#do bears even ride those in the circus anymore

[jasonborrowed]

There is a fine line between confidence and delusion, and I ride that shit like a bear on a unicycle!

[juniorgman187]

Spoiled Rotten (Reid Fic)

Summary: After Spencer went radio silent on Reader while he was in prison, their pride and stubbornness threatens to tear them apart forever. Reader’s forced to mourn the death of who they were and experience the inner turmoil of navigating who they are.

A/N: Y’all are gonna kill me for the ending, but it’s one hell of a way to go.  Pairing: Fem!Reader x Spencer Reid Category: Angst Content Warning: Imprisonment, humiliation, abandonment, anger, frustration, angst, yelling, fighting Word Count: 5.3k Playlist: Traitor by Olivia Rodrigo

Time jumps are indicated by “. . .” or “_ _ _”

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 

A rather unfortunate predicament we’ve found ourselves in tonight. I can’t say I’ve ever been quite this uncomfortable in my life, yet I’m careful not to speak too soon. Because I know the second Spencer opens his mouth to break the silence we’re currently sitting in, I’ll stand corrected. 

“You’re breathing really hard,” He tells me out of nowhere. 

See, I stand corrected. 

Now that I’ve become hyper aware of my own inhale and exhale, my respiration is just that much more restricted. I’m practically holding my breath at this moment - both from the anticipation of catching this unsub in the act and giving Spencer one less thing to scrutinize about me. 

“I didn’t say you had to stop breathing,” He tacks on as if it would put me any more at ease. Not that if he had explicitly said such a thing, I would’ve. 

Unlike other people, I wasn’t exactly jumping at the chance to throw myself at his feet so he’d like me. But to use that as grounds for his disdain would be foolish. Our rancor went deeper than the basic lack of synergy between us. 

And in the spirit of getting to the bottom of that abyssal pit, I finally asked the question with words that always seemed to hang above but never would form. 

“Why was I the only one denied visitation while you were in prison?” 

It may surprise you to know that it wasn’t always like this between us; we were actually close once, although it is hard to imagine that version of us ever really existing. However, if I think about it hard enough, I can remember with perfect clarity who we used to be. 

. . .

“Jeez, you really don’t like these things do you?” I nudged him playfully before feeling instantly guilty once I witnessed the result of my shove that must’ve been a little too much for all 120 (at most) pounds of him. I’d neglected to remember the strength I held over the lanky Doctor as well as neglected to notice where the trajectory of my push would land him - in the direct line of a circus clown walking the opposite direction as us. This, of course, brought him face to face with the character. Unfortunately, I managed to catch a glimpse of the lens of Spencer’s glasses grazing the white face paint of the caricature. 

After a shudder of mortification and a very brave shriek, Spencer ran to my other side to be as far away from the clown as possible and apparently, as close to me as possible. From a distance, you’d think we were conjoined simply by the way he was glued to me - shoulder to shoulder, elbow to elbow, hip to hip, thigh to thigh. 

While removing his glasses to clean them off with the hem of his blazer, he answered, “Carnivals? I mean, what’s not to like? What with the loud noises, the heart-attack-inducing food that’s more grease than actual food, or the sheer amount of bacteria harboring on each and every handle, hoop, ball, or button of these ridiculous game booths.” 

“Wow, you really don’t like carnivals.” I should’ve figured. 

“Nope. Never have and probably never will.” 

As someone who looked forward to the fair every summer of her childhood, any aversion to carnivals broke my heart. I had a fondness for them borne in adolescence that I couldn’t quite justify now in my adulthood. 

“But they’re fun!” was the best argument I could muster. The whine in my voice being provoked by the possibility that the higher the shrill of my pitch, the easier he’d be to sway. Turns out, Dr. Reid was not nearly as susceptible to my auditory persuasion as I might’ve thought he was. Just a stone cold, inconvincible slab of steel. 

“I’m sorry. I know you brought me here because you love these things, but I just can’t get past the ...” He surveyed the fair, ostensibly against his will, in search of the perfect word to describe our surroundings. “Filth.”

I would’ve argued in the defense of the carnival, mentioning how it’s endearing that the only bathrooms for miles were porta potties, and that the screaming, crying, sticky children galore just added to the attraction, and that there was a hidden charm to the way the roller coasters creaked beyond their means with every ride. 

But to an extent, I agreed. It was rather filthy, and I wasn’t much of a germaphobe myself so to someone like him, this would be hell on earth. 

“Well, you get what you put into it. If you’re willing to overlook some minor imperfections, I really think you’d enjoy this place.” 

Spencer by now had his hands in his pockets and his walking pace had slowed to a complete halt. There was a moment of skepticism, followed by a partially open smile to make way for the laughter that escaped from the disbelief that he felt for letting me break his resolve so easily. 

“Alright then. What do you want to do first, Brat?” 

The nickname I’d earned could be seen as meanspirited, but truly, it was affectionately diminutive. Like all good nicknames are. And like the proclaimed Brat I was, I’d taken him to all my favorite parts of the fair. 

First came the bumper cars to ease him into the experience - as ironic as that sounds. He was reluctant to submerge his gangly body into a mini vehicle, much less one that’d been inhabited by God knows how many people before us, but he pushed his reservations aside when he realized he’d get to slam into my car (safely, of course). 

Secondly, we went on the Carousel, but this was only in preparation for the real ride that I wanted to take him on next - the Swinging Chairs. He’d gotten a little nauseous, from both the repetitive circling and the galvanized chains he had to hold that were definitely held by several others. 

He had no interest in going on the Gravitron - super lame, I know - so we opted for the Ferris Wheel instead. I didn’t mind making this compromise so much after recognizing all that he’d done for my benefit that night. And for his generosity and selflessness, I thought it only fitting to end the night going somewhere so tame he couldn’t possibly have any opposition to it.

The photo booth.

The booth in particular we’d gone to was smaller than an airplane bathroom, if you can imagine that. The bench seat was barely wide enough to fit Spencer, let alone seat the both of us. While he didn’t explicitly make the offer to let me sit on his lap, it was kind of a give in that I’d have some part of my body intertwined around him like stubborn ivy. 

. . .

I still laugh thinking about the tangled mess of limbs we were below what the camera couldn’t capture. It was arguably the furthest extent of contortionist work I wanted to do in my lifetime, and henceforth exceedingly uncomfortable, and yet, I’d never felt more at home than when I was in his arms. 

That night he would tear off the top three photos to keep for himself while I kept the bottom three photos. 

To this day, I have never seen the pictures that he kept, and I’m left to wonder if he had them at all.

Because I still have mine. And they were virtually the only thing keeping me sane throughout his trial and subsequent imprisonment. 

Six Months Ago ...

My eyes were locked on the loose thread of my cardigan that I was rolling between my fingers anxiously. 

“Would you stop that?” Penelope swatted my hand away from my sweater. “You’re making me nervous just looking at you.” She grumbled. 

“Sorry,” I apologized bleakly.

A few seconds later she groaned again, making me think I was still doing something bothersome, but it turned out to be just the opposite. “Ugh, I know that sounded mean, and I hate when I sound mean, but I can feel my forehead creasing from the stress, and watching you fidget is going to give me an ulcer.”

“I wish I could help it. I’m just really worried about him.”

“Well I am, too, but that’s not gonna do us any good right now. All we can do is hope for the best.”

Sometimes Penelope’s overly optimistic view on life was futile and unwelcome, and truthfully, this was one of those times. 

“Penny?” 

As she turned her head, I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the lenses of her dark green glasses. I could see my own mournful expression as I asked, “What if he’s found guilty?” 

She started to say something but stopped herself. “Right now, all we need to focus on is his bail. We can worry about a verdict later.” She put her hand on top of mine and shook it briefly to remind me that we were in this together. 

Moments later recess was over and the team came trudging back into the courtroom. 

The sound of the judge clearing her throat and our footsteps on the floor made this feel all too normal. 

How could Spencer’s life be hanging in the balance in such a place as non-intimate as this? 

It frustrated me how casual things felt today and how everyone was acting normally. Prentiss had yet to bat an eye, Rossi’s stoic expression never changed, and Penelope was telling me not to worry. Everyone was acting so aloof. 

My eyes darted to Spencer, who was looking back at us woefully. I couldn’t bear to see him like that any longer, so I kept my head down and stared at my feet after I took my seat. 

Even when I closed my eyes, I was haunted by the vision of him in a suit, just like one he’d wear to work. But instead, he was wearing it for this - this vastly different situation. 

I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to look at him the same in one anymore. I’ll probably just remember this particular look on his face, in this god awful courtroom, during this horribly nauseating circumstance. 

If one thing was for certain, it was that this would all come back to me if I ever laid eyes on him in a suit, and that thought fucking terrified me. 

Because that one thought spiraled into the next: Everything was bound to change after this. Every little thing would change in every little way. 

Spencer’s lawyer, the judge, and the prosecutor were going back and forth for a while, but I tuned it all out because I knew if I had tuned in, I wouldn’t have been able to hold back my arguments. Eventually, though, I heard something I could no longer ignore. 

“If past behavior is the best indicator of future conduct, and I do believe it is, then your client presents a flight risk.”

I stood up immediately, getting a head rush from the speed. I knew what was to follow, so I needed to be on my feet the second I heard it. Maybe so I could run and escape before I had to.

“Bail is denied. The defendant will remain in federal custody pending trial.” 

“Spencer!” I shouted, losing all the composure I’d been trying to maintain. I reached for him as if he was at any capacity to reach back and hold me. God, I needed him to hold me. Hold me like how he did at the carnival. 

Hold me.

Luke held me back as I fought to be near him.

“Let me go!” I screamed, trying to break free of his tight grip. Spencer could only stand and stare, mirroring my own wistful glance. He mouthed something to me that I couldn’t quite make out, but if I knew him at all, he probably said something about not wanting me to worry about him. 

“(Y/n), (y/n) it’s gonna be alright.” JJ reasoned, pulling me into a hug. 

“How long before this case goes to trial?” I heard Prentiss whisper to Spencer’s lawyer. 

“It’s a complicated case. I’d say three months maybe?” 

Immediately, I worked myself out of JJ’s arms and pushed my way through the team, running up to the barrier between us.

“Spence!” I cried out in anguish. 

To the sound of my voice, he glanced over his shoulder sadly. He wasn’t even shocked I’d been able to get so close to him - he seemed to expect it, and for that, he was sad. Because he knew if I was going to be as stubborn as to fight to get to him at this hearing, then I was going to be stubborn enough to reach him in prison, too. And should he find himself behind bars, he knew that I’d get to him one way or another. 

That is if he’d let me. 

“Be strong,” He weakly smiled. ‘For me’ his sad eyes begged in addition. He held my gaze for as long as he possibly could before disappearing into another room. 

As I watched him walk away, I could feel my heart shattering and crumbling into the pit of my stomach. Perhaps that was a premonition, a true gut feeling, telling me something I at the time couldn’t have known and wouldn’t have accepted. 

That was the last time I would see Spencer. 

People always say when something unbelievable happens, it doesn’t feel real, but this? Nothing felt more real and more intense than this. 

There was no other way for me to see this situation but as the first defeat in an endless line of them.

If Spencer was denied bail, what else could happen to him? Could he be found guilty too? Because prior to this, the denial of his bail seemed impossible. He posed no flight risk, but according to the judge, he did. So if what I once thought to be impossible happened, then it could and would happen again.

I knew Spencer was going to be found guilty.

What I didn’t know, though, was how I was going to live with myself from then on.

I didn’t go that day. 

I knew myself too well. So did the others, which is why they didn’t object to my decision not to come to Spencer’s trial. They knew I was better off staying home. Especially, if there was the chance that I might react hysterically again.

I didn’t stay home, though. That part the team never found out about. 

I went to visit Diana instead. A much wiser choice, in my opinion. 

“You know, we’ve been talking so much about Spencer today, but we haven’t talked about you yet,” said Diana. 

“Yeah, I guess that’s true.” I feigned a polite smile. 

“You thought I wouldn’t notice?” She tilted her chin downward and gave me that sly grin of hers. 

“No, no, of course not. I know better than to underestimate the Diana Reid.” I quipped, making her smile widen. “I just figured you’d wanna spend your time talking about someone much more interesting.” 

“Oh please, Spencer and I talk about you all the time.”

I perked up from the checker piece I was fiddling with. “You do?”

“Mhm,” She nodded over and over again. “I always knew there was something between you two because you could always talk about each other to me, but for some reason, you could never actually talk to each other.”

For the first time in months, I genuinely laughed and I couldn’t help it. “He makes me nervous! I always feel like he might correct something I say, or tell me that there’s food in my teeth.” 

“You know, now that you mention it, I do remember him saying something about seeing a really big piece of lettuce in your teeth one time.” 

“Diana!” I squealed, pushing the checkerboard at her, pretending to take offense. 

“I really don’t know what you’re so nervous about! I think it would be good if you just talked to him.” 

“It’s, um, it’s not that simple. Not right now, at least.” 

My energy quickly nose-dived and I tried to do my best to hide it from Diana, but it permeated through the rest of the visit. I couldn’t fully enjoy myself after it. 

The team and I all agreed not to let Diana know, especially not with the uncertainty of the case. There was no point riling her up if there was nothing to be worried about. And I could only imagine how I reacted - Diana would be reacting 10 times more hysterically. 

But as much as I hated to say it, I almost would’ve rather been in her position. 

I would give anything to un-know Spencer’s circumstance.

Present Time ...

In this car, there was nowhere for him to run or hide, not like before.

Anytime I so much as entered his gravity by being in the same room, he’d flee the space in the next breath. Granted, he couldn’t really avoid me entirely. We did have to be on the same flight for an extended period of time, but he made that work by letting me choose my spot first, then choosing a spot directly on the opposite side of the jet. 

What a gentleman, huh?

“Kudos to you, by the way. For managing to avoid me for this long. I imagine it’s been as not-easy as it has been incredibly-cowardly.” My words stung as they flowed from my lips as badly as I imagine they seared his already cracked skin. I couldn’t believe that now that I finally had the opportunity to talk to him, I was using it to be petty and passively aggressive. But then again, I could. 

Because after what he put me through, he deserved to feel the full severity of my indignation.

My only wish was that he knew exactly how I had felt when I found out. 

. . .

Icarus. 

He died tragically while using artificial wings, invented by his father, to escape from the Labyrinth. When Icarus flew too close to the sun, it melted the wax that held the wings together, and he fell into the sea.

‘Don’t fly too close to the sun.’ That’s the moral of the story. That’s what Reid was trying to tell me. But I didn’t listen. 

I flew too close. 

I had approached the window with more zeal than this predicament warranted. 

“I’m (y/n) (y/l/n). I’m here to see Spencer Reid, R-E-I-D,” I eagerly spelt his last name with ease as though it were my own last name. 

She’d flipped back and forth between pages, running her index finger up and down the sheet for far too long that it made me worry. Turns out, I had every right to be worried. 

“I don’t see you on the list, ma’am.” 

I was so mindnumbingly dumb that I couldn’t even see how dumb I was being. “Oh no no no, I’m with the FBI. I called earlier and left a message, remember?” 

“Yeah, I remember you,” She smiled politely, giving me the tiniest fragment of hope. “But you’re not on his list.” Only for it to be shattered in an instant. 

I had yet to process or accept this information. “So what does that mean?”

“It means he doesn't wanna see you right now. And frankly, neither do I. Next!” 

“Wait, could you just please check with him? My name is (y/n) -” 

“Ma’am, you are holding up a whole line of people that wanna see their loved ones too, so I suggest you see yourself out before I call security to help see you out.” 

I knew by her tone of the word ‘help’ that meant a prison guard would most likely forcibly remove me from the premises, and the last thing I needed was to feel even more humiliated. 

I got plenty of that when I had to come back to the BAU. 

“You’re not on the list?” Luke seemed genuinely shocked. More so than I was. Above all, I just felt really stupid. 

“I’m sure it was just a mistake.” Stephen reasoned. He was so good at being level-headed. Which normally, I would’ve loved. But right now, it only fueled the fire burning in my chest.

“That’s what I thought at first, too. But later on, she asked him herself, and he said - and I quote, ‘I don’t want to see her. Not now. Not ever.’”

. . .

Those were the words that seared my skin, and he hadn’t even spoken them directly to me to do it. 

The words that did just enough to heal me back to health were, of course, Penelope’s.

“Since you haven’t seen him yet, the rest of us will just wait until you have. It’s only fair that you have your first turn before the rest of us go back for a second time.” 

Back then, it was easy to hold out hope, but the more and more time passed, the more he kept denying my visits. Therefore, the more my hope began to fade. 

It had been weeks since anyone else had seen him before I finally surrendered. Although I had newly-brewing sourness towards Reid, it didn’t feel fair to deny him everyone else’s presence until mine was permitted. 

Luke was the one who volunteered to visit first. And to my dismay, Spencer didn’t fight against it. 

The proof was finally there. Now I could say with absolute certainty: Spencer just didn’t want to see me. 

It was both ironic and utterly frustrating to think about how I’d never gone more than two weeks without seeing him. Even when the BAU got time off after big cases, we’d always spend that time together. The longest we’d spent apart was 12 days. And right when he came back to D.C, we were attached at the hip for the next week, trying to compensate for all that time we were apart. 

Now, look at us. I haven’t said one word to him in half a year. 

If tragedy and comedy could coexist, this would be it. 

“How is he?” I asked Luke as soon as he got back. 

“He’s holding on,” Luke affirmed with confidence. What he said next lacked any of that. “He told me to tell you not to worry about him.” 

Something in me knew it was a lie. “Did he actually say that?”

His lack of an answer was one itself. 

“Did he say anything at all about me?”

“I tried telling him how much you wanted to see him, but he just brushed it off. I’m sorry, (y/n).” 

This became my routine for the months to follow. Every time someone would come back from the prison, I’d ask them if they talked about me, but the answer was always no. After a while, it had gotten to the point where I purposefully started leaving myself out of the loop. At least in that case, it was by my own volition that I was being excluded, not by a predicament being forced on me. 

Not by Spencer. 

“We’re not doing this right now,” Spencer declaration brought me back to the present, where I found him removing himself from both the conversation and the vehicle. When I heard the latch click to open, my hand reflexively flew to my auto-lock to prevent him from leaving. Naturally, he still managed to escape using his door’s button.

If I couldn’t stop him, then I could follow him. 

“Then when will we do this? Huh, Spencer? When? Because anytime I try to talk to you, you run away.” The mere fact that I was speed-walking after him was proof. While he casually strolled down the sidewalk paying me no mind, I tried to be clever and walk down the street so we’d be somewhat side to side. I was tired of staring at his back every time he walked away. I needed to see his face.

For his every stride, I had to take at least three steps. He was gliding through the world so effortlessly as I was trekking my uphill battle. It was quite fitting, though. Further exemplification that, between us, I was fighting harder to preserve the people we used to be, the relationship we used to have. Meanwhile, he couldn’t care less. A stone cold, inconvincible slab of steel. Just like he always was. 

As I began to speak, I had to also be conscious of the parked cars along the curb, being careful to weave in and out. 

“For months, you have blatantly ignored me. The entire time you were in prison, you denied my visits. And it’s not like it was a one time thing. I tried to visit you over 100 times while you were in jail! 100 times I got rejected. 100 times I got turned away. 100 times my heart shattered.” 

By now, I was speaking so loudly that I could see household lights within neighboring homes turning on. I hadn’t even realized how far we’d walked down the street and away from our car, but it was the last thing on my mind. 

“Then after you were released, it’s like I never even existed. I had to find out that you were out of there a week later than everyone else because they all assumed you came to me yourself to tell me the good news,” I laughed wryly at my own stupidity. “Do you know how hard it was for me?” 

“Do you know how hard it was for me?” 

It took me a second to register that he was actually engaging with me in this conversation now. But when I looked at his expression, I could see that something within him had snapped. A little piece of me was glad, though. Now I knew for sure that there was some effect I had on him. 

“Hard for you?”

“I know you came to visit me 100 times! Want to know how I know? Because I was there, too! I was there every time a guard came to ask if I wanted to see you. I was there every time I turned you away. And while you got to walk out of those doors every time I did, I was stuck in there, rotting in that cell, thinking about how badly I wanted to see you. How badly I wanted to touch ...” His voice faltered. “To touch you. But I had to protect you!” 

“You do realize in protecting me, you were hurting me in the process.” 

