonment going to be bad. AoC fed off of the knowledge, the adoration for the characters and things and lore we were given in botw, crafting it into a love letter of a game to botw, we were hyped to see the champions and to play as them, there was a reason to want to play it to see all these things we know of the lore play out before out eyes

Whearas AoI we know nothing about the imprisoning war. It had no effect on the world, we have barely 3 mins worth of lore on it, we have zero conection to it at all. The ancient sages dont have anything to them and we dont care about them, so why would we want to play as them? I bet they will all have the exact same fighting style as the champions in botw, and we've already seen the new sages and their fighting style in aoc. Sure it will be slightly different due to their sage powers but it wont be anything that special. There is no lore we will be excited to see unfolding in front of us, we have no emotions or connection to these events other than diconnected cutscenes that dont have any impact. Even raru and sonya are so painfully boring, just the kind and fair and powerful founders on hyrule who talk the same calm way as their sages, its so incredibly boring. The zonai have no culture, lore or personality thay is in any way interesting, and they will be so boring to play cuz every character will end up being a zonai character probably most likely. Also link wont be there, so they will have to find some arbitrary way for him to be here, maybe aoc link, which just does not work at all with the lore of totk that we know it just wont work!!

The roster im guessig will be: raru, sonia, zelda, ancient sages, new sages, link, terrako, ganon

If botw was meant to be courage, aoc meant to be power and totk meant to be wisdom, then what is aoi? The lil middle bit? The nothing?

Idk im sad about this game existing, it only exist so that nintendo can milk the crazy amounts of money botw and totk made. I miss when each zelda game was a passion project from the developer, even botw was that but then totk and aoi...

I was actively not wanting a new wild era game, the art style has now gotten so boring im so tired of it even if it is good, im tired of the grand scale game in the same hyrule for THE FOURTH TIME! Let me remind you, A ZELDA GAME HAS NEVER REVISITED THE SAME HYRULE BEFORE TIL THE WILD ERA

Even eow im tired of the style because its the same iversaturated artstyle and plastic toy look of every other nintendo game and series and it doesnt have that much if its own personality like every single zelda game does, it just reuses (while a really good design and really fitting for the game) the links awakening style and doesnt have its own identity like every zelda game does its so sad

Also we've been here for so long, botw released in 2017, was announced years before that, we've been mingling in this era for 8+ years meanwhile no hero has done that before! Oot and mm released one year apart then that hero was retired, the hero of legend had four games but didnt run anywhere this long even with oot and mm releasing in the middle of his games, im so tired of the wild era and i so so so want to move on

[revolutionsingingintherainnn]

number one driver ᯓ★

── .✦ landoscar

── .✦ angst/no comfort

a/n: oscar's kind of a dick in this one. so if you don't wanna read your fav being a dick, don't click on it. do not come crying in my reblogs or my comments about how i made your little ookie pookie oscie a villain. i love oscar, and i love lando, but fuck, am i done with this bullshit. reminder that this is all fiction. oscar never really said that. just, keep your rpf away from real life.

masterlist ☾☼

"guess i'm the number one driver now, huh?" the words and the laugh that followed played on repeat on lando's phone. number one driver. of course.

lando couldn't stop watching the video. the volume was at max, the sound was echoing through his driver's room, but there he was, sat on his little bed, leaned forward, and watching oscar, his teammate, his rival, his boyfriend, say that he's the number one driver now.

and he should be, lando thought to himself, of course he should be.

a knock on the door made lando look away from the video, and he watched as oscar slipped in with a bright smile, red cheeks, wet hair. usually, lando would climb on oscar in moments like these. lando would sit on oscar's lap, and lando would kiss the hell out of him, whispering how proud he was of him. but, fuck, he couldn't find it in him today.

"great race, huh?" oscar said, laughing a little bit as he dropped on the bed across lando.

"yeah." lando gave a clipped response.

