#day 6 that same girl called me amy and a girl name (not close ti Damien and a girls name)

[ajax-mew]

when i back in uni

me think

i do uni updates again

[clan-sayeed-fic]

Let me earn your trust (Kamilah Sayeed & MC) finale

Previous chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24

Book: Bloodbound (property of Pixelberry Studios) Pairing: Kamilah Sayeed & MC: Amy (I do not own those characters, they're the property of Pixelberry Studios as well) ❗ Warnings: this chapter describes difficult situations / angst / might cause distress ❗ Rating: Mature Author's note:  I'm not a native English speaker, I'm sorry for any mistakes (feel free to correct me).

So here we are, at the end of the story. I'm honestly shocked that this story even has the end, or that I wrote it because... you know... every story has it 😄

From this place, I would like to say thank you to everyone who read this fic and stayed here with me in anticipation of what will happen next. Believe me, for the majority of the time, I was totally clueless about what the next chapters would bring to the story haha 😅

The finale turned out to be probably the longest chapter of all from this fic. I hope you'll enjoy reading it! 💖💖💖

~ 3300 words

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Chapter 25 finale

"Why don't you free yourself?" the calming voice woke Amy up, once again.

She opened her eyes to see almost the exact same ones, a little smile was playing in the corner of the woman's mouth in front of her.

"I'm tied up to this stupid chair if you haven't noticed," her company started annoying Amy earlier, but the woman never left.

No matter what.

"Soon enough, all those ferals will spread all over the city, and you're down here, waiting," the woman's voice judgemental.

Amy looked at her own hands and tried to struggle, pulling on the rope. But her attempt ended up with the string driving deeper into her skin, causing more pain.

"I'm too weak," she gave up, tilting her head back, exhausted even after such a little effort.

The woman was staying in front of Amy without doing anything. All she had to do to help her was untying the ropes, cutting them with something sharp.

Instead, she just said out loud.

"Don't give up."

***

"Have you heard the rumors?" Adrian's words were trying to fight their way through Kamilah's thoughts.

It had been almost two weeks since Amy disappeared. They didn't have much progress so far in finding her. Adam left without saying anything, which only confirmed their theory about him being guilty.

But even though their hands were tied up.

If they accused a senator of New York of doing such thing as kidnapping a person without actual proof, no one would ever believe them. They needed to talk to him first, push him into giving himself away, and telling them where he was holding Amy captive.

The next matter they had to take into consideration was that Adam wasn't only a senator of the city. What most important was him, being a well-respected member of the Council and a clan leader. Baseless accusations would cause chaos and make vampires grow suspicious.

Because, why would any vampire be concerned about a human?

Explaining it would require giving up Amy's identity about her being a Bloodkeeper. And that wasn't an option.  

"I did, I'm already on the way to his office," Kamilah's voice sharp.

"Please, Kamilah, don't do anything stupid," Adrian's voice showed his deep concern.

But the woman only hung up, driving as fast as she could, heading to Vega's office. Kamilah's source had already told her about his arrival. It was like this man didn't exist for the last few days, unable to find. And now, when he finally decided to step out of shadows, they would have a talk.

Not the most polite one.

Kamilah didn't even bother to wait or ask anyone to let her in. Thanks to her vampire speed, she was standing in front of him within a second.

"Where is she?" her eyes flashing with red from anger.

Adam was in the middle of work, crowded with a stack of papers around him. He stopped writing something down right after the woman walked to his office.

"Can I help you with something, Ms. Sayeed?" he took off his glasses, leaning back on his seat, his expression untouched.

"Yes, you can start by telling me where the hell did you hide her, you..." Kamilah was filled with rage, barely controlling herself.

Vega looked at her with surprise. That was an unusual view to see the great Kamilah Sayeed being attached to someone such weak like a simple mortal.

"That's interesting," his voice calm, as the opposite to hers. "Because, a while ago, I remember having Amy here in my office," he made a pause, taking out some documents from the drawer. "Or, should I say... Amelia."

"If you even touched her, I swear..." Kamilah made a fist out of her hands, using all of her strength to stay in place.

She knew that anger would have no use for Amy at that moment, but the awareness of it didn't stop the rage burning inside her veins. Hearing the girl's name leaving this poisoned mouth made it even harder for her to handle.

"I did way much more than that," Vega smiled, but before the woman jumped to his throat, he put the files before her. "But nothing that she hadn't already agreed on."

Kamilah grabbed the documents, reading them with impossible tempo, taking all the letters, words, sentences, paragraphs of the contract in.

Recognizing Amy's signature at the end of it.

"She didn't..." Kamilah's mouth slightly opened in disbelief.

"She did what she had to do," Adam's mouth curling in a sly smile. "Uphold her end of the deal," he reached for the speaker, a smile never leaving his face. "Be so kind and send here someone who'll show Ms. Sayeed the way to the doors."

Kamilah's eyes had never been before this red, an intense shade of crimson burning inside her iris. She ripped the contract apart with her nails, assuming that Adam showed her only a copy of it.

"You don't know who you're dealing with Vega," icy stare of her eyes. "I will..."

"You will do nothing," he put on his glasses. "And if I may suggest something, I recommend you to leave the city before it gets too hot in here," he looked at her one last time. "I'm saying it as a friend, Kamilah."

"Don't you dare call yourself my friend," she almost yelled.

At that moment, the security entered the room, and not wanting to cause any more scene Kamilah turned around speechless.

She made a promise to herself.

She will not rest until she finds Amy and brings her home.

***

"It's happening."

"How do you know?" Amy's forehead sweating.

It had been hours since Vega left her there. The wounds after needles were finally healed, but she lost a lot of blood until it happened.

"I don't, but you do," the woman looked at her with concern.

Her skin was getting paler with every minute of waiting, acting like she was the reflection of Amy. Like what was happening to both of them was somehow connected.

But what she said was true, Amy was able to feel it inside her chest that something was happening. New York might have been burning or being destroyed by the enormous amount of free ferals running between the buildings. The mindless creatures killing innocents.

And she was still closed there, alone.

Almost alone.

To think that her blood was the key for Vega to build his own empire. The blood that was running inside veins of such useless girl as she was at that moment.

No, it won't end like this, Amy scolded herself in thoughts. She started to struggle again on the chair, pulling on the ropes. With a similar result to her previous attempt.

"Good, keep fighting," the voice echoed next to her, or inside her head, she wasn't sure of that anymore.

That's when Amy started moving her body back and forth, trying to swing the chair. It was actually working, legs of the chair slightly lifting and falling again. But still not enough.

Come on...just... fucking... move, her mind shouted.

Suddenly, the chair lost its balanced, and she fell with it on the ground. The chair broke after meeting with the floor, leaving the girl writhing in pain.

"Amy, get up, you don't have much time," the woman beside her, encouraging her.

Amy sighed loudly and slowly lifted her weak body. Everything before her eyes went blurry, but somehow, she managed to focus on the surroundings, and reach the stairs.

She climbed slowly to the doors, and without much hope, she gripped the door handle.

To her surprise, the doors were left open, and she needed only to give them a little push to see what was hidden behind them.

Freedom.

***

"We need to go now!" Adrian shouted at both women.

The whole city was under evacuation. Everything started in the morning.

At first, there were only speculations from someone seeing a few ferals in unrelated to each other places, which made it look like a coincidence. But then, reports started coming from many clan members and sources that Council had spread all over the city.

It was sure then, they had to call it a crisis.

It made Kamilah, Lily, and Adrian hurry to Vega's office, trying to finally get information about where he kept Amy. Since there was already chaos and panic everywhere, they didn't care anymore about the meaning of his reputation.

But, to their great astonishment, when they got there, the place was filled with ferals. They were sure that Adam did it as a distraction, so anyone would think about him being responsible for the attack.

So that's where they found themselves, fighting those ferals together. Every time it seemed that they were getting closer to win, there was more of them appearing out of nowhere.

"We are outnumbered, we stand no chance with them!" Adrian tried to reason with women once again. "We won't help her by dying here today!"

"Either way, this whole city is gonna burn with everyone in it!" Lily shouted from a different place, getting herself lost in a fight.

"That's why we need to save ourselves," Adrian answered, between ripping heads of several ferals. "Vega must have taken Amy with himself. He wouldn't have left her here to die, he needs her."

Their talk was interrupted by more attackers. Ferals were hissing from every side of the hall, getting closer one by one.

It was the worst type of enemy. They weren't scared of anything, and the only thing responsible for their bloodlust was their instinct. Even seeing one of their own kind getting killed meant nothing for them.

"I know that she..." Kamilah's voice interrupted when she cut through the chest of another feral with her daggers, "...is here. End of discussion!"

One of the ferals came out of nowhere, attacking Kamilah before she even sensed its presence behind. That's when Adrian came with help, killing the creature just in time before it tried to bite her.

"I won't let you die, only because you have an intuition," he sent her a grave look, showing how serious he was about that.

Kamilah was ready to argue with him, but at the same time, something hit her. It was this impossibly intense and tempting smell. It made all of the vampires look at each other meaningfully.

They didn't have to say anything, everyone knew what this scent meant.

"Go get her," Lily said to Kamilah and smiled slyly. "My bro and I will keep those greedy ferals in place a little bit more."

***

Amy went out of the basement, and from that moment, the noise hit her.

Earlier, she wasn't able to hear anything since walls and doors were soundproof. And then, when she escaped from that place, every sound was hitting her brain, making it almost explode from ache.

"Keep going, Amy," the voice behind her pierced through all the noises. "Focus your hearing on what's important."

The girl followed her advice, being able to recognize the sounds, separate them from each other. What the most stood up from all of them was hissing. This characteristic, irritating noise was coming from higher floors of the building she found herself in.

Amy never heard something like that, so she only assumed that it was ferals who made those sounds.

But, there was something else in the noise.

Somehow, maybe subconsciously, Amy heard a deep, feminine voice. The one that she would recognize anywhere.

"Kamilah!" she screamed without thinking, feeling a sudden relief in her chest.

But even though she yelled as loud as she could, nothing happened.

She tried shouting again, but clearly, it wasn't working.

"She can't hear me," Amy leaned her back against the wall, feeling hopeless.

Kamilah didn't hear her, she was lost in the fight. She would probably never know that Amy even was down there. The thought of it made her legs tremble as she slowly sat down on the floor, putting both hands on her sides, trying to steady herself.

That's when her fingertips touched the cold surface, making her move away in surprise. She looked at the floor, noticing shattered glass all over the place. And she knew what to do.

"Please, notice this," Amy whispered to herself.

She cut deep through her wrist, right at the place of her old scar.

Breaking it apart, making blood flow out of her body once again.

***

"Tell me, what has all of this brought you?" a soft voice, the same one never leaving her side.

Amy looked into her eyes, smiling. There was no chance left for her, and the thought of that made her chuckle ironically.

The woman was right. Was it all even worth the effort?

Frustration, pain, constant feeling of fear.

Good memories, friendship, love.

Her head became heavier, breaths were slowing down. She was giving up little by little, drifting away into darkness.

Her body couldn't take much more.

She didn't want to fight more.

"Amy," the young woman tried to wake her up, but the girl's eyes were closed.

"Amy," another attempt.

"Amy!" the voice sounded different, waking her up immediately.

She didn't see the blonde girl in front of her anymore. No, the view was way much more gorgeous. She quickly recognized the features she knew so well, eyes that she kept looking into so many times, completely mesmerized.

The definition of pure perfection.

"Kamilah," Amy smiled weakly, barely believing in what was happening. She looked around, searching for the woman that accompanied her earlier. "Where is she?"

"Where is who?" Kamilah already healed Amy's wound, stopping the bleeding.

"This woman... she was here," Amy's voice was shaky. "She helped me."

"Amy..." those chestnut eyes were showing so much concern. "You must be mistaken. There was no one except you when I got here."

How...Amy's brain started working, reminding itself all the moments during which she was talking to this woman. The woman with blonde, wavy hair, light skin, green eyes.

How she spoke to her, with the exact same voice that was leaving Amy's mouth every time she said something. How she was looking at her with the same eyes, feeling the same emotions.

"Oh my god," Amy looked at Kamilah when the solution hit her. "It was me."

It was me all this time, she said to herself, shocked when she finally understood the message behind the vision.

"Amy, you lost too much blood," Kamilah tried to lift her, but the girl disobeyed. It made the woman frown with misunderstanding, "I need to take you from here as soon as it's possible, it's not safe."

But the girl looked like she didn't want to be saved, the view making Kamilah's heart to break in half. She was looking at this person, and she couldn't recognize her anymore. There was no light in her green eyes.

Not in the way like it was before.

"How bad is it?" Amy asked her, smile fading away from her face. "Tell me, Kamilah, how bad is it, is there any chance to fight it?"

The vision of herself hit her again, the memory when her own eyes turned red.

"No," Kamilah kneeled down, close to the girl. "Adrian and Lily are upstairs, they are trying to keep the ferals away, but there are no more vampires left in the city," her voice broke, "only humans."

Amy closed her eyes for a moment, she was aware of what needed to happen next. She knew that Kamilah would not be able to get her out of there, not when Amy was in this state.

And at least one of them should have a chance to make it out alive.

"You need to fight them all," Amy looked at her, holding her by the cheek because Kamilah was avoiding her eyes. She knew what was coming before she even heard the words. "You need to fight them all, save the city."

"Even if we tried, that's impossible," the woman placed her hand over Amy's, feeling her cold skin that caused shudders down her spine.

"Of course it's impossible on your own, silly," Amy chuckled, a single tear escaping her eye. "That's why you have me."

"Amy...don't," Kamilah couldn't take it.

There was no need to go back to the night of their argument. No need to say the words of apology, when they understood each other without them. This night was just a meaningless episode, nothing compared to what they felt toward each other.

And Amy already made her decision about their future fate.

She freed her hand from Kamilah's grip and neared her wrist to the vampire's mouth.

"With my blood, you can do this," she spoke aloud, keeping herself calm.

"It will kill you," Kamilah's eyes filling with tears, the view breaking Amy's heart into million pieces. "You lost too much blood for this..."

"Take what's left," Amy interrupted. "Take all of it," she smiled reassuringly, "all of me with you."

Tears escaped Kamilah's eyes and flew down her cheeks without control. She knew that what Amy had in mind would work. That this was the only way to save those innocent people. Maybe even the only one to save Adrian and Lily.

Drinking Bloodkeeper's blood would make her impossibly powerful, it would stand for enough time for her to kill all the ferals.

But it was Amy's blood.

It was her Amy who they were talking about, and Kamilah didn't know if she was ready for such a sacrifice.

"Hey," Amy sensed her pain. "It's ok, it's my choice, I'm ok with it."

"I'm not," Kamilah's voice shaky.

"Kamilah..." Amy didn't hold back tears anymore. "I trust you...I...I love you more than anyone in my life."

The woman froze in place, she wasn't expecting to hear such words. She didn't expect to hear them at all, and for sure not under such circumstances.

She opened her mouth slightly, wanting to say something, but Amy didn't let her.

"Don't say anything," the girl smiled a little. "You'll tell me when all of it will be over," her hope was killing them both from the inside. "You can be sure that I won't let you forget about it," Amy smiled weakly.

"Of course, you won't," Kamilah returned the smile, looking at her with love in her eyes, trying to be brave.

She leaned down to Amy's lips, placing a soft kiss on them.

This one last time.

When she stepped back, they shared a meaningful look, ready for what's to come.

Kamilah took Amy's wrist up to her own mouth. Her fangs grew out from her teeth, but this time it wasn't accompanied by any intoxicating feeling.

After a moment of hesitation, she finally did what she hated the most at that moment.

She bit through the soft surface of her skin.

Blood started floating down her throat, but its taste brought no pleasure. Kamilah's body was growing more powerful, her skin was glowing. Every cell, nerve, muscle in her body was waking up alive.

But all she felt was the pain.

Like she was dying all over again.

For this whole time, they were looking into each other's eyes.

As life from one was flowing to another.

Amy kept a reassuring smile on her face as long as she could, trying to give the woman courage. To help her get through this. Even if she was the one from whom the life was escaping with every minute.

After a while, her eyes closed up, and all she was hearing was her heartbeat, dangerously slowing down.

At first, she felt pain, then the ache changed into pure exhaustion that was mixed with relief.

Sounds around her mixed with each other, leaving silence behind.

Until the very last drop of blood left Amy's body.

And there was nothing more for her to feel in this life.

***

One thing was clear,

Amy was dead.

And who would have guessed...

That when you die,

Your heart can beat stronger than ever before.

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Explanation 

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tag list: @onyxgaytrash @lightning-fury @scarlet-letter-a0114 @caliseds @myonlybae-joohyun @spacecarrousel

[hollands-poppet]

Dancing with Our Hands Tied // Part 8 ( Last Part..) // Tom Holland x Reader

Summary: Tom Holland is your best friend and your roommate, but you both have undisclosed feelings for each other.