“Because you just don’t know when to leave well enough alone!” His hands tugged at the root of his unruly hair like evidence of the frustration that my stubbornness caused. “You’re such a pain in the ass because you can never cooperate! It’s gotta be your way or no one else’s! ‘Spencer, it has to be this way because I said so. Spencer, you have to let me see you because I said so. Spencer, you have to talk to me because I said so. Spencer, you have to ride this stupid roller coaster because I said so,’” His imitation of my nagging voice would’ve made me laugh before. Now, it was bringing me onto the verge of tears. “Since clearly no one’s told you this before - not everything is about you! You just want it to be because you’re a whiny, little brat! You’re so spoiled rotten that you can’t even see how far down it goes. If you did, you’d know that you’re rotten to the core and that nothing will ever satisfy you. Especially me.”

His words had done more than sear me. They pierced me. They ripped me. They destroyed me. When he called me Brat, I thought it was endearing. Now, looking back, I realize - no, that’s just how little he thought of me. 

As I came to the conclusion, I stopped dead in my tracks on the pavement. 

I was done chasing Spencer.

His face had fallen from its anger, indicating he was apologetic, but I was beyond accepting his sorry excuses anymore. I couldn’t stand to look at him so I looked behind me to find our car at least a football field away. I guess in many ways, I’d gone the whole nine yards. 

“This is what you wanted right?” I turned back to him momentarily. My voice scared me how calm it was because, inside, I was boiling with rage. “Well, here you go, Spence. Have all the fucking space you want.” 

It was usually me watching his back while he walked away, and now, he was watching mine. 

“(Y/n), wait!” 

And for the briefest second, it actually felt good to be the first one to leave. 

I was free. 

_ _ _

To my dismay and relief, when I walked into work the next morning, he wasn’t there. I would’ve looked for him with more than a cursory glance except I was stuck on looking at something strange in the bullpen that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. But as I walked further in, a blaring siren went off in my head. 

Spencer’s desk is completely empty. 

I instantly sorted through my purse for my phone to reach Prentiss when I noticed something more. 

I had been desperate to cling onto any notion that he still loved me, and there it was, just sitting on his desk. Proof that the man I loved was still in there somewhere.

The top three pictures from the carnival photo booth.

I laughed, as I always did, thinking about how much we had to exert ourselves to be positioned in a semi-adequate way. In the next wave, I felt profoundly empty. He had kept the pictures all these years, and now that I finally get to see them, he’s left me.

As I brought my hand to my face to clear the tears pooling at my lower lashes, I saw that my finger had an ink smear on the pad of it. There was nowhere else I could’ve obtained it except for if there was writing on the back of the photos. 

What I read when I turned it over was as follows. 

I want to be this guy for you again, (y/n). I just don’t know how. 

I just don’t know if I can.

No matter how much I’ve changed, one thing’s still the same.

I love you. 

I should’ve focused on the message, but all that I could focus on was that if I managed to smear the ink, that meant it was fresh, written just now. 

He was still here. 

I pocketed the photos and abandoned my purse, only carrying with me the phone that I forgot to use to dial Prentiss. After a moment’s indecision, I figured that taking the stairs would be faster than the elevator, and I bounded down the steps without hesitation. 

“Spencer!” I yelled into the parking structure when I reached the ground floor. The sound of me bursting through the door caught the attention of Anderson, who was getting out of his car. 

“I just saw him leave.” Anderson threw his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the exit. I knew, even in my state of mind, there was no feasible reality where I could reach him on foot. I had to call him. 

I pleaded to myself for him to pick up with every ring of my phone. 

“(Y/n),” He said like a statement instead of a question. Again, he’d anticipated I’d do this. He probably picked it up not even having to look at the caller ID but knowing it was me and no one else. 

“I don’t need you to be the guy you were before, Spencer. I just need you to bend a little bit. I know we’re both stubborn people, but if we can just find a halfway point-”

“(Y/n), (y/n),” He was settling me and the sentences that were coming out of my mouth at 100 mph. 

“I’ll bend if you bend.” I promised. 

The static of the call filled my ears until his voice finally did.

“For everyone else, I bend ... for you, I break.”

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 

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[rainiswriting]

Black Butler where o!ciel is the only one getting kidnapped because Rachel, Vincent, and r!ciel was out

My idea is that r!ciel wants to suprised o!ciel with toys so he beg his dad to take him to the toy store, Rachel follow along to pick up Angelina since she just got out of the hospital after her accident/miscarriage but then they come home to a blazing fire and all of them are devastated.

A month later o!ciel come back with Sebastian despite being happy the family mourns over o!ciel who now just emotionless.

I wanna write a scene where the whole month the family stays with o!ciel even Vincent ignore all his guard dog duty for him playing and taking him on a trip to London, buy alot more toys and new clothes, but sadly none of them even gain a twitch of smile from o!ciel except a "thank you, father" and it hurts Vincent so much. Rachel can't help to cry every night and r!ciel feels like a failure (I have alot of ideas and alot of them is just overprotective family)

Heres some of my ideas for this au:

On the twins 13th birthday they ride horses with Elizabeth and aunt Francis but because o!ciel never ride a horse before (even after he came home) r!ciel make this their bonding moment and teaches o!ciel to ride it only for o!ciel almost falling (and got caught by Sebastian) that he stopped and let o!ciel ride with him, when the bear attacks it appears behind o!ciel rather than Elizabeth and r!ciel tackled him down.

(Campania arc) o!ciel knows what undertaker is doing and decided to snoop around but got caught by Elizabeth and r!ciel (and he's mad) but before they could go up the boat the zombies (?) Woke up and attack them, when they reach the lifeboat o!ciel sneak away with Sebastian to stop undertaker and the two of them got found floating on a raft (he got an earful by his family even Edward, lizzy, and aunt Francis for a very long time)

(Book of murder arc) Vincent hold a party to captured Woodley but he didn't expect his youngest son Butler to get murdered (for the first time in three years his youngest son finally shows emotions and he hate how this is his first emotions)

Finny, meyrin, and bard is still here but I decided to put doll and joker as their servants too because rather than in the original where ciel kills everyone in that arc except snake Vincent is more level headed and take them in (including snake too I guess) (the other circus members still got killed but doll and joker mourns and accept it because they were the one planning to kill)

Drabble time (circus arc when the mansion got attacked but the target is Vincent family and Elizabeth who was staying over) (also a bit of character study? Vincent is a family guy at day and the queen watchdog/the underworld leader some kind?)

"Baron Kelvin.. You disgusts me enough as it is, first for kidnapping and basically enslaving kids and you just confessed your perverted obsession with MY kids" Tanaka besides him have a calmer expression than his master but his eyes says otherwise

"After everything the young master went through...sir Baron Kelvin you deserve to die" he hiss, he will never forgive himself for the failure he did three years ago. Not only did he failed to keep the manor save he failed protecting his master beloved son he could never redeem himself no matter what his master said

"Yes! Oh please earl phantomhive! Kill me! Kill me the way your son kill all those people in the cult! Kill me--"

"PLEASE!! HES OUR FATHER HE'S MY FATHER PLEASE DONT KILL HIM!!" Vincent almost forget about the ever loyal joker who is crawling pathetically on the ground "i-if you kill him we just gonna take something precious from you too!"his face twist to a smirk a painful smirk at that

"Are you..talking about my family?" Vincent glare cut through joker cooky smirk and Vincent sharp eyes can see him shrunk back a bit he let out a bit of satisfying chuckle in his head

"Well that would be impossible then" Vincent without hesitation took out his gun and shot Kelvin through his head instantly shutting him up "he was being so annoying" he sight

"F-FATHER" joker crawl more "THE CIRCUS IS ON THEIR WAY RIGHT NOW!! THEYRE GOING TO KILL YOUR FAMILY AND EVERYTHING YOU EVER DEAR!! EVEN YOUR SERVANTS" Between each breath joker scream

"Are you hearing yourself boy?" Tanaka chuckle and Vincent let out an amused smirk

He'll never let his family got under attack not anymore

"This is the servants of phantomhive, after what happened three years ago" Vincent kneel to joker heigh, joker feel like a bug that's about to get squish

"I would never let anything happened to my family again"

That painful month of self regret and self loathing, Vincent should be thankful to god astre is still alive (despite being broken) and he would never let anything happened to astre or anyone of his family ever again

[sokkascroptop]

traitor. (sokka x f!reader) pt 5

part 1 | part 4 | part 6

A/N: Y/N finally meets the gaang; on a side note, I am really proud of this chapter ❤️

She caught it just a moment before it smacked her in the chest. Her reflexes were delayed from her sleepiness but also from the realization that her Fire Princess just had dropped to her knees and tied her boots for her. “Easy. I’m not a bender. I don’t need the sun.”

“Lo and Li have advised me that it isn’t smart to go after Zuko and Uncle with a Royal Procession.” Azula leaned in the doorway to Y/N’s room. Her hair was a black curtain around her pale face. Y/N ran her fingers through her own loose hair before replying.

“It would be less conspicuous without guards flanking us on all sides. Do you think that the two of us could do it ourselves?” She asked hesitantly, thinking back to just a day earlier when Azula said she was a liability. Y/N wasn’t even planning to fight when she agreed to come! She thought it was going to be easier, she didn’t expect Iroh to be so suspicious of them from the get go. Apparently, neither did Azula. She was so mad when they pulled her from the sea, the water was steaming off of her clothes and skin. 

Azula smiled and sat in the chair to the small, empty writing desk in the room. “I need a small, elite team.” She tapped one pointed nail on her chin. “I think it’s time to call on some old friends, don’t you think so?”

“Mai and Ty Lee?” Y/N questioned. The last time one of them was mentioned Azula set fire to the napkin she was holding at dinner and pointed a butter knife in Y/N’s direction telling her never to mention their names again. 

“Of course them.” Azula rolled her eyes and cracked her fingers. “They’re our friends, Y/N. They’ll do anything I want.” Her voice was low and even though it wasn’t meant as a threat, it sounded like one. 

Azula shut the door to Y/N’s room with a sharp click. She leaned back against her pillow and crossed her arms. This was not going to go well. 

Anytime she and the girls exchanged letters, the answer was always the same. Neither Mai or Ty Lee were planning on coming back to the palace any time soon. They never explicitly said that Azula was the reason–one could never know who was reading your letters–but Y/N could see the subtext. A taste of life outside of Capital City and outside of Azula’s influence had spoiled them. Y/N had never felt like that before, but every day, she got a little bit more understanding as to why one might want to leave. 

It was still dark out when Azula came into Y/N’s room the next morning. She tapped Y/N’s cheek with her nail. “Get up, we’re leaving soon.”

She glared at Azula from under the very warm covers. “Why so early?” 

Azula’s gold eyes flashed with humor. “It’s a long ride into town. I’ve got us a carriage.” She grabbed the blanket that Y/N was clutching and threw them off the bed, leaving her shivering. 

“Every time,” Y/N muttered as she pulled her night clothes off and her red tunic and pants on. 

“Every time what?” Azula asked. Y/N thought she could hear a smile in the other girls words but she was currently too busy looking cross-eyed at the laces of her boots to check. 

“Why are you such a morning person?” Y/N knew the answer that Azula was going to give, but it didn’t make the question any less relevant in her mind. She hated mornings. 

“More like a question as to why aren’t you?” Hands slapped Y/N’s own fumbling ones away and tied each boot deftly. Before Y/N could even utter a ‘thank you’, Azula was grabbing her sword from where it was propped in the corner and tossing it in Y/N’s direction. 

She caught it just a moment before it smacked her in the chest. Her reflexes were delayed from her sleepiness but also from the realization that her Fire Princess just had dropped to her knees and tied her boots for her. “Easy. I’m not a bender. I don’t need the sun.”

Azula had only tied the boots because she wanted to get going, Y/N decided. Probably.

“You sound like one of those Water Tribe savages. Next thing you know, you’ll be howling at the moon.” Y/N laughed with Azula no matter how awful she thought the joke was and basked in the warm that her friend gave off. She was always so much nicer in the mornings. 

The sun was just rising as they set off, probably purposeful if she knew Azula. Y/N stared out the window the whole trip. She’d never been to the Earth Kingdom before and she was so intrigued by everything she saw. There was greenery everywhere. It made her heartache for her childhood home on Ember Island. The climate was different, here it was much cooler and the wind ruffled the leaves on the trees every now and then. And Ember Island was hot and muggy year round. But she couldn’t miss the similarities of the two places. Every now and then she’d catch an animal she’d never seen before run past and she’d all but hold her head out the window to get a second look. Azula was much more regal, which was unsurprising though she wasn’t sure if Azula had ever been to the Earth Kingdom either. She sat in the seat across Y/N with her arms crossed and her feet on the bench next to Y/N. Azula had her eyes closed the whole time, reclining in a beam of sunlight coming in through the windows, but Y/N knew she wasn’t sleeping. 

She thought Azula looked much better like this; with her face softened in relaxation. No furrowing of the eyebrows or pursing of her lips. Occasionally, the wind would blow in the windows and ruffle her usually pristine hair. Y/N thought Azula glared and frowned way too much for a fourteen year old girl, Fire Princess or not. Just then Azula cracked open one of her eyes like she knew Y/N was thinking about her. But Y/N didn’t look away like she usually would have done. She just stared and smiled at her friend until Azula closed that eye again and settled further down into the seat. Y/N chose to ignore the light tap of Azula’s toe on her elbow, but not the small smile that was now on her face. 

After reaching the town it wasn’t hard to find the circus. Azula and Y/N just followed the noise and the smell. They were set up in a large field where they could have enough room to set up their tall tents and keep their platypus-bears and scorpion-lions. 

Ty Lee was in the middle of it all. 

She didn’t see them when they first approached. Y/N thought it looked like Ty Lee was flying as she flipped head over heels in the grass. She held herself in a perfectly still handstand. Y/N’s abs ached just watching. 

“Azula! Y/N!” Ty Lee rushed forward, hastily bowed, before crushing Azula in a hug. Y/N received the same tight–albeit longer–hug. “It’s so good to see you!” Ty Lee chirped. 

“I’ve missed you!” Y/N did realize how excited she was to see her old friend until she was in her arms. She smelled the same, like rose perfume and the rosin she used in her tricks. Letters were nice, but they took weeks to travel to each other. Something always happened between them, and when it was time to reply, that ‘something’ was never important anymore. 

“Don’t let us interrupt… whatever you’re doing.” Azula raised an arched eyebrow.

Ty Lee took that as permission and backflipped back into a forearm stand and began scissoring her legs in the air. She held herself on her elbows and rested her head in her hands like it was the easiest thing in the world. 

“You look like you’re having the time of your life here, Ty Lee,” Y/N said. The glow on the girls cheeks and the permanent smile on her lips was obvious. She was always bubbly, but she’d never been like this.

“What is the daughter of a nobleman doing here?” Azula asked, gesturing around to the tents and people who walked by. A hurt look erased Ty Lee’s smile, one that Azula didn’t pay attention to. She jumped right in, never caring for small talk. “I have a proposition. I’m hunting a traitor. You remember my old fuddy-duddy uncle?”

“Oh, yeah!” Ty Lee exclaimed. “He was so funny.”

“I would be honored if you would help me and join my mission.” 

Ty Lee’s feet, which moment’s ago rested on her head, slipped as she lost balance and nearly fell forward on her face. She looked to Y/N for assistance but like a coward, Y/N looked at the grass under her boots. The glance lasted half a second, maybe even less but it still made Y/N tense next to Azula as if she was caught with her hand in the bowl of unfried dough by her mother. This was between Ty Lee and Azula. Any indication that Ty Lee and Y/N had spoken since she’d left would. Be. Bad. 

“Oh, you know Azula, I would love to.” She flipped back to her feet. “But the truth is I’m really happy here. My aura has never been pinker!” Y/N smiled. Leave it to Ty Lee to lighten the mood by talking about her auras. It was incredibly smart, to make it seem like you were dumb to avoid consequences. Y/N wished she could pull that card with Azula sometimes, but she knew her too well. And Y/N knew nothing about auras. 

“Well,” Azula frowned. “I wouldn’t want you to give up the life you love to please me.” 

Y/N ground her teeth. She looked up through her lashes at Ty Lee. This was somewhere she finally fit in. Y/N knew the story with Ty Lee’s sisters and how she felt like part of a matched set. This is where she needed to be, not traveling the world with Azula on some mission that wasn’t going to do anything for her. Y/N didn’t have a choice. Ty Lee did. Don’t fall for it! Y/N wanted to scream. 

Maybe it was Agni, or maybe Ty Lee just had more self control and a self-preservation that Y/N lacked. She placed one fist against her open palm and bowed deeply. “Thank you, Azula.” 

Azula was bristling beside Y/N as they walked away. “Of course before we leave we’re going to catch your show. Aren’t we, Y/N?” Azula gripped Y/N’s arm like a vise. 

“We wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Y/N said. 

----

Y/N wasn’t sure what Azula told the ringmaster, but every seat in the tent was empty that night. 

High above their box, a square frame filled the stage. Lanterns hung around the frame, illuminating the whole tent. A tightrope spanned across it; a tightrope which Ty Lee was currently balancing on. 

“We are so pleased to have the Fire Lord’s daughter here tonight to see our humble circus. Please tell us if we can do anything to make it more enjoyable.” the ringmaster bowed and left the stage. 

“I will,” Azula muttered. Y/N furrowed her brow in Azula’s direction but she stared straight ahead like she didn’t even notice. What was she planning? Y/N wondered. 

Ty Lee was perched on a pole that rolled along the tightrope like pulley. She slowly switched from hand to hand, posing with a split in the air. Her costume glimmered under the candle-lit lanterns and her full dancer’s skirt bounced as she moved. 

“Incredible. Do you think she’ll fall?” Azula asked Y/N. 

Y/N scoffed at the question, never taking her eyes off of Ty Lee. “Of course not!”

“Then let’s make it more interesting. Ringmaster! Let’s remove the net at the bottom.”

The man’s grey eyes widened. “Remove the net? The thing is–the performers–”

Azula waved a hand. “You’re right. That’s been done. Set the net on fire.”

“Azula, don’t you think that’s a little much?” Y/N asked warily. She wasn’t sure what her friend was playing at but risking Ty Lee’s life wasn’t the answer. Y/N, however, didn’t get an answer. The ringmaster had already done what she had asked. 

For a second, just as the fire reached all the corners of the net below, Ty Lee seemed to teeter, before regaining her balance. Azula huffed, almost like she expected the other girl to fall. “Brilliant. And ringmaster, what kind of dangerous animals do you have here?”

“Azula, I don’t think–” Y/N started only to be cut off by a hand waving in her face. 

“Well, Princess, our circus boasts an assortment of exotic–”

“Release them all,” Azula smiled. 

Y/N sat in horror as she watched saber-tooth moose tigers, scorpion-lions and even an elephant-bear get released below the tight-rope. 

How Ty Lee managed to finish her act without falling was a mystery to Y/N. When she reached the opposite platform she even blew a kiss in their direction before climbing down and ceding the stage to the rest of the performers. 

Azula had only been interested in Ty Lee’s performance and ignored the rest of the performers, finding filing her nails into sharp points more interesting. Y/N wasn’t much better, her head was still spinning at what Azula had done. This was her friend. Someone who ignited such a rage in leaving her that Azula had threatened Y/N with fire if she ever mentioned her name. Was that why she did it? Was this some type of revenge for running away to the circus?

For a second she allowed her mind to think of what would have happened if Ty Lee hadn’t been such a good acrobat. What would either of them have done had she fallen into the flames? The net was in tatters, blackened and burned away. It couldn’t have held her weight from a fall that far, would have been like it wasn’t even a net at all. Plus she would have been on fire! Y/N had just watched Azula try to publicly kill her, and Y/N had just sat there and watched. 

As soon as the performance ended Azula dragged Y/N out of the tent. The air was full of black smoke from the net being burnt away and it blotted out the stars above. They made their way to Ty Lee’s tent. 

She was sitting at her vanity peeling sticky jewels off her face and wiping away layers of makeup. Y/N stared at the stain of ash that coated her gold-plated headband.

Azula leaned against the table forcing Ty Lee to look up at her. “What an exquisite performance. I can’t wait to see how you’ll top yourself tomorrow.”

Ty Lee caught Y/N’s eyes in the mirror and Y/N knew what she was going to do. 

“Unfortunately, there won’t be a show tomorrow.”

Azula widened her eyes in mock-surprise at Y/N. “Really?”

Ty Lee stood to hang her headband above the mirror. “The universe is giving me strong hints that it’s time for a career change. I want to join you on your mission.”

And that’s when it all clicked for Y/N. That net being set on fire and the animals being released wasn’t about killing Ty Lee. Sure, it would have killed her if she had fallen, but the real motive behind it all was worse. 

She could tell by the smirk on Azula’s face that she had gotten exactly what she wanted. Because during Ty Lee’s show, Azula was putting on her own. She was displaying the power she held over them. Telling them without so many words what would happen if they proved disloyal, or stepped out of line. She was in control. And suddenly, Y/N was very fearful of her friend; even as she allowed herself to be pulled into a hug. 