"what position did you finish? p8? p7? sorry, i can't remember, i was just so excited, y'know,"

"p4."

oscar made his usual 'impressed' expression, "oh wow, not bad. track's tricky to overtake, but good job, babe,"

"thanks."

the video still played in a the background, though, lando had lowered the voice when oscar walked in.

he gestured with his chin, "whatcha watching there?"

lando looked down at his phone, a moment's hesitation, before he turned the phone towards oscar, increasing the volume again.

"guess i'm the number one driver now, huh?" video oscar said on repeat. lando watched as real life oscar smiled, like it was a joke.

it was always a joke.

"yeah, thought it might be funny to say it. stir up some drama and shit," he said.

lando lowered the volume again, nodding, "right. funny."

he doesn't look away from video oscar, but he can feel oscar's mood changing. he can feel the way oscar's watching him.

"what? what's wrong? you didn't find it funny?"

and something in lando just... snapped.

"no, oscar, i don't think this is funny." his voice was cold, and he had to move. he stood up, trying to figure out whether he needed to pace or just get the fuck out.

"you say stuff like that all the time-"

"no, oscar, i don't. you know why? because all of these- these cowards behind their screens don't care about us, and i don't want them to hate on you the way they do to me."

oscar sat there, stunned. not sure what to say. and then, slowly, he said, "it's not that bad-"

"not that bad, oscar? not that bad? what do you know about me or my mental state or what they're writing about me since this season started? huh?"

"lando, that's unfair-"

"no, oscar! what's fucking unfair is that i've given ten years of my life to this goddamn team, stayed late every fucking saturday, turned down offers from red bull and mercedes, got my paycheques cut to fund other people, to fund the fucking team, did everything for them, and i'm not worthy to them-"

"lando-"

"the car is not for my style, there's always something wrong, it was the brakes in china, and then the changes before Q3 in bahrain, and all of that. it's the way they talk about me to the media, as if i haven't done anything for them, as if i didn't come second in the championship last year-"

"hey, i could've gotten top three last year-"

"but, you didn't, oscar! that's my fucking point! i had people breathing down my neck, watching my every move. i had death threats from everywhere. i had all of these people writing about how i'm mentally weak and how i don't have the championship mentality and how i'll never fucking win. every race i didn't win, i was hated on. for every lead i lost- even with no fault of my own sometimes -i got called names. i got called 'the bottler'! not you, oscar!

"you scored lesser than me in the championship and you're still somehow the better driver between the two of us! you've been here three years, and it's like, i don't exist to my own fucking team."

lando fell on the couch, dropping his head in his hands, trying to breathe. fuck, he needed jon or his dad or max or carlos or anyone right now.

"you- you exist to me, lando," oscar finally said softly, almost like he was afraid.

"do i, though?"

"of course you do. you're my boyfriend."

lando scoffed, rubbing a hand over his eyes. "okay, boyfriend-" god, lando had never spit that word out like this before, "where were you yesterday?"

"what do you mean?"

"after my crash. after i spent forty minutes in the medical centre, where were you?"

"i- i had to go for all the duties and recording the debrief and stuff-"

"right, right. that's obviously more important."

"lando, it's part of our job."

"clearly very important."

"what the fuck are you trying to say, lando? that i don't care about my boyfriend's crash?"

lando stood up again, needing to get out of the confined space. "what i'm saying, oscar, is that i had carlos, max, charles, george, and alex check up on me before they went for their media duties. what i'm saying is that i had jenson and nico and seb, and somehow, fucking mika hakkinen texting me and telling me to not lose hope.

"what i'm fucking saying is that from yesterday till now, you didn't even ask if i was alright. we're boyfriends, huh? clearly."

"that's not fair, i was lost in my head- lando, where are you going?"

the door was only halfway open, but lando turned to oscar and said, "i'm going over to the williams garage. won't fucking feel like a failure there. you stay lost in your head, oscar, i don't care. hope you win the championship you want. cause- cause i'm done. with you."

and he walked out.

fuck, he walked out.