Word count: 3K💛

A/N: HELLLOO BABIES!! AMY IS BACK FROM THE DEAD. HAHA jk, well kind of. I really wanted to finish this story because I just kind of want to move on from this phase of my life, as far as my fan fictions go. I still want to write, I just want to move on from this story. I love you guys, hope it was worth the wait!!!  💛 💛 💛

Warnings:  cussing, I didn’t proofread at all lmao.. I’m just gonna copy and past all my warnings now hahaha y’all get so butthurt on here (like fake fucking homecomings like wtf), its just a fucking story. anyway, this shit ain’t real..if you don’t want to read what people want to put out then maybe fan fictions aren’t for ya.. y’all are super sensitive on here lmao k thanks for coming to my ted talk bye and I kind of proofread but not really

PART 1 PART 2 PART 3 PART 4 PART 5 PART 6 PART 7

-

-

“You what?!” Zendaya yells at Tom who is zipping up his spidey suit.

“I broke up with her.” And he says it with such anger in himself, he would admit that he had a short temper but he knew he fucked up. He didn’t mean to break up with her but the heat of the moment brought up all these emotions and he wanted to hurt her in that short second. It had been a day since he had about seen y/n but it felt like a lifetime.

In that short second, he wanted to hurt her because she had hurt him. But had he waited another second, none of this would have happened if he had just listened to what she had to say..but he didn’t. He brought breaking up first, and he knew it was fault.

“Tom, you realize that you screwed this up right? I really don’t know what else to tell you.” Zendaya says as she waits for her co-star to get ready to shoot.

He wouldn’t admit it but the truth burned, “I know! I know! But- I just..I didn’t think about what I was saying..I just wanted her to come back with me, y’know?” He finishes zipping up the side of the suit and faces Z in the face and away from the mirror in his trailer, “I fucked up..and that’s that.”

Zendaya gives a sarcastic smile as she begins to slow clap, “Royally, my friend.”

Tom rolls his eyes and flips off his friend whose only laying out the plain truth, and only a few seconds later Harrison walks in with a cup of coffee.

“Is that my coffee?” Tom asks as he walks towards his friend/assistant but finds that the cup of joe moves over his hand.

“No mate, sorry.” Haz takes a sip, “Honestly, you don’t want to kiss Zendaya with coffee breath though.:

Z and Tom’s heads both snap at the exact moment in shock and at same time speak, “that’s today?!”

Haz gulps down another sip of his coffee, “Yeah, talk about bad timing. Break up with your girlfriend and kiss another girl right in front of her. What a time to be an actor!” The blonde says exaggeratingly to annoy his best friend.

Tom sighs as she walks towards the exit of his trailer, “Is y/n on set yet?”

Haz shrugs as he looks at himself in the vanity, “Not sure, maybe.” Z lightly smacks the back of his head, “You’re literally no help.”

-

Everyone on set was ready, it had taken about two hours to prep and all the crew was waiting for was the talent. y/n was along one of the crew to wait around to touch up Z, she wore barely to any makeup for the role of MJ. Her job for this specific film was to make sure her hair looked consistent and to pat away any shiny-ness on Z’s face.

She waited for Tom and Zendaya along with everyone and she didn’t know how she really felt about that, she wasn’t sure what they were filming today to be honest. She did notice some harnesses, so she figured that her ex was probably going to be filming some stunts. Even though they were no longer an item, to even refer to Tom as in ex in her mind really hurt.

She didn’t understand why he would do that to her, and for such a stupid reason too, well in her opinion at least. She knew Tom was going to feel some type of way about her not moving to Kingston, but she didn’t think the worst. She didn’t know it was going to be his deal breaker.

y/n clears her throat as away to get back in focus because the talent is finally arriving on set, and from the distance there she spots him. She sees Tom and Z walk on set, and his mask is already on. The only visible part of his face were his eyes, he couldn’t put on the spidey eyes until they were ready to film for safety reasons.

Z breaks off from Tom and makes her towards y/n to get touched up before they start filming. Tom makes his way towards the stunt coordinator and towards the harnesses to discuss what’s about to go down.

y/n hears her name and immediately focuses back on her task, this was not the time and place to be thinking about this. She pulls a powder puff and brush so that she can begin touching up Zendaya.

“How you feeling?” Z asks as she looks into her friends eyes, y/n sighs as she pats down her forehead and completely avoids eye contact.

She almost whispers her response because she doesn’t want to even think about it, “Just leave it alone, please.”

Y/N puts away her brush and powder in her belt and re-adjusts Z’s hair just to make sure it’s been consistent since the last time they shot. “Don’t worry about me today.”

And for the most part, Y/N was zoned out until she was called to fix Zendaya’s hair or touch up her shine. A lot ran through her mind as she stand behind the tents and cameras, and a lot was about her and Tom and if all these fighting was worth it anymore.

When y/n wasn’t zoned out, she would catch glimpses of Zendaya and Tom laughing and talking. It almost stung because he was so nonchalant about everything but he also had a job to do, and so did y/n.

y/n and tom started off as roommates and nothing more but this nothing turned into something. She knew what she was getting herself into and now she just wanted a way out of it.

All she needed was time and he couldn’t give that to her… well that’s what it seemed like. People in love say ‘home is where the heart is’ and if that’s what Tom was then why couldn’t she let go of the rest.. right?

More bitterness began to hit as the day was closer to ending. This was the last day of filming and she couldn’t believe that these past few months had gone by so quickly. It also hit her that she hasn’t gotten help for her trauma that she hadn’t taken care of.

She knew it was a reason that caused her and Tom break up.

As Tom and Zendaya swing down from the air and onto the pavement, y/n watches from the distance as the two lock eyes and the film is still rolling. He pulls of his mask and immediately locks his lips with Zendaya, and it’s almost a stab to the heart.

And they didn’t just shoot this scene once, they shot it enough that y/n had to move away from the main set while she hung out at the food table.

This was all fake and she knew that, and she was going to be fine. It was a little annoying to see but she knew that he loved her whether he had to kiss her best friend or not. And this was one of the last of her problems because she had nowhere to live and also had ptsd.

“cut! and that’s a wrap!”

y/n sighs and lets out a fake smile as the rest of the crew who claps out of excitement because quite literally this was the last scene. She claps from the food table as she watches her friends from the distance. Spiderman:far from home was done and so were her and Tom?

-

-

y/n had began packing for a couple of hours now, shooting was wrapped and she had no other reason to be in new york anymore. z was on her way back home to vacation with her family and y/n literally had nowhere to go. She wasn’t sure what Tom had done with their apartment back in LA but she as hell didn’t want to back there.

Her ptsd from that awful situation still haunts her and being alone in that place would trigger her so bad. This was truly one of those moments that she didn’t know if she could escape from, she had to face her fears whether that meant being homeless for a couple of days or facing Tom. She didn’t know if she could do either of them but she had to choose.

It was like in that moment the energy had brought up the knock on your hotel room door, “Who is it?” She asks as she continues shoving some of her toiletries in her luggage. The person’s voice at the door was too faint to hear so she decided to look and there stood her tall friend, Zendaya. y/n wasn’t too excited about company at the moment but she decided to open the door for her friend, “ Hey..”

Z smiles awkwardly, her snaggle tooth making an appearance, “Can I come in?”

y/n purses her lips in thought and nods almost hesitantly but let’s her friend into her room, “What’s up?” She asks as she closes her room door.

“I just wanted to check up on you, you’ve been pretty distant since we filmed last..” Zendaya turns around to face y/n who is still close to the door, “Like right now, your energy feels so off.”

y/n sighs, rubs her eyes in frustration and completely forgets she has mascara on, “I mean, Tom and I are done. I’m kind of upset about that.”

Z crosses her arms, she believed y/n but something felt different. “Okay, I get that but did I do something?” Her arms unfold and she rest her to hands on her chest, “Did I do something personally to upset you?”

And in fact, y/n wasn’t upset with her good friend at all but just bitter because she was freely being intimate with Tom on set. It was work though, Tom and Z’s job is romantic at the moment and y/n had no say in that but it also wasn’t her friend’s fault. In truth, y/n couldn’t bare the sight of them together but she had no right to be upset at her friend.

Although y/n wanted to tell Z the truth, right now wasn’t the time. “I- I just have a lot on my mind, I’m kind of homeless right now so I’m trying to figure out where I should even book a flight to.”

Z walks up to her friend and holds both of her elbows, she is super confused. “What do you mean..homeless? Your apartment..?”

y/n nods her head in defeat, even bowing her head because she can’t look her friend in the eyes, “I can’t go back there..it’s just too much.” Just thinking about the break in makes her so nauseous, the tears in her eyes beginning to overflow.

“Is it because of Tom?” Z asks, and y/n’s head immediately shoots up, “How dare you ask that.”

y/n’s tone becomes serious, her two tears flow down her cheeks as her eyes dry up, “I have more important things to deal with than him. I think I fucking need therapy for that fucking break in because I’m so fucked up and I can’t be alone.”

“Then don’t be, y/n.”

y/n nods her head, her throat burning because she is triggered that her friend is hitting the spots that she has been avoiding.

“For fucksakes, he literally wants to move to a different country with you..please help me understand.” Zendaya’s voice is in between frustrated but also understanding, she wants nothing but the best for her friend.

“That’s the thing... I need to be alone.” y/n moves past her friend and sits next to her luggage, “I need to be okay to be alone again. I love him so much..I just can’t be alone and what if-”

“What if?” Z asks before she can even finish her sentence. She makes her way next to y/n and moves her hair behind her ears, desperate to try and help her friend find an answer.

“What if I let my trauma take over my life?” She sighs as she lets out a few more tears, “I just know that I have to take care of this.”

-

-

Even though filming was done, Tom was going to stay in the big apple for a couple of more days. He was going to make an appearance at jimmy kimmel the next night so he was resting up. He lay on his bed in his pajamas and phone in hand just scrolling through his instagram when he gets a call.

Her name reads across the screen as he sits up quickly and blinks a couple of more times to make sure this was real.

“Hello?” He says into the phone, waiting to hear her voice on the other side.

“Hey...uhm, I’m outside your door.”

He keeps the phone to his ear as he gets up from his bed and makes his way to the hotel door, removing all the extra locks and there she was.

There is awkward tension but the energy flowing between them also feels safe. She brings her phone to her jean pocket and clears her throat, “Can I…?” She doesn’t even finish her question, it doesn’t give Tom more than a second to move out of the way.

He finally removes the phone from his ear, “I didn’t think you would still be here.”

She shrugs her shoulders as she stands in the middle of his room, “There were still things I needed to take care of.”

“Like us?” Tom bluntly asks, he needed to know and she needed to know that he fucked up. y/n looks to the ground and bites her bottom lip and makes eye contact with him, “There is no us..not anymore and I just wanted to-”

“No,no,no,” He repeatedly says as he drops

his phone to the floor and makes his way to her, “Listen, I fucked up so badly and I just wanted you to know that we don’t have to move anywhere you don’t want to.”

y/n purses her lips in thought, not even directly making eye contact with him. “I just- I need help.”

Tom shrugs his neck back a bit in confusion, “What?”

Tears begin to flow down her cheeks as she lets out a sigh in between an awkward laugh, “I need to be able to be alone..whether we’re together or not. I need to be able to be independent and not afraid.”

Before he can even respond, she continues. “And trust me, moving to a different country with you has nothing to do with it. And the old me would’ve went in a heartbeat...I need to find her again.”

Tom is still slightly unaware at what she is hinting it, he understands that the break in still has her a bit paranoid. “So, what are you saying?”

“I’m going to start going to therapy.” She lets out as she stands in the front of his bed, she meddles with her fingers as she finally releases her truth.

“And that’s okay, darling. I’m literally going to be here with you every step of the way.” Tom remarks as he finally makes his way to her, his hands interlocking with hers. Her hands weren’t as warm as they usually were but there he was to make her feel safe again. His hands move from her hands and up her arms, she still isn’t making eye contact with him.

“We can’t, Tom.” She doesn’t move, not even an inch because the warmth feels nice and familiar. She’s weary of even giving into a hug or a kiss, she doesn’t want to regret her decision.

He notices her not wanting to give into him but he also knows that this is what she has wanted for a long time..actually what they both have wanted for the longest time.

“Come on, love...aren’t you tired of dancing with our hands tied?” He asks as his hands rest on her neck, and her hands slowly come up his.

Her head comes closer to his, their noses touching at this point, “I am tired..but I need to work on myself first.”

Their lips touch and it felt like nothing has ever went wrong between the two. They were just two young kids who wanted only this and this moment to last forever.

She pulls away and her sighs, she needs to express a bit more before any of this goes further, “Tom..I just want you to know that I can’t move to Kingston…”

He nods in agreement as their noses are still intact, “That’s okay, love. You don’t-”

“But, I do. I really do want to move there and be with you.” She bites her bottom lip as her hands hold onto arms tightly, “I just need to make sure I’m okay..And I don’t know if that’ll be tomorrow, a week, a month, a year.” There is a pause between the two, she’s nervous. All she wanted was this to work and whether that meant they had to work on themselves separately or together.

All y/n wanted to make sure was that he made her heart feel safe, and that if this wasn’t okay that he needed to tell her that. All she wanted to hear was that it was going to be okay, and his response was only a few moments away. She hoped he didn’t run away this time.

-

A/N: SO DON’T FREAK OUT. THERE IS GOING TO BE AN EPILOGUE. UNTIL THEN...HIT MY MESSAGES..SEND ME THEORIES, THOUGHTS ANYHTING! LOVE YOU GUYS.  -Amy 💛

[philester]

my II Experience

Hey, a bunch of you guys have been asking me my experience and honestly I wanted to tell y’all how amazing it was but I was still on the high from the show and friends last night. I’ll put everything about the show under the cute and everything before the show before the cut! It was honestly one of the best nights of my life and it was so great to meet up with a bunch of amazing people! I will never forget this night :’)

Before the Meet & Greet: 

I didn’t take a picture of the thank you note, but I made a little doodle and thank you note of the II team and I gave it to Ryann as she was by the merch table when I arrived

I was lowkey intimidated by her so I made @haleykynz​ @danisonfire​ @gryphll​ @bellesandtea​ come with me ajhsdka (also I fuckin love these guys...v talented people)

Ryann said thanks and smiled really big and then went inside to show the rest of the crew

While we were waiting outside, some people started airdropping random shit kashdlaskjd (see below...its not letting me post it up here)

when I got to the security check I had my lanyard in my backpack and I always carry pepper spray with me so they told me I couldn’t go in with the spray sakdhkajsd so i literally ran back to the car, chucked the spray, and ran back and then i was v sweaty (thankfully the car was less than a 5 min walk)

Marianne (icon) was organizing us inside and went over the general rules of the meet and greet

they dropped the video right before the meet n greet asldjhaksjd i hate them

DnP came out, and we all lost our shit and started hyperventilating and some of the people around our group were like...wtf???

DnP were both wearing black and god was REAL because I just wanted Phil to either be wearing glasses or black and the universe listened to me and had phil wear black

Meet & Greet

OMG ailhdsjlasdjaksdkjhaslkjdhajsdhakjsdhljkasdlkjasdkljalksjdlkajsd

for my letter, I actually had a thicc envelope because not only did I have my actual letter, I printed out the entire script of the Bee Movie and I wish I can see their expressions of whenever they saw my letter ajdhaksld

I filmed for Haley, and I freaked out and almost forgot cause they were so beautiful and I couldn’t stop staring at how good they looked

Haley and I switched places, and Dan gave met he softest look EVER and Phil did this cute ass smile and they were both like hello :’)

I looked at Phil again up close and blacked out 

In the time I blacked out I gave them both a hug (they both smelled good, their voices were so much deeper, I almost cried; Phil was so nice to hug cause he is so skinny and I just wrapped my arms around his torso; Dan was like a bear...he was so soft and while it was his usual side hug it was still so nice)

I deemed myself unworthy of looking at Phil because he was just so beautiful so I remember looking at Dan a bit more but I would black out every time I switched to look at Phil

I had them sign a bro post and I lowkey don’t remember if they said anything about it because I was too busy rehearsing my dumb joke in my head

I asked dnp “if their thighs were sore from all the squatting they’ve been doing at meet and greets” KJLHADLKJASD 

They both chuckled and I almost nut because their voices were so deep and then Phil was like “ah quite a bit” and Dan was like “haha yes this is the most exercise we’ve done in a few weeks” 

we did our poses and I was so close to the THIDDIES

after the meet and greet haley and I literally had to stop to catch our breaths and like just not faint akshjdkajsd

After Meet & Greet and in between show

Our group recollected downstairs and we literally just all were trying to breathe and we shared our experiences with each other

We went out to buy some merch and I saw @philtrovert (hi Amy) and another girl whose name I forgot to ask 

also we met @hey-laura right before the show started! queen!!!

also I met @thesquishtm right at the end after the show !!!