“Let’s go get Mai.” Azula tucked a stray hair behind Y/N’s ear and nodded at them to follow her out of the tent and back to the carriage. 

----

Azula made the carriage take them back to the ship that night. The mountain roads were too small for a carriage as large as theirs to carry them to Omashu, where Mai’s father governed and they needed to dock the ship at the city’s port. This time, Azula entered on a palanquin. Ty Lee and Y/N marched behind it as they entered the palace grounds. 

“Please tell me you’re here to kill me.” Mai bowed to Azula as they approached. She looked at Azula seriously, before smiling and laughing. 

“It’s good to see you too, Mai,” Azula confessed. 

Ty Lee rushed past both of them to hug Mai. When Y/N could tell that the hug had lasted long enough for Mai, she gently pulled Ty Lee off and replaced her. 

“I thought you ran off and joined the circus?” Mai asked Ty Lee. “You said it was your calling.”

Ty Lee smiled brightly. “Well, Azula called a little louder.” 

“And you–” Mai gripped Y/N’s bicep. “Swinging that stupid sword must be all you do. You’re built like a guard.” A comment like that coming from anyone else might have offended Y/N, but from Mai she knew what it really meant–you’re still in one piece. 

Mai was quick to join their team. Y/N knew from letters that Mai was bored with Omashu, and this was a perfect opportunity to get out from underneath her parents. 

“You guys came at the right time,” Mai said as they entered the palace. “My brother was kidnapped by the resistance last night.”

“Oh no!” Ty Lee gasped. 

“Why would they take Tom-Tom?” Y/N asked. There had to be a motive behind kidnapping a baby. Omashu might have been taken over by the Fire Nation but surely the people here wouldn’t resort to anything...murder-y just for their city back. He was just a baby! 

Mai looked back at her and Y/N noticed dark circles under her eyes she hadn’t seen before. She didn’t sleep at all last night knowing someone had her brother. “We don’t know.”

As she led the three of them to the throne room where Ukano and Michi were waiting, she caught them up on everything they needed to know. The room smelled like dust, clearly sitting unused since the governor took over the city. The three girls, as well as Mai’s parent’s knelt on pillows as Azula ascended to the throne. 

They all bowed before sitting up. Mai continued, “We’ve offered up an exchange; we sent a messenger hawk last night. We have Omashu’s King in the prison–Bumi.”

Azula turned to Ukano. “I’m so sorry to hear about your son. But really, what did you expect by just letting all the citizens leave?” She clasped her hands together and crossed her legs. Y/N noticed she didn’t look sorry at all; her face was cold, angry even. 

“Princess–” Ukano bowed his head respectfully. 

“My father has trusted you with this city, and you’re making a mess of things.” She stepped down from the throne and the girls all rose to meet her. “Mai will handle the hostage trade so you don’t have the chance to mess it up. And there is no more Omashu.” Azula growled. “I’m renaming it in honor of my father. The city of New Ozai!” She strode out of the room with all three of them on her heels. All three of them ignored the tears in Michi’s eyes.

They met on the landing of a construction project. Looking up, Y/N could see what it was. It was a giant statue of Ozai. It was mostly covered in scaffolding but Y/N still shuddered just looking at it. Though this Ozai was made of stone, the eyes were the same, cold and dead. Mai took the lead flanked to left with her and Azula, the right with Ty Lee. 

Even from a distance Y/N could tell that these weren’t members of any resistance. They were kids, probably her age, but maybe younger. Two were wearing Water Tribe blue–the boy in the middle though–was wearing yellow and orange. Y/N had never seen anyone wear those colors before. She could hear Azula hum thoughtfully next to her. 

A crane from above lowered the metal box that held former King Bumi. Y/N noticed he seemed rather chipper for being locked in a metal coffin with only his head sticking out. 

“You brought my brother?” Mai asked. Her low, raspy voice carried over the distance between them. 

“He’s here. We’re ready to trade,” The one in orange answered.

Azula turned to Mai. “I’m sorry, but a thought just occurred to me. Do you mind?”

Mai tensed. “Of course not, Princess Azula.”

“We’re trading a two-year-old for a king. A powerful, earthbending king. It just doesn’t seem like a fair trade, does it?”

Mai’s eyes narrowed, searching over every inch of Azula’s face. Her jaw tightened and slowly she turned to look back at the ‘resistance’ members. “You’re right. The deal’s off.”

Ty Lee and Y/N shared a look. What was Mai thinking? This was her brother. 

As King Bumi was once again lifted into the air, the boy in orange ran towards them, a swirling mass of dirt trailing him. Azula stepped out and threw a ball of fire at him. Or at least where he should have been. He jumped and then flew? high above them, floating on air currents with his staff that was now a glider. He was an airbender. 

“The Avatar!” Azula exclaimed. “My lucky day.” As Azula took off after the Avatar, Y/N ran to the Water Tribesmen, Ty Lee and Mai hot on her tail. She drew her sword and cut an ice dagger in half that the girl threw at her head. She ducked a rope of water and slipped past the waterbender, leaving Mai and Ty Lee to take care of her. Y/N was going to get Tom-Tom. 

The Watertribe boy was furiously blowing on a silent whistle and trying to wrangle the squirming baby in his arms. He turned and ran but tripped over a loose board and slid backwards to the edge. Y/N was nearly there, her fingers inches from grabbing the baby when something wet wrapped around her ankle like seaweed and pulled her hard in the opposite direction. She hit her chin on the wooden boards and lost her grip on her sword which skittered away helplessly over the edge and down to the ground. 

She kicked out but there was nothing for her foot to hit. The waterbender had grabbed her foot with a water rope to stop her and went back to fighting Mai and Ty Lee. She had her hands full with them, dodging chi blocks and blocking knives so she was protective of the boy–loyal to him. Her brother. Use it. A voice in Y/N’s head that sounded too much like Azula’s told her.

Y/N pushed herself to her feet, ignoring the sting of her chin and slid down the ladder just as the Water Tribe boy had done seconds earlier. 

He stood at the bottom looking to the air like he was waiting for something. He watched her come near but didn’t move. That’s when she saw her sword laying a few feet away. He saw her see it at the same time. 

They both rushed to it. Y/N grabbed the hilt but couldn’t pull away. He’d crossed his club over it holding the blade down.

 “Don’t.”

“Then I won’t.” She kicked his club away and pulled her blade back. They both backstepped giving each other space. She held her hand out to him. “ I just want the baby.” 

“Not a chance.” His bright blue eyes watched her every move. He shifted Tom-Tom on his hip.

“Please, it’s my friend’s brother. What would you do if this was your sister?”

“Don’t talk about her!” He shouted. But Y/N didn’t miss his eyes flicker to the platform. 

“I can talk to Princess Azula. I can tell her to make the deal. Bumi for Tom-Tom. Just trust me.”

“Trust you?” he echoed. Then he laughed. Y/N didn’t get to ask him what he was laughing about because she was suddenly hit with something large in the ribs and thrown under the scaffolding. She grunted as she sat up and crawled through the broken beams she was thrown through. In the sky was a flying bison.

“Damn it.” 

After climbing back up the ladder, Y/N and her friends met in the middle of the platform, Azula nowhere in sight. 

Y/N shook her head. “I’m sorry I couldn’t get Tom-Tom.”

Mai massaged a bruised wrist and shrugged. 

“But why would Azula cancel the deal?” Ty Lee asked. “We want Tom-Tom back just as much as they wanted King Bumi!”

“Azula didn’t,” Mai spat. 

Y/N sighed. “Why’d you let her do it, Mai?”

“You know why.”

“It’s not fair.” Ty Lee slung an arm around Mai’s waist. Y/N mirrored her on the other side. They walked back to the palace in silence. Nothing needed to be said, they knew what one another were thinking. 

----

“We have a third target now,” Azula announced from inside the palanquin as they marched out of the city. “We’re going after the Avatar.” 

“Ooh, I’d like to see that cute Water Tribe boy again, wouldn’t you?” Ty Lee nudged Y/N in the ribs with her pointy elbow. Y/N smiled, he was pretty cute, she thought to herself. 

Her smile grew to a grin. “Yeah, but I bet Mai’s more excited to see Zuko.” Y/N poked Mai in the arm and watched the girl who tried her hardest not to show her emotions flushed a deep red. 

Ty Lee and Y/N fell into a fit of giggles. Y/N missed her friends.

Taglist: @reclusive-chicken-nugget​ , @myexgirlfriendisthemoon​ , @astroninaaa​

A/N: if you’re getting vibes that Azula likes Y/N more than a friend, you are right ;) AND HEY we finally meet the gaang!! Y/N thinks Sokka’s cute!! Sokka hates her Fire Nation guts!! 

Like & reblog!! ❤️If you would like to be added to the taglist please shoot me a message or ask! 

[whatsyourcolor]

Dragnet - Chapter 9 - Kingdom of Thieves.

Read on Ao3

Thank you to those of you that are still reading Dragnet! In previous chapters Kogami and Akane conducted a mission that resulted in technology malfunctioning, suspicions arising and Akane almost getting killed. Kogami broke up their short-lived (or so he thinks) association for reasons and emotions still confusing to him. Here’s Chapter 9:

KINGDOM OF THIEVES

Pliable, suspiciously warm, the sofa's leather cushions in the analysis lab sank underneath Kogami's weight, comfort suffusing his tense limbs like an anxiolytic. Undoubtedly, Kunizuka had made a routine pitstop here prior to heading to the interrogation room with Ginoza for another round of fruitless grilling. Which would explain the mellow, secret melody Shion was humming as she typed away on her keyboard. At least someone in Division 1 was having fun. Banished from the interrogation room and having severed the only connection he had to that other world, lulls of silent anticipation such as this had become nearly intolerable for him because, like a stray dog, his mind would go—insistently, shamelessly—back to her.

If only his ruminations had been centered in the pragmatic aspects of their relationship (what was her exact link to the syndicates? When did it start? And why?), he could have forgiven himself more easily. But it was the way his name sprung from her direct mouth, and how it meant she was not cross with him (as opposed to Inspector), and that furrowed brow each time she sermonized about things not unlike those he’d spend hours perusing in books—things he had strictly forbidden himself to linger on; things he’d never dream to speak about out loud. It was her scrutiny, never sub rosa. Not when she looked at him with unabashed eyes, not searching for a weakness or a fault—he suspected—but for something like a virtue, something that would warrant their unlikely partnership in her eyes.

So what did it mean for him to be sitting here while she was still out there, meandering in the dark? Stubbornly continuing this, insisting on this, and she would lose more than her hue. Kogami palmed the cellphone inside his pocket and then thought better of it because—what right did he have to care? To ask anything from her? Who was he in her life but an accident of chance? Or, perhaps, had his threats managed to compel her, and had she gone back to an ordinary life where she didn’t want to change the world? No, he thought sullenly. Even I know that about you. But it’s not like you’re alone either, is it, Tsunemori? Not that it makes you any safer.

On a large screen, a corner-side vantage of the dark interrogation room. Light spilled from a lamp above onto a table as a cuffed man swaggered in like a circus bear that's figured out the master's whip is made of hay. A braggart's smirk splashed across his face as he flumped on a chair. Kogami perched his elbows on his legs, interlaced hands under his nose to summon all his objective focus on the screen, but all he could think about was how much he'd love to pummel that sneer off again.

"A different species of inspector today," proclaimed the Arumajiro man, all affected bravado to Gino's bespectacled, sober professionalism. Still bearing the marks Tsunemori had gouged on his tattooed skin, he slammed his arms on the table, presumably to stir a wince from Ginoza, who only blinked with imperturbable disdain. "And you even brought a woman to protect you. That a habit of Sibyl's dogs?"

"The type of technology found in the interior of the truck you and your comrades were riding on is not something that can be built with metal scraps scavenged from Ougishima,” Gino said with no inflection in his voice. "Who is funding your association?"

The man acknowledged the question with a caustic snort for answer, a sort of growl. His eyes slithering over the less illuminated corners of the room—methodically, as if searching for something.

“He’s watching, ain’t he?” he eventually muttered. “He wouldn’t miss this.”

"You'll have enough time to look at walls when you go to the isolation facility. No need to strain your eyes so hard on these,” Gino spat back. “Answer the question. Your syndicate knew about the crackdowns by the MWPSB. How did you acquire a signal jammer? Who programmed it?"

"Inspectors in the blocks," the man began in a low voice. "You lot stick out like a pack of wild hens running around with your dominators. Of course, everyone always knows when you're there, with your holos and your drones. You’re not exactly low-key, you know? The eyes of Sibyl might see us only when they want to, but we’re always watching.”

"And so your syndicate figured they'd try to go undetected and invest on an illegal piece of technology impossible to acquire within the abolition blocks.”

"Impossible,” the man echoed as if mulling the meaning of the word. As if, Kogami thought, what a Sibyl detective would deem impossible, even preposterous in his world, was something that acquired a different value where he came from. A perverse grimace spread on the man’s face, a sort of smiling frown full of certitude. "Nothing is impossible in the abolition blocks. Not anymore.”

“Not exactly a charmer when he finally decides to talk, is he?” Shion drawled with a slow plume of smoke, her profile silhouetted by blue light in the haze. “What could he possibly mean?”

"At least he's taunting us now,” Kogami murmured dryly. “But I don’t perceive urgency in his behavior. No negotiation or surrender. If he’s decided to talk it must be for more than dull temporizing, though I don’t think his objective is to necessarily give us what we want.”

“Hmm. Who knows.” Shion gave an affected gasp. “Could it be he likes Ginoza better?”

Kogami chuckled softly, and Shion smiled, proud of herself. He figured he probably had been looking as dismal as he felt.

“Definitely,” he acknowledged with a cool sigh, lifting himself up from the softness of the sofa, and starting to hanker for a smoke. He shoved the flaps of his navy windbreaker aside and thrust his hands in the pockets of his pants. “Gino can be a darling when he wants to. But I should head over there now. Might as well put some pressure now he’s talking.”

“I thought Ginoza said—”

“I know. I know he instructed all of you to keep me at bay. But this case might be bigger than we think and I can’t just wait idly by.”

Shion exhaled coolly, swiveling her chair toward her station again. “Very well. Just be careful.”

Freely, brashly for an interrogation, the man went on blathering on the screen. “But impossible things have been happening. People disappearing. Tunnels hidden behind holo. Miracles, even. The last of which involved a woman intercepting a truck in the tunnels, armed with nothing but a bat—so what I’ve been wondering is, how did the excellent and competent MWPSB get a double-crossing bitch to do their job for them?”

Doors glided open in front of him as Kogami’s step came to a standstill. Jaw clenching, he whirled round to face the grainy image of the man again.

“You’d do well to remember I’m the one asking questions here,” Ginoza retorted impatiently, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “This isn’t an exchange of particulars between two commensurate parties. This is an interrogation, and your time is running out.”

The man leaned in over the table and Kunizuka’s back went upright, her hand circling around her waist as a warning. “You see,” he said. “I can’t help but be intrigued as to how a single woman gained the trust of the underground resistance and helped them against the syndicates, all while working with the police.”

Kogami stiffened. Was that the reason behind Tsunemori’s ironclad secrecy? Did the man not kill her only because he was working information out of her? Even if Kogami had entertained a similar notion before—with her overt spurning of the system and her criminal consorts—something in him refused to admit that she could be, for lack of a better word, his enemy. But if what was being said was true, then the accusations he’d hurled at her—the same ones that had been tormenting him since he’d said them—may have been wholly understating.

“Justice for traitors and informers, know what that is? That wretched girl hanging from a wire in the ports of Ougishima where anyone else with funny ideas can see. Or worse—No. Better—her chained to a bed in the filth of a brothel. See that pretty hue turn black.” The man spoke slowly but without pause, in his visage a pained expression that evoked menace in lieu of sorrow. “Imagine, if you can, in a place crawling with people both desperate to cleanse their sins and itching for something unsullied to defile, just what coveted merchandise a clear-hued Sib would be. Not just any Sib, no. A plant by the MWPSB. A traitor. Hell, for all we know it might be her own people that get her first.”

With clenched fists, Kogami made his way back toward the screen. It wasn’t that the man’s tirade didn’t incense him greatly, considering to whom his poisoned darts were being aimed. But there was something else: the fact that he spoke as if he wasn’t in Sibyl’s claws. In his claws.

“That brat is too smart for her own good. Messing with things she don’t understand. Stealing things that don’t belong to her. Out of all the crummy chumps the so-called resistance has produced, this one might be the trickiest one. Should’ve snuffed her out when I had the chance.”

“This resistance,” Ginoza cleared his throat, “is it an anti-governmental group?”

The man stared superciliously, almost amused. “You Sibs think the blocks are seedbeds of chaos where the scum of society oozes like a weeping blister in your clean world. It’s not for me to deny it. I’ve seen men rip out each other’s guts over a cigarette. I’ve slain many more myself, men and women, for less than that. Why? You worried the pus might spill onto your streets? You afraid hearing these things will make you catch that disease?” A spark of relish in his eye. “What if I told you there’s a cure for that?”

“A—a cure? A cure for what?”

“The illness of evil—the illness the Sibyl system diagnosed for the rest of us. In fact, I’ll prove it to you right now,” the man invited with an almost affable tone. “Point your dominator at me.”

“What? What are you talking abou—H-Hound 2! No one ordered you to withdraw your dominator!”

Kunizuka, arm fully extended next to Ginoza’s face, had her sights aimed directly at the space between the eyebrows of the Arumajiro man. “I’m sorry, Inspector. This is the only language men like these speak.” A heavy mute second was filled with Ginoza’s eyes flitting from the dominator, to the man, back to Kunizuka until at last, haltingly, she lowered her arm and her jaw dropped with shock. “Th-There has to be a mistake. We checked his hue this morning and it was—a-and besides, he just said—”

Kogami didn’t wait to hear the rest. He bolted out of the analysis lab and down the corridor in the direction of the emergency stairs. His mind raced. One victim found dead in a factory. A second victim mauling herself to death in Nona Tower. Disparate timelines and intervals in both casualties, as if the pill’s dual mechanism could be detonated at a distance, at will. It made no sense. He hurtled down endless flights of stairs many floors below, gnawing despair lodged deep in his stomach. He’d seen him strangling her. He’d tried to drown him. No doubt he was a murderer. It couldn’t be. Nausea and doom had overtaken him by the time he tore past the doors of the last hallway and turned the last corner, silvered walls bouncing all around him as he caught sight of his mark leaving the interrogation room behind Ginoza and Kunizuka. He couldn’t see or hear until his hands were on the man. Until he felt other hands trying to pull him away.

“Shepherd 2! Get a hold of yourself!” Ginoza thundered, forcefully jostling against him. “Stop this right now! Kogami!”

“You fucking bastard,” Kogami growled, both hands yanking the manacled Arumajiro man by his threadbare shirt. “You know about the pill. You know what it is. You’re gonna tell me everything even if I have to kick it outta you!”

“Seems like someone’s found the antidote to Sibyl,” the tottering man hissed back, reveling in Kogami’s stunned expression. “Whatever it is you want to call it.”

“Yeah?” Kogami’s grip was taut on the collar around the man’s neck. “Then you must know about its side effects. Does that make you smile also?”

“I’d be more worried about that hue of yours, Inspector. I’d even go as far as advising you to choose your friends and allies wisely. Before she ruins you.”

A sobering shudder ran through Kogami.

“Search for her,” he rasped with bared teeth, “touch her again, and I swear I’ll find you and kill you with my own hands!”

“That’s enough of that!” Masaoka shouted from somewhere. Next thing he knew, Sasayama was there too, shouldering his way between them, tearing Kogami off as Kunizuka and Gino pulled the man away. Still, Kogami shoved and kicked and cursed as the man crossed the threshold of a door shutting closed, and then his vision went askew as a sharp pain had him hunching down and looking at the ground, immobilized.

“You need to cool down, son.” Masaoka tightened his armlock and Kogami heard himself pant helplessly, his forehead beading with sweat.

“Don’t you realize,” Kogami grunted through the pain, “that’s the one lead we have in this case?”

“And what good will it do if you end up in a rehabilitation facility?” Sasayama’s shoes came into view and Kogami was just able to shift his head up to shoot a glare at him. “How is pulling this bullshit gonna help you catch him then?”

There was the slow squeak and hush of a door opening and closing again.

“I hope you know this is all your influence, Sasayama,” Ginoza roared. “And if you think I won’t have a few words to say about you in the report of this incident, then you’re awfully misguided.” Masaoka loosened the grip of his metallic arm, and Kogami yanked his own free. He straightened up to meet the withering, unforgiving gaze of his partner. “Masaoka, go assist Kunizuka in the discharge of the witness. Kogami, you and I need to talk.”