⋆⭒˚.⋆🪐 ⋆⭒˚.⋆

look, i know this is shitty. i don't care. this is me trying to fucking sort my head through goddamn rpf. i don't care if you read it or if you like it or not. i'm fucking done.

[theotherbackgrounder]

Headcanon and Theories Day 5: Cerise Hood

Aka. My favorite mess.

While raised to be the next Red Riding Hood, Cerise’s true destiny is the Big Bad Wolf.

Because of her secret, Cerise didn’t have real friends she could bond with that she could call close.

Had an imaginary friend when she was a kid. Whatever happened to her?

Cerise witnessed both Raven and Ginger being bullied, but was too scared to say anything. She felt like if she spoke up it would lead to others learning her secret and that she would be targeted next for the bullying. So she said nothing. It still haunts her that she never tried to help.

Cerise has regrets from her childhood about her father, that she was never able to do the things that other girls got to do with their daddies. She always wanted to do the doughnuts for dad or the daughter-father dance

She sleeps run like a dog.

4 time champio in Storybrooke fair Hotdog eating contest. Wears disguises at the fair so her friends doesn’t find out.

Red Riding Hood has baby photos where Cerise acts more like a puppy than human baby. She had her own chew toy and everything. Edit: Apparently I read about this in Unfairest of them All.

[hulknussen]

Kevin Magnussen: 'McLaren chose me over Button. Then the shareholders overruled everyone' April 30th 2025

Kevin Magnussen speaks openly about his struggles after losing his McLaren F1 drive in 2015 and the "unfair" pressure he had from the team Pablo Elizalde - original

Kevin Magnussen had finished on the podium in his first-ever F1 race; he’d shown the speed to compete at the front for McLaren; and he had the backing of most of his team. Then, towards the end of 2014, the 22-year-old discovered just how brutal F1 could be.

In the June issue of Motor Sport, Magnussen recalls how the McLaren board voted overwhelmingly to keep him for the following season and drop team-mate Jenson Button to make way for Fernando Alonso.

Seven board members were in favour of the young Dane, including CEO Ron Dennis, with only two opting for Button. Unfortunately for Magnussen, the objectors were Mansour Ojjeh and Shaikh Mohammed Bin Essa Al Khalifa, McLaren’s majority shareholders who simply overruled the vote.

A year that had started with one of the most successful F1 debuts ended with Magnussen back on the sidelines.

“I became depressed in 2015,” he says. “I don’t mind admitting that. I lived to race, and I wasn’t racing.”

Now a veteran of 185 grands prix starts, Magnussen looks back on his F1 career with Matt Bishop in the latest Motor Sport Interview, including his sensational finish at the 2014 Australian Grand Prix that made him the first rookie since Jacques Villeneuve in 1996 to score a podium on debut.

He went on to score points in 12 races on his way to 11th in the standings, three places behind 2009 world champion Button before being demoted to a reserve position for 2015, as Alonso took his place.

“Together, Mohammed and Mansour had a majority shareholding, so they used that power to overrule everyone else, including Ron, who’d voted for me, and in 2015 I ended up being the reserve driver, which meant nothing really,” said Magnussen.

“But Ron said, ‘Trust me, you’ll race for us in 2016, or maybe even before the end of the 2015 season.’ And, honestly, I think he was being sincere. That really was his plan for me.

“So, when Williams contacted my then manager Dorte [Riis Madsen] about me racing for them in 2016, I talked to Éric [Boullier, racing director] about it, and he said, ‘No, stay with us, you’ll race for us with Fernando next season.’ And, honestly, I think he was being sincere, too. So, reassured by both Ron and Éric, I didn’t pursue the Williams option.”

Magnussen got the chance to replace Alonso in the 2015 season-opener after the Spaniard’s crash in pre-season testing, but couldn’t even complete a lap as his Honda engine broke down on his way to the grid.