Show under the cut

The Show:

I was sitting in the 3rd row and I was so close I could see them SO CLEARLY and despite my blacking out when I originally saw Phil, I was able to see him during the entire show and he was so hot FUCK

literally felt bad for Alana cause I kept on saying how hot he was every 5 minutes

also Dan does have an ass asjkdhaskd 

Dan did the fuckin naruto run 

one of the truth bombs for what they’ve got hidden from each other was that Dan and Phil have shrines of each other and Dan’s shrine for Phil is just his dead houseplants and Phil’s shrine for him is dan’s head made out of bubble gum

Dan writes shrek x donkey x self insert reader fic from his secret wattpad account

Phil fuckin DABBED because for truth bombs someone was like Phil actually wants to be Part of Team 10 aklsdhlaksjd

also apparently our show was really different compared to the rest of the shows in terms of the survey...a lot of the results they saw they weren’t expecting based on previous shows

There was so much dabbing...why

In the simulation, we chose all the evil ones obviously and Phil ended up being with Satan and a creepy ass picture of Dan popped up and jumpscared me and Dan ended up being dead after going through a Lady door at a furry convention and dying because his tail got caught

Phil was really hot

In Dan’s box the options were hiding snacks from Phil, his houseplant shrine to Phil, and Kidz Bop tickets

Phil was fuckin deaf (poor old man i love him) and he came close to us and tried to hear what we were saying for like 5 minutes when someone said Kidz Bop

also the Kidz Bop on the Scroll was written Kids Bop but the s was crossed out and a Z was written over it ajkhdsakls

they talked a lot about how our actions have consequences and I know they were joking but also like calling the phandom in general out aklsdhasj

Phil was so beautiful and pretty

Our collective name was Linda

Dan was on the wheel and Phil missed all three times but he was close to Dan’s nips like 2/3 times

when phil came out wearing that torturing outfit...GOD HELP ME I FUCK HE LOOKED GOOD

Phil Lester’s nipple kink was THRIVING like nipples were mentioned a total of 6 times throughout the show

everyone started screaming when Dan stripped asdlhjasd

Phil was so cute holy fuck

Dan was cute too I guess I kinda loved him a lot and I wanted to just hold him

They did phantastic facts :’) got bless

Dan literally knew all the Phil questions and he called himself Phil trash #1

the question was “what was Phil’s second music video” and he guessed Toxic which was right

Phil was asked what Dan’s 2nd favorite color was and he literally could have said grey which was a normal answer but he said purple and got it wrong (Dan said it was silver)

the X rated Lester, Phil literally won all the times like UGH HIS MIND!

Dan had to make punching a baby & mayonnaise  sound good rip akldhaskjd

Phil had to make “your sweet old grandma” sound bad and for the other 3 times he literally tied everything back to the sweet grandma actually being evil

THEY SAID MY FUCKIN NAME I DIED AND CRIED AND SHAT MYSELF AT THE SAME TIME I AJSHDKAJSDLKHAJSDKAJS DLKAHSDKJAHSLKDJHASKLDKASD

DAN SAID MY NAME AS AYNOOSH BUT SAID IT SUPER BRITISH AND HE’S VALID FOR IT

MY QUESTION WAS FOR THE DILEMMA AND PHIL HAD TO CHOOSE BETWEEN HIM GETTING ALL OF DAN’S CEREAL BUT IN TURN PHIL HAD TO SHARE HALF HIS STASH OF SWEETS WITH DAN BUT PHIL SAID NO HE WOULDNT I CANT BELIEVE I CAUSED #PHANDIVORCE

THEY SAID MY NAME AND ALL MY FRIENDS SCREAMED WHEN THEY HEARD MY NAME SAKJDHAKSJD

god bless @whatthepeoplewant for recording it I owe you my life literally

Dan would have to give up the Internet but Phil would die and Dan chose to save Phil and everyone was like awwwww 

like bitch he couldn’t live a day without Phil,,,,,

for II worst predictions someone was like Kathryn would come onstage and Dan proposes and LITERALLY EVERYONE DIED BUT YALL KNOW DNP they turned around the words and said that dan would propose to kathryn and then Phil called dan his stepdad so...@ fic writers....

phil looked so fuckin amazing

Phil’s disstrack was funny as hell and Dan used a air gun to shoot out capita£ester bucks in the air ICONIC

When Dan and Phil started singing I was clutching my left boob the entire time and I was teary eyed, especially at the part when they said that they never imagined they would get this far

All in all, it was one of the best nights of my life and I met some amazing people! I wish I could relive it again every day but alas, reality. I’m so happy and the post II depression hasn’t hit yet but I know it will soon and :(. I felt so much love and laughter yesterday, and seeing dnp live was such an amazing experience. I’m sorry if I sounded like I was bragging or something but I’m not I just wrote everything so I have all my memories accurate. Thank you to everyone who sent me an ask or commented on my pictures on instagram! I hope this was a good summary for you guys!

[emilyplaysotome]

Chapter 8 - Hiding in Plain Sight

Catch up on Chapters 1 - 7 here! (or just Chapter 7)

I calmed myself down by reminding myself that Meg was no bright eyed fool.

She was a New Yorker in the most stereotypical sense - slightly cynical, (at the moment) jaded towards relationships, and completely self-sufficient. Her second year into her relationship with Noah, Meg had gotten laid off when a major brand had left the agency she was employed at.

Noah was an engineer and steadily rising in the corporate ranks at the time. He’d suggested that they move in together in order to take any pressure off of her, but Meg had flatly refused. She had appreciated the gesture but refused to allow herself to be rescued by some white knight. Instead, she revised her resume and updated her site, applying to jobs and freelancing before she was offered a creative director role at a superior agency than the one who laid her off.

With her upgraded title and upgraded employer, she then considered Noah’s offer to live together and rather than move into either of their apartments, they found a new place together that was also a considerable upgrade.

I remember secretly admiring how Meg had handled herself back then and wondered if I would have handled myself as well as she did. With that said, there was no way she would let her guard down (even in otome-ville) and certainly not with a PUA type like Baba.

Rather than get derailed with what ifs, I refocused on what I needed to do in order to get her home in a timely fashion. I pulled out my laptop and saw that Anita had sent me another message, “Naomi I know you’re sick but we couldn’t reschedule - can you do a video conference at 2? Please!?”

I’d hoped to sneak down to the Tribeca precinct that was dangerously close to my office during that time but with the realization that pressing pause on my life was impossible, I begrudgingly agreed to dial into the Zoom meeting. With an hour to kill I sent a flirty text to Hiroshi - confirming that we were still on for our date tomorrow in the park. 

He didn’t reply immediately and I wondered if this was thanks to his new persona, or if he was merely tied up at work.

As for Soryu, I was at a loss but figured it couldn’t hurt to take a closer look at Terek’s card. I noticed that there was a phone number and email address listed but waffled on whether or not emailing him would lead anywhere. Instead, I opted to google Soryu and his arrest information. I was surprised to find out that he’d posted bail - something that seemed off considering the fact that bail had been set fairly high and he had been mugging people on the train for spare change.

There was no further information as far as if he’d been the one to pay or if someone else had covered it, and before I knew it I had to stop sleuthing and instead dial into Anita’s video conference.

“Hey Naomi - are you with us?”

The quality of the feed made it hard to see who exactly was in the room, but it was clear that the office’s largest conference room was packed full of clients and coworkers.

“Yep! I’m here. Hello everyone.”

“Thanks for dialing in. I know you’re feeling under the weather but I wanted to make sure you were present for this discovery meeting,” Anita said, leading the meeting. “We’ve already done intros so when you’re back in person we’ll be sure to go through that again, but for now I’d like to make the most of our time together and dive in.”

“Sounds good. It’s nice to meet you all.”

I saw the pixilated people nod in acknowledgement and Anita let them know in a lighthearted way that I was 360i’s resident digital marketing expert before moving on to the brand discovery. 

I learned that this “new brand” Anita had been hinting at was actually a hospitality behemoth in Asia that was looking to break into the American market. At the moment their luxury hotel was almost ready to open in New York and they were looking to partner with an agency who could lead a successful digital marketing campaign that would help launch the brand.

We would have one month of prep and discovery (where we’d learn about the brand, their guidelines in order to formulate where in the NYC hospitality space there was a gap that they could fill), a pitch against two other agencies, and once awarded, only one month before the ribbon cutting ceremony.

The owner of the hotel (Hyun Kim) was a heavyset gentleman with salt and pepper hair who sat next to Anita taking notes on a sleek laptop. His fingers made an abnormally loud clacking sound on the keyboard, but his colleagues seemed used to it whereas I noticed a few of my coworkers glancing over from time to time.

Nothing was said during this initial discovery meeting that I found particularly meaningful. In general, I’d worked on and for several hospitality brands and they all required the same type of marketing. The only thing that stood out to me was the fact that this brand did not offer the standard amenities of a luxury hotel but also had created a “health and fitness” component.

LT Hotels was planning to roll out in addition to their spa offerings spin, barre, and yoga classes. Having just been reminded of how cramped NYC gyms tend to be, I silently wondered if there might be an opportunity in our NYC launch strategy by opening up these services to the public for a healthy fee. It seemed like a way not only to define LT Hotels (allowing them to keep half of the space in their classes for guests and half for local members) while maintaining the upper class, expensive and exclusive atmosphere.

I jotted down a small note to research luxury gyms in the city and get a cost estimate, also factoring in that members would have access to LT Hotels’ spa services at a discounted rate, should we propose something along those lines.

At the end of the hour, I thanked Mr. Kim and his team for their time and Anita brought the video meeting to a close. 

Just before she did, I caught a glimpse of some of the men who were on Mr. Kim’s team towards the back and noted that it was slightly ironic that a luxury hotel and spa brand that appealed primarily to women was headed up exclusively by men.

With my work obligation complete, I pulled out all the stops to find Namba knowing that once 6 pm hit I wouldn’t be able to find him until Monday, should he currently be working a 9-5. I raced down to the TriBeCa precinct (and by raced I mean hobbled seeing as how I was incredibly sore), and strolled right up to the front desk where a weathered, butch female officer asked, “How can I help ya hon?”

“I’m actually looking for someone who used to work here - Jin Namba?”

Unimpressed, she raised an eyebrow and said, “And who would you be?”

“Naomi Lee.”

“Hold.”

I watched as she dialed a few numbers on a beat up phone and gruffly said, “Yeah, Fitzgerald - do you remember Jin ever mentioning someone named Naomi Lee?”

There was a pause and she eyed me up and down before quietly saying, “I dunno, regular lookin’ for this area. Dark hair and eyes. Why? Ok. Ok…sure.”

She hung up and informed me to take a seat. 

I wasn’t entirely sure as to what was happening but after a short wait a burly, Irish cop in his 40s approached me. His ID revealed him as the man the woman at the front had been speaking with and with a smile he gave me a small wave.

“Hey there.”

“Hi,” I said, standing.

“Do you mind going for a walk with me?”

It was a little odd, but Officer Fitzgerald didn’t seem to be shady or scary and so, I followed him outside. We made small talk for a block and a half before he finally revealed that he wasn’t really supposed to say anything about Jin, but had remembered him talking about a girl he was crazy about.

“You’re that girl, aren’t you?”

I flushed and nodded, “I think so.”

“So why you lookin’ for him now when before you didn’t give him the time of day before?”

“Did he tell you I was engaged?”

“Was?”

“Yes, was.”

Officer Fitzgerald smiled, “Shit. I’m a sucker for a happy ending. I was gonna grill you but fuck it - he’s a PI now.”

“That’s a real thing?”

“Sure it is! You mean to tell me you thought it was only somethin’ in movies?”

Officer Fitzgerald let out a good natured tsk and with another grin told me the address of Jin’s office a few blocks away.

“You think I can just…go?”

“You better go! I expect to be the best man at this wedding, ya know.”

“Officer -”

“Call my Fitzy - all my friends do.”

There was something magical about a city where a tough looking man had a soft cuddly nickname and I found myself smiling as a result.

“Thanks Fitzy. I owe you one.”

“Hope it works out. Don’t break my dude’s heart, ok?”

I started to walk in the director of Jin’s office, but Fitzy stopped me by calling out, “And Naomi - if anyone asks…you didn’t hear any of this from me.”

“You got it,” I said and then picked up the pace towards Jin’s office in the west most section of TriBeCa.

“Can I help you?”

I found myself frozen standing in front of Jin Namba as the magic hour light flooded the large windows and illuminated his office, creating a warm glow around a man who still occupied a special place in my heart. He was the same Jin he’d always been - tall, serious, and eyes that had a hint of good natured mischief behind them.

Out of all of this world’s iterations, he was the closest to his original self - wearing a rumpled, outdated suit that was slightly too large as his five o’clock shadowed ventured on beard territory.

I think it was because of how familiar he currently felt to me that caused all these old feelings to come racing back and I found myself fighting back tears knowing that I wasn’t familiar to him at all.

“Miss - are you ok?” He asked cautiously.

“It’s Namoi,” I said. “Ami. Naomi. You don’t remember either one, do you?”

“Either? I don’t understand…”

“No, it’s nothing. I’m sorry.”

Jin ushered me to have a seat in his office. The space had a small waiting area, but there was no receptionist and from what I could see it was just Jin in an office resembled the one he’d occupied in Her Love in the Force. It was ironic that he’d lost his recollection of who he was, and yet had managed to recreate a space from his past.

He sat behind a large mahogany desk and I sat across from him and watched as he pulled out a vape pen and inhaled.

“So what brings you here?” He asked quietly, sensing my emotional upheaval.

“I’m looking for someone, but I don’t know who…”

Jin grinned and I felt my heart jump in my chest, “Sounds like quite the pickle Little Bird.”

“What did you just call me?”

For a moment, I could see in Jin’s eyes that he looked lost. He whispered the nickname to himself again and then apologized, noting that he couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but that there was something familiar about me. Hearing that made me feel received - as if for once, I wasn’t experiencing something that was completely one-sided.

It was strange that I felt so nostalgic now, seeing as how since our breakup, I’d never looked back.

I knew why I had chosen Zyg and had also not-so-secretly thought that Jin was slightly too old for me. Despite that, there was something about the fact that even the “changed” Jin at his core was so closely tied to the man he was that even the king himself failed to alter him drastically. Perhaps it due to his age that he had maintained this strong sense of “self” while his younger otome counterparts had been altered much more.

The utterance of his old nickname for me conjured a bunch of feelings in both of us, and he mentioned that he’d gotten into a skirmish at work and suffered a blow to the head which the doctor said caused temporary amnesia. 

I knew it was less of a blow to the head and more the doing of a nefarious king, but seeing as how Jin didn’t seem to want to go into detail he changed the subject and asked, “Anyway, how do you propose finding someone whose identity you don’t know?”

“I have no idea,” I said, “which is why I came to you hoping that you could help.”

“I mostly do cheating spouses, runaway kids, that kind of thing…this….”

“Why’d you quit the force?”

He paused, and I watched a flicker of curiosity flash through his gaze causing him to take another drag of his vape pen and avert his eyes before asking, “You knew me from before?”

“Something like that.”

“Being an officer in this city is dangerous. I’m gettin’ too old for that kind of thing. I thought tailing adulterers would be a bit safer and have far more job security.”

“That doesn’t sound like the person I knew.”

“How did we know each other Little Bird? I get the sense we weren’t just casual acquaintances.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Because when I look at you…no. Nothing.”

“No, what?”

I could feel myself leaning towards him with a seductive look that I hadn’t anticipated wearing. He grinned at me and ran his fingers through his hair and with that irresistible smirk of his playfully noted, “I gotta be on guard around you heartbreaker.”

I pretended that he didn’t, though of course I was planning to get that kiss. For now, I celebrated the fact that I’d found five of the six men and left his office fifteen minutes later, promising to compile a list as far as who my top suspects for the king’s mystery sixth person was in this world. 

As I stood in that small waiting area, I boarded the elevator feeling pretty good about this plan of Jin helping me locate this mystery man. However, when the elevator doors closed and I was alone once more, I realized that time was a flat circle and I had a legitimate, authentic crush on Jin Namba once more.

I managed not to run into any of my coworkers on the way home, and walked into my apartment tired but feeling on top of the world.

I collapsed on my couch and took out my planner to make sure I was on track to get Meg back (and also show the king who was boss). As I reviewed things, I also took notes with the hopes of brainstorming for situations that didn’t seem to have a clear answer at the moment.

Regardless though as drained as I was, I was also feeling very accomplished.

Tomorrow I was set to go out with Hiroshi. I’d met Soryu but had no idea as to his whereabouts. Thea’s contact information was in my phone and as much as it pained me, I could follow up and hopefully figure out what Zyglavis’ new life looked like. Hijikata had me popping Advil like they were candy but I was hopeful my haiku had started to thaw his heart. And finally, I was relieved to know that Jin hadn’t been transformed into some sexist, racist bad iteration of a NYPD cop.

Just as my guard started to come down there was a bright light and a snap and the King of the Heavens stood with an annoyed looking Meg standing next to him.

“Meg!”

I ran towards her and gave her a hug which she reciprocated.