“Gino, we can’t let him go,” Kogami protested with a gruff voice. “You saw what just happ—”

“Would you rather we do this in the presence of the Chief?”

Kogami squeezed his eyes shut, attempting to steady himself, but rage still boiled inside of him. “Fine,” he grumbled with frustration. “Fine.”

---------

Outside of Nona Tower the sun had set but the city was blazing like it was the middle of the day. A shine as artificial as that of the abolition blocks, though sleeker, clearer, new. Not the dizzying red and yellow twilights that led the way through the narrower, angular alleys of the abolition blocks, nor the darkened hollows and crannies where eyes and knives glinted. From a holographic billboard the large face of a woman donned in traditional garb gazed at him, her pale face dissolving into a pink forest, carpeted with what looked like pink snow. The next thing he noticed was that there was no distinct smell.

He walked the stretch of the plaza. Guardedly. Drawing near to where another hologram had attracted a multitude, but still keeping a cautious distance, he stood to watch. Three large fish swam in a hoop, floating in sync until one of them broke the formation to playfully pursue the others, making a squealing sound similar to that of rats, but louder and full of delight. Something like a fog, a vague sensation taking form, disturbed him. A nebulous recollection from years ago, of childhood in the blocks. A discoloured picture of animals like these nailed to a cracking wall. A wrinkled old lady calling him evil before falling with a thud. He remembered her body being warm even after he’d withdrawn his knife more times than he could count. The eyes in the eyes of his first kill looking deep into him and then…nothing. It’s cold, he thought, and that’s why I’m shivering. He peered at the crowd. Oblivious onlookers and their marveled profiles. His gaze drifted upwards and behind the surrounding skyscrapers. They didn’t know a few kilometers from here people burned. Soon they would.

He pivoted to two pairs of gawking eyes pegged on him. Youngsters. They approached him with slimy passivity, before gushing admiringly.

“Woah, mister, you really went out of your way with that cosplay! See? I told you the tattoos weren’t holo!”

“Of course they’re holo! How do you think he’d show to work with those tattoos? But isn’t the convention until next February though? If it was today I’m sure he’d win first prize!”

He snarled at the two pests, which only seemed to excite them more. A flashing light blinded him for a second, and before he could curse them out, they were scuttling away. It was then he took notice of the woman wearing a red long coat standing beside him.

“Do you actually know where you’re going, Igarashi-san?”

Unblemished skin. Long, silky hair. Almond eyes evenly shaped with a strange green sheen to them, and a thin, pointy nose. An enigmatic smile that could’ve been wider but wasn’t.

“Choe Gu-sung?”

“I knew Makishima-san was right to put his trust in the Arumajiro.”

“Your holo is too perfect,” Igarashi answered with blunt disdain. “No one looks like that.”

“That may be true in the abolition blocks, but as you can see, people love illusions here.”

Minutes later they were driving through the elevated highways of Tokyo. A light rain fell aslant, pins of purple and pink hitting on the windshield of the driverless vehicle. Igarashi kept a wary side-eye on Makishima’s lackey sitting beside him, though underneath that stupid holo he was more unreadable than usual. Not that he didn’t understand how such concealment was necessary for serious matters, but it pissed him off that important work should fall on the lap of a foreigner out of all people.

“I hope your doubts about our plan are settled now, Igarashi-san,” said Choe Gu-sung as if reading his mind, the faintest hint of mockery in his voice.

“Our plan requires certain arrangements we’ll overlook for the moment, but I know the Arumajiro won’t be so sparing afterwards.”

“It’s precisely that ruthlessness that Makishima found so compelling for this project to start with. In this brave new world of Sibyl, few men are willing to go where the Arumajiro go, and so your clan is instrumental for what needs to be done.”

All the sickly ass-licking made Igarashi turn his face toward the city flashing past. “To think you’re the first person to

address me by my name since I was arrested,” he muttered with disgust.

Once they had arrived at the high-rise hotel, an elegant wooden door embellished with the metal knocker of a spider admitted them into a vast suite decked out with fine furnishings. A low gray sofa with plush cushions half-mooned around a glass table where a steaming cup of tea had been set. An open book rested onto the lid of a black piano, and above it, a strange light fixture glittered from the ceiling like a dancing bride. Igarashi was becoming acutely aware of the thick, green rug underneath his tatty boots, but unlike him, the silver-haired man contemplating Tokyo out of the ceiling-to-floor windows fit into the room perfectly. Deceptively.

“I’m glad you made it out safely, Igarashi-san.”

Obscured on the reflection, Makishima’s features betrayed his otherwise harmless semblance as a truer, more sinister face smiled at Igarashi from the glass. Long gone was his first impression of a wealthy, over-spoilt child uttering words of revolution because, where the pointless, clumsy violence of the blocks rose and fell with no consequence or significance, Makishima had given them the means to overthrow an evil bigger than all the gangsters of the underground.

“The MWPSB has an informer in the blocks. That’s how they were able to get us. It’s Lemonade Candy.”

Piqued by his words, Makishima looked briefly over his shoulder. “The mastermind of the resistance works with the MWPSB,” he said, turning again toward the city. “How interesting. It only makes it the more impressive for you to have survived such a predicament, being attacked, as you were, by both sides.”

“It was one of their own group who gave them away. An unregistered who’d worked for Bunzo.” Igarashi’s fingers trailed the soft fabric on the arm of the sofa without daring to sit. “Wanted to settle a score or somethin’. Went mad, and for a moment there I really thought we’d turned the tables on her.”

“Her, you said?”

“Lemonade Candy is a twenty-something woman. Small and thin as a reed. And still the bitch was able to take out our lights singlehandedly and then escape through one of their hidden tunnels. We followed, and for a moment I had her, until an inspector showed up.”

“She ensnared you,” murmured Makishima. “She used herself as bait knowing you’d follow her. What appeared like recklessness at a cursory glance, was a calculated gamble.” He turned around and ambled across the room, feathery and lithe, with hands in his pockets. “We’re not the only ones with the will to choose to bet, it seems.”

Again there was that mysterious smile on Makishima’s lips and, like an obedient disciple, Igarashi felt the irresistible urge to supply more. “The resistance is not our biggest problem. Getting the syndicate to get rid of her now that I’ve seen her should be easy. But there’s also the police. That detective, especially. He don’t seem the type to let go of things.” An ear-to-ear grin spread on his face. “And he’s a hot head for that woman. Nearly slugged me when I mentioned her to him. Threatened to kill me, even.”

“Are they not merely enforcers?”

“No,” Igarashi assured with a sharp shake of his head. “He’s the one who’s been interrogating me. Or trying to, at least. Today I heard his partner refer to him as Kogami. As for the woman…haven’t seen her since that night.”

“Kogami,” Makishima echoed with flash of eagerness in his amber eyes. “Are there still humans in this city who are not afraid of themselves, I wonder? And, if so, is it a coincidence that we happened to lure two of them out of hiding? Is this what the sentimentalist calls ‘destiny’?”

Across from him, Choe Gu-sung ambled over and sat on the other side of the sofa where he opened a laptop. He’d remained so quiet, Igarashi had but completely forgotten about his presence, and his appearance, now devoid of holo, glared like a sour reminder. He began typing something hurriedly.

“They’re vermin—that’s what they are,” crossing his arms, Igarashi commented while looming over Choe. “All those who can’t rise by their own strength deserve to be squashed like roaches. It’s the rule of the world. Eat or be eaten.”

“You know, Igarashi-san,” Makishima lingered by the piano, slowly turning over the pages of the book. “I’ve always admired men like you. The ones who agitate the whole world through the sheer strength of your desire. If the world sings blue, you’ll force it to sing red until it matches your vision. A common man in an uncommon world. Please,” his eyes rose from the page to watch him intently. “Understand that this is the deepest of compliments. You see, in this sterile, plastic world, that type of primal life force has been forgotten. The human animal domesticated, his soul depurated, sterilized, until he became nothing more than the ruins of what he once was—and ruins are only beautiful after a great war. Anything else is…mockery.”  

“Well, that’s the way of the blocks. The only way we know. And now, thanks to you, these things will be ours too.” Not until he said it did it seem true to Igarashi—that they would rule over this world just like they ruled over the underground. Dominators, cymatic scanners and drones could not stop them anymore, and the weak children of Sibyl would succumb just like their evil mother. “And even the enemies of the Arumajiro won’t mind it if it means destroying this system.”

“You are correct. Anger has an interesting way of vitalizing people in ways no other need or cause does, notwithstanding how pure or lofty. That vein those spurned by the system share is what the Sibyl system has cut off and anesthetized, to the extent where the masses can’t even recall it ever being there. Their senses lay dormant as if they could truly exist as humans without them. Others even claim to want to live forever. But what value does a life have when it’s benumbed and protected from the knowledge of its own mortality? When it loses all primitive instincts in a beautiful cage where there’s no danger? As in the yesteryear, we need men like you to remind us what it means to be alive.”

In more ways than he could understand, Makishima’s words made Igarashi feel strangely satisfied. Comforted, even. Never before had he thought of his life in any aspect beyond, well, living.  What for was a question that hadn’t occurred to him. But for all the things he’d seen and done, he never would have guessed it’d be this man the one to weave meaning into his life.

“Do you know what intrahistory is, Igarashi-san?”

Choe Gu-sung’s annoying typing made it difficult for him to hear the question. “Huh?”

“Intrahistory,” Makishima continued as he ran his finger down a yellowed page in the book, “Is the history that’s left outside of the books. Think of it as the blank margins on the paper. It’s the story of the nameless people who made history but who are never mentioned. Without them, History with a capital H is unconceivable.”

Igarashi gave a sly smile. “Is that the people from the blocks?”

“Indeed. The men who wrought the world and thrust it forward through blood and fire. You can see why the system made sure we never hear about them. Those who dare to be the actors of their own existence have no need for Sibyl.”

“Like the Arumajiro in the blocks.”

Makishima closed the book carefully. “Like the gladiators who died devoured by the lions under the impassive eyes of an Emperor. Or the soldiers in the vanguard bringing us closer to victory with their sacrifices. The anonymous martyrs who enrage the survivors. The strongest within the strong.”

It was quiet now. Choe Gu-sung had abruptly stopped his noise. A bizarre, undeniable aura of expectation hung in the air. Igarashi swallowed something he’d not felt in years down his parched throat, his mind scrambling to decipher what Makishima was getting at with his incessant blabber.

“Violence can be captivating, even beautiful. But like any art, when it’s empty, it’s hopelessly corrupted and vulgar. You do not need to worry about that, Igarashi-san. I’ll be sure to make your sacrifice meaningful.”

Dread surged in Igarashi like a freezing chill. “What the hell are you talking about?” he murmured. He’d kill the two of them. He could take them both easily, rip them apart with his hands, bludgeon them to death.

With a flourish, Choe Gu-sung made a single clicking sound on his keyboard, and Igarashi felt his body drop and crash into the glass table. A hail storm of white particles infested his vision, followed by a green crooked line and a tea cup rolling on the floor. Beyond that, Makishima’s feet trod toward him with the precision of a ropewalker, and he felt fear.

“I know you don’t like this gruesome part, Choe. You may go.”

Igarashi’s wild eyes tried to meet the mechanical eyes of the hacker, but he couldn’t move because a rumbling began inside his body; his blood boiling and searing and cauterizing from the inside. He clenched his teeth and grunted, his body growing rigid as pain travelled through his veins like a jagged marble—excruciating pain that made it impossible to think on anything except on it being over. With what little mind he had, he started wide-eyed at a slice of a window visible between Makishima’s legs, wishing with all his rotten heart he could jump from it. Then he heard himself howl a beast-like howl over and over again.

“’Alas, what is good and what is evil?’” Makishima said looking down on him. “’Are they both one single thing with which we furiously attest our impotence and passion to attain the infinite by even the maddest means? Or are they two different things? Yes…they had sooner be one and the same…for if not, what will become of me on Judgement Day?’”

[alright-red]

The rhythm of my heart

Summary: Street racing wasn’t something that Race was particularly proud of. He didn’t like the shitty attitude that people in the scene had and he sure as hell didn’t enjoy spending time after time breaking several laws in one go.

What he did enjoy was the rush of adrenaline, the way his body almost disconnected from his brain. The way his brain assumed that he was almost flying.

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Hey you guys, this is a prequel to a fic I’m currently writing and I thought why not share it. This is for my street racing AU featuring Race and this lil’ thing is mainly me figuring out plot holes so.

Disclaimer: I don’t know anything about street racing and I’m pretty sure it’s shows, but bear with me. Also English isn’t my first language but I think I did okay.

Rated: T for language, I guess. There’s a lot of cursing. ~1500 words

_________________________________________

The engine roared loudly, the entire car vibrating from it’s force, being pushed into third gear with the hand brake still on.

The wheels were turning and had started smoking against the dark asphalt, making sounds that any other person would’ve deemed hurtful to their ears.

To Race though, they sounded like a melody, an old familiar song, that accompanied him on the street. He took the pedal down to the metal and looked straight ahead, where some female thing was waving around flags like she was a shitty circus performer.

Race never knew where the guys got the girls they put on the spot, but he didn’t really care either. They enjoyed the feeling of being part of something like this, so who was he to judge?

Suddenly her waving pattern changed, a pattern Race would recognize anytime anywhere. He checked his rearview mirror one last time.

Three. Two. One.

He put down the break and almost flew into the night, the lights of the city traveling by faster than shooting stars. He barely registered them, focus unwavering and locked on the road in front of him. He knew the streets by heart, knew every bump and sign, knew the way the curves tightened and loosened.

He was confident he could win this thing and he got Albert to listen to the police radio and inform him in time if a car was headed up their way. He rarely got into races with that much confidence but today just seemed to be one of those days. He shifted up to the next gear within a mere blink of an eye.

Street racing wasn’t something that Race was particularly proud of. He didn’t like the shitty attitude that people in the scene had and he sure as hell didn’t enjoy spending time after time breaking several laws in one go.

What he did enjoy was the rush of adrenaline, the way his body almost disconnected from his brain and did all the driving while he focused on the traffic and made sure to let his opponents think they could beat him, just long enough to not end up in a giant brawl in the end, because they could count his win off as luck. It was tactics that helped him survive out here.

Aside from that. there was also the fact that his brain couldn’t quite tell they were driving anymore. It straight up lost all common sense and assumed that he was flying. There was nothing Race could do that would even come close to that sense of freedom (and he had tried to find a less dangerous pasttime).

Race also loved the car that Finch had assembled for him. Well, maybe less for him than for Charlie, but he was the one who took her out for drives at night and beat her up to over 140 mph in the city.

This year Charlie had chipped him a Toyota Supra despite Race’s protesting (“only the best for the best, Race”) and Finch had modified the sleek sportscar with gadgets and technology Race didn’t even pretend to understand. What he did understand though, was that Finch wouldn’t dare to disappoint Charlie and that’s why he trusted in the car. Well that, and because he assumed that Finch wasn’t one to go out and try to get people killed.

Halfway through the course that he had agreed on with his competitor, Race realized he should’ve taken the Toyota out a bit more before racing. Every now and then his driving got weird, whenever the car handled the speed and wind differently than he expected it too and he felt like his handling was going to get him to lose grip and send him flying into the next wall.

He started checking his rearview mirror more regularly, a slight insecurity starting to settle in his stomach, but realized that he couldn’t find a trace of the other’s car behind him. That was beyond weird. Morris Delancey most definitely had not managed to overtake him, yet he shouldn’t be far back either. At least not so far, that Race couldn’t even see his lights in the mirror. Morris’ car was a damn powerhouse and with any other driver surely would’ve come out top of each race.

Race was starting to feel sick. He definitely could not lose this race. Not with high stakes.

Race was well aware that the decision to race Morris was hella risky. Most of the city’s racers went under nicknames, trying to make sure that they couldn’t be ratted out and the plice couldn’t trace them. Or for that matter, other racers.

Morris Delancey though, he didn’t need a nickname to be safe. His daddy’s money made sure of that all by itself. If the police ever got him he’d be free again sooner than sunrise. The racers around the city were cautious of him; not only did he have supplies and money to boost his ride, he also was known for not following the few rules that street racing had.

So when word got to Race that Morris Delancey wanted to race him, the one person nicknamed after his talent in street racing, Race’s initial reaction had been to decline. He was good at what he did, but that didn’t make him stupid.

But now here he was, in Charlie’s car, getting more nervous by the minute, because Morris Delancey had made him an offer he couldn’t pass up. The same Morris Delancey who apparently had cheated and took a shortcut, because there was no way in hell he was that far behind Race.

“Crutch, you read me?”, he asked while speeding up even more, having to use the handbrake to make the turn and partway drifting through the turn that got him back on track to their starting point. His vision started blurring and he took a deep breath in an attempt to calm his nerves. The alarm that had started blaring in his head as soon as he had realized that Morris wasn’t where he was supposed to be, didn’t really help as he tried to concentrate on getting back as fast as possible, throwing any caution to the wind and pushing the car to it’s limits.

A small crackling sound reached him through the radio, followed by Charlie’s voice. “Yeah, man. What the hell is going on out there? We lost signal on Morris’ car a few miles ago. His team ain’t any wiser.”

Shit. Race, contrary to popular belief, wasn’t stupid or slow. He knew damn well that could only mean one thing.

“Crutch, he’s taking a blackout. Haven’t seen his car for a bit and there’s no way he took the lead. He’s playin dirty. I can’t lose this one, you hear me, Crutch?”

When he got no answer, Race started to panic and for split second forgot he was supposed to be handling a monster of a machine at a speed that would kill him if he made one mistake. He heaved the car off the course into the street lamp back onto the road. His knuckles had turned white a couple minutes ago from the death grip he had on the wheel.

“Crutchie?” Nothing.

Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Fucking Morris Delancey. Fucking asshole.

Another crackled sound made it to the radio. “Yo, Race, it’s Al. I had Charlie take over the radio station. Give me a sec and I will find where that ass is hiding.”

Race breathed out a sigh of relief, thanking the gods for giving him a best friend that had too much free time on his hands and tought himself how to hack pretty much any system. He knew the race couldn’t take that much longer; if he kept up his speed he’d probably be back in around 15 minutes.

“Al, how are we lookin? I need good news and preferably now.” Another turn, another neigh drift. Shifting gears, using the momentum for faster acceleration.

“I got something and… Shit.” The connection went down for a second before - “Race, he went right through that old lane that belongs to the outer parts of the red-light destrict. I don’t know how you can overtake him, man, he’s got a couple miles on you.”

A string or curses left Race’s mouth, some of them slipping right back to Italian. Merda.  Va’ a fare in culo!

“I feel ya. So what you wanna do now?”, Albert asked through the com.

What do you wanna do now? Race didn’t need to think twice. He had raced cheating assholes before, making sure they got a lesson for trying to best him under entirely unfair conditions.

“Funny you should ask, my dear Al. Because I have quite the idea.” He got off the road he was supposed to be taking and drove down a lane that would save him a good couple minutes on his way.

“I wanna take out that motherfucker and I sure as hell won’t let him beat me at my own damn game. Al, get your systems started, I want a route that will put me in front of him me, pronto! I want his sorry ass to eat dirt.”

He heard laughter on the other line, then frantic typing. A beat of static noises and then - “There you go, dude. Show him who’s the King of ‘Hattan!” A small clicking noise let him know that Albert had cut the connection for now, most likely because he knew that any kind of distraction might cost Race his win.

A mere second later the screen inside the car lit up, providing him navigation and - on top of that - let him keep track of Morris’ position.

“Alright, baby, let’s see what you got”, he murmured and took the car down the trail that would cost Morris his sweet, sweet victory.

Race only had one thought as he flew down the streets of Manhattan: I am going to win this thing!

[journeysintowebcomics]

Girl Genius Liveblog #213

UPDATE 213: Political Marriage

Last time Agatha and pals had gone into the many underground passageways underneath Paris, because Hoffman says they can get into the forbidden library where not even Colette can get in. Along the way, they encounter a civilization of xenophobic and suspicious mole people, nowadays less xenophobic and suspicious, thanks to Hoffman. Let’s continue.

Ah, Hoffman has been adopted into the royal family of ‘the moligarchy’. I really appreciate the pun, that’s a nice one. The king is sitting on a pile of gold and treasures; with enough style it’d make a dragon nod in acknowledgement.

Turns out the royal heir who will get married to the opposite civilization in order to broker peace is Hoffman. Hah! I bet that’s why they were okay with being peaceful with each other now, beause the mole king here saw the way to get a political marriage without having to make one of his people marry the enemies. Still, it does seem to me like the mole is sincere about liking Hoffman, so it’s not really that bad – although Hoffman sure looks like he disagrees. Let’s just hope his grades in political science will skyrocket thanks to the experience.