Having pinned his hopes on a future with McLaren, Magnussen became increasingly despondent at being the lack of racing. “I had an offer to do some Super Formula races in Japan, which would have been cool, but Ron said I shouldn’t.

“In 2016, when Stoffel was the McLaren reserve driver, Ron let him race in Super Formula, and he loved it, winning a couple of races, so I don’t know why Ron didn’t allow me to do the same thing the year before, but anyway he didn’t.”

Ridiculous expectations

Magnussen’s podium in the Australian GP remained his best F1 race result in a career where he drove for McLaren, Renault and Haas.

Now 32 years old, Magnussen says the pressure put on him by the team was far too high for a driver as inexperienced as he was.

He revealed that he felt he wasn’t treated fairly by being compared to drivers like Lewis Hamilton, who had partnered Button at McLaren from 2010 to 2012.

“I remember Jonathan [Neale, managing director] and Éric telling me, ‘Lewis was an average of 0.15sec faster than Jenson in qualifying over the three years they raced alongside each other, so, to retain your drive for next year, you should be aiming to beat Jenson by the same margin.’

“I accepted it at the time but, looking back, it was unfair.

“Lewis and Jenson were both F1 world champions, far more experienced than I was, and Jonathan and Éric were telling me that if I wasn’t as good in my rookie season as Lewis had been in his third, fourth and fifth F1 seasons, I’d be out. That was crazy – and also disrespectful to Jenson.

“Now I wish I’d stood up for myself. I was naïve. But, in my defence, I was an F1 new boy. Inevitably, that unfair weight of expectation heaped unnecessary pressure on me, and I began to make mistakes.

“It was a ridiculous set of expectations to push onto a 21-year-old rookie. I had the talent, I had the speed, but I needed support mentally and emotionally, and the senior McLaren management on the racing side offered the opposite.”

[retroillustrates]

The Eternal Championesses

I've made half of a FB group mad with this art. It's so funny.

[sins-of-warriors]

He could feel her efforts to make him release his seed, laud moans came out of him the moment Yoko trashed her body against his hard cock, he was trying to hold his climax as much as he could to enjoy the look of her body bouncing and her face stuck on that expresión of lust but little by little as his manhood sank deeper he pass his limits, taking a firm grip into her waist the barbarian began to go faster and roughly smaking his cock up until a warm feeling began to flood her his cum spilling right into her womb expanding it to fit this new load that filled beyond her expectations.

A Big Fan (Closed RP w/ @sins-of-warriors

Linda approached the private quarters of the popular gladiator, happy to have finally gotten past. She was married, but her private life had been dead for years. She wore what was basically a dancer's outfit, still looking great despite nearing 40. She was still a beauty, and she squeezed her tit, moaning slightly. She was definitely ready for this, and she knocked on his door, waiting.

[daikhenkhi]

There's hardly any Johanna content in this fandom, so I commissioned the talented @ephemereos to write a fic centered on her. Read on A03 or under the cut

Johanna woke up in a cold sweat, her eyes shooting open. Her heart thumped in her chest, rattling against her ribcage. She had a felling something was really wrong. She didn't know what, but her gut just told her something was off. She felt a weight at her feet and looked down to see her Glameow staring back at her, blinking its eyes blearily. It was clearly concerned for it's owner, but still battling sleep. Johanna looked around the room, the first lights of the morning sun were seeping in, and she could hear a group of Starly chirp from the nearby trees. She looked at her phone, checking for time: 6:00 A.M. It was too early to call Lucas, so she sent him a message.

"Honey, how are you doing? Call me when you wake up, if you're not too busy. I just wanna hear your voice. Miss you!"