“Ah tut tut,” the king said, gently separating us. “I’ll admit that I was amazed by your progress, but until you tell me the names and whereabouts of all the men you don’t get this one back.”

“Meg, are you-”

“I’m fine. Don’t worry about me…”

“Goldfish!” The king barked, “Names and whereabouts now or I send her back!”

“But I’ve only found five of the six.”

With a devilish grin the king laughed and noted, “Oh ho! I should have known you weren’t that clever.”

“Excuse me?”

“You didn’t even realize that you found the sixth man?!”

The king’s laughter grew from a chuckle into a hearty belly laugh and I racked my brain trying to think of all the places I’d gone today - from the subway, to the bodega, and even those at Hijikata’s gym. Either way, I’d been far too distracted to really notice and was beating myself up as a result.

Meg caught my attention by covertly waving her hands in the hopes of pulling me out of my stupor. She stood slightly behind the king (out of his eyeline) who was having a grand ol’ time at my expense, and mouthed something at me while pointing to her pocket. Before I could process everything that was happening the king snapped his fingers and she was gone once more.

“Just text me when you figure out the identity of the 6th man,” the king said flippantly, dabbing the tears that formed from laughter before snapping his fingers and leaving me alone again.

I let out an angry moan and collapsed on the couch once more, frustrated and wondering how it was possible that I could have met the last man without realizing. I had been so tired when I came in that I was still in my army jacket and as I slumped onto the couch I heard a crinkle and remembered Meg’s gesturing.

It was then that I reached into my pocket and discovered the list of possible suspects I’d written out before the king had taken her. My eyes widened as I saw that not only had Meg survived her time in the otome world, but she’d continued to be my ally as more than half of the names on my list were crossed out.

I now had three suspects for the mystery sixth man, and to be honest I wasn’t happy about who they were.

Chapter 9 here

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Thanks for reading :)

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[bravonovel]

Trapped by the CEO novel read online - Sydney Rosbak and Alex Reiner - Bravonovel

Trapped by the CEO

https://www.bravonovel.com/trapped-by-the-ceo-8420

Trapped by the CEO novel is a romance story about Sydney Rosbak and Alex Reiner.

Blurb : "A contract marriage?" Sydney said aghast. "Yes, it's not the first contract marriage in history. Why are you so surprised?" Aiden asked. "I know, this kind of things do happen but, with divas......like one of the Kardashians, or Amy Irvin, or one of those reality TV stars, not someone normal like me!" He chuckled," thats why I chose you, I like normal." Sydney Rosbak, an art school student and a digital artist had dreams of making it big in the US. She had no idea that she would land in police trouble, and the only person who could save her was Aiden Reiner, Billionaire CEO of Reiner group of industries. Known for his ruthlessness he agreed to help her but at a cost. She would have to become his contract wife for a year. Trapped between the law and Aiden, Sydney had no choice but to agree. The trouble started when she starts falling for his charm.

You can read this novel online on Bravonovel and keep track of the latest chapters

Read novel Trapped by the CEO chapter 1

Aiden

I drove my sleek silver Porsche to the landing field and parked it in the Executive garage. Moments later I was sitting on board my flight. I was on my way back to San Francisco. This had been a sweet deal l. Getting the deal signed was easy. But as expected not everything went smoothly, there were always small obstacles and details that needed to be smoothed out. It was business, so it was nothing unusual. At least I would have time to eat something before meeting with the board of directors back home, and I had discovered that it was always easier to deal with business issues with a full stomach.

The flight would take a while, so, I decided to use that time wisely and catch some sleep. I lowered the back support and leaned against it in a nice relaxing position, closed my eyes and tried not to think of anything at all.

I wasn't sure, but I thought I heard footsteps, and suddenly felt someone standing near me. So, I opened up my eyes and gazed at a gorgeous woman dressed in a tight blue uniform with white cuffs. Her face was elegant and artfully covered with makeup, her black hair tied in a neat bun, she spoke in a low voice. I got the impression that she was trying to make it extra husky.

"Good day, my name is Aliya and I'll be serving you on today's flight. Would you like to have something to drink?"

"Yes, a whisky would be nice," I replied.

She giggled, and looked at me with her deep dark eyes, squinting her eyes a bit as she leaned closer. 

"Could I tempt you...with some champagne instead?"

She smiled at me a little too seductively.

I rolled my eyes, Her nameplate flashed in the sunlight, and her words combined with that wiggling hips was a most tempting offer but I was in no mood for playing. 

"Just a whisky, please and make sure no one disturbs me, I need to catch some sleep. Thank you." I said dismissively.

"Sure sir," she replied a little disappointed and left me alone.

Aiden Malcome Reiner, aged 28, was one of the most sought after billionaire bachelor of the west coast. His great grandfather who hailed from Eastern Europe had shifted base to the USA a year before World War I. He used the great land of opportunity well and made a fortune by dealings in arms and ammunition, in a legal way of course.

When his great grandfather passed away, he bequeathed his wealth to his only son, Malcolm Richard Reiner. His son who had inherited the same business acumen expanded their business further by, investing in real estates, land, and oil refineries. 

Malcolm's son Thomas Malcolm Reiner took over the helm of his empire at the tender age of  26, he had proven to be just as successful in business dealings as his father and grandfather. When he turned 29, he married Aiden's mother, who came from a very wealthy family just like him.  Her family's wealth was almost equivalent to theirs, it was a perfect union. The society magazines had gushed about their wedding for months.

A year later Aiden was born. Even though Thomas was a doting father, and an ideal husband. He was also a man with raving libido, who was trapped in a marriage of convenience.

Gossips about his philandering ways were by no means false. His love affairs were an open secret. His wife was either unaware or didn't care. Whatever might be the case, they never displayed any marital discord at least in public.

When Aiden was 6 he lost his mother in a car crash. Thomas was left free to become a swinging bachelor again.

Within few months of his wife's death. Thomas Reiner announced to the world he was remarrying, this time to a twenty-two-year-old model who was already pregnant with his child.

Old man Malcolm Reiner refused to bless this marriage. He also had a suspicion that the baby did not belong to Thomas but there was nothing he could do about it.

10 years year later when 16-year-old Aiden came home from his school he was informed by his grandfather that his father had a heart attack and had been rushed off to the hospital. That night Thomas Malcolm Reiner passed away in sleep. Leaving behind a young wife, and two sons.

Aiden was still too young to run the family business as he was only sixteen, and old Malcolm had no intention of letting his opportunist daughter-in-law touch it, for he knew she was nothing but a scheming cold-hearted gold digger.

Aiden was bundled off to the finest school in Europe to complete his education and to be kept away from his scheming stepmother. While he was abroad studying, and learning the sly ways of the world, his half brother William was growing up as the perfect spoilt-brat. His mother was teaching him the calculating, scheming ways of life.

When old Malcolm Reiner wasn't watching. William would organize his wild parties at one of their many mansions where booze and cocaine flowed freely.

He had to be bailed several times, by his mother for drunken driving, drug possession or assaulting a hooker. His mother would even pay the media to shut up.

It's not that Malcome Reiner was unaware of his other grandson's erratic lifestyle,  but he chose to turn a blind eye as long as it was kept out of the media.

He was bidding his time for Aiden to return and take over the family business. He was getting old and wouldn't be able to hold for long. 

Much to his grandfather's delight, Aiden returned before he hit the bucket. In no time Aiden had taken over the family business. He was shrewd yet fair in his dealings. Older business rivals and friends had nothing but respect for young Aiden.

Standing lean and trim at 6'3" with broad shoulders, snow skier's arms and legs, with a narrow waist. He was every inch of any woman's dream man. 

The lush, sleek black hair he groomed so carefully had a rippling quality, a sign of his ruddy health. 

The aquiline nose he sported complemented his prominent cheekbones. He possessed a latent, leonine power and always walked with purpose and authority.

People had always remarked that his best feature was his entrancing, wayfarer-blue eyes. Sloe shaped, they could shine as bright as the evening stars when they were a-light with joy. At other times, they could resemble two liquid-blue pools of flashing fire.

A flamboyant character, the room always filled with his sonorous, rumbling voice. He was also quick to crack a joke or fire off a humorous retort when needed. His square jaw with a dimple like cleft on his chin lent a sexy yet dangerous look to his already rugged handsome face not to mention that golden tan he had acquired while taking a well-deserved holiday in the Bahamas or skiing away at the French Alps. 

Women would quiver with desire by just looking at him.

He was so caught up in his work that it left little time for something called romance. Like any full-blooded male, he wasn't immune to feminine charm and he did have his share of fun. However, he knew where to draw the line.

Lately, his grandfather had been nagging him to get hitched and provide him with some much-needed great-grandchildren. The old man, Malcolm was afraid that his other grandson, might produce a bastard before Aiden. He wasn't going to let his hard-earned business slip into the hands of his gold digger daughter in law.

Aiden had been cleverly brushing off his requests so far. Relationships or marriage was not for him. Until a chance meeting with a girl changed his life.

......

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[almostaduck]

Dear Ex Best Friend

Dear ex best friend,

We spent 6 years together, life was hard but i felt we stuck together through it all. we were always seen together remember? remember how we went to fun fairs and parks together and messed with bubbles? remember our sleepovers and sneaking drinks? of course you do they were our best memories :)

Rember how people pretended to be my friends and tied me up and forced me to eat sand? or how I was pushed down stairs at school by classmates? or how i had a classmate tell me to kill myself with a knife in cooking class? no? of course you don't all the physical bullying that happened I hid from you, you heard the names i got called, you heard people calling me obese and saying i should kill myself, yet all you got called was a weirdo because you were my friend but people always told you were cool if you weren't my friend.

remember how I starved myself to give you my lunches because you were deluded into thinking you shouldnt eat? remember how I always took time out of the classses you werent in to go cry in the toilets? remember how I got nightmares for the last 3 years because I had to listen to you dying after chugging drain cleaner?  remember how I did everything I could to make sure you the one falling apart was the one that was happy? No of course you don't I made sure you were the one that was happy because I loved you that much.

after we left highschool all you did was come to me about your issues, if your boyfriend would cheat, you spoke about how you hated these girls because of how attractive they were, I went along of course because I thought hey shes just changing. then our conversations just turnt into you bitching about how people live their lives. Then another year later still the same accept I was the depressed one I needed support I had started self harming and drinking in secret again and I thought you would have supported me like i did through all our time in highschool.

"self destructive" that was the last thing you called me after you ghosted me for a few months. I made mistakes, I dated the wrong people because I wanted to find someone that actually sees worth in me because I saw none, you told me I was self destructive because of the people I dated, I was too trusting I admit that but I felt you were the most broken of us both, after all 2 suicide attempts, a history of self starving, self harming and calling me at randoms times with a breakdown, it really made me feel stable in comparrison to you.

Dear ex best friend,

I strived to make sure you were happy but with that I ended up tearing myself down to build you up, I had friends at school but you always wanted to sit on your own. After I told you that a life of bullying, my mums 3 attempts of suicide as a child and your attempts too had finally worn me out you got distant, after I tried taking my life you shrugged me off, why is it you were allowed to lean on me for all those years but the one time I tried to fully lean on you, you weren't there and I ended up falling and the people I have left had to help pick me up. Isn't that funny I cared about if you were happy but you didn't care about if I was, you only cared if I was becoming a bother to you. I wont wish you bad, I just hope one day you realise how shallow and cold you have become, I hope you realise that for popularity you disposed of the one person who would be here for you through anything.

Dear ex best friend, I'm weird, I'm a freak, you have told me to act more normal around people, that should have been a sign you were just self absorbed. I'm getting better now, I'm working on my health and the relationship you said would fail? we are close to half a year and to be honest he has cared more about me than you ever have, I got in contact with a old friend from high school (Amy), you remember her? the one i was closest with and the reason we stopped talking was because YOU didn't like them and you isolated me from everyone, Amy is like a sister to me we are just as close as we were in school and im beyond happy to be in contact again. It's hard but I'm picking up the pieces of my life, I'm getting it together, I'm getting help. I'm proud of myself for getting through my mess of a life and coming out with a positive, I'm glad to have people who love me and care about my well being.

Dear ex best friend, You don't deserve the things I did for you.

[burnedhybrid]

please reblog | psa;

This is gonna be long so brace yourself, but if you’re in the RPing community especially the TVD, TO fandoms you’ll want to read on. Now, I'm not one to start or cause drama, but after some recent events I've felt the need to address a person who's not only continued to harass a friend and I but also try to emotionally manipulate us. 

This girl ran the dailydanielgillies blog and has many alias, her most recent name to go by is Amy but has been know as Piper, Yvonne & Holly according to @shitheardonline  (which is pretty much a blog dedicated to keeping the RPing community in the know about Amy and her whereabouts). I was following dailydanielgillies of course, to keep up with all things Daniel Gillies. After a few good weeks of following her I realized the blog contained more admin updates than anything Daniel Gillies related. The posts consisted of the admin getting upset every time Elijah (Daniels Character on The Originals) was hurt, or died or her favourite pairing wasn't together she would mouth off, get sad and threatened to delete the blog, threaten to harm herself or to hand the blog over to someone else.

I messaged her initially offering to take over the blog if she wanted to pass it along as she had previously stated. She asked me a few questions (if I had ran a fansite before,  how long I had been on Tumblr... etc) and I thought that was pretty standard and she gave off the impression that she was ready to hand it over to me but then she got quiet, didn’t correspond any further and the negative posts on her blog continued. That wasn’t fun for anyone, a lot of people have claimed it made them feel uncomfortable. After the three weeks had past and finally getting a hold of her, I could tell she didn’t want to part with the blog. That was fine, however her blog wasn’t giving me what I initially sought out for, so I told a friend, Ree, (@suitsofarmor) I was planning to make a Daniel Gillies fansite and she offered to help (Ree has huge admiration for Daniels work and knows a lot of info about him and his projects - so it was perfect)  So we started our own Daniel Gillies fansite under @thegilliesource.  10 hours into starting that blog (the template wasn’t complete or customised, we had about 3-6 followers by then) we both received messages from the Amy asking us why we didnt ask her permission to start that blog. My initial thoughts were ‘WTF?’ After doing some digging I realized she had posted on @dailydanielgillies  (gone now) our new link and then saying she was going to close the site because we made one. Bare in mind none of us made the blog to rival with hers, no one had bad intentions, we both just werent getting what we wanted from her blog and decided to create our own as a lot of her followers had voiced the same issues of not enjoying her admin posts. I woke up to messages from both her dailydanielgillies blog (which by then she had archived) and her inspirationromance RPing blog too. I have some screen shots of the messages she sent us as well as well as what she posted on dailydanielgillies (remember to read from the bottom of each screenshot upward):

She messaged me both on her RP blog and on  (inspirationromance) & dailydanielgillies to which the conversation went like this:

As I said the template wasn’t completed, no schedules were made and we had about 3-6 followers at the point so no one knew about us nor did they flock. 

Also may I add I found it amusing that she already knew the reasoning behind us not deciding to have her as a contributor.  She knew what she was doing already. PLUS she wasn’t entitled to the blog in any way shape or form.

I’m sorry. I found It funny because enemies sounded so dramatic. I felt like a kid in a playground and someone has just said they didnt want to be mates LOL I was confused like, what? I went along with it anyway.

Apparently not.

And I kept to my word. It was clear that as soon as I said something she’d take it way out of context or twist it and that upset me, so I cut ties.  I initially only responded to the messages from this account but I did get some from her RP one inspirationromance and after the Sunday and this previous conversation. I didnt respond. A couple of days after that she deleted that blog altogether - but didn’t forget to blame us first.

At first I didn’t know who inspirationromance was but after looking on her blog I came to find out it was her. Also she had left a really cute message for Ree and I, take a look and also yes, from then on out dailydanielgillies had been deleted which is why you wont find anything.

Yeah...

Than another few message to both me, Ree & @thegilliesource:

Funny that. She’s never mentioned RPing before.  We received an ask on thegilliesource, asking if we had stole dailydanielgillies to which Ree answered you can find here: https://thegilliesource.tumblr.com/post/160926607439/did-you-steal-dailydanielgillies-account

Some ex followers of Amy’s dailydanielgillies blog commented too:

The ‘lots of people’ she was pertaining to where in response to these comments. two.

Didn’t really matter though because she got a shiny new blog with a similar name shortly after called @gilliesgifsource (also deleted, she likes deleting things within a period of a few hours to a few days)

And she sent us this:

I wish I had more shots of her site because the similarity in text was ironic. Still, we never flagged it up with her.