Looks like even though the civilization up there on the surface doesn’t know about the moles, those down here know about what’s going on up there. The mole king hopes she’ll solve the time bubble soon so he gets to try his favorite cave snails from over there again. Oh boy, the stakes are getting even higher and higher, aren’t they. Maybe Agatha should market those snails around with her face.

I have a feeling saying ‘suspicious and xenophobic’ about other civilizations is the running gag of this volume, hah. Regardless, going to ask the enemy king sounds like a plan, and since Agatha is with Hoffman, she has societal influence! Thank goodness, things are going kind of well.

Far away, in Mechanisburg and its time bubble, Gil is coming to inspect the situation, and hope for good news. He arrives in a drill vehicle with ‘eloi eater’ inscribed on it. Hey, that’s a reference to that H.G. Wells book about traveling in time, right? I remember reading it ages ago. It was a good book, yup. Either way, they managed to extract someone in perfect condition, without accelerated aging or sudden death! Everything’s going well over here. Heck, maybe Gil will be able to solve the Mechanisburg problem before Agatha finds a way to – or at least he’ll manage to save the characters with names and familiar faces.

Speaking of familiar faces, turns out the person his crew saved is not a person Gil’s fond of.

Ah, now there’s someone I hadn’t seen in a while. Honestly I’m somewhat surprised he was trapped here. I had thought he’d be lucky enough to not be trapped in Mechanisburg. But hey, he’s alive and intact, his luck is still good. Besides, now that it’s been proven someone can be extracted from Mechanisburg and survive, this means soon someone like Tarvek can be extracted! I’m really glad about that.

It takes a brief scuffle and someone who isn’t Gil to explain the situation before Othar of the bright blue eyes listens – those are some really great eyes, honestly. Gil says there are other problems, and I suppose he means the...things coming for the Baron. How much time does Gil have to get to Wulfenbach, I wonder?

A new volume is starting! First, a couple images.

Reminds me of the circus times. The baba yaga thing...even though that was a cottage and not a turkey. Oh, simpler times, how do I long for thee sometimes.

And this must be the inside of the library! With almost no books at all, so it’s more like...a museum, not a library. Doesn’t look like Hoffman came along, so I guess he stayed down to get married, but Colette is still here. I like Colette, she’ll be a nice ally to have here.

You know, now that Othar is free, maybe Gil will send him to go see Agatha in Paris, instead of going all the way there. Othar isn’t an idiot – when he’s not in a sidestory – and he’s decently competent. He should be of help, and it also would keep him out of Gil’s hair. Although Othar is a spark, he’s not an expert in time, no? Sending him to do what he’s good at may be better.

Aha, there’s Tarvek, still not melting from all the poison he was stabbed with. The guy holding him is Vanamonde, no? I think Vanamonde will be left frozen for a while longer after Tarvek is freed, although...he’ll be a convenient person to keep trying things on, if they continue doing that.

The outer base is under attack. Must be the Other’s forces, trying to ruin everything. Seems like Gil isn’t leaving without Tarvek, though. Tarvek’s return to Girl Genius is imminent! And by imminent I suspect it’ll be a volume or maybe two before he’s free. Yeah, I don’t have the utmost faith on Girl Genius’ pacing, but hey, things could be worse.

So turns out Paris has numerous secret kingdoms under it. It’s all so crowded the royal palaces are like two hundred meters from each other. Hard to believe you can have a war when everything is so close, hah. And part of the reason why the secret kingdoms are a secret is because the people who have heard about them don’t want to believe they exist. Guess they’re all suspicious and xenophobic.

Among the many guests for Hoffman’s wedding, there’s someone who identifies herself as an ally of Agatha, from her diplomatic corps. Since Agatha is being suspicious and not xenophobic, she demands to know who she’s talking with. She doesn’t get an answer, but she’s told there’s someone who can vouch for this woman. That person is Dimo, who is...looking far more elegant than usual. Guess that means this woman is trustworthy.

Oh hey, I faintly remember that bear. How nice!

Jager bear, huh. Does that mean this bear had a dose of that Jagerbrau? I always thought it just was a bear the Jagers managed to subdue and ride around, but nope, it’s a Jager bear. And likes opera. Truly, lady Jenka is fulfilling her current role of the eccentric beauty. I suspect she came to this party because it’s underneath Paris and therefore it’s in some proximity to Agatha.

The message Jenka had was that the Castle is urging Agatha to fix the problem in Mechanisburg, as if she wasn’t currently working on that. He warns the thing that’s coming to Mechanisburg, attracted by the time bubble, will arrive in less than two years. Well that’s like...seventeen volumes, so there’s still plenty of time.

I was wrong – it seems for now – and the reason why Jenka and Dimo are here is because they had to meet with a few people. One of those people was just murdered, and the person who killed him is infected by a slaver wasp, as proved by the wasp eater alarming everyone about it. Hm, hm, I see. Was this something Lucrezia ordered, perhaps? It was implied her plans would start getting afoot now. Maybe it’s already happening.

Huh, there really are many revenants here, more than expected. I suppose asking the king here how to get into the forbidden library isn’t a good plan anymore. Also Hoffman is here again. Nice of you to join us.

Regardless, this seems like a good place to stop.

 Next time: in three updates

[askcarlyle]

[A contribution (in conjunction with @askbarnum) to FanFicFeb on @theothersidediscord for Prompts #2-4, "Vertigo", "Missing Memories" and "Tracks". Edited from the live version, which concluded on server last night.]

Barnum

Blows an impressed whistle as he pushes open the doors to the bank and strolls inside

They've redecorated. Perhaps we should redecorate your apartment like this? Could use some more gold embossing and decorative pillars. We still have ten minutes until our meeting, plenty of time to find the room on the 7th floor. You have all the paperwork in order, right? Nothing can go wrong with this proposal. Do you have any idea how long I have been trying to get a loan for this Circus Train?

Carlyle

pats briefcase

I double checked all the applications and schematics last night. Everything is ready to present.

stops Barnum as he heads towards the stairs

Where are you going? Elevator's this way.

Barnum

They have an elevator now? That's new too.

Fixes his cravat in the mirror before following Phillip

Have you ever been in one of these before?

Carlyle

A few times. Impressive new technology. They say it could lead to buildings taller than 20 stories! We live in a remarkable age.

rings the bell and waits patiently for the operator to open the doors before indicating that Barnum should enter first

After you. Remember, we are here to negotiate for a train, not an upgrade to your house.

Barnum

Pauses before cautiously stepping inside

But just think of it, a house with 20 floors!

Shifts to make room for Phillip as the door closes

Seventh floor please.

Carlyle

watches as the operator cranks the gates and doors closed, then starts to pull levers and twist knobs on a control board. "Yes sir, seventh floor." glances around the small space as it lurches and starts moving upwards, taking in the dark wood paneling, fitted with large mirrors in alternating sections

Barnum

Closes his eyes tightly and presses his back against the wall, feeling the vibrations of movement and letting out a long breath through his nose

Certainly faster than the stairs but I can't imagine it is much use during the busy periods of the day, we barely fit. Do you mind taking your foot off of mine?

Clears his throat

Perhaps we should have our own tracks built. Personal circus tracks, only for us. Can you imagine the image it would give us? Maybe we could sell rides, cram people in with the less dangerous animals.

Carlyle

whispers

An image of being redundant and egomaniacal spendthrifts, you mean? Currently functioning tracks are just fine. And I hope you are kidding, because those poor animals have enough to deal with when you're constantly in there trying to train them to sing for peanuts.

is about to continue when a screeching sound cuts through the air, followed by the elevator car jerking and shuddering to a halt

Funny, that's not how it usually arrives at a floor.

Barnum

Only the bears. No one wants to hear an elephant sing.

Jolts and instinctively grabs Phillip and the operator to protect them in the event of an impact. Holding on for perhaps a few seconds longer than necessary after realising they had just stopped.

...I don't claim to be an expert on these things, but shouldn't the doors be opening?

Carlyle

the operator scratches his head, scrutinizing his controls for several moments before coming to a conclusion. "Greatest apologies, sirs, but we seem to be having some unforeseen difficulties. Sometimes the car does stall a bit. If you wouldn't mind remaining here, I will go check out the situation and give you an update shortly."

Wha... but...

watches as the operator stands on his stool and pushes open a small ceiling panel, then pulls himself up onto the roof and out of sight

Well, this is unexpected.

Barnum

Watches the small operator boy climb out of the ceiling panel with ease, then shuts his eyes tight again

How long is shortly? We are going to be late.

Loosens the cravat around his neck and tugs it off

We can't be far off the seventh floor. I'm sure I can squeeze through that gap, I'll pull you up. We can just take the stairs.

Carlyle

looks up at the hole in the ceiling uncertainly

I don't like the sound of that idea, PT. There's no telling where this thing got stuck, and I think we are very high up.

Barnum

We've been in higher scrapes before. Remember the hot air balloon?

Climbs up on the stool and pokes his head out of the ceiling hole, squinting up at the dark tunneling abyss above them. Tries to push his shoulders through but can't quite squeeze through.

It's hard to see where we are, perhaps if I count the metal riming's? It's high, how many floors did you say there were?

Squints up, trying to calculate a rough distance, after several moments starting to find the shaft spinning nauseatingly. Shifting himself down from the stool and stumbling a bit, dizzily.

Vertigo. You try instead. You're more slight than me, perhaps you can get further out. I'll figure something else out. Maybe if I just-

Tries to force his fingers between the doors to pry them open, grunting as he forces them open by half an inch only to be greeted by concrete

...We could un-wedge it! Enough force will unstick it.

Starts jumping up and down aggressively, making the wooden elevator shift and creak precariously. Then after several failed attempts, stops and instead starts banging on the wall with his fists

It's not moving. Why aren't you helping?

Uses his abandoned cravat to rub the sweat from his forehead

I can't breathe. There's no room in here.

Carlyle

gives Barnum a concerned once over, maintaining as calm and measured a tone as possible

There is no less room here than there was before, and plenty of air is coming in. Especially from that open hatch in the ceiling, which I will not attempt to climb out of because our most helpful car operator has already gone to obtain assistance and will return shortly.

moves a little closer and pulls silk handkerchief out of pocket, hovering just shy of contact

May I?

Barnum

Are you sure? I'm sure that the walls weren't this tight a moment ago. I don't think I could even extend my arms out half way.

Watches the other man for a moment before offering a slight nod, putting his cravat in his jacket pocket to stop himself ruining it further. Clenching and unclenching his empty hands at his side

My apologies, I'm overreacting. It's very hot in here, do you have any water? How long has he been gone now? You don't think he's forgotten us?

Carlyle

lightly dabs at Barnum's forehead with handkerchief, then smooths his hair back gently

There, as fetching as ever.

indicates the mirror for him to see for himself, then knocks on the wall under it

Pretty sure this is made of wood, no worries about it doing anything unexpected. You just take up more space than the average occupant. Blame it on your grandiose notions or perhaps that extra pastry from breakfast.

tucks handkerchief into Barnum's hand and then reaches into another inside pocket, producing a small metal flask and placing it in his other hand

You know very well I don't carry water. Here, have a sip. It's been less than five minutes, I'm sure he will be back shortly.

Barnum

Better than water. Thank you.

Takes a large mouthful from the flask, leaning back against one of the mirrors a little bit and feeling satisfied with it's cool surface.

Hey! I burn off those pastries faster than I can eat them.

Rubs at his head once again with the handkerchief, giving the other a grateful look

They should make these things three times the size. This is unbearable, just between you and me, I've never been fond of tight spaces. Feels like the world is closing in and suffocating you.

Carlyle

nods slowly

I might have noticed. Small spaces never really bothered me... quite the opposite, actually. Is it because of something that happened in the past?

Barnum

I suspect it's a lingering discomfort from something that happened to me as a boy. Hard to pinpoint what exactly. I often find there are some gaps in my memories from certain experiences. I suppose just about everyone has lingering childhood fears hanging over them and missing memories of some sort.

Shuffles over to lean slightly against Phillip's shoulder.

What is it about small spaces that you like?

Carlyle

shifts weight to lean back a corresponding degree, tilting head in contemplation

Hmm. Not sure. It just seems more cozy. You can more easily influence your surroundings and know where everything is. You're not as... exposed?

nudges Barnum in the ribs

I know your childhood was a very long time ago, but you're not quite old enough to be claiming feeble-mindedness. How does one misplace memories?

Barnum

Perhaps I have more important things to fill my head with than ridiculous old memories.

Discretely wipes his sweaty hand on the hem of his jacket before pushing it into Phillip's hand, closing his eyes once more and tipping his head back against the cold mirror

I believe it's possible to erase parts of your memory you do not want to remember anymore. When I was a boy on the cusp of manhood, maybe eleven years of age, it was my job to climb inside the train engine compartments to clean them out. To avoid the filth catching fire and causing an explosion. One morning, I think someone shut me inside and I was trapped for days before anyone noticed. I don't remember much of the experience other than being rescued and a blurry few days afterwards.

Carlyle

blinks in surprise and gives Barnum's hand a small squeeze

That must have terrifying, I'm sorry. You have every reason for wanting to forget.

reaches over to take a sip from the flask before handing it back

I have even more respect for how admirably level you remained during other instances now. Like you said, the balloon incident, the ship... you got out of all of those situations just fine and this will be no different.

Barnum

Smiles slightly at the squeeze, then takes another sip from the flask before screwing the lid back on.

I suppose it's those kind of experiences as a child that build character and make you a man. Though at the same time I'd die before letting either of my children experience that.

Takes a deep breath before chuckling lightly under his breath, cracking an eye open to glance at Phillip

The hot air balloon incident didn't count. I was very distracted.

Carlyle

rubs absentmindedly at the underside of a particular ring with thumb, feeling cheeks go a bit warm

Yes. That's right. I was trying to distract you from our precarious circumstances. Did it work?

Barnum

I think you'll find that I was the one initiating the distractions. Though yes, it was very helpful.

Gives him a playful grin, opening his eyes properly to enjoy the sight of his embarrassed companion

They say the best way to overcome nerves is to have something to do with your hands.

Carlyle

glances down at where said hands are clasped, then back up to Barnum's face, now only inches away, with just the slightest glint of challenge

I suppose an encore would only be appropriate. If you don't think there's too little room to work with.

Barnum

Well I am always open to a challenge.

Gently pushes Phillip back against the mirror, cupping the back of his head and pressing a passionate kiss on his lips

Carlyle

smiles into the kiss, deepening it even as hands wander under Barnum's jacket and down his sides

Hmm. It is maybe a little warm in here.

Barnum

Mm

Slides his free hand down Phillip's waist and tucks it into the front of his pants, using the other to gently stroke the back of his head as they kiss The elevator suddenly jolts harshly, pauses for a moment, then resumes moving upwards.

Carlyle

stumbles backwards and shakes head as if to clear the fog, rapidly patting self down and readjusting clothing just as the elevator comes to a halt at their floor and the operator comes dropping through the hatch to release the doors

Ahem! Figured it out, then?

Barnum

Steps out of the small space in a hurry, taking a few deep breaths before tugging his cravat from his pocket and begining to re-adjust it around his neck. Then reaching over to smooth down Phillip's ruffled hair

Finally! Took you long enough. At least we are only...

Tugs his pocket watch from his pocket

Eight minutes late for our appointment. Let's go, let's go.

Carlyle

grabs briefcase and jogs after Barnum

Fashionably late is the term you're looking for!

Barnum

Is that your excuse for never turning up on time in the mornings?

Nudges him playfully in the ribs as he catches up

We can finish our discussion from in there later.

Carlyle

fade to black

[irregardlessly-tish]

Let me tell you my weird dream from last night. First I was in a very strange place that was divided in: library, like a hallway with classrooms, bar, park, living room, parking lot. Maybe more but those are what I remember. I had somehow a general view of all thes places from above but I was still just a person and I could see people coming and going, doing their daily routine there which was always the same. I could go to whatever area I choose. I was looking for someone. I don’t know who, I don’t know what their name was or how they looked. This used to be something quite recurring a couple of years ago, I dreamt a lot about looking for someone constantly even though I had no idea who I was looking for. I visited all the areas and tried to talk to people but they didn’t answer my questions, until I went to the parking lot and someone offered me a ride to go looking around (don’t accept rides from strangers, kids) and I went with them. We left this place and they drove me down the street until I said “leave me here” which was the middle of the city but when I left the car I was suddenly in a desert and it was the middle of the night. There was nothing weird to be honest but it had an alien feeling to me like I was in a different planet. There was an unpaved road so I followed that trail until I noticed that the road became wider and there were giant rocks at both sides and people were hiding behind these rocks and observing the road so I went to talk to them. They told me to be quiet and stay there because they were coming. Then giant caravans started to march in the middle of the wide road, it looked like a traveling circus and they had animals that were way bigger than normal ones, like 20m tall elephants, bears, orangutans, tigers and rhinos. They all looked unhappy and you couldn’t really see any people being part of this marching circus. Those who were hiding seemed to be scared but as this circus or whatever left they became calmer but then there was sudden hustle and then a really loud roar that made everyone cover their ears and I also closed my eyes. When I opened my eyes the circus wasn’t visible anymore and everybody was lying on the ground. I don’t know if they were dead or unconscious but I had the feeling like there had been an explosion and the ground was unstable. And that’s all I remember.

[sunset-wishes-upon-hill]

Name (Kuroshitsuji - Sebastian x Yuri) (Christmas one-shot)

Spin-off to The Liars and The Soothsayer: FF I Wattpad

The whole London was cloaked in pure white, excitement tangible in the air as the Christmas bell rang throughout the bustling, crowded city street. The smell of the turkey, trimmings and sweet desserts lingered in the air. Eager children accompanied their parents, wrapped presents held under their arms. London thrived in festive mood; the usually dark, grey city has never been livelier and more colourful.

He’s unnerved, Yuri noted scrutinising his stiff, mechanical movements shifting through the company documents that needed to be approved and signed. She wanted to believe he was simply stressed and exhausted by the sheer workload he had to inspect and review – after all, no company will be more busier than a toy company during Christmas. Despite her own logical speculation, certain part of her nagging mind was prompting otherwise. Even with the lavishly decorated Christmas tree, umpteen wrapped gifts of all size and shapes, and the ménage’s anticipation of year’s end and start of brand new beginning, the air he carried was awful, tense and full of resentment.

21st century London never snowed. The wintery scenes was breathtakingly beautiful; she imagined filling the frozen pond with skating woodland creatures, a magical winter ball with dancing mice and a sleigh ride with polar bears. Everything that made Christmas the magical day people made it out to be seemed to be there. It was the first time Christmas day felt like Christmas rather than just a 25th December on the calendar. Had she been back in her time, she wouldn’t have been able to spend it the way she would have liked. Christmas weeks paid double the amount than she received and it was money she couldn’t afford to pass her and that went for her mum too. Christmas was never a special day for her. There was no gift exchanged, no putting up Christmas tree, no Christmas dinner except for maybe a nice dessert she might splash out on – it was always a 25th December.

“You’ll catch a cold.” A voice said beside her.

Yuri jumped, startled by Sebastian’s sudden appearance. She hadn’t heard him approach. His eyes remained on her bare feet, part submerged in the snow.

“I always wanted to do this.” She sheepishly admitted. How comical it must be for a nearly adult woman wanting to do something as childish as going bare foot in snow.

“Is this…beautiful to you?” He suddenly asked to her surprise.

“Yes. I don’t see snow often.” She said, “You don’t think so?”

“I’ve seen countless snows in my lifetime. In the end, it will melt and change into dirty mud; what’s so beautiful about it?” Sebastian stated, watching the tiny snowflakes fall and seep into the mass on the ground.

That was then she decided to turn her gaze to him. Her reflection held in his dark, pitless eyes yet she wondered if he truly were looking at her. He breathed, moved, bled and his heart beat in his chest like her and many would, without suspicion, accept him as anything but a man. His character as a butler was flawless – perfect, deserving of standing ovation, although his façade as a man was horribly inept and forced. His speech, truly appropriate in any given situations; gestures that would label him as ideal gentleman of the era turned into a fiasco by his mismatching expressions and stoic tone as though an actor impeccably reciting a script and simply believing it was good enough without understanding the power of words weren’t a straightforward notion of conveying those words in the right time and place and the people.

He reminded her of a child. A baby. A tabula rasa*. Experienced and inexperienced. Knew and not understood. Alive but not lived.

“For someone who’s been alive for a long time, experienced and witnessed things beyond what anyone could imagine – none of it was ever reflected in your eyes.” Yuri summed. A semi chastise and semi disappointment.