She went on about her day, waiting for a call or message from her son, but heard nothing from Lucas. A pit of dread settled at the bottom of her stomach, but she tried not to think about it too much. She didn't want to seem overly protective. Maybe Lucas was just busy, maybe he still needed to get adjusted to his new life. She was sure he would call at some point

That evening, Johanna turned her head from the sink to took outside the window, watching the setting sun paint the sky with beautiful oranges and pinks. From the open window came the distinct smell of summer, and she could hear the faint call of a few Hoothoots from nearby trees, getting ready to live their night. She dipped the plate back into the water before scrubbing it clean, then dried it and placed it away. She dried her hands on the apron, then pulled it off and hung it to dry. Johanna felt something soft bump her leg, and looked down to see her Glameow stare back at her and purr.

“It’s time for our show, I know.” She chuckled and followed Glameow to the couch, where Jumpy had already taken her usual spot.

“Well, you better leave some space for us as well.” Johanna put her hands on her hips and laughed, gently scolding the Pokémon. But she had more than enough space left, and Jumpy’s size definitely helped her not feel the missing presence as much. Jumpy grumbled playfully and scooted over a little. She sat down next to her, and Glameow curled up on Johanna’s lap almost immediately. She was grateful for their company, she genuinely didn't know what she would've done without the two Pokémon.

She turned on the TV and zapped around for a while until she came across a news program. Normally, she wouldn’t have stopped, but they were showing a picture of Lucas. It was nothing that Johanna didn’t know already; it was mostly an article recounting his recent victory as the new League champion. She lingered just to look at the pictures they were showing of him. She couldn’t believe how quickly he had grown up, how far he had gone all on his own. She was so proud she felt her chest tighten in a mixture of joy and bittersweet melancholy. Things hadn’t always been easy. When he was diagnosed with autism as a child, his father decided to erase himself from the picture. Johanna still couldn’t understand how he could leave them so easily, but it was no use dwelling on the past. Johanna’s stardom dreams had to be put away, as much as she loved doing contests with her Pokémon, she knew Lucas needed her more. And while giving up wasn’t easy, she was so glad she had made that choice. The time spent with Lucas had been a gift, and seeing him go as far as becoming a league champion was proof to the world of what she had always known: her son was more than what people thought him to be.

As soon as the news article was over, Johanna switched channels and landed on a replica of a Pokémon contest show. She needed to distract herself before she started running in circles, thinking about Lucas. As long as he wasn’t 18, Cynthia remained the standing champion. At first, Johanna had hoped he could stay there, close to her, especially considering everything he had gone through with Team Galactic. But Cynthia had eventually convinced her to let him spread his wings. After all, he had shown he could fend for himself just fine, and he had his Pokémon by his side…But a mother stays a mother, and she wishfully hoped he’d come back, at least for a little while.

After a while, Johanna felt her head and eyes grow heavy, and she struggled to stay awake. She sighed and turned off the TV, patting Glameow’s head to wake her up.

“Let’s head to bed.”

She sat on her bed, looking at her phone. Still no message, no call from Lucas. She furrowed her brows. It wasn’t the first time he didn’t answer for a day or two. Especially when he first started out his voyage, he would only get back to her after a couple of days; some areas really had no reception at all. Perhaps he had just set off on another little trip. She placed her phone on the bedside table and lay down, staring at the ceiling. As soon as her eyes fell shut and she began to doze off, she was scared awake by her phone ringing. She felt hope rise in her chest and threw herself to get the cellphone, but her face fell a little in disappointment when she read “Cynthia” was the caller. She stilled her voice and answered.

“Yes, Cynthia? Why such a late-night call? Did something happen?”

“Yes.” Cynthia’s voice was more serious than Johanna had ever heard it to be. She felt her blood run cold.

“What’s the matter? Did something happen to Lucas?” Johanna asked, her voice rising in panic. There was a brief silence on the other side of the phone, and she could tell Cynthia was tense.

“Johanna, I…I have no idea what happened, but Lucas disappeared. He’s gone missing from the league building, and we haven’t found him anywhere in the vicinity either.”

Johanna felt her entire world collapse in an instant. Her hands trembled so violently she could barely keep hold of the phone.

"Johanna, I—Arceus—I’m so sorry. Lucas is… he’s gone."