She continued to message us every couple of days on our personal accounts or on thegilliesource. They were all ignored, and that seemed to annoy her more, but we didnt respond because we knew regardless, our voices wouldn’t be heard or respected. We had already tried to have a civil conversation and that wasn’t enough. She would also write about us on her RP blog and then tell us we were horrible people for not responding. This week I started RPing with someone new and realised their blog was made in the past 24 hours and they were a semi selective roleplayer, I realised she had made a starter with Amy and knowing emotional manipulation and abuse can be a trigger warning for people and knowing Amy had a preference for certain face claims... I didnt want this blog getting into something that could be emotionally harmful so early. So I explained that I didnt want to change their mind about RPing with Amy but I sent the RPer there to @shitheardonline, a blog that particularly talks about Amy and her antics online, and the RPer decided they didn’t want to go down that route.  After seeing that we were even mutuals Amy wrote this on her blog (but also blocked the new RPer due to us being mutuals BEFORE the new RPer even had the chance to block her, herself as the new RPer had already started to see the negative side of her)

What tipped me over the edge is when she sent thegilliesource this message:

I did nothing wrong. We did nothing wrong. @shitheardonline is a public site, everyone can grab that information themselves.  She also tweeted this:

Now I’m not one to play with a suicide threat. I have lost three real life friends this way, one being in the past couple of weeks. I treat the topic very sensitively. According to @shitheardonline there had been old accounts of her threatening suicide like this but just doing it to scare people.. And after reading her tweets that followed her tumblr posts and that message I made sure I reported her accounts to a Suicide watch. I wanted to make sure she was okay. Because all things aside it's clear she has a mental health issue (I have anxiety, depression and get severe panic attacks to the point where I pass out) So I know how scary and difficult it is. I get help for my mental health, but I feel as if she doesnt have that help or control over it, her emotions change erratically and I would hate for anyone to feel as if they have done something wrong especially when not even responding to someone.

She was offline for a day and came back with this post:

I’m not posting this long ass post to ‘out’ any one, or shame anyone. That’s never healthy. But I know that also the way she can treat people, take things out of context and react to things isnt healthy either, especially to those who are vulnerable and take things to heart. Messaging someone to say they are the cause of their suicide is intolerable. I was worried sick and for what? She was trying to scare me and it worked, which had bought back a flood of triggers from my childhood, but I choose not to be a victim to it at all and I would hate any of the community having to go through that too.   I’ve felt like I was doing something wrong or was in the wrong until my fiancé reminded me that hurt people, hurt people - But that doesn't make it justifiable. To get the message out and protect  others too. I’m writing this post as a psa if anyone is looking to steer clear of Tumblr drama or want to avoid triggers like like suicide, emotional abuse and manipulation. She has a tendency to post and then delete, so that’s why I’ve been taking screenshots, so going on those pages they may have posts missing - this isn't out of the ordinary.  All info I shared are online and public and can be publically shared. The reason I’m sharing  screenshots of PMs is because I want everyone to see that I’m not making this up and/or I’m not lying. Because Amy has called me that. On several accounts. BTW within the last 24 hours she’s also changed her URL from @inspirationromance to @theheartofromance, then to @characterarchiving. I woke up this morning to a notification of a follow/unfollow from phoebegillies. After inspecting the account  and realising the rest had been deleted (including gilliesgifsource) I’ve realised she signed up with a new email (because she was blocked on the other accounts too so she couldn’t have followed me.) So she’s deliberately come and found me again to follow me then unfollow me. It was like a little dig at me. So I blocked her. If you choose to do the same its: http://www.phoebegillies.tumblr.com URL changes and account changes arent uncommon either. Bare in mind. I still haven’t responded to her since. She’s now harassing me by constantly reaching out despite my efforts to stop her. If you’re interested in more info about her you can find it on @shitheardonline That blogs over a year old and Amys history has been tracked that far. There you can find a list of aliases she’s used over the years as well as URLs she been under, horrible tweets she’s sent out and tagged TO writers in etc...

As of today (the 31st of May) she’s also made her Twitter account private so I’m glad I screen shotted what I could when I had the chance. I wish this girl the best and hope she gets the helps she needs, but its not okay to point the finger, victimise, harass and manipulate people online. And I want all of us to stay safe. Please reblog this so others can know. Take Care, Jolie x

[timeflies1007-blog]

Doctor Who Reviews by a Female Doctor, Season 6, p. 3

Night Terrors: This is an unusual episode, particularly for this season, in that it’s really quite unambitious. It’s pretty unambiguously an episode of a children’s show, more so than most other episodes of the reboot or even much of the classic series. It’s a straightforward, simple little story about a frightened little boy and the monsters in his closet, and overall it’s pretty charming. The concept of how we deal with fear has definitely been done in much more sophisticated ways elsewhere on the show; “Midnight” was a terrifying look at how fear can make us turn on one another, while the later episode “Listen” is a powerful exploration of the ways in which fear moves and inspires us. This story is a much narrower tale of one child’s experience of feeling worried and vulnerable, but it’s a perfectly fine version of that story.

           While this episode is relatively unimpressive when compared with stories like “Midnight” and “Listen,” its focus on childhood fears could also invoke comparisons to Season Two’s disastrous “Fear Her,” possibly the only episode of the reboot to be more clearly directed at a child audience than this one is. The show seems to have benefited from the criticism of the former episode, as it avoids most of its mistakes (and retains its one strong point by including a cute animal—the landlord’s droopy bulldog is not tied to quantum humor like Possibly Schrodinger’s Cat, but compensates by looking very huggable.) While the ending remains extremely sentimental, the sentiment is grounded in the primary plot about George and his father rather than centering on nonsense about the Olympic torch. Unlike the offensively demonic portrayal of Chloe, George comes across as frightened but actively trying to keep the monsters at bay through various rituals, like having his mother flick the lights on and off and putting frightening things in the closet. This episode also portrays George’s dad much more sensitively than its predecessor managed with Chloe’s mom, and Daniel Mays’s endearing performance in the role goes a long way toward making this story palatable. It would have been nice to see a little bit more of George’s mother, though, not least because female characters other than Amy don’t get much to do in this episode.

           The episode’s visuals vary in quality, with the setting generally faring better than the monsters. The apartment complex has an oddly comforting presence, particularly after the more outlandish settings in recent episodes; to me, it’s the most familiar-looking depiction of contemporary Earth since Davies left the show. The enlarged dollhouse is also enjoyable, and I like the Ponds’ exploration of the odd space, complete with wooden pans painted to look like copper, seemingly anachronistic lighting, and eyeballs in drawers. The dolls themselves are pretty disappointing, though—their appearance is creepy enough, but this portion of the story is just too sleepy and slow-moving to capture my attention. (That said, it does give the Ponds some entertaining dialogue, and I’m amused that Rory is starting to get annoyed at how many times he has “died.”) George’s toys, and the shadows that they cast on his bedroom walls, are more successfully scary; they’re not among the show’s most memorable frights, but I can remember feeling precisely the same kinds of terrors when I was little, so I can empathize with George here.

           As Amy and Rory are mostly tied to the dollhouse plot, it’s not a great episode for them. On the one hand, this episode fits really nicely into their overall arc this season. It’s yet another iteration of the “parents save the world by loving their children and refusing to be separated from them” narrative that happens a lot in Season Six, and my heart goes out to Amy and Rory every time this works for everybody except them. On the other hand, the episode was controversial for not having them directly comment on how close to home this situation is for them. This has been explained in part by the fact that the episode was initially slated for the first half of the season, when it would have preceded their loss of Melody, and then later moved to the second half. This actually winds up working out well for Amy, I think; the second half of this season is very focused on how much she is bottling up her feelings, and the next two episodes are going to go into the psychological impact of that to such a degree that I think it would be a mistake to have her abandon that mentality and actually talk about or even visibly react to her own loss here. While the season as a whole provides lots of reasons for Amy’s occasional underreactions, it never quite manages to do the same for Rory, and so while it’s totally believable to me that Amy would be pushing herself to keep a stiff upper lip, it would have made sense to get more of a reaction from him.

A lot people hate this episode, but while I think you could skip it without missing anything integral to the season, I honestly find most of it extremely pleasant. There are so many large-scale episodes this season that it’s sort of nice to have a more low-key one here, and there’s enough angst both before and, especially, after this episode that a sweet story about the monsters in a child’s closet is a welcome change of pace. B-

The Girl Who Waited: I almost never cry in reaction to TV. There are a few rare occasions in which I’ve gotten slightly teary, but for the most part, my default emotional reaction is to get very tense and forget to breathe. (Temporarily, of course.) The first time I watched the end of this episode, I started sobbing. When I rewatched it a couple of months later, I had exactly the same reaction. I have never had a reaction quite this dramatic to any other television episode, and it took me some time to figure out quite what was producing this response, in large part because this episode is more complicated than it looks. On the surface, this looks like an episode about Amy’s love for Rory, which is sweet but is already very well established and so isn’t great subject matter for a story. In truth, though, Amy’s relationship with Rory is the least important one in this storyline, serving as the constant in an exploration of Amy’s much more volatile relationships with the Doctor and with her own mental state. (The title, which references Amy’s history with the Doctor, is a pretty good clue that this episode isn’t really going to be about Rory.) This episode is dark in a way that this show can only manage every once in a long while, but as bleak as it can be, there is something beautiful about how much it tells us about Amy.

           This is the first intentional trip that the three have taken since the events of “Let’s Kill Hitler,” as “Night Terrors” involved a detour in response to George’s message, and they are pretty clearly on a mission to comfort Amy. Appalappachia (what a great name!) is supposedly one of the nicest planets out there, which would have been a nice respite after the draining events they’ve been through if it hadn’t turned out to be under quarantine for the one-day plague. Instead of a nice vacation, Amy gets a fairly sterilized medical facility, where she is constantly being offered “kindness” that would kill her and where she is mostly cut off from communication with Rory and the Doctor. Her aloneness, her inability to talk to even those closest to her, and the total uselessness of attempts at kindness, are not the subtlest pieces of subtext the show has ever done, but the episode generally does a good job of using the sci-fi plot to showcase Amy’s pain and sense of isolation without sledgehammering “This is a symbol of Amy’s grief over losing her child!!!”

           The plot, in which Amy hits the wrong button when entering Appalappachia and winds up in a different time stream from the one that Rory and the Doctor are in, is simple enough, allowing the episode to focus on the emotions of the characters. Even the Appalappachian facility is pretty straightforward, although the grounds look beautiful and the harsh white light is distinctive; there aren’t a lot of nuances to this planet, and the robots play a minimal role, so the world informs the experiences of the characters without really distracting attention from them. It’s a dark episode for the Doctor, who has to lie to Older Amy in order to bring about Young Amy’s rescue. It’s chilling when he slams the door on Older Amy’s face at the end, but the episode manages to work with this dark side of the Doctor without engaging in outright character assassination. He’s in a terrible position, knowing that his best friend will have to endure 38 years—most of her adult life—of complete solitude if he brings Older Amy on the TARDIS with him. I don’t really know what I think the right choice is here, and that lets us look at the Doctor’s tendencies toward manipulation without making him look like a monster. Rory is also in a harrowing position, especially since he sort of has to grieve for the loss of the wife he knew while interacting with the person she has become. I’m glad that Older Amy makes the decision for him at the end, because it really should be her call, but watching him wrestle with which version of Amy to take with him is horribly sad, and completely justifies his furious claim to the Doctor that “You’re turning me into you.”

           As interesting as the Doctor and Rory are here, though, it’s the Amy Pond show, and Gillan is absolutely magnificent as the version of herself who has been alone for nearly four decades. We can see remnants of Amy’s personality in her sense of humor, but she’s thoroughly changed by her time on her own. For one thing, she’s gotten extremely good at surviving—without any help from the Doctor or Rory, she has managed to fend off the robots and make a life for herself. The nature of that life is difficult to imagine; not only does she have to deal with complete solitude, she has to contend with not knowing whether she’ll ever be rescued. Every day could be the day that the Doctor and Rory finally reach her, and having that hope frustrated over and over again for 38 years is probably the most difficult part of this scenario. It also means that this Amy has had time to process what the Doctor has meant to her life and how his behavior has affected her, and after 38 years, all that’s left is anger. It’s not the first time that he’s accidentally shown up at the wrong moment—their very first encounter featured him turning up twelve years later than promised. Amy’s abandonment takes the concept of “Aw, tiny Amelia waited for her Doctor all night with a little suitcase” and transforms it into something deeply horrifying—all the more so because we know that the Doctor’s sometimes irresponsible behavior has caused Amy irreparable harm already this season. She insists that the device she’s made is a sonic probe, not a screwdriver, because she’s “not on a romp.” The implication that the Doctor is just out playing and being whimsical while other people suffer the consequences makes sense from someone who has endured nearly four decades of solitude because of him, and she’s not kidding when she declares that she hates the Doctor.

           She still loves Rory, though, and the scene in which young Amy uses that love to convince her older self to help her escape is extremely moving. Her words about Rory becoming beautiful as she got to know him are appropriate to the relationship that she has with Rory, which was pretty clearly not love at first sight, but rather a gradual growth toward an understanding of Rory’s importance to her. The scene allows her a beautiful articulation of exactly what Rory means to her, and it’s the kind of connection that seems plausible as something that would still be resonant 38 years later. The following scene, in which she sort of awkwardly does the Macarena to remind herself of her first kiss with Rory, is the one part of this episode that falls a bit flat for me, but its setup, in which she declares “I’m going to pull time apart for you,” is a perfectly-rendered moment: Gillan’s performance and the soundtrack combine to create an absolutely stunning sense of her determination and resolve.

It’s leading up to something impossible, though; there can’t be two Amys, and in convincing Older Amy to save her younger self, Young Amy is unwittingly causing the older version to unwrite herself. “Time can be rewritten” is Amy’s favorite phrase, only here she’s what’s being rewritten, which is even sadder when considered in light of recent events in Amy’s life. There are two Amys now, one who is still clinging to faith and hope, the other who has acknowledged the destructive impact that the Doctor had on her and who is fully willing to express her anger and sense of betrayal. She’s the embodiment of all of the feelings that Young Amy isn’t expressing, but in the end, she erases herself from existence because Rory and Amy will be happier together without her. Until the final seconds, this is portrayed as noble, generous and heroic. “Tell Amy, I’m giving her my days,” she says to Rory, as she speaks to him from outside the TARDIS, only her outstretched hand visible from his point of view. She goes out bravely, willingly turning away from the TARDIS and facing the robots armed with kindness. Her last seconds, as she asks the Interface to show her Earth, are astonishingly effective, and the script invests so fully in Older Amy’s perspective that it takes a while to grasp the fundamental wrongness of the situation. It’s not until the very end of the episode, when Young Amy awakes and asks where her older self is, followed by an ominous chord and a shot of the Doctor looking conflicted, that we get an overpowering sense of “Something very not good is going to come of this.”

One of the hardest things about psychological crisis is that acts of self-erasure feel so temptingly right. At my lowest point, I had a brief breakdown just once, when I came home from a party after having a little bit too much to drink and stood in front of my bathroom mirror and screamed at my reflection while gasping for breath. Other than that, in the eight months or so when I was experiencing my usual mental health issues to a much more serious extent than is usually the case, I didn’t cry, I didn’t raise my voice, and I didn’t let anyone know how much pain I was in. This wasn’t so much fear of anyone’s reaction as it was a persistent sense that there was something else to do; I constantly felt like I ought to do something about my mental state, but I really needed to finish a conference paper, and a couple of my students needed a lot of help or they were going to fail the next assignment, and even though I believed very strongly in the need to acknowledge and work carefully through mental health problems, this belief always came with an attached “…but not yet.” We tend to think about a crisis as a time of emotional intensity, but mine mostly involved waiting—I knew that a lot of difficult feelings were there, and I had every intention of dealing with them…later, when there was more time. It felt powerful, sometimes, when I managed to accomplish things in spite of the fact that I was spending significant portions of most days practically unable to move. Look at me, I thought to myself, heroically finishing a dissertation chapter and grading lots of student work and going to multiple social events in one week in spite of feeling like this. These are fairly small victories, but they felt enormous to me because of the state that I was in, and the pride that I felt from getting my work done and keeping my composure every day was enough of a rush that I couldn’t shake that sense that I needed to keep holding off on acknowledging how much of a crisis I was in. I need to deal with how I’m feeling, I’d think, but I really needed to get a lot done today, and I did it without falling apart, and I stuck with that mentality, week after week, month after month, until finally I had a flash of recognition that if I had let myself step a little bit closer to falling apart that might have been better for me. Over time, though, things get buried, and if you repress your feelings for long enough, it can be difficult to get them back when you figure out that you need to express them. By the time I got to the point of wanting to acknowledge what I’d gone through, I felt detached from some of those feelings, as if there had been another woman who had felt anger and grief and betrayal and fear, but I’d stopped her from surfacing by replacing her with the smiling, professional, emotionally stable person that I’d performed for so long. Trying to get back some of those feelings was difficult, because they had grown confused from lack of use, and while I knew that that other me had existed and had been real, I was mostly left wondering, like Amy, “Where is she?”