She didn’t know what to feel for this..man. This demon. It was likely he won’t see her reason for sadness, this empathetic pity. He won’t understand why she spoke of it as if he was missing something as vital as his life and he was blind to it. He won’t know why the snow should be beautiful. Why his privation was something to be so heart-rending. But that’s why it was so tragic, wasn’t it? A man could have a taste of something blissful and lose it and be equally tragic. What soothed it was the fact he knew it was tragic and would probably try to gain it back somehow whether it was through revenge or forgiveness. The man who never had it and could not see his own tragic existence, would always feel empty, she supposed. Always thirsty and hungry for something they could not fill with tedious things like money.  

“Dirty things can be beautiful.” Yuri told him.

“…Then do you think I’m beautiful?” He cautiously asked her. The question surprised her. Surprised him. An impromptu. He was rarely so impulsive. More so on seeking out others’ sentiment of him. He has never once cared for such trivial sort.

“You think you’re ugly?” Yuri blinked, unable to understand how someone who could clearly distinguish and know – at least – physical aesthetic would consider himself unsightly.

“My original form is hideous.” He revealed blatantly, his voice flat as though he was reading out a list on the menu.

“I think you’re alright.” Yuri said after a thoughtful pause.

Darkness. The white world defiled in suffocating, icy darkness. She could feel something crawling on her skin. Underneath it. The spine chilling sound vibrated in the air; sound of million insects chewing at her skin, bones and flesh and quivering their wings. There was no pain yet she couldn’t help but scratch and claw her body to thwart it off her. Her mouth gaped in silent scream. She could imagine beetles and maggots chewing down her body, magnified chittery background grinding, merging into a drone that rose and fell.

A footstep. The staccato beat of heel echoing in the darkness to the rhythm of insects buzz. It was accompanied by a foul, rotting smell that made her want to retch. Something was decomposing. She couldn’t quite describe what she saw of Sebastian’s true form.

Black feathers. Nails like eagles talons. Glowing red eyes. Cold. So cold. So so cold. A living decay.

She was not so naïve to believe in the romanticised vision of demons as some tragically beautiful fallen angels – if Sebastian were even an angel in the first place. After all, the belief fall from grace could be, even at slightest, merciful as to spare angelic beauty was almost laughable; the fall signified shame and perversion of something so sacred and holy, one could only imagine how hideous to see it tainted.

White returned with her voice. Numbing coldness crept up from her bare feet, purple patches forming. She could breathe again. He smelled sweet again. He was beautiful. The only colour in the colourless.

He had given her a glimpse of his true self. The grotesque freak in a circus show behind the glitzy glamorous mask he donned. But just as he intended, this had been a scant coup d'œil. He wanted her to know, if he was dreadfully abhorrent even from this short brief moment, how disgusting would he be wholly bared to the world.

But at least…at least..at the very least, you don’t do what he does. She couldn’t help but ponder. To her, the true demon in her life was her father. He had stolen from her. Her money. Her life. A loving family. Her chance of being a normal teenage girl. Fucked her up.

“..I’ve seen worse.”

Sebastian face remained vacant, emotionless. Her word didn’t seem to have any impact on his belief. He wouldn’t know. Wouldn’t understand the working of her thought. It didn’t matter anyway.

Sebastian, unmoving for a minute then strode across, closing the distance she had made between them before swooping her up to his body. One arm on her back, another underneath the crook of her knees.

“You’re feet are blue.” He commented, nodding toward her exposed legs that had now turned cyanotic from cold. His body radiated usual warmth she didn’t expect.

“You’re really warm for a demon, well at least when you look human.” She noted. His body temperature was higher than an average human, almost feverish to touch, while she was always cold. She liked that about him – the ironic warmth that emitted from the demon.

Something shuffled in her chest, the abrupt movement startling the pair from the serene silence stretched between them. It bopped up and down, slinking up her body before the mystery mound popped out from her décolletage and made itself known to the curious demon.

Its large, sharp eyes blinked up to Sebastian’s stunned gaze and let out a piping meow.

“Oh, seems like she’s not cold anymore.” Yuri smiled, stroking its small head.

Looking up to see his response, she was pleasantly surprised by the red hues in his cheeks as he regarded the tiny little kitten. Who knew a demon had a soft spot for a cat?

“I found her shivering in the snow without its mother around so I think she was abandoned.” Yuri said sadly, “Do you like cats?”

“Yes, I think they are the most beautiful creatures on Earth.” He said with adoration.

“Does Hell have…well animals?”

“We have creatures kept as pets but..” Sebastian hummed, “They are not as..pleasant.”

“How do they look like?” Yuri asked and the more she listened to Sebastian’s in-depth description of the so-called pets, she couldn’t help but imagine the very alien from the movie. She reckoned it was equivalent to a dangerous exotic pet people kept either as living exhibition or status symbol.

They arrived inside the manor and he gently released her from his hold. Yuri quickly caught the kitten before it slipped down her dress.

Stretching out her kitten held arms to him, she offered, “..Do you want to name her?”

Her little trifling suggestion thrown off his guard, while the kitten’s innocent, twinkling eyes stared, waiting.

“You’ve not named her.”

She nodded, “I’ve only just found her. Besides, I’m terrible with names.”

“I’ve never named anything before.” He muttered, perplexed.

“How come?” Yuri frowned, puzzled as to why someone, who lived as long as he did, never came across an opportunity to name anything.

And even he, rare as it may be, seemed at lost in moment such as this. How laughable it was to be dumbstruck to such petty question yet it seemed more baffling than any questions or tasks he had been given in his years of servitude.

“They were the ones who have named me.” He revealed, “And neither of us cared little for other things than what they desired.”

“Ah…” Yuri realised. He was just like a baby. “Then…think of it as a Christmas gift from me. I wasn’t sure what a demon would want for Christmas present seeing you lived for a long time but I guess this is perfect – something you never had.”

He was silent, eyes darting back and forth between the kitten and her, all the while his face never betraying his thought.

“Yuri.”

“Yeah?”

“The kitten’s name is Yuri.”

She stared at him, agape, bewildered by his choice of name. “Are you serious?! Should I bring out a name dictionary? Does the library even have that kind of book?”

“I think it’s a beautiful name.”

Yuri bit down her lip to hold a grin from spreading, albeit horribly and instead forming a crooked smile.

“It’s an alright name,” She shrugged, “But really? Out of all names in the world, you choose that?”

He took the kitten into his arm, holding it close to his chest and cooed, “You like that name, don’t you?”

The kitten meowed in response, receiving a tickle under the chin as reward.

“Gee..and I thought I was terrible with names.”

“Unfortunately, so am I.”

“I can see that.” Yuri grinned, “Merry Christmas, Sebastian.”

“Merry Christmas.” He returned then added, “Yuri.”

The kitten purred, snuggling into Sebastian’s warmth.

*tabula rasa- an absence of preconceived ideas or predetermined goals; a clean slate.

[auburnfamilynews]

https://twitter.com/burks_mb/status/1212194652255924224

It will probably be a quiet day for the Tigers.

Somehow we have come to the end of the 2020 recruiting cycle. In yonder times, there was no Early Signing Period meaning National Signing Day was THE day and it was often a circus. However, with the majority of the 2020 class having already signed, there will likely be very little drama tomorrow, especially for the Auburn Tigers.

Tigers Pickup Preferred Walk On

Before we talk about what to expect tomorrow, I think it’s important to highlight an interesting pickup the Tigers got yesterday. 3* QB Sawyer Pate lead Thompson to a state championship which included thrashing Central, a program with some familiar names on it for Auburn recruiting fans in 4* WR EJ Williams and 4* OT Javion Cohen. Pate threw for over 3,000 yards, 41 touchdowns and 3 interceptions in 2019 yet did not receive a single offer. However, Auburn might prove the beneficiary as they offered the Thompson standout a preferred walk on opportunity this past weekend and yesterday he accepted.

Committed!! #WarEagle @CoachGusMalzahn @coachchadmorris @Keith247Sports @Rivals @247Sports @YellowhammerFB @coachmarkf @WARRIORNATION20 pic.twitter.com/0N60wF03iN

— Sawyer Pate (@PateSawyer) February 4, 2020

Pate is listed as a pro style quarterback but has some elusiveness to his game. He might not break off many 20+ yard scampers but he’s quick enough to escape pressure in the backfield and pickup positive yardage if it’s there. At 6’1” 210 lbs, he’s a well built kid with the size to play at the next level. His delivery is a bit funky but he’s insanely accurate completing almost 75% of his passes this past season. Don’t be surprised if this kid ends up on scholarship in the not too distant future. He’s got a chance to at least battle for that backup spot this fall.

National Signing Day Preview

Considering Auburn signed 23 players back in December and already has pledges from two other blue chip prospects, tomorrow shouldn’t be a too dramatic day for the Tigers. Here’s a quick breakdown on who has already signed and who to watch out for tomorrow.

Auburn Early Enrollees

5* RB Tank Bigsby

4* DL Zykeivous Walker

4* WR Kobe Hudson

4* DB Ladarius Tennison

4* S Chris Thompson Jr

3* Buck Romello Height

3* OT Kilian Zierer

3* C Avery Johnson

3* OG Tate Johnson

3* QB Chayil Garnett

Auburn Signees

4* LB Wesley Steiner

4* DL Jay Hardy

4* WR Ze’Vian Capers

4* WR J.J. Evans

4* DB Eric Reed Jr

4* TE J.J. Pegues

4* LB Desmond Tisdol

4* LB Cam Riley

4* CB Marco Domio

3* OT Brenden Coffey

3* DL Daniel Foster-Allen

3* WR Elijah Canion

3* OL Jeremiah Wright

Auburn Commits

4* DL Deandre Butler

4* TE Brandon Frazier

Auburn Targets

With only 1-2 spots left, Auburn doesn’t have much room for new additions. The Tigers took some big swings in the late period but it looks like they will come up empty for the most part. There’s always a chance of a late surprise or a name that hasn’t been reported popping up (ala JaTarvious Whitlow not too long ago). For now though these are the names to follow. I am using the same confidence prediction I did back in December:

As for my predictions, I am gonna add a confidence level of Lock (VERY confident in pick), 50/50 (leaning that direction but far from certain) and No Idea (literally just me guessing).

Here we go...

5* OT Broderick Jones | 6’5” | 298 lbs | Lithonia, GA | Georgia Commit

Contenders: Arkansas, Auburn, Georgia, Illinois

What was supposed to be the biggest storyline for Auburn heading into National Signing Day turned into a bit of a dud. After electing not to sign early and telling reporters at the Under Armour All-America Game that things were “50/50” between Auburn and Georgia, there was some understandable excitement about what might happen in this race come February 5th. The Tigers had the last visit and it was thought that might be enough to push them over in this race.

Except he never took that visit...

UGA’s coaching staff visited Jones on Friday evening to watch him play basketball and then stayed all the way to midnight preventing him from making the trip to the Plains. However, he still could have shown up on Saturday or Sunday but instead elected to cancel the trip all together. I know there have been some internet rumors that maybe he made to campus for a secret unofficial but I doubt those to be true. Once again, Auburn will sign another recruiting class without a single blue chip (meaning 4* or 5*) offensive tackle.

Lovely...

Prediction: Georgia (Lock)

4* DT McKinnley Jackson | 6’2’ | 327 lbs | Lucedale, MS

Contenders: Alabama, Auburn, LSU, Texas A&M

This one has felt unlikely for some time and barring a true shocker I don’t see Jackson putting on an Auburn cap tomorrow morning. The Mississippi standout took an official visit to the Plains last fall but it appears the Tigers are sitting #4 in this race. There was a lot of Alabama buzz up until this weekend and now it appears the Aggies might have snuck ahead. I really don’t know where he goes other than it won’t be Auburn so I’ll take the safe pick and go Bama. They annoyingly tend to win these types of battles more often than they lose.

Prediction: Alabama (No Idea)

4* DL Princely Umanmielen | 6’4” | 249 lbs | Manor, TX

Contenders: Auburn, Baylor, Florida, Texas

When Umanmielen decommited from the Longhorns back in October, it was thought Auburn would be a major factor in this race. However, he never made it to campus that fall. It was reported he might take an official visit to the Plains this past weekend but Auburn apparently decided to part ways. With so little spots left, it appears they won’t use that last one on a defensive lineman. I think the Gators are the darkhorse in this race but I am gonna pick he ends up signing with the program he had been committed to last fall.

Prediction: Texas (No Idea)

3* DT Marquis Burks | 6’3” | 285 lbs | Chicago, IL

Contenders: Auburn

I do expect at least one Boom tomorrow in the form of the nation’s #4 ranked JUCO defensive tackle. The Tigers are looking for depth in the interior of its defensive line next season and see Burks as someone that can provide it. Rodney Garner scouted quite a few top JUCO defensive tackles and settled on Burks last fall. That says a lot about this kid’s potential. He never took any other official visits after his Auburn one in December.

Prediction: Auburn (Lock)

3* CB Alfahiym Walcott | 6’1” | 190 lbs | Wilmington, NC

Contenders: Auburn, Baylor

Walcott showed up suddenly on Auburn’s radar last week. The Tigers offered the JUCO standout and then hosted him on an official visit last Thursday and Friday. If Auburn decides to push I think they would have a great chance at landing him. However, it does not appear that is happening at this time. Dave Aranda hosted Walcott right after his Auburn OV and it appears the Bears are the team to beat right now. Anything can change over the next 24 hours but as of this morning, I don’t see Walcott landing in this class.

Prediction: Baylor (50/50)

3* OT Brady Ward | 6’7” | 310 lbs | Mobile, AL

Contenders: Arkansas, Auburn, Ole Miss

There was another interesting visitor this past weekend. Brady Ward is a massive human being at 6’7” 310 lbs with an impressive reported offer list. However, I am not sure how many of those offers are actually committable. Ole Miss is reportedly considering giving him a grayshirt opportunity. The Tigers appear to be offering either a preferred walk on spot or a blueshirt. My guess is unless an SEC program comes in late with a full ride, Ward takes the Auburn offer. This could end up being a sneaky pickup down the road for the Tigers.

Prediction: Auburn (50/50)

Final Thoughts

It was going to be hard to top Auburn’s excellent Early Signing Day given how few spots remained in this class and the fact the Tigers picked up commitments already from two top targets. The Jones news hurts, especially since all the buzz heading into his Georgia OV was that Auburn had the momentum. But overall, this a solid class for the Tigers and one that has a chance to fill some immediate needs for next season. We will see if this staff has anymore surprises hidden up their sleeves and given their history of hitting on late additions (Daniel Thomas, Tyrone Truesdell, Boobee Whitlow), I wouldn’t put it past the Tigers to sign another under the radar stud tomorrow. Otherwise, they will likely use that last spot in the graduate transfer market.

War Eagle!

from College and Magnolia - All Posts https://www.collegeandmagnolia.com/2020/2/4/21121588/2020-auburn-football-recruiting-national-signing-day-preview

[ellana-ravenwood]

Fun fair with the Family - Batmom x Batfam (REPOST please READ the explanation right under the summary :-( )

Summary : Batmom decides to take her family to the fun fair…She quickly realizes it might not be her best idea ever.

You can find my masterlist here : @ella-ravenwood-archives

Repost because, and this time I really don’t know how, the original post got erased...BUT I had it backed up for once. So here. FUCK. Hum. Sorry. But it had almost 100 notes, and comment people left I didn’t even had time to read because the story simply disappeared...I’m a bit bummed out right now...Is it too much to ask if you could like, reblog and comment again ? I kinda feel bad, it’s not my style to ask those things...I’m so sorry for that, but it’s a bit discouraging, to write something, and to see that apparently it was liked, but to not know who liked it, what were the comments etc etc, especially since this time, I didn’t do anything, the story simply disappeared...Anyway, hope you’ll enjoy, and re-enjoy if you already read it :’-( : 

__________________________________________________

Not even an hour in, and you know you made a huge mistake bringing them here. All at the same time. They were going to be the death of you, so much energy…But it was just so rare that you all had some free times at once…You just wanted to spend some time with them.

It all started so well though.

*******************

You woke up in the best way possible : with your Bruce’s lips trailing kisses on your neck, shoulders and back, his arms wrapped around you. You shifted around, and before you could say anything, he kissed your temple, the corner of your mouth, slowly putting butterfly kisses on your face, to finally kiss you on the lips.

You melted in the kiss, and squeezed his large frame against you, your arms struggling to wrap around him. Damn that man was big. When he pulls away, you can’t help but grin at him, and he gives you the smile he only reserved to you. A real, pure smile. You nuzzle his neck, and he let out a contended sigh.

-You’re alright ?

-More than alright my love, as always when you’re here.

-My sweet Broosh. You know what I mean.

-I am alright. Not even a single bruise or scratch. The boys are too. Calm night.

-I like those.

-I like you.

-I love you.

-Oh yeah, that too. I love you (Y/N).

-Well, here’s for our morning’s cheesy ritual…We probably should get up.

-I have the entire day off.

-Oh ? Well then, what’s the hurry right ?

He smiles once more at you, and you crash your lips on his, climbing on him to straddle him. One of his hand tangles itself in your (H/L) (H/C) hair, the other goes to your waist and his grip is almost bruising. He cannot stop himself, you always had a strong and immediate effect on him…He rolls on top of you, and you wrap your arms around his neck, your legs around his waist.

-What’s the hurry indeed.

********************

-Can I change bedroom ? Because I need sleep, and I realized that choosing the bedroom just down the hall from yours was a mistake. I think I understand now why the others have their bedroom at the other side of the Manor. You guys are so loud.

Bruce chokes on his coffee, and you turn all kind of shades of red. Give it to Damian to be brutally honest like that…His brothers hesitate between being disgusted (reminding themselves why they also switched bedrooms from the master bedroom’s floor to the opposite aisle of the house), and bursting out laughing, Alfred and his childish giggle convince them to howl in laughter.

You look at your husband, quite horrified, and he shifts awkwardly on his seat, the fork full of eggs he was going to eat still half way through between his plate and his mouth…He says :

-Yes, of course you can change room.

-Great, because really, my dear parents, you’re mak…

-OOOoooook, subject close.

-Yes Dams, subject close. You’re going to make it weird again.

-I never make it weird Grayson ! I think it’s gross too, they just have to know that they’re a nuisance when together, that we can hear them from the gard…

Bruce cuts his son off, putting his large hand on his mouth, and says :

-Let’s not talk about this anymore, instead, let’s talk about the fact that today, we’re all completely free and we should do something together ! 

You freeze at Bruce’s words. “All completely free” ? Could it be ? This hasn’t happened for almost seven months ! You definitely had to do something as a family ! Before one of your sons could say he had plan, you throw in the idea of going to Gotham’s fun fair, without really thinking about it (maybe if you had, things would have gone differently). You even convince Alfred to come with you, because come on, he’s definitely part of the family. When you say he’s “like the dad you never had”, you swore you saw tears welling up in his eyes, as he rushed to put the dirty breakfast dishes in the dishwasher…

Your sons are excited, Bruce seems ok with the plan (as long as he’s with you, his sons, or Alfred, he’s always OK), and you’re just too happy at the prospect of spending a day with your family !

*********************

As you all were wearing casual clothes, almost unfashionable for some of you (Bruce and his black sweatpants, baseball cap and oversized hoodie…oh, what were you saying, that man always looked good), no paparazzis bothered you. They just couldn’t even fathom the fact that the great Wayne family would go out in ripped jeans, flannels, sweat pants, and old shirt that seemed to be a thousand years old ! You guys were always classy !

It was so good, to not be recognize. You could all be yourselves without fearing a silly picture to be posted in every papers the next day !

Like right now, in the fun house, making faces at each others, laughing your asses off when one would fall on a “trap”, dancing as if no one was watching to the stupid circus song that kept playing over and over again. You all had some great move. You completely lost it when Alfred, finally loosing his English phlegm, did the “arms wave dance” with your boys.

You could hug and kiss your Bruce without fearing articles being written the next day, with the pictures, judging you guys’ relationship…Everything was just great ! Your sons though, kept rolling your eyes at you two, whispering, or plainly saying out loud : “Get a room”, “PDA !!!” and other “Ew, gross”.

Damian won a gigantic teddy Bear for you at some darts game, that was bigger than him, and you thought it was the most hilarious thing ever to see him carry it all around the fun fair. The boy refused the help of his brothers and father, so he deserved his struggle, and damn, it was just too cute. He had to twist his neck on the side to be able to see where he was going, because that damn bear was so large ! When you thanked him with a kiss on the forehead, he looked just so proud of himself that it melted your heart a little bit. That boy.

Jason, making all of you laugh, won some water guns at the “hook-a-duck” game, that was suppose to be for little kids. Of course, the rest of the warm summer day was spent spraying each other.