I hadn’t quite put some of this into words, until I watched this episode and was so emotionally overpowered by it that I started thinking about why it made me feel so strongly. It took me a couple of times to quite get what was going on in this episode, and even longer to connect it fully to myself, but I can’t think of another episode of television that has looked so much like how that psychological low point felt. As much as this episode made me think about myself a lot, it leaves us with a frightening sense of what is yet to come for Amy. She has been through a lot this season, and she’s struggled to put her feelings into words. She’s finally met the embodiment of her anger, grief, and loneliness, but that body has literally vanished, made to have never existed, and for someone in a crisis, it’s hard to think of a more concerning image. This is an intriguing story, and the use of off-kilter time streams is fascinating in itself, but what’s truly memorable about this one is how much it lets us into how lonely it is to be the girl who waited. A+

The God Complex: This episode isn’t quite as brilliant or as emotionally captivating as the previous one, but while the previous episode remained quite serious and fairly heavy throughout, this one is frequently silly and whimsical, and so the fact that it gets pretty close to the emotional heights of its predecessor is even more impressive. “The Girl Who Waited” is one of several episodes that is memorable as a departure from the show’s usual tone—“Midnight” and “Heaven Sent” are similar in this respect. This episode is exactly what regular Doctor Who should be like: fun, enjoyable, and creative, with a great deal to laugh at but a surprising amount of insight at the same time.

           The fake eighties hotel is an absolutely brilliant setting: it looks so convincingly mundane and ordinary that it throws all of the insanity unfolding within it into sharper relief. Having a separate room for each fear is a solid device, and the shifting corridors mean that this Minotaur-centric episode has managed to turn the hotel into a sort of labyrinth, which is a lovely touch that completely escaped me the first time I watched the episode. The Minotaur itself is fabulous; I generally enjoy the big, clompy monsters, but even apart from that the makeup department did a great job with it. (In spite of the repeated exclamations of “Praise him!” the Doctor generally refers to the Minotaur as “it,” so I’m going to take that as the correct pronoun.) It’s definitely an intimidating presence, and is made even more so by how long it takes us to get a proper look at it, but its appearance also manages to evoke sympathy, in part because when we get closeups of its face it looks surprisingly like ET. Its final scene, in which it gratefully dies after the Doctor cuts off his food source, is a lot more moving than you would expect the death of a character who has just wandered around growling to be, and the Doctor’s translation of his last words show him to have a hugely effective sense of empathy. (He also gets the Doctor to make a brief reference to Classic Who’s utterly ridiculous but generally entertaining “The Horns of Nimon,” which is a nice callback.) What the Minotaur does to its victims—invoking their worst fears in order to prey upon their most deeply-held beliefs—is among the most horrifying things we’ve seen this season, but it emerges from the episode looking more like a victim of the system that links Gods and worshippers than an intentionally evil figure.

           The “minotaur in a labyrinth” narrative isn’t the only traditional story at work here, as this is also an iteration of the time-honored “fears coming to life” episode. This has appeared in plenty of sci-fi and fantasy shows (“Nightmares” and “Fear Itself” from Buffy the Vampire Slayer are both good examples.) There are some terrific individual fears here: “that brutal gorilla” is awesome, and the wall of fears is both terrifying and darkly funny; I wouldn’t want my last memorial to be my photo on a wall with “Other people’s socks” captioned beneath it. The story is so interesting, and the Minotaur is such a great monster, that the episode could have gotten away with uninteresting minor characters, but in this regard it remains mostly sublime. Even the initial exchange between the Doctor/Ponds and our new characters for this episode is an absolute delight: Amy mocks Rory for responding to their new acquaintances by yelling “It’s okay, we’re nice!” while the Doctor realizes that this is, in fact, not the first time that someone has threatened him with a chair leg. Howie looks for a while like a sort of mean-spirited depiction of a nerd, but there’s a nice moment after his death in which Rory notes with admiration that he had just gotten over a stammer through speech therapy, and I really appreciate the inclusion of this positive information about a character who might have otherwise come across as a one-note joke. Gibbis is our first glimpse of the Tivolian species, and the bits of information that we get about this constantly-surrendering planet are hilarious. Between their anthem (“Glory to Insert Name Here”), Gibbis’s school motto (“Resistance is Exhausting”), and his job (planting trees so that invading armies can march in the shade), Tivoli sounds amazing; it might be too nonsensical to support an actual storyline, but hearing occasional facts about it works extremely well. As funny as the character is, David Walliams also does a great job of conveying the aggressive, controlling aspects of the character’s cowardice.

If I could pick one single-story character in the entirety of the reboot to serve as a major companion, I would probably pick Rita, the Muslim doctor (or medical student? I don’t think this is clarified) who believes the hotel is Jahannam. Amara Karan’s performance is splendid, allowing Rita to join characters like Rose and Bill in feeling like a believable, well-rounded character even before anything much happens with her. She’s extraordinarily likeable: clearly concerned about what is happening, but composed enough to formulate and find comfort in a theory and even, awesomely, to find out where the hotel keeps its tea. While a parent’s disappointment about a low grade is awfully clichéd as an Asian woman’s worst nightmare, she otherwise gets some really interesting material, and I would include her death scene in that category. It can get irritating when the show brings on a great new female character, only to kill her off immediately, and I do wish that we could have gotten at least a few episodes for this character, especially since the episode ends with the Ponds getting a vacation from the Doctor. Unlike Lorna Bucket a few episodes ago, though, Rita’s death scene really feels like an occurrence that has significance beyond the Doctor’s resulting sense of guilt. The Minotaur’s actions take away most of her ability to think for herself, but she insists on preserving what little autonomy she can retain, asking the Doctor to turn the screen off and let her be robbed of her faith in private. It’s such a beautifully-written moment that I react to it in the way that I reacted to the Hostess’s death in “Midnight” and Bishop Octavian’s death in “Flesh and Stone,” in that I’m just so fascinated by the depiction of the dying character’s final moments that it doesn’t occur to me to think about the death in terms of how it might move forward the narrative or other character arcs. Not having Rita as a long-term companion is the biggest missed opportunity of this season, but even in death she’s compelling and memorable.  

This is also the one episode this season in which I’m completely satisfied with the depiction of Rory. There’s been a lot of vagueness regarding his reaction to the events surrounding Melody Pond, but in this story, we can see just how troubled he is. The Minotaur has so little interest in him that he’s constantly seeing ways out of the hotel, and once we find out what the Minotaur is actually interested in, this means that Rory just doesn’t have any faith. Not in the Doctor, not in his relationship with Amy—just no faith at all. As the hotel seems to take the concept of faith extremely broadly, well beyond religion, it’s a sad indication of his current mindset that the Minotaur can’t find any belief to latch onto. He also, in his conversation with the Doctor, speaks of his travels with the Doctor in the past tense, suggesting that he is basically done with the kind of life he and Amy have had on the TARDIS. I still think that this season could do more to explain Rory’s feelings, but this episode gives us far more depth for him than any other.

For a while, Amy seems like a minor presence in this episode. The version of herself who feels actual rage and disillusionment toward the Doctor having been erased from existence in Appalappachia, she is now the embodiment of firmly-committed belief in the Doctor. The previous episode’s events were a severe test, but she has gotten through it, clinging to her belief in the Doctor by the skin of her teeth. She’s fully prepared to trust him here, which is why she’s in so much danger. She’s fought for the faith that so endangers her here, maintaining her hope in him even when he abandoned her as a child, believing “for twenty minutes” when he asked her to in “The Eleventh Hour,” trusting in him enough to walk past the Angels with eyes closed in “Flesh and Stone,” keeping hold of that faith even when he was gone from the universe in “The Big Bang,” insisting, in the midst of grief and loss besetting her throughout Season Six, that “time can be rewritten.” She’s gotten through all of that without losing her grip on her faith, but in order to survive the Minotaur, she’s got to destroy it. She even has to destroy this belief voluntarily—it’s not taken forcibly from her, so she has to deliberately choose to set aside her trust in him. After so many years of insisting on that belief, she essentially has to relearn how to see the world, and she has to do so in a moment characterized by precisely the kind of fear that would generally call forth her reliance on the Doctor. Gillan’s face here is just perfection, showing not so much grief as confusion, as if she is wondering, “how do I learn to think like this?” The knowledge that her worst fear is her disappointed but still hopeful younger self makes this even sadder. (I wasn’t sure, when I first watched this scene, whether the room was Amy’s or the Doctor’s, but on rewatch, it’s clear that it’s hers, because the door that falls on Rory has a 7 on it, which is established earlier in the episode as Amy’s room.) My heart just breaks for Amy, but I’m impressed that she has the strength to go through with what she does here, even if she does have the Doctor walking her through it. It’s not easy to let go of the beliefs that sustain you, especially when you’ve been having a rough time, and I can’t imagine how hard it must be for her to have to shift a fundamental sense of how she perceives the world within seconds.

This makes the ending something of a relief. I have varying opinions on the moments in which the Doctor sends companions away for their own good; I’m perfectly fine with it in “The Parting of the Ways,” for instance, but much less so in “Journey’s End.” This is one of the times in which it seems justified—after what the Ponds have been through this season, and especially after what we’ve seen of Amy’s mental state, they really do need some time away from the Doctor. I love that he gives them a house with a little blue door, and that he remembered exactly what Rory’s ideal car looked like. (In general, I’m just really happy that the Doctor got something specifically for Rory here, because sometimes he treats Amy like she’s his companion and Rory is just along for the ride, so I’m glad that he put some thought into his temporary departure from both of the Ponds.) He makes it clear that he’s not saying goodbye for good, but this is a huge transitional point for them; after this, they start to gravitate back toward their normal lives, and act as much more temporary companions. Everything is different after this episode, and it’s not because anyone died, or had their memory wiped, or jumped into a timeline, or got trapped somewhere, it’s just because the Doctor and Amy thought about what they meant to each other, and realized what needed to change. A+/A

Closing Time: This sequel of sorts to “The Lodger” captures some of the fun of that earlier episode, but overall doesn’t live up to it. James Corden continues to be delightful as Craig, and young Stormageddon is enjoyable, but the episode doesn’t quite manage the exuberance that made “The Lodger” such a success. I do like seeing the Doctor hanging out in Craig’s house again, and the shop generally works well as a setting, particularly because it gives us an opportunity to watch the Doctor play with toys. (I agree with him that Yappy the Robot Dog is nowhere near as good as K-9.) While there are plenty of fun moments here, much of the humor seems much cheaper than it was in Craig’s first episode. While “The Lodger” grounded most of its comedy in the absurdity of the Doctor functioning in an ordinary human space, this episode takes as the premise for many of its jokes the notion that the Doctor and Craig are acting sort of like a couple. There are multiple scenes that play the possibility of a Doctor/Craig relationship for comedic effect, most notably Val assuming that the Doctor and Craig are involved and the Doctor declaring his love for Craig in an effort to distract him from the spaceship. Gareth Roberts, who wrote the episode, is gay himself, but even coming from a gay writer this kind of humor seems mean-spirited to me. There’s also a brief bit of “comedy” about the Doctor walking into a changing room while a woman is changing, as well as a scene about Craig freaking out a female employee working in the lingerie section. There are plenty of moments of humor that do work, but it’s aggravating that we have to wade through these ill-advised jokes in between.

           As a Cyberman story, this is a pretty mixed bag. I really like Cybermats, so having them running about is nice, and there are moments in which the Cybermen are used to very good effect: the solitary one that greets Shona from a changing room in the beginning is especially creepy. Unfortunately, there just isn’t enough of an effort here to figure out how to resolve the Cyber threat, so we get a silly resolution that fits nicely into the seasonal arc but doesn’t work very well on its own. Throughout the Moffat era, the Cybermen are used to challenge ideas about what constitutes humanity and how emotion fits into that picture. It’s an endeavor that functions much more interestingly in later seasons, when Moffat begins to shift into an understanding of the fundamentally human qualities that are not immediately reliant on emotion. For now, though, we’re stuck with Craig’s love for his child overcoming the cyberprogramming, and it comes across as an arbitrary and underwhelming way of fending off the threat. (Also, the Doctor specifically calls attention to the idea that love was the solution—if you’ve got a somewhat lazy ending to your story, it’s probably best to avoid having the Doctor directly mention it.) We conclude with a couple of scenes that lead into the finale: first, there are some voiceovers from people who saw the Doctor in his final moments before going to Lake Silencio, and then we move to River being sent on her mission to kill the Doctor. The latter is at least a decent way of building anticipation, but the first is deeply annoying and utterly unnecessary.

           I do find this episode more interesting in terms of its contribution to the more personal dimensions of the seasonal arc. Amy and Rory are very close to not being in this episode, but it’s still highly concerned with their feelings. The most obvious approach that this episode takes to the Ponds is the final installment of the “everyone saves the world through a refusal to be separated from their children, except for Amy and Rory” subplot. Craig’s love for his son is so powerful that it can offset Cyber technology; meanwhile, Amy and Rory have a brief, basically meaningless exchange with a little girl looking for an autograph. Every time this season juxtaposes triumphs of parental love with their own loss of Melody, it’s very effective, and this is the moment at which the contrast is at its strongest. The subtler approach to the Ponds’ emotional state comes in the form of a tiny echo of language from earlier in the season. Amy is now a model, appearing in posters for “Petrichor,” a perfume. We were first introduced to this term in “The Doctor’s Wife,” when the TARDIS defined it as “the smell of dust after rain.” I guess this isn’t completely implausible as a perfume scent, as there is a quite nice aroma to dust in this state, but it’s just unusual enough that it draws attention to the words. If you google “Dust after rain,” one of the first things that comes up is “The Smell of Rain on Dust,” a book that appears to be focused on our difficulties with properly expressing and experiencing grief. I don’t think that the show is referencing this particular book, but I mention it because it confirms for me that there’s a basis for my association between these images and the notion of grief that has been somehow blocked. Rain is naturally suggestive of tears, but the idea of dust in the wake of rain conjures up the image of the dull, messy feelings that ensue when the first shock of grief is over. We see basically nothing of the Ponds’ feelings here, but we persist in the sense, set up in the previous two episodes, that something is very badly wrong.

           These implications about the Ponds’ emotional state give the episode a little bit of the emotional weight it would otherwise lack, and Corden and Smith work together so well that the episode is more successful than the script really merits. The cheap humor and the weak ending to the Cyberman plot are enough, though, to make this a fairly weak episode. C+

The Wedding of River Song: “Sometimes you don’t look hard enough,” the Doctor tells Amy, in a season finale that necessitates extremely careful observation. This episode definitely has its flaws, but in between them, it’s absolutely magical. Like much of this season, it is not really an episode for casual enjoyment, as appreciating its nuances requires a lot of commitment and effort, and I can understand the mentality that this episode is just too much work. In spite of the ambition, though, it’s absolutely delightful, full of tiny pieces of brilliance that mostly counterbalance the moments in which it goes slightly off the rails.  

           The story is aided by a terrific setting, replete with “don’t feed the pterodactyls” signs, Charles Dickens on the news, and Emperor Winston Churchill returning home on his own personal mammoth. (I really, really want there to be a mammoth on this show. I’m sad that we didn’t get to see Churchill’s mammoth here, but even just the mention really made me laugh—there’s something about the solemnity with which the newscaster delivers the line that makes it hysterically funny.) It’s chaos, but it’s wonderfully satisfying chaos, the kind that works because it’s silly but also very carefully planned. I wish we had five episodes in which to play around in this universe, but I guess that giving us a glimpse of it without dwelling too long lets us enjoy how thrilling it is without getting tired of it. Even the bits that we see of the regular universe are wonderfully done: there are CHESS GLADIATORS and Dorium’s severed head enjoying the free wi-fi in a crypt, and a bad guy being devoured by skulls, and everything is just so thrilling and imaginative and I love it.

           There are also some pretty glaring issues here, the first of which is that the timeline of events in the main, ordinary universe just completely confuses me. I can just about buy that Amy would be able to access some of her memories from the real world in the time-collapsed universe, although even that requires a bit of suspension of disbelief. What I can’t really follow is what her experience is of the real timeline. At what point does she remember what happened in the alternate timeline? When does she become aware that the Doctor has died? I can understand the sequence of events within each universe, but the interaction between them just doesn’t make any sense to me at all.

The other main problem is the depiction of River’s avoidance of the main timeline. In spite of being in the title, it’s not really a great episode for River, in part because her declaration of how much she will suffer if she has to kill the Doctor is just so overwrought. Kingston is usually fantastic, but she can’t quite make the heavy-handed scene work, and so her wedding doesn’t have quite the lead-in that I want it to. I do rather like the actual wedding ceremony, which is pleasingly simple and sweet, but I would have liked this entire development better if River’s emotions had been worded more clearly, or in ways that didn’t make her look massively selfish. (I mean, she thinks having to kill the Doctor is worse than the deaths of billions of people? Really?)

The gaping plot holes with regard to the relationship between universes and the poor writing for River definitely weaken the episode, but there are a lot of compensations. The Doctor is very charming in both universes, in spite of being stuck with possibly the worst haircut ever seen on this show while he’s in the alternate world. I like his early-episode exuberance, followed by the sobering news about the Brigadier’s death—if this had been the last we’d heard of the Brigadier, I’d be a little sad that he didn’t get more of a moment, but the end of Season Eight takes care of that, and the Doctor’s grief is nicely played here. He is also sort of adorably invested in the Ponds’ relationship, even if he thinks that dating basically just involves “texting and scones.” I really appreciate that the season ends with his decision to play dead for a while, on the grounds that he has gotten “too big.” We haven’t spent a lot of time exploring his actual reaction to the accusations that River made at the end of “A Good Man Goes to War,” but his actions here suggest that he’s actually thought about some of his flaws and is trying to correct them, so that’s nice. Moffat’s insistence on incorporating the show’s title into the plot might be wading a little bit too far in a meta direction, but I honestly really do enjoy it, and so I like the decision to end the episode with Dorium repeating “Doctor Who?”

While there’s a lot of spectacle at work here, the heart of the episode is still Amy’s attempt to recover from the events that have happened to her this season. “The God Complex” was a pivotal moment in her arc, but giving up on the intensity that had characterized her faith in the Doctor to that point isn’t an endpoint but rather the creation of a new set of problems. As I said before, the nature of her memories of the real world is a bit confusing, but she does seem to have at least some access to the memories that occurred this season, which means that she’s reacting to the loss of Melody and to the choice that she made to cut off her faith in the Doctor. This has had a number of effects—for one, now that she isn’t relying so heavily on the Doctor to fix things, she’s doing more herself. Her efforts to join River in summoning all of the Doctor’s friends to come to his aid don’t have much of a narrative payoff—there isn’t much they can do about this scenario, so they’re mostly irrelevant. It’s a nice reversal, though, of the previous season’s finale, in which all of his enemies joined forces to defeat him, and I like that Amy and River have been working together on such a large-scale project. This universe also exists in such an extreme state—everything is happening at once! Time is falling apart!—that it creates a sort of perpetually high-stakes environment, and that seems to draw more reaction from her than anything else has this season. Not long ago, she was engaged in pretty destructive self-erasure, and some of her behavior here seems like an endeavor to un-erase her life. She literally has to draw things, to commit them to paper in order to prevent them from escaping her, and the attempt to create physical memories of things that threaten to vanish from her mind is an interesting psychological step for her.

She also directly articulates her feelings about the loss of her baby, in an incredibly dark scene that ends with her leaving Madame Kovarian to die. This is preceded by a moment in which she shoots down a lot of the Silence with a machine gun in order to protect Rory, immediately before finally articulating her anger about the loss of her baby. Having Amy destroy the Silence immediately before breaking her own silence about her feelings is not going to win Moffat any Subtlety of the Year awards, but I like it. If this were the end of a conventional action movie, killing Madame Kovarian would be the natural endpoint—she’s a force of considerable destruction, whose actions have not only hurt Amy and those close to her but have also sometimes threatened all of existence. Amy hasn’t exactly gone evil here, but she has rejected the kind of ethics that the Doctor usually employs. Her words to Madame Kovarian are partly a statement of vengeance toward the woman who stole her baby, but they seem just as motivated by her thoughts about the Doctor. The Doctor told young Amelia that he would be five minutes and then didn’t return for twelve years, he told her that he’d pick her up in Appalappachia and then he showed up 38 years late, he has at multiple points wandered off without telling her when he would return, and her whole relationship with the Doctor has featured the persistent uncertainty about whether or not he would be there when he said he would. When she tells Madame Kovarian, “You know what else the Doctor is? Not here,” it’s partly an expression of her willingness to break the Doctor’s rules in his absence, but in part an expression of anger at the abandonment she has suffered over and over again on this show. I do think that this scene lurks fairly close to linking trauma with violence, but it generally avoids suggesting anything too damaging. Earlier in the season, I mentioned that the Doctor had sort of gone off of the usual Doctor Who ethos and into more of a Star Wars approach, and Amy is essentially embracing here the notion of “striking down the villain is the natural goal of an adventure.” It’s a mentality that the Doctor usually rejects (although not without exception), but she’s turned into Luke Skywalker, not Darth Vader, and that removes most of the harm that this might otherwise do.

Her position of rejection toward the Doctor’s approach to violence is not the end of the story, though, because we eventually return to the usual world, unburdened by the collapse of time. Amy is sad, but when River turns up she’s more willing to communicate than she has been for much of the season. She starts to tell River everything, from her grief about the Doctor to her guilt about Madame Kovarian. (I really appreciate that the script makes time for her to directly acknowledge that this is still real to her; River tries to give her a pass by saying that this happened in another universe that has now gone out of existence, but Amy rightfully dismisses this with the brief statement that “I remember it, so it happened, so I did it.”) I’m happy whenever there’s interaction between Amy and River, but it’s especially nice to watch Amy so determined to face reality and express her feelings. This kind of emotional awareness and directness has been eluding her the whole season, and so this conversation feels like a huge triumph for her, even though it is an expression of some very troubled feelings.

It’s not a gloomy ending, though, because Moffat gives Amy a moment of tremendous joy to cap off a season that has been mostly sadness for her. We don’t hear exactly what River tells Amy about how the Doctor escaped death—it’s fitting, given the themes of the season, that the most important words are silent to us. We know the substance of what has happened, though, and can piece together something of what those words must have expressed. At Lake Silencio, when she watched the Doctor die, she immediately said that maybe it was a clone or a doppelganger, because she’s Amy Pond, the woman who believes, the one who acts with constant faith in the idea that time can be rewritten. You can’t rely on that, not all of the time, not even with a time machine and a brilliant alien best friend, and Amy let herself get so wrapped up in the idea that things will right themselves, that a miracle will happen and all will turn out for the best, that her faith has sometimes led her astray. This kind of faith isn’t an entirely bad thing, though, at least not when it’s directed toward something good, and what River’s off-screen words reveal to her is that her sometimes excessive hopefulness might be damaging at times, but it’s not always going to be wrong. We don’t hear the words, whatever they are, just the scream of pure happiness that gives way to adorable awkward dancing. It’s not the same kind of joy that we got at the end of last season, when the Doctor rebooted the universe and everyone ran off jubilantly after a beautiful wedding. After all of the holes that this season has poked in Amy’s approach to belief, though, having that quality actually validated for once is such a lovely way to resolve this season that I wind up happier about this than I did about the more obviously joyful conclusion to Season Five.

           Plenty of this episode doesn’t work, but the pieces that do add up to a beautiful resolution of this season’s narrative. The previous Christmas special defined Christmas as being “halfway out of the dark,” and it would have been a reasonable guess to assume that the expression would wind up characterizing the Doctor, who in previous seasons was the only character really to have an extended brush with darkness. At the close of the season, though, it’s Amy who is best described by this phrase. She hasn’t gotten past every dark thing she’s gone through this season—as the start of this scene shows, she’s still dealing with her actions in the other world. If she hasn’t completely emerged from the darkness, though, she looks like she’s about halfway out: after a season of silence, she’s finally speaking, and for a moment at least, she’s so full of joy that it looks like Christmas morning. A-/B+

[mlcsped]

USA Heartland Fans Celebrates Our Groupies With An Interview Our next featured Groupie is Les Cline! Les, as you will all discover, is a huge Heartland fan, and joined the Group on Feb. 26th, 2015. We got so much great information in this interview and we had a great time with it, as you’ll see why. Meet Les: ________ USA Heartland Fans: How long have you been a fan of Heartland? Les: I stared watching Heartland four years ago. Almost to the date. Found it on Netflix during a snow storm and became hooked. Nothing like binge watching for four straight days. USA Heartland Fans: Why do you like Heartland? Les: I grew up in Nebraska around farms and ranches. I was the town kid that had grandparent who were farmers. I really related to the characters of the show. Even though I am almost the same age as Jack he reminds me of my grandfather. His wisdom and his guidance. I started to call some of what Jack says as “Jack-isms”. USA Heartland Fans: We agree, the story lines are so relate-able to almost everyone. And YES about those “Jack-isms”. Who else watches Heartland with you? Les: My wife, she actually found it on Netflix thinking it was a movie. She was so angry when episode one ended: “How could they end a movie that way?” Then I told her that she just started to watch a series. She was relieved. She was a farm girl from Nebraska too. Later we found out that one of our nieces also loved watching Heartland. USA Heartland Fans: Aww, wow. We love how Heartland brings our families together. Okay, Les, who shouts louder at the TV, or the most during an episode: You or your wife? Les: Me! My wife will make some comments about certain things, but my voice seems louder when things happen that surprise us or that we want to go differently. For example, Season 8 Episode 6, Ty and Amy meet on the road. Amy says: “I miss you.” And Ty responds: “Take care of yourself.” Me: WHAT! TY, YOU IDIOT! YOU JERK! One of many reactions; some bad, but most good, and some with tears in the eyes. USA Heartland Fans: Hahahaha, LOL. You shouting at the TV. I love it.What are 3 of your top/fav story lines in the past 9 Seasons? Les: I think it is easier to look at seasons versus story lines, but when you think of it, each season is a story line. #1 would be Season 8—from the uncomfortable reunion; (Ty) punching Prince Ahmed; Pike River; Jack and Ty in the barn loft—to the ending with the wedding (with Amy saying) “I married the boy in the loft.” {USA Heartland Fans: Aw, yes what a great moment}. Les: #2 would be the bonding of Jack and Ty in season 5 when Ty takes his dad's ashes to the lake. Then the hunter tells Jack that he thought Ty was his son. {USA Heartland Fans: Huh, OMG Les, YES! That whole episode}. Les: So many and they are all so good. #3 would be the moment that Ty tells Amy in Season 2, Episode 16—‘Ties that Bind’— when trying to rescue Spartan: Amy: I'm so sorry, I should have listened to you (...) I'm so stupid sometimes.” Ty: No you’re not; you’re just passionate. I'd do it again in a second. I'd to anything for you”.” USA Heartland Fans: Les, those are truly some amazing moments! When was the last time you watched an episode with your wife, and what episode was it? Les: Unfortunately, we do not get Heartland like those select few in the Northern areas. The last episode we have had the chance to watch together was Season 9, Episode 18. My wife does not like watching things on computers and is more patient than I am, so she wants to wait for Season 10 to be on TV. I am so hooked that I have to have my Heartland fix. I read social media, follow the productions, follow the stars, and watch whatever I can. And if there is a long break, I get into my DVDs (Seasons 1-9) and re-watch everything. Yes, I have watched from the beginning of Heartland about four times. It is such a great show. USA Heartland Fans: Okay, now *IF* you had creative control over the show, what would you do with the characters? Les: Amy and Ty will finally open their own clinic in the barn like they always planned and expand the ranch. With the baby on the way they will eventually have a small house built on the ranch. We then can watch their little "nugget" grow up for more seasons to come. This way we can relive Amy and her mom's relationship through Amy and her daughter. Maybe a son, but I think it needs to be a daughter for that reason. Tim and Casey get married, Georgie graduates and goes to college, Lou marries [redacted]. The directions are limitless, but exciting to think about. USA Heartland Fans: Hahaha; OMG! I love your [redacted]. That is so awesome. We have wanted that too… and seeing ‘Nugget Borden’ with mom and flashing back to Marion and Amy... PRICELESS! Okay, so *WHO* is your fav character and why? Les: My favorite character is Jack Bartlett. He is so laid back, except when it comes to Tim. He is such a grandfather; has the answers even when it is something you don't want to hear. Or he makes you come up with your own answer instead of telling you. He is also stern, but fair with discipline. Yet is a cream-puff when it comes to emotions and living in a house of estrogen. Thank god for Ty being close by. Lisa is the perfect wife for him. I have to add this as one of the best scenes: Jack owing Lisa $20 because Remi got back on his good side. USA Heartland Fans: Hehehe. We love that scene, too!. Dare we ask who your fav couple is? Though we think we know. Les: That is the hardest question, so many perfect ones. Has to be Jack and Lisa. USA Heartland Fans: YESSS! GO, "JISA"!   Why are they your fav couple? Les: They are the couple that just clicks together. They get on each other’s nerves, yet adore one another. They are not afraid to talk about difficult things even though sometimes it takes them extra time to bring it up. Lisa wanting Jack to meet with the lawyers; wearing a ring; taking a name. Just a great relationship, just wish Lisa would move into Heartland. USA Heartland Fans: Yes, we totally agree with that. Jack is your fav character but, who is your least fav and why? Les: Where do we begin? Season 2: Caleb; Season 4: Chase; Season 6: Jeremy, Season 7-8: Prince Ahmed, and then there was Dan Hartfield. Of course, I was not a big fan of Cassandra in the beginning until Amy needed a girlfriend, now I like her. But the winners are Chase and Prince Ahmed. Oh, wait. I forgot one. Jesse Stanton, he wins. Jesse Stanton: the spoiled rich kid that attacks Amy through Ty, Ty through Amy and tries to manipulate things so he can steal Heartland. Yes, has to be Jesse.(Tim was a jerk but I don't consider him as a least favorite. He was lost but now he's found. (And Casey is great for him.) USA Heartland Fans: All great choices. Okay, bonus question: You’ve mentioned “Jack-isms”, so we must ask: Which Jack-ism is your favorite? Les: My favorite Jack-ism was in Season 8, Episode 17—All I Need is You. Jack to Ty. Not really a Jack-ism, but… "Watching you grow up over these past eight years confirmed something that I’ve always believed. That the goodness in a man runs much deeper than one moment in time. You’re a good man, Ty Borden. I don't judge a man for his mistakes; it's what he does to repair those mistakes that count.” Runner-up: “For a bronc riders, Caleb, we think that eight seconds makes the man. Because that eight seconds feels like a lifetime. In a funny way marriage is like riding a bronc. There are twists and turns and the odd headache. But if you both ride it like there is no tomorrow, that lifetime together will feel like eight seconds.” Too bad it was wasted on the Caleb and Ashley’s wedding. USA Heartland Fans: Those are both excellent quotes from Jack. Thank you, Les, for your incredibly detailed answers. Is there anything you want to add? Les: Thank you; it was fun thinking back into episodes. I have followed this show more than any show ever. I was a true M*A*S*H fan with Alan Alda and Harry Morgan. Heartland bumped them to #2 all- time favorite. I have created notes on every episode of every season of Heartland, Titles, Songs, and highlights with some quotes. I would not say that I am obsessed but I am a very big fan of the show. And if they do not get renewed for a season 11 I will go into a mild depression just like I did when Hawkeye got on that chopper and watched Trapper drive away on his motorcycle (on M*A*S*H). Heartland has also introduced me to singers and songwriters that I may have never heard of or even listened to. Now I have collected not only the songs they sung for Heartland but other they have produced. Just another great benefit that Heartland has done not only for their fans but those that contributed to the shows success. Look at the actors that have had brief appearances on Heartland and then moved one to other ventures that have great success. One is Kit (Tatiana Maslany) Orphan Black. Another is Miranda Frigon who has been in many Hallmark movies and produced her first music album. USA Heartland Fans: All great points, Les! You provided us with so much amazing info about your likes and dislikes. You are definitely a true Heartland fan, and we're so pleased to have you on board here with the Group! Thanks for sharing your passion with us! ________ Stay tuned for our next "Celebrating Our Groupies".

[psychotiic-liiza-hanson]

60 Random Questions for January 13th, 14th & 15th!

 Context: I missed two days in a row because I am a forgetful human being so now, as a result, I am going to answer 60 RANDOM QUESTIONS!!1

LET’S FUCKING DO THIS!!!

1. Name the first song that comes to mind that starts with the letter H.

Answer: Happily by One Direction

2. Name the first song that comes to mind that is instrumental and starts with a vowel.

Answer: Ascendance by Lindsey Stirling

3. Name a song that you that starts with the letter Q.

Answer: Quitter by Carrie Underwood.

4. Top 3 favorite Carrie Underwood songs?

   1. Cowboy Casanova - Play On

   2. Two Black Cadillacs - Blown Away

   3. Relapse - Storyteller

5. Top 3 favorite Christina Aguilera songs?

   1. Fighter - Stripped

   2. Let There Be Love - Lotus

   3. Stronger Than Ever - Bionic

6. Top 3 favorite Britney Spears songs?

    1. If U Seek Amy

   2. Radar

   3. Womanizer

7. Top 3 favorite Instrumental Artists?

    1. F-777  https://jessevalentinemusic.bandcamp.com/

   2. DVJI  https://www.youtube.com/user/DJVITechno

   3. TheFatRat   3. TheFatRat https://www.youtube.com/user/ThisIsTheFatRat

8. Top 3 favorite songs from your childhood?

   1. Lay All Your Love On Me - ABBA

   2. Ain’t No Other Man - Christina Aguilera

   3. Fly - Hilary Duff

9. Top 3 favorite One Direction songs?

     1. They Don’t Know About Us - Take Me Home

   2. Little White Lies - Midnight Memories

   3.  Up All Night - Up All Night

10.  Top 3 favorite Falling In Reverse songs?

     1. The Drug In Me Is You - The Drug In Me Is You

   2. I’m Not a Vampire - 

   3. Raised By Wolves - 

11. Top 3 favorite All Time Low songs?

   1. Old Scars/Future Hearts - 

   2. A Love Like War - Don’t Panic

   3. Get Down On Your Knees And Tell Me You Love Me - Dirty Work

12. First song that comes to mind that starts with the letter A?

Answer: Absolutely Final Goodbye - Christina Grimmie

13. First song that comes to mind that starts with the letter E?

Answer: Everything You Are - Ed Sheeran

14. First song that comes to mind that starts with the letter I ?

Answer: I don’t Care - Fall Out Boy

15. First song that comes to mind that starts with the letter O?

Answer: Obsessed - Gwen Stefani

16. First song that comes to mind that starts with the letter W?

Answer: Walk Away - Christina Aguilera

19. First song that comes to mind that starts with the letter Y?

Answer: You Lost Me - Christina Aguilera

20. Name the song that makes you cry every time?

Answer: Hurt - Christina Aguilera

21. When’s the last time you were very excited?

Answer: last night at around 11:40 pm when i heard that the other friend was going to join the skype call

22. When the last time that you felt scared?

Answer: This evening when I witnessed my niece’s father verbally abuse her when she wanted to show her makeup.