Tim got thrown out of the “magic house” as he made it a mission to debunk absolutely every single “creatures” in it, and explained every single trick, in details, the magicians were performing. The owner, a very fat, dirty and bald character, grabbed him by the collar, and Bruce almost knocked the man out, no one was touching his babies ! …Fortunately, you got a hold of him before he could do anything, and Tim handled himself. You could understand the owner though, because your son was being a total buzzkill, and every visitors were leaving his attraction…

Dick decided to “test his strength” by using one of those machines where you put a couple of quarters in, and a ball would come down for you to punch, and then a number would tell you how “strong” you were. All the boys did it, even Alfred…Dick punched the hardest, breaking the score that was the highest before he tried…Until Bruce tried too, and broke the machine because he punched too hard. He apologized to the owner of the machine, and gave him check for him to buy another one.

Everything was just great.

Until your sons’ energy was a bit too much. They wanted to do EVERYTHING. As soon as they finished an attraction, they were running to the next one, and you realized that you were not fit to follow them…But then a day that was starting to be too exhausting for you to really appreciate your family’s presence, too much at the same time, while it started so great..turned perfect.

Bruce gave you a piggy back ride through the fun fair, and things were good again. You could follow your children with ease, comfortably snuggled against his back, and you had easy access to his neck, jaw, temple and hair…All the places he liked to be kissed and caressed. Bonus point because your actions grossed out your sons a lot.

You were so glad you decided to go to the fun fair everything was so perfect…a few other accidents happened besides Bruce broking the punching machine, and Tim being thrown out of the magic house.

Damian punched a man disguised as a werewolf in the haunted house, because he jump scared him, and you guys all ran out of the place…until he realized he forgot his giant teddy bear inside, and went back in, just to punch the werewolf man once again because the fool was trying to grab him, while yelling “SOMEONE CALL THE POLICE PLEASE”…You avoided the Haunted House area until the end of the day.

Jason ate too many candies, and threw up everything after he went on the tea cups attraction…You couldn’t help but telling him : “I told you son”, as, indeed, you warned him all day that he was going to get sick with all this sugar combined with fun fair stuffs. Even the carousel made him gag…

Dick almost got punched in the face for flirting with the girlfriend of some very jealous guy. Of course, he didn’t realized the girl had a boyfriend. He escaped with a laugh that infuriated the dude, and a few backflips that impressed the girl…and was able to slip his number in her pocket. Of course he would.

Tim got stuck in the “hamster wheel” of one of the fun house because Damian kept throwing his giant teddy bear at him…and both you and Bruce had to separate them before they would get in a violent fist fight. You made them hold hands the rest of the day as a punishment. Yours and your husband constant snickering towards them got the lesson through their head. Alright, no more fighting…in front of the parents.

And finally, the boys convinced Alfred to go with them in the biggest roller coaster on the fair, even though their favorite butler kept refusing their proposal as he said “rollercoasters made him sick”…He just couldn’t resist them. He considered them his grandchildren, he felt obligated to please them. And so here you all were, on a gigantic rollercoaster and…Damian, who was sitting next to Alfred, turned, and the panic on his face scared you.

-MOM, DAD, PENNYWORTH JUST FAINTED !!!! AL’ !! HE’S NOT OK !!

You all rushed around your loved butler to see if he was alright at the end of the ride, and with a weak voice, as he was waking up, he just said :

-I told you those made me sick…I don’t like heights too much…

And that marked the end of your day. It was getting quite late anyway, almost time for patrol. Dick and Jason supported Alfred back to the car, and Bruce went behind the wheel, forbidding his dear butler to drive, and once you all got home, he forced him to go take some rest.

Your boys felt extremely guilty that they almost broke their Al’…

********************

Before going to sleep, you checked on Alfred, bringing him some hot tea…that he never drunk as he was already in a deep slumber when you came in his room. You put the blanket back up to his neck, and with a kiss on your adoptive father’s forehead, you felt him, leaving a note telling him that if he needed anything he should just ring you, even though you knew he probably would never do it…

You went to bed late, but not late enough for your children and husband to be home, and you slipped into your king sized bed alone.

It was alright though, you knew your Bruce was going to warm the place next to you soon enough (you hoped it would be another “calm night”)…And the day you spent with him and all yours boys charged you up so much on family time that it was fine.

You made a mental note to take them to the fair again some day, but after a very exhausting night, so that their energy would be a bit lower.

********************

The sun was already rising in the sky when you felt Bruce’s side of the bed shifting, and his arms wrapping around you, squeezing you on his naked chest.

-Calm night ?

You asked hesitantly.

-Very calm. Bruise and scratch less.

You smiled, and turned around into his embrace so that you’d face him.

-Good. I like those.

-I like you.

-I love you.

-Yeah, that too. I love you (Y/N).

You stare at each other for a bit, each enjoying the presence of the love of your life, until a mischievous smile appears on your face :

-The night was calm enough to leave you with some energy ?

-You betcha sweetheart.

And on that note, he is on you, his lips crashed on yours, and his hand roaming your body. Damn you loved that man. And if you could hear his thoughts, what his heart said, you’d realize he loves you even more.

[7men]

Seven in the circus AU;

Vin makes friends with all the animals and bribes them to do things. Ends up with a bear cub following him around like a puppy. Has been known to nap with lions. Always covered in fur.

Ezra terrifies no matter what he’s doing, and he can do a lot of things. Juggling things that are on fire? No problem. Trapeze crap that is unwatchable if you know him because you’re convinced he’s going to die at any moment? Does it every night.

Josiah is the elephant keeper and they love him. He usually has a trunk draped over his shoulder because someone’s always following him around everywhere and he doesn’t even notice any more. Also the strongman. People are starting to think he’s part elephant.

JD would honestly be happy mucking out the elephant enclosures but turns out he’s a daredevil on a motorcycle and whelp guess we’re going to have to build one of those terrifying balls he can drive upside down in.

Chris does a quickdraw/trickshot/card splitting show and honestly he doesn’t even think it’s all that special anymore, he just does his job and ignores everyone else.

Nathan is the knife guy, juggling them, throwing them, occasionally producing them out of thin air, everything. They are usually not on fire.

Buck’s the ringmaster, because originally Ezra wasn’t trusted to not pass a hat around and run a gigantic con every night, but also because Buck’s just so charismatic and the people love him and he’s so good at directing attention and making it sound like he’s made everything up off the top of his head.

Ezra teaches Vin and Chris trapeze stuff and eventually they start doing things together, they also end up doing trick riding stuff. Josiah sometimes carries Vin around on his shoulders so he can hold a hoop for one of the big cats to jump through. JD has been known to try and race the animals on his bike, and has been asking for lessons doing basically everything since he first started with the circus. The boys are convinced he’ll take all their jobs one day.

[all-things-andrew-scott]

Okay. I am grossly overdue for telling you about my adventures at the Sherlock convention. If you don't care, of course, feel free to move along. But for anyone that does care, do read ahead.

Friday: Friday morning was spent in Hollywood. I was emotional as soon as we set foot out of the Lyft ride and actually cried tears while standing on Hollywood Blvd. Visiting Hollywood was something that I had always dreamed of since I was a child. For me to be able to make that dream come true… I can't even put into words how amazing it felt. Naturally, we stopped in a souvenir shop. There, I looked through a rack of souvenir keychains that were designed to look like stars on the Walk of Fame. They were black squares with pink Stars just like the real thing. I found one with Andrew's name on it and immediately knew that we had to get it to him. after all, he truly does deserve a star on the Walk of Fame for his incredible talent. When the time came, we made our way to the Marriott for registration. The rest of Friday was relatively uneventful. The four of us did have our photo taken in front of the aquarium bench and backdrop inspired by The Six Thatchers (The bench was actually the real one used in the show). We were also fortunate enough to be able to have our photo taken on the screen-used living room set of 221B. To our surprise, those chairs are actually extremely narrow. Sherlock's chair is just as squishy and comfortable as it looks. The night ended with the Chinese Circus-themed party which just ended up being a dance but was actually kind of cool. We did try to check out karaoke but they kept the lights on and it just kind of over all sucked. So we skipped out on that in favor of food and sleep. Saturday: Saturday morning I'll admit that I cried during the opening ceremony just from actually seeing Andrew Scott up on the stage and processing the fact that he's a very real person. I did bid to try and get into his meet and greet but unfortunately I lost. I was pretty visibly upset by this fact considering my emotional attachment to him and the fact that he was the reason that I attended the convention. However, this did not stop Blue Hair Girl from bragging about the meet-and-greet and shoving her selfie with him in my face. I ended up using the money that I bid on the meet and greet with to purchase a second autograph with Andrew (so that I could still have him sign my DVD even though I planned on having him design my tattoo) and a photograph with Jonathan Aris. Poor Jonathan got no love from any fans all weekend. Every time I saw his autograph table it was nearly empty or the line was extremely short. because of that, I did ask if I could go up and speak to him. The staff obliged and he was so sweet. That's what made me decide to buy the photograph with him. I got Steven Moffat’s autograph first. I wasn't sure what to think but he was actually very nice. I followed that up with Arwel’s autograph and he was also very nice. Unfortunately, the lunch break we were on ran a bit late so we just caught the end of Jonathan and Alistair's panel. But from what I did get to see it was very enjoyable. I can say that I absolutely loved Una, Wanda and Tim's panel. The three of them together were just a scream. Poor Tim could barely get a word in edgewise. But it was a delight to hear Tim and Wanda share stories about Benedict. I did have a mild freak-out prior to Andrew’s photograph because it was the first time I was actually getting to meet him. Immediately after, I walked off until wait for my photo to print and I collapsed against the back wall and just sobbed. Luckily, the anxiety part of my brain always seems to work no matter what so I skedaddled from the room before we could get yelled at for lingering. Naturally, I absolutely ADORED Andrew’s panel. He was so funny and it’s completely adorable how fidgety he is. Saturday Night: The drinks reception was, by far, the highlight of the weekend. An old lady kept yelling at us while we were waiting in the hallway even though we weren't being very loud and it was only 7pm. There were about 10 of us per table. I'll tell you that two glasses of white wine loosened me up and made me more talkative than I otherwise would have been. We started with Alistair and I found out that he's absolutely marvelous. He completely understood what fandom means to us all and why we were there. He was so funny and engaging. He told us he had a party to attend after and in said “So you're just pregaming then?” His reply: “...Yeah. Pretty much.” Next, we had Arwel Wyn-Jones but that was a bit awkward as no one seemed to know what to really say. He was still lovely despite that. Sue Vertue is an absolutely fantastic woman. The kind you'd like to grab lunch with. She was very engaging and it was a joy to laugh with her. Once again, Moffat was a pleasant surprise. He was very nice to all of us. We accidentally got him on an anti-Trump/anti-Brexit/anti-hatred/pro-kindness tangent. It's clear he's a very passionate man and he earned so much of my respect that night. Also, he refers to Trump as “that orange toad across the pond”. Finally, we finished the drinks reception with my darling Andrew. He lit up when we gave him the keychain and he loved it. Someone asked if he was going to the same party as Alistair. He didn't even know Alistair was going to a party and jokingly mumbled “fuck him”. He made a lot of eye contact with me and I think I earned brownie points by mentioning John Butler (director and Andrew’s friend) and some of Andrew’s other work. He got bashful when I told him his performances in those other things were wonderful. We talked a little bit about music and karaoke and it turns out that he loves Katy Perry and P!nk. We also chatted about Hamlet. I mentioned it is my favourite Shakespearean work and he immediately said “Did you see Benedict’s?!” He mentioned that the fans’ request was heard and they're filming his run as Hamlet. He apologized for his photo session being “impersonal” and “on factory settings”. He was certain that he must look terrible in every single photo. I assured him that he didn't and showed him how ours came out and he loved it. When it was over, he blew the whole table a kiss. I said, “Thank you so much. We love you.” His reply: “I love you guys too”. It was such an honor and pleasure to laugh with him. Overall, I was glad conversation flowed so easily with each guest. Despite only having about six minutes with each guest, it felt like really connecting and was well worth the money. Andrew abandoned his glass water. Someone pointed it out to me and I drank it. We all laughed about it. Except one girl called it disgusting. I don't see why. It was perfectly good water. Andrew is not a dirty person. The other nine of us laughed about it. It was harmless. I've known someone to do worse. Something far more disgusting and creepy. As a side note: I'm completely in love with his full body laugh and his eye crinkles. After, I ran into Moffat while waiting for the elevators. I accidentally called him “Moffat” to his face. I told him how much respect I gained for him during the drinks reception and he thanked me. I told him I wouldn't fall victim to the lies and bullshit about him spread on the internet anymore. He also called the elevators “lifts” then apologized and corrected himself. I said “No no no. I'm American but I watch plenty of British TV to know what Lifts are. Doctor Who, Sherlock, League of Gentlemen, Little Britain…” Turns out he also likes Little Britain. Sunday: Again, relatively uneventful. I spent a lot of time talking to fellow fans. I did get Sue Vertue’s autograph; she was just as sweet as she was the night before. When it was time to get my photo with Mark Gatiss, I was bouncing with excitement. I've been a fan of his since I started watching Doctor Who in 2011. He's a phenomenal writer and a big part of the reason I fell back in love with writing. Again, I spent a large part of my day talking to fellow fans. When it came time for my photo on set with Andrew, I was still nervous but a little more comfortable because of the drinks reception the night before. He called me “lovely” which he seems to do to a lot of his female fans (particularly the plus-sized ones) but I don't care because that doesn't make it any less genuine. He saw me carrying Furiarty (puppy I made at Build-A-Bear Workshop that I modeled after Moriarty) and he went “Who’s this?” as he gently took him from me and stroked his head. I explained and he looked at me with total awe. I sat beside him in John's chair (he was perched on the arm) and Andrew fiddled with Furiarty’s suit. I asked if the three of us could cuddle and we did. Everywhere we could be touching, we were. It was magical. Afterward, I immediately went across the hall to get my photo with Jonathan Aris. I stepped up, chatted with him a bit, and put my arms around him. Unfortunately, the photographer was not ready yet so we ended up awkwardly cuddling in a standing position for a moment before the photographer told us that it would be a moment before he was ready. We pulled away and chatted a bit more. He's a sweet guy. There was a brief, minor issue with the printer so I had to wait a little bit longer for my photo to print. But unlike Creation Entertainment they didn't try to rush me out of the photo op room. It's also nice that the photos print out immediately and you don't have to go digging for them later. Finally, it was time to get my autograph from Andrew. Unfortunately, his line was so long that we didn't have much time for a proper chat. I did, however, present him with his large container of Ferrero Rocher chocolates, the Moriarty coloring page that I completed for him from my Sherlock coloring book, and the card with the letter in it that I wrote. He was completely surprised by the large container of chocolates, and he absolutely loved the coloring page. He signed the DVD cover of my copy of Dead Bodies, which has to be one of my top 3 favourite projects of his (so far). I gave him the blank piece of paper I brought and briefly explained to him why I wanted the tattoo and what I wanted him to do. All I said was “Could you please write something brief and positive and sign it that I could get tattooed later?” it was his choice to draw the waves with a heart. He called them “air waves”, but he was so rushed I think he meant positive waves. regardless, I thanked him profusely and walked away only to grossly sob over how much it meant to me. The final event was The Great Sherlocked Game Show. An absolutely genius idea, I think it showed how much fun the guests and the fans were having with each other. There is a lot to be said when the entire room of people is laughing together. You could really tell that the guests were having a great time. The final afterparty was Moriarty’s Pool Party. I unfortunately forgot my bathing suit at our hotel (separate from the convention hotel and cheaper) so I couldn't get in the hot tub. It was too cold to get in the pool. Samantha and I enjoyed free wine and then went into a friend’s hotel room until we were joined by the rest of the girls. Overall… absolutely the best weekend of my life and I'd love to do it all again.

[moodboardinthecloud]

Martin Shaw THE NIGHT WAGES

THE TIME-WRESTLE

We are a house of agitated birds flying in and out of time.

That’s how he writes his books, by becoming agitated. Un-domestic.

He walks round and round the very edges of his imagination with a lantern finding all those lonely little gleams of light, those furry animals of the unconscious that want to come on board. Never abandons them.

In middle age he’s been thinking more and more about memory. He’s been thinking that there must be different kinds. There’s the sort that you can trace back to a certain age and then present rather like a C.V., like peering through ice. It provokes no great pathos, just a four-square stomp through the years. A checklist. It’s not without its uses. We could call this skin memory. Pops up at job interviews. Reveals a mind not ravaged by substance abuse. Skin memory hovers like a hawk over the creek of our own years. We need skin memory, 

especially its emotional distance.

Then there’s another kind. In this squats a greater sense of the interior: your wider senses lurch into range––you can feel the deathly cool of the telephone in your hand as your lover breaks faith with you, the reek of the phonebox (a scent you have become almost fond of as you associate it with your nightly attempts at courting) and the crazy weight of the dark as you stagger out into that fresh March night of 1989.

Now that recollection is quite a different animal to the first. That shoots the hawk right out of the sky. Gets these adrenals moving. Shirt sticky on the back. First love memories have a little more boom and clatter––either that or they are placed well and truly in the deep freeze. So it’s all a little more holistic, edgier, a flesh memory.

But over many years now as a storyteller he’s found there’s another kind again. Bone memory.

This is the tears unbidden, the clench of the gut, the wild-sky-waking of some story that lashes its great sexy tale straight round the table legs of your steady life and pulls all the crockery to the floor. And you bend your head and thank it for the trouble. Alive a live-oh. Amen the thunderbolt in the dark void.

It’s as if in the dust of your collagen and calcium is a secretion of alchemical deposits that can't be readily accounted for in the push-pull of your years. It’s not to do with a Lincolnshire high school, or a leery husband or anything you really can claim to have experienced, it doesn't quite add up. Where did it come from? Be sure, it has spook attached. But you’ve always sensed it at the edge of your vision. Maybe you don’t talk about it. Maybe as a child, just before sleep, with your eyes closed you beheld hundreds of faces you’ve never met. Remember that? Who are they and where do they come from? If someone tries to explain them away, it’s vital you tell them they’re an idiot.

But what is this terrible treasury, so magnificent and elusive? Is bone-memory the way into a religious life that we are not supposed to believe in anymore? Why does a chick raised in a 

laboratory shudder when the cardboard shape of a Hawk swoops its shadow over the babe, despite never being in the presence of a predator?

The greatest storytellers curate echoes.

They can feel them in ancient stories, and if there’s no echo, no stirring of bone memory, then they won’t tell them. But if the echo trembles its blue bell in the teller, then their work has begun. This isn’t as simple as maintaining that a moment in the story is a metaphor for something that happened when you were six. That’s a cop out if that’s where the enquiry ends. This is participation mystique. This is a time-wrestle; when as a teller you know things you should not know, bear witness to the moment where the horses of past, present and future all drink from the deep trough which is the story being told in its ordinary and tremendous fullness. You commence holy seance with trees and saints and croft. You change your shape. If that sounds grandiose then you’ve understood exactly what I’m trying to communicate. A great time-wrestler will push you out of the normal range of reference without for a moment belittling the lived human experience; they will render you completely to its vastness.

He knows what he’s thinking lacks some connecting tissue, allows a degree of misrule into what’s presented. So he tries to come at it again. We have the general recollections of a life, then we have the deeper, more emotive reservoirs––the endings, the betrayals, the happiness, and then we have chthonic memory and from that erupts the word soul. And he does mean erupt. You respond to certain wild views, grand old castles, the delicate swoop of the goldfinch. You walk into a Finnish church and you stop still. You know you’ve been there before. But not this time round.

It is, some would say, a little baffling. Maybe once in every hundred years or so you may meet someone who has the same subterranean pressure points as you, but it’s as rare as the white-skinned deer in a far Northern forest that the hunter weeps for when he takes its life. You and they share bone-memory somehow.

Maybe that is what a soul-mate actually is. A bone-mate.

The passport to a modern life is often to drift through without the difficulty of such an encounter. But that passport becomes wretched when we realise that those very difficulties and their bullish prickles remind us that we are not alone. We aren’t designed to do this alone, no matter what they say.

We’re not here to glide through. It’s a contact sport.

All these crazy folktales, myths and fairy tales are a way of strengthening your capacity to vocalise bone-memory; to evoke not just pastoral but prophetic information. To reach back into history and realise it was riding alongside you all the time. You just had to reach over and touch its bridle. A way of becoming proficient at your particular form of echolocation. This must not be kept entirely in the hand of the specialist anymore: the times are far too pressing. To have the capacity to not just carry but communicate bone memory is a talismanic activism against forces that do not wish you well. And yes, they’re out there.

He knows chaos stands at the gate of this statement, he knows that. Not much he can do about it. Licence for every eye-quivering mystic and low grade channeller for a thousand miles to bellow their celestial reports uninvited into your weary face. Sorry about that.

But where were we? Memory. That thing so vital to a storyteller. That clouded buff of image that you plead to, pray to, to crowd into your jaw and then be loosened into the world like a scent we’d almost given up ever catching again. You have to enchant the story to come as much as the audience that receives it.

But reader, he has a confession.

It’s memory that flees him as he sits in the green room of a Manhattan night club, or stands in frosty-dark outside a Dorset longhouse as he prepare to speaks. It goes away. Always. There’s no memory at that moment. Or at least not the flesh kind. Or even the body. Just blankness. A kind of weakness too. He feels unsubstantial. There’s no A to B, no recital, no incantation, just a kind of nothing. It’s not a good sensation. Only prayers to gird the way at that moment. Then, sure enough, someone emerges from the dark and says its time.

You glance around but there’s no spirit-companions. Nada. Just some bad coffee and an article on Rimbaud stuffed down the back of the sofa. So be it. So you stand up and shake yourself down, snorting like some Shetland pony still waiting for its load. And somewhere out there, under the lights, that little pony will have to become a lion. The stories won’t show up for less. And then, and only then, as you croak your greetings to the murky strangers does bone-memory show up. Pushes all the other gradients of recollection aside and speaks its rough-rattle of beauty to the second, secret heart of those gathered listeners.

High risk strategy, circus work really––tightrope, no net. He scribbles something down.

Note to self: Lion Tamer Knows He Needs To Become Lion.

Copyright words and drawing, Martin Shaw 2018

[jodyedgarus]

We Still Don’t Know Which NFL Teams Are Any Good

gfoster (Geoff Foster, sports editor): Week 15 in the NFL is almost over, and we are here to discuss the key takeaways from the weekend and how the playoff picture is shaping up. Most broadly, a pair of playoff-bound teams that looked shaky a week ago (Patriots and Rams) continued to look off their game, while a couple of teams that were gaining steam (Cowboys and Seahawks) cooled off. Add it all up and the league’s hierarchy is still murky.

Let’s start with the reigning champions Eagles. They start the quarterback who won them the Super Bowl last February, Nick Foles, and look what happens: They look like the team that won the Super Bowl. What do you make of this?

neil (Neil Paine, senior sports writer): Obviously Foles >>>> Carson Wentz.

(Heh.)

I do think the Eagles had underachieved to this point and were better than their record indicated. I didn’t expect the Eagles to go into L.A. with Foles and knock off the Rams, though.

sara.ziegler (Sara Ziegler, assistant sports editor): With the Cowboys losing, the Eagles have a shot, right?

neil: The Eagles’ playoff odds are up to 37 percent, Sara — so there’s a shot. But it’s going to be an interesting game vs. Houston, to say the least.

Salfino (Michael Salfino, contributor): I wonder if it’s the Eagles or whether it’s that for three games now, teams have seemed to figure out how to play the Rams. You rarely see a good team thwarted three straight weeks. I’m shocked that they have not been able to respond to Aaron Donald being double-teamed (duh!) and defenses pretty much ignoring play-action and playing softer zones.

neil: That’s a great point. We were worried about the Rams last week. And now this happens. Has the shine come off Sean McVay and friends?

Salfino: I would have bet a lot of money that the Rams would just roll it up on the undermanned Eagles defense, and instead they really struggled. Jared Goff was pressured almost as badly as against the Bears.

gfoster: Goff also may not be a good quarterback. (Pretty sure I said this last week.) That’s seven interceptions in three weeks, after being picked off just six times in 11 games. He can’t seem to adjust or make plays with the pressure in his face.

Turns out “Jeff Fisher Goff” wasn’t an illusion.

Salfino: As for the Eagles, the two losses against Dallas and the tiebreakers seems lethal in the division, but that wild card is very much in play.

You wonder if the Vikings have figured out a winning formula by turning their $84 million QB into a game manager.

sara.ziegler: “The Vikings have figured out a winning formula” is not a thing.

That will never be a thing.

gfoster: The Vikings are back.

sara.ziegler: Stop.

neil: It does seem like it’s going to come down to Minnesota and Philly — with maybe some of that changing based on what Carolina does tonight.

(I guess Washington also won with Josh Johnson on Sunday.)

Salfino: The Vikings passed 34 percent of the time Sunday, when they were 66 percent pass previously. And even in the first half, if you want to throw out the game total because of the blowout, the Vikings were only 42 percent pass. Mike Zimmer has put the team into the DeLorean. This is not 2018 football. But maybe it’s their best chance since Kirk Cousins seemed so mechanical and was playing so inefficiently.

sara.ziegler: You could see the effect of the new play-calling almost immediately for the Vikings. Through Week 14, they had rushed on first down only 41 percent of the time. On Sunday, that was up to 79 percent.

Salfino: Dalvin Cook is really good, but the strength of the team is the wide receivers. While running could work against the Dolphins, who are 26th in yards allowed per rush, can it work against better competition?

neil: The Vikings are fascinating to me. They had the single worst loss of the season and have generally underachieved relative to expectations. I want to write about this, but Cousins has basically matched most of Case Keenum’s output from last year — and Keenum’s Denver performance is making them look smart for moving on anyway — and the receivers (Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs) are more productive than ever. But their offense is somehow down according to holistic metrics such as SRS. Yet they still probably will make the playoffs — and could be a tough out for somebody.

gfoster: Where is Thielen though? He was the best receiver in football for the first half of the season, and now he’s a glorified Quincy Enunwa out there.

sara.ziegler: Maybe whatever Bill Belichick yelled at Thielen in Foxboro has really stuck with him.

Salfino: I would not want to play the Vikings if Cousins is hot like in a few games this year — think of the game at Los Angeles. Their defense can be tough, too. They’re first in sack rate. But I feel better about playing them if they insist on playing small ball.

gfoster: Thielen only received two targets yesterday, but part of that was game flow.

Salfino: Thielen’s problem yesterday is that when your passing volume gets cut in half, you’re going to suffer. But only two targets (he caught both) is just terrible market share as well. He should be 25 to 30 percent of attempts, not 10 percent.

Minnesota basically has built a pass-oriented offense but now wants to run. It’s weird.

gfoster: OK, let’s talk about the Patriots. They will not win at least 12 games for the first time since 2009. That alone is absurd in a league where teams routinely go from making the playoffs to drafting in the top 5, season to season. But after the loss to Pittsburgh, it’s definitely clear these Patriots are just off, right?

sara.ziegler: Love that both of the embattled Pennsylvania teams pulled off big upsets Sunday.

Salfino: The Pittsburgh win feels like an upset, but at home against these Patriots and not-really Tom Brady? Pittsburgh seems so much better than the Patriots. New England has to grind it out now. They have no explosion unless Chris Hogan is running a route with no defender within 19 yards of him or whatever it was.

neil: For several weeks now, Brady has made some inexplicably bad red-zone decisions. Clearly it is time to intensify those “Tom is losing it” takes (only to see him turn it around in the playoffs).

sara.ziegler: Though I remain unconvinced that Pittsburgh is all that good.

Didn’t we all think Brady was going to lead that winning drive at the end of the game?

Still surprised he didn’t, tbh.

Salfino: Consecutive December losses for the first time since the Jets won the AFC East (2002).

gfoster: The late holding penalty — when they were second and five from the Pittsburgh 11 yard line — probably cost them the game.

Salfino: What do you guys think about fourth-quarter Tom? People point to the four TDs and five picks in the fourth quarter this year. But his yards per attempt is nearly 10.

Is Gronk going to retire? When you are invisible against the Steelers, who could not cover Jared Cook last week, maybe the circus has left town.

neil: Sara, you and I were Slacking during that game, and it seemed like everything was going according to our imaginary script — Steelers lead until the very end, before the Pats storm back and break their hearts. And yet…

sara.ziegler: Yeah, the Pats couldn’t quite finish that script. But why? What’s different this year?

Salfino: It’s just a lack of playmakers on the Patriots. Josh Gordon is not Josh Gordon. Gronk is not Gronk. Brady is not really Brady anymore — he’s like a top 10ish QB but no one would think he was top two or three.

gfoster: But James White and Julian Edelman are the same. Just those two alone, was enough to win a Super Bowl a couple years ago?

sara.ziegler: And Gordon certainly gave them a boost earlier in the season.

They usually can ride the hot hand, but it doesn’t seem like anyone is able to be the hot hand right now.

neil: And the Pats usually get an edge at the margins. On Sunday, they won the turnover battle but were only +1. Also went 3 for 10 on third down (3 for 11 if you wanna include that failed fourth-down conversion) and had that brutal red-zone mistake.

Salfino: Maybe 41-year-old Brady is much different from 39-year-old Brady. Plus Edelman is old for a WR and coming off a major injury. He probably isn’t the same player either. White can be mixed in but can’t be central to your offense.

It’s tough to say, but Brady was chucking and ducking yesterday.

sara.ziegler: It’s weird to me, too, how they use some weapons so sparingly.

Cordarrelle Patterson was so effective against Green Bay in Week 9. But he’s barely been heard from since.

gfoster: Let’s talk about the Chiefs’ collapse against the Chargers. Is Los Angeles (it always sounds so wrong) now the team to beat in the AFC?

neil: I love watching Philip Rivers lead a desperation drive.

I imagine it’s the same as it was watching Dan Marino in the ’90s.

My inclination is to not read too much into that result because K.C. dominated most of the game. But maybe that’s wrong.

sara.ziegler: Yeah, I think the Chiefs just took their foot off the gas.

neil: The three K.C. losses have come by a total of 7 points.

gfoster: I also love the zero hesitation on going for two to win the game. I can think of about a dozen coaches who would have been too chicken to do it.

Mainly Bill “Let’s Punt” O’Brien.

sara.ziegler: Did that play into Kansas City’s approach, too? Like, “Oh, the worst that can happen is a tie here, so we’re fine.”

Salfino: The 2-point conversion was obvious to me. Textbook. When you are a big underdog on the road, you go for the win on one play. That’s defined all the teams that have done it except one: the Panthers earlier this year.

neil: San Diego — er, L.A. — probably knew that was their best shot. On the road against that team, odds were against them if they extended the game.

Salfino: Rivers is so deadly still. Has not lost anything. They have pass rush, a running game assuming Melvin Gordon can come back, a good secondary and Philip Rivers. They are deadly. K.C. has the tiebreaker with the better divisional record.

I can’t believe the Chargers can win 13 games and be a wild-card team.

gfoster: You also can’t really blame the loss of Kareem Hunt. Damien Williams was the best player on the field.

Salfino: Williams is a generational talent though at running back.

gfoster: Not to mention Darrel Williams.

sara.ziegler: There were SO MANY Williamses on the field in that game.

neil: I can’t wait for the NFL version of that failed NBA trade where nobody knew which player with the same last name was included.

sara.ziegler: LOLOL

neil: That will happen with a “Williams” someday.

gfoster: Do the Chiefs also have to have a doppelganger for their lead running back? Remember when they had Kareem Hunt and Akeem Hunt.

It’s like the double Queen Amidala has in “The Phantom Menace.”

neil: LOL.

I can’t believe you made a “Phantom Menace” reference.

sara.ziegler: (Geoff was watching the “Star Wars” marathon this weekend too, apparently.)

gfoster: Speaking of phantom menaces (wait for it…), is it time to take Andrew Luck and the Colts seriously in the AFC?

Salfino: I’m very disappointed that the Colts may not make the playoffs. What’s their chance currently?

neil: Only 34 percent.

(Which surprises me.)

gfoster: I think they will make it. They’ve quietly won seven of eight, with the only loss being that strange no-show against Jacksonville.

neil: But it is a numbers game in the AFC.

gfoster: And they host the Giants next week, so…

sara.ziegler: And then they finish with the Titans.

neil: Gotta keep pace with Tennessee in terms of shutting out Eli Manning.

Salfino: It’s tough when you start 1-5. They have Luck, a running game now with Marlon Mack and a defense that just shut out the Cowboys. One possible explanation is that Colts defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus came over from Jason Garrett’s 2017 staff and clearly knew Dallas well.

sara.ziegler: Oh, that’s a good point.

I always wonder how much that kind of familiarity helps in specific games.

gfoster: Before the season, people were saying the Colts defense could be the worst in the league, particularly the run defense that bottled up Ezekiel Elliott yesterday.

Salfino: The Colts are actually sixth in rushing efficiency allowed.

As for Eli, it’s kind of funny that, on the day where there’s a report that the Giants are going to have Eli back in 2019, he gets goose-egged.

neil: Eli has been teetering on that edge for weeks now. Whenever it looks like he’ll definitely lose his starting job, he plays better. Whenever it looks like he’ll keep it, he plays worse.

sara.ziegler:

From @GMFB Weekend: #Giants QB Eli Manning may be playing his way onto the roster in 2019, which seemed crazy just a few months ago. Interesting decision looming this offseason. pic.twitter.com/9hVQx2PzIO

— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) December 16, 2018

I believe my exact words on Sunday were, “Did Ian Rapoport just doom Eli to a Peterman-like effort today?”

Salfino: Eli does just enough to keep the believers in his camp and just enough to provide fodder for the haters. He’s middling it.

The big problem yesterday for the Cowboys is that nothing was easy in the passing game. That was shocking after the explosion against the Eagles where they seemed to have turned the corner offensively.

neil: Yep. Dak Prescott followed up three straight 100+ QB rating games with … a 64.7.

gfoster: Marlon Mack’s emergence might mean they don’t break the bank to get Le’Veon Bell this offseason.

neil: Marlon Mack ran through that Cowboys defense like Boga the varactyl on Utapau.

sara.ziegler: OMG, Neil.

neil: Hahaha.

gfoster: Listen, readers, all our “Star Wars” references are strictly Episodes I-III.

neil: Are there any other episodes???

Salfino: The Bell thing is fascinating. The Jets are the top-rumored team. The Colts and Texans definitely have the money. But the Texans have other franchise-level players and Jadeveon Clowney to sign and the Colts have Mack.

gfoster: Is that a good move for the Jets?

sara.ziegler: A combo of Broadway Sam-Le’Veon Bell would be pretty fun to watch.

gfoster: The answer to “Is that a good move for the Jets?” is always no, by the way.

sara.ziegler: LOL

Salfino: The Jets have so much money that I’m coming around to it. You have to spend it someway. On paper, it’s stupid. But I like that he stopped his mileage. I know we wrote about maximizing earnings and the injury risk he would have assumed. But maybe Bell wanted to avoid the single-trial disastrous outcome (a catastrophic injury).

neil: The offseason carousel in general should be fun next year. At QB, Joe Flacco is leaving Baltimore, it was reported, with Lamar Jackson’s emergence. Eli might be out of a job (yet also available!!!). The 49ers will have two legitimate QBs with Nick Mullens being good. (I think??)

Salfino: I think Bell would provide for at least two years something really easy for Sam Darnold in the passing game.

gfoster: Darnold has been put in a position to fail. The play-calling is so conservative, the skill position players around him are so bad, he has no time.

Salfino: Darnold is not failing now. He had the in-season reset with the time off and is overcoming those handicaps, seemingly.

gfoster: They are 4-10.

That’s failing.

neil: Darnold had a 100.0 QB rating Saturday!

Salfino: Geoff, the Jets’ tank on Saturday was as elegant as a Noel Coward dinner party. Jason Myers missing the extra points was the plot twist no one saw coming.

sara.ziegler: “Elegant as a Noel Coward dinner party” is the best turn of phrase ever used about the Jets.

gfoster: Speaking of Mullens, is he a starter in this league??

Salfino: Mullens started 44 college games. And he’s in a Kyle Shanahan system. I think there are two questions with Mullens: Is he good, and does he prove that system/coaching makes the quarterback more than the tools that are traditionally scouted?

neil: Whether coaching or not, Mullens has played the best of any rookie this season:

It is true that Sam Darnold, Josh Allen, and Josh Rosen have been thrust into terrible situations.

It's also true that Nick Mullens is looking like a Pro Bowl QB in a situation that would be easy to call terrible if he wasn't playing so well. pic.twitter.com/XrUeNTqdYw

— Football Perspective (@fbgchase) December 17, 2018

But to your point, Mike, it is definitely tough to disentangle from Shanahan.

But should that change what we think of Jimmy Garoppolo as well?

gfoster: I just don’t know if a team is willing to make a trade and commit to him as a starter. This is the Brock Osweiler conundrum.

neil: Mullens has been much better than Osweiler was, for what it’s worth.

sara.ziegler: And he has the Brett Favre seal of approval.

neil: (And Osweiler was on a team that won the Super Bowl.)

Salfino: Mullens is 6-foot-1. I think people are going to look at him as a fluke. A guy like Mullens with no real pedigree (other, ironically, than NFL performance) will never have a long enough leash to make it as a starter.

gfoster: So he’s in “very good backup” land along with Ryan Fitzpatrick.

neil: I still don’t know that he’s necessarily a backup in a world where Flacco and Eli probably get additional starting shots next season.

Salfino: I think Mullens is going to be in the Dave Krieg, Tyrod Taylor, Jeff Garcia, Case Keenum, undersized, “not a real QB” camp — not the Drew Brees and Russell Wilson camp.

Also he’s not a free agent. Are you trading a second-round pick for Mullens?

neil: True. The Niners at least have time to make a decision there. They still have him under contract for 2019. Besides, I’ve long been a fan of the “strategically pump up the trade value of your backup QB” plan to team management, as my friend Doug Drinen laid out in this old post about Falcons-era Matt Schaub.

gfoster: The Browns, meanwhile, are keeping the dream alive.

Salfino: What is the Browns’ playoff probability?

They’re basically eliminated right?

sara.ziegler: They’re at a less than 1 percent chance, according to our model.

neil: The Steelers’ win kept the Browns from being mathematically eliminated.

sara.ziegler: So you’re saying there’s a chance…

neil: “The Indianapolis Colts and Tennessee Titans would need to lose in Week 16 then tie in Week 17. It would be a three-way tie between the Colts, Titans and Browns. Cleveland would hold the tiebreaker. The Browns can also win the AFC North if the Steelers lose out, the Browns win out and the Los Angeles Chargers beat the Ravens next week.”

LOL.

sara.ziegler: I mean, that’s not the most unlikely thing to have happened in the NFL.

Salfino: Based on our prior research, it seems like Gregg Williams is 100 percent coming back? 80 percent? What number do we put on a winning interim coach with this large a sample?

I think it’s madness to hire Williams, BTW. New offensive coordinator Freddie Kitchens should get the job first.

neil: It does seem like it will be very difficult to resist the urge to bring him back on the basis of their post-Hue Jackson performance.

(Even if, as we wrote about, Williams hasn’t really had very much to do with it.)

Salfino: I think the nightmare scenario for Cleveland fans and Baker Mayfield is that Williams gets the job and Kitchens gets an offer to be the head coach of the Jets.

neil: (Aside from, like, not being Hue Jackson.)

Salfino: Damien Woody asked on Saturday if the Browns had top-15 talent. I thought it was an interesting question.

gfoster: Their defense has so much talent. Denzel Ward, their awesome rookie corner, didn’t even play against Denver. Jabrill Peppers had a star-turning performance on Saturday with the INT in the end zone and the game-winning sack.

Salfino: You and “Star Wars” and Michigan, Geoff…..

gfoster: What, is that where Peppers went?

I don’t remember.

neil: Hah.

Salfino: Ha ha ha.

neil: All I know is that Browns have now won two more games this season than the previous three combined. For this franchise, that is something special, playoffs or not.

sara.ziegler: Maybe the Browns’ chaos is behind them.

(Or maybe not.)

neil: I doubt it. But hey, if the Rebels could hold off the First Order at the resistance outpost on Crait, anything is possible.

sara.ziegler: OMG

gfoster: The Broncos, meanwhile, are gross. Vance Joseph needs to go. That was really timid coaching.

Salfino: Joseph is all the bad things about a defensive-minded head coach.

gfoster: Let’s end with our Week 15 Super Bowl predictions. I’m not changing mine from last week. Saints vs. Chargers. It helps that the Saints play tonight.

Salfino: Saints — but man am I worried about their offense even though their defense now is underrated — and … Steelers. I think they beat the Chargers in the wild-card round, and you know the Chiefs are dying to lose their first playoff game. Thursday night was a preview.

sara.ziegler: I’m starting to come around on the Bears, which is not a thing I thought I would say this season.

neil: Wow, especially as a Vikings fan.

sara.ziegler: SERIOUSLY

I hate myself right now.

So … Bears-Chiefs.

neil: I’m sticking with Saints-Chiefs. Mainly because of how entertaining that game would be. Something has to compensate for a halftime show consisting of Maroon 5 + random people found busking at subway stations.

sara.ziegler: Hahahahaha

Check out our latest NFL predictions.

from News About Sports https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/we-still-dont-know-which-nfl-teams-are-any-good/