23. When’s the last time that you felt embarrassed?

Answer: I-I don’t know actually. That’s a first.

24. When’ s the last time you were really happy?

Answer: When I called @sweetapple01​ for the first time on Skype.

25. When the last time you were nervous as balls?

Answer: When @floofiemark​ called me on Skype for the first time.  I shouldn’t have been though. She’s like a different version of me that lives too far away from me.

26.What did you want to be when you were a kid?

Answer: A teacher. It’s always been something I wanted to be.

27. How tall were you when you were ten?

Answer: 4′0″ tall. I was very small for that age.

28. Are you an extrovert or introvert?

Answer: A literal mix of both. I can be both at anytime. Even though, I gotta be honest, I lean more on the introvert side.

29.  Favorite social media?

Answer: Tuuuuuumblrrrr!

30. When is your birthday?

Answer: It was yesterday! I turned 19!

31. How does one know how to adult?

Answer: I don’t know. I literally do not know.

32. What makes you weird?

Answer: Talk to me on skype for more than an hour and you’ll see what makes me fucking weird.

33. Name an annoying thing about yourself.

Answer: I talk waaaaaaaaay too much.

34. Name an amazing thing about yourself.

Answer: My singing! It’s awesome y’all!

35.  Who is your Celebrity crush?

Answer: Fucking Leigh Daniel Avidan cause jeeeeeesus christ that man is fucking everything.

36. What are your favorite make up brands?

Answer: NYX & Too Faced cause they’re awesome as shit.

37. Talk about your first kiss.

It's not my first kiss, but it's my first kiss with a guy I truly loved. It was on thursday, june 26th 2014 and it was with him. It was the first time that me and him were alone in his house. When his mother told me that he was waiting in the basement, I went down there. And I just ran to him, who was just coming out of the bathroom and I hugged him. Once I pulled away, he lift my head up so he could look at me right in the eyes. He kissed me. It was sweet, passionate. It was perfect.

38. Talk about something that happened in middle school.

Answer: Where I grew up, there was no middle school. In the province of Quebec, high school starts at grade 7 and finishes at grade 11.

39. Talk about things you do when you're sick.

Answer: Basically, I lay in bed, I eat a fuck ton of soup and I watch youtube videos till I fall asleep.

40. Choose a song at random, what ship does it remind you of? 

Answer: Bubblegum Bitch by Marina & the Diamonds reminds me of Rubberbang for some fucking reason...

41.  What are your favorite male/female ships?

Answer: Arin Hanson/ Suzy Berhow . Best married couple: hands down.

42. What’s your favorite quote of 2016?

Answer: “I can be happy cause I be not dead”-Crankgameplays

43. Name 5 youtube series that made you helplessly happy.

   1. Mega Man X - Game Grumps (just the Arins)

   2. Uncharted 4 - Jacksepticeye

   3. The Walking Dead: New Frontier - Pewdiepie

   4. Astronner - Jacksepticeye & Pixlpit

   5. Raft - Crangameplays

44. Name 5 Game Grumps videos that won’t fail at making you laugh:

   1. Super Mario Galaxy PART 77: Thinky Pinky https://youtu.be/wtaCjauhDQU

   2. Kirby and The Rainbow Curse PART 19: Dropping Deuces https://youtu.be/bhnIFWeg3Pc

   3. Zelda Ocarina of Time PART 72: Movin' to the Stratosphere https://youtu.be/8WhwU_Zbt6M

   4. Bloodborne PART 9: Delicious Human! https://youtu.be/7kA6_vbbrUI

   5. Super Mario Maker PART 50: On Fire! https://youtu.be/qcO2G6ALo_c

45. How old were you when you learned to ride a bike?

Answer: Age 7, I think. Before i moved to France, anyway.

46. What was the name of your first pet?

Answer: Ti-Loup, which means “ Small Wolf”

47. Have you ever consumed drugs?

Answer: I was a speed addict from ages 12 - 16. It’s been 3 years that I’ve stopped.

48. What color do you associate yourself with?

Answer: Red but it expressed anger and passion which are the twom ain feelings that consume me.

49. Do you still sleep with stuffed animals?

Answer: I stopped sleeping with them when my mother died, which going to be 5 years ago in May 2017.

50. Sweet or bitter?

Answer: For taste, I’ll say sweet.

51. Sweet or Salty?

Answer: SALTY ALL THE WAY DUDE! 

52. Who was your first celebrity crush?

Answer: Justin Bieber, sadly.

53. Do you prefer tea over coffee?

Answer: Yes, yes I do.

54. Did you ever have an imaginary friend?

Answer: Oh my...I don’t think that i ever did have imaginary friends. I had imaginary bullies though. Those fuckers are still here to this day and they are the voices in my head.

55. Are you more of a tomboy or girly girl when it comes to your outfits?

Answer: It really depends of the days honestly. I can be a horrible mixture of both.

56. What is the most recent wet dream you've had?

Answer: It’s about myself and a muse created by this friend of mine and it’s really kinky and the muse itself has been haunting my fucking dreams since last monday...

57. Are you exhausted?

Answer: The making of this post has brought my sore eyes to exhaustion.

58. At what ages did you learn to swim?

Answer: Around the same time that I learned to ride a bike...so like age 7 as well...

59. Do you bite your nails?

Answer: Yes, I do. Curse my anxiety.

60. How many years have you been into therapy?

Answer: 11 years, my dude. 11 fucking years. And I ain’t close of getting out of it.

[clan-sayeed-fic]

Let me earn your trust (Kamilah Sayeed & MC)

Previous chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23

Book: Bloodbound (property of Pixelberry Studios) Pairing: Kamilah Sayeed & MC: Amy (I do not own those characters, they're the property of Pixelberry Studios as well) ❗ Warnings: this chapter contains violence, angst, might cause distress ❗ Rating: Mature Author's note:  I'm not a native English speaker, I'm sorry for any mistakes (feel free to correct me).

~ 2100 words

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

Chapter 24

"What did she tell you?" Lily's voice high-pitched, revealing how shocked she was.

"I already told you every single word she said, do you really want me to go through this once again?" Kamilah's eyes were slowly changing its color as the anger was taking over. "Or perhaps I should work on your memory first."

"Easy," Adrian interrupted, standing between them, sensing the tension.

After what happened, Kamilah returned to the gala. She participated in the Council meeting, and when it ended, she told Adrian about her argument with Amy.

Actually, she didn't plan on telling him anything, but Adrian noticed her more distanced than usual behavior. Finally, after multiple nagging questions from him, Kamilah gave up and decided to tell him what happened. And at the same moment, Lily called them worrying about her best friend since she just arrived home from the gala and saw Amy's things gone.

And that's how they found themselves in this situation.

They were in Lily's apartment. Or, to be precise in Amy's former room. The only things suggesting that she had ever lived there were photographs of her and Lily on the wall.

"Did you really do something to her?" Lily was asking this question another time in a row. She didn't realize how much it must hurt Kamilah to even consider such a possibility.

"Lily..." Adrian's eyes pleading, he couldn't stand his best friend's suffering. "We all know how happy Amy was during those past days. There was no indication she would do such a thing."

Kamilah felt like her shirt was made of pure metal instead of smooth cotton. Irritating pain in her chest was causing her problems with breathing. Her legs were daring to tremble as all the pressure and hurt were dragging her down.

"Has she ever done something like that?" Kamilah looked into Lily's eyes, her voice was shaky, unlike her. She sat down on the chair next to the desk.

"Has she ever run away without a word?" Lily asked. "Of course, that's what her family did for years," she frowned. "The real question is, would she do this without a serious reason? Fuck no."

"Well, she explained to me her reasons loud and clear," Kamilah's head spinning. She wasn't able to think at that moment, sorrow spreading on every part of her body.

"Maybe she lied to you," Adrian was the only one focused there. "We can't exclude the possibility that Amy's reasons weren't about us at all. She had a lot on her plate recently."

Those words make the three of them think, search for answers. They were pushing their memories about the past few days, trying to remind themselves something significant in Amy's behavior. Something that would give them a clue to explain her actions.

Lily was sitting on her best friend's bed during this whole talk. Even thinking about the possibility of Amy never coming back was bringing tears to her eyes. She took the pillow from the bed and hugged it tightly to herself, inhaling the smell of the girl's perfume that was slowly fading away.

"What is it?" Kamilah stood up immediately and made her way toward the bed.

Previously covered with a pillow, and then finally visible to their eyes was a small piece of paper with familiar handwriting on it.

Amy's note.

***

"So, you're a Bloodkeeper and the vampire at once?" Amy asked right after she got out of her memories and was able to think straight.

"Apparently so," the woman smiled to her, there was something similar about this smile. About how her lips were curling up effortlessly.

Amy was still sitting on the chair with her wrists tied up. Her blood was slowly floating inside the wires, draining away from her body. But She wasn't concerned about that anymore, not when this discovery got her attention.

"How is it?" the girl looked at her blonde new companion. Her golden strands of hair were like a reflection of her own ones. "How is it to be both?"

The young woman was standing in front of her. She was staring at Amy with her green eyes, rethinking the question.

"Maybe you'll find out one day," she chuckled at her own words. "But for now, you shouldn't bother yourself about it. You need to stay strong to get through all of this."

Amy looked around the room to remind herself of where she was, that it wasn't just a nightmare of hers. That's when a beeping sound pierced through her head once again, ensuring about her full consciousness. Her forehead was sweaty as the fever took over her body. Trying to keep herself awake, she bit onto her lower lip until she tasted the metallic flavor.

Her own blood.

So that's how it tastes, Amy thought to herself with irony.

Despite the pain, her eyelids were getting heavier again, daring to close themselves completely.

"Focus," the voice echoed in her head. "You need to stay strong for Kamilah, can you hear me?"

Amy opened her eyes wider in an instant at the sound of the woman's name. Every feeling from that terrible night came back to her twice as strong. The night when she hurt Kamilah so much.

"How do you know about her?" Amy asked aloud, with suspicion. She was trying her best to concentrate on the features of the person in front of her, so similar.

"You told me," the woman smiled calmly. "You're talking about her all the time."

The girl laughed shortly, imagining Lily saying that. Her best friend that she might never see again. Those thoughts were sending shudders down her spine, so she let go of them, focusing on the next topic.

"For what reason Vega needs so much of my blood?" Amy glanced at blood bags that were slowly filling with red liquid.

The blonde walked to one of those blood bags, touching its characteristic surface with her fingers. Then, she looked again at the girl tied up to the chair.

"What did you learn about him so far?" her voice mysterious, stimulating Amy's brain to think.

"He is a sick person," Amy answered, frowning. But she knew that it wasn't the most important thing. "And power is all that he desires."

"Exactly," the young woman moved closer to her chair. "So what would give him his so much power? How far is he ready to go?"

Their eyes connected with each other, colors almost the same. Amy felt like by staring at this woman's eyes, she was looking intensively into her own soul.

And that's when the solution hit her.

"Of course, he did it before, why wouldn't he try again?"

***

"Come on, Kamilah, read it aloud," Lily was complaining like a little child, not being able to handle the anticipation.

But her nagging tone didn't change a thing in Kamilah's expression. It was still emotionless. She just read the words written by the person she cared about, and she was feeling nothing after doing that.

Because there was absolutely nothing emotional about this letter. No explanation, just a few meaningless words written on the useless piece of paper.

Finally, Lily couldn't stand waiting anymore, and she ripped the note out of Kamilah's hands. The woman didn't even react at such an act of insubordination, as the younger vampire started reading the words loud and clear.

Lily, I had to leave. Stay strong, stay positive, stay safe.

"That's everything?" Adrian's voice didn't hide his surprise.

Kamilah was staring with her empty eyes at the wall. She didn't expect Amy to write anything about her after what she heard last night. But what the girl wrote didn't have a meaning at all.

It meant absolutely nothing.

She looked at Lily, who suddenly became less talkative. She was studying the piece of paper like the note Amy left was way much longer than it actually was. It made the woman feel suspicious.

"Lily," Kamilah's voice made her jump, dragging her out of her thoughts. "What is it?" her tone sharp.

The girl looked at her, her eyes filling with tears.

"Lily," Adrian put a hand on her shoulder, trying to calm her and encourage at once. "If this message means something, you need to tell us."

"It does," Lily looked from one vampire to the other. "Amy wrote to me a long time ago the exact same words."

The girl gulped nervously, remembering what happened next. She felt a little squeeze on her shoulder, reminding her that she should continue explaining.

"Amy...she," Lily's voice shaky, making Kamilah's eyes filled with concern and fear. "She almost died back then."

***

Amy was alone in the basement for hours.

Again.

Or... maybe she was alone there for the whole time...

"I see you're still alive," she didn't even notice when Vega walked inside.

He made his steps toward her, and without any warning, ripped the needles out of her skin. Amy trembled from pain, gritting her teeth together. Blood started flowing slowly from her wounds, her body too weak to heal it quickly. The fact of it didn't bother Vega at all. He got himself to work, taking off the blood bags that were hanging around her.

"Why are you doing this?" Amy's voice was husky because of her dry throat. "Why would you unleash ferals all over New York?"

Adam stopped for a moment gathering the bags. Her accusation was so on point, and he didn't even share a thing about this idea with her.

"You might be smarter than I assumed," he seemed to be impressed by her. "Tell me, what betrayed me?"

Amy looked at him with disgust, he was so proud of himself. If she knew all of that earlier, she would have thought of another way to deal with him. She would not have let him lock her there to slaughter.

"Why else would you need so much of my blood?" she watched his movements closely, trying to see an opportunity to escape for herself. "You want to have the cure for yourself when you let out those ferals," his expression changed, and that made Amy come up with another conclusion, a more shocking one. "Unless... you don't need it only for yourself."

Vega packed the blood into one big bag, looking at her with intense eyes. Full of passion for his crime.

"Can you imagine the panic between people in this city?" his eyes burning with red. "How desperate would be all the vampires to get the cure? How afraid of being bitten and turned into a brainless creature?"

He walked closer to her, placing both hands near Amy's in a spot where she was tied up. His eyes were shining with madness.

"And that's when the great Vega would appear," the girl's words full of disgust. "Offering them the antidote."

"Everyone is going to beg me for this," he interrupted her, his fangs growing. "Their life is in my hands."

"You're sick," Amy spit on him, forming fists out of her hands, being angry at herself that she couldn't do more.

Adam closed his eyes for a moment, composing himself. Then, he stepped back slowly, wiping the spit off from his face with the cloth.

"Maybe I am," he looked at her with his usual dark eyes. "But, unlike you," a sly smile in the corner of his mouth. "I'm going to live."

***

"What do we remember from this night?" Kamilah felt motivation, concern, and anger fighting inside her at the same time.

Lily explained to them in a hurry about what happened last time Amy acted like that. She was just a teenager back then, wanting to help their parents. Sacrifice herself.

"We were at the gala," Adrian said, trying to boost their memory. "We were sitting by the table, talking, having fun, and then..."

"Vega's speech," Lily got all dreamy about the speech senator gave them that night.

She didn't know how much mentioning it would help to solve the case.

"And after the speech," Kamilah's imagination brought the memory of Amy dancing with Vega, and the look she gave her after Kamilah saved her from this dance. "This bastard... he..."

"Do you think that Vega has something to do with it?" Adrian watched his best friend's face, trying to read something out of it.

"I know this, Adrian," Kamilah's voice showed how sure she was of it.

There was no other explanation, and the only thing she wished at that moment was for her to realize it much sooner. Before it caused Amy's decision, about disappearing.

"So," Lily stared at them like a kid that was in the middle of her parent's important talk. "What are we gonna do with it?"

Kamilah and Adrian looked at each other. Meaningfully. Finally, the Vampire Queen spoke out loudly.

"Isn't it obvious?

We will get our girl back."

Next chapter: 25 (finale)

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