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djs-sideblog-for-pog-trains · 9 months

Text

James and his ballroom dancing teacher

a rewrite of this post/ficlet from 2021 :] and a partner to this art piece i posted yesterday.

wordcount: 8.9k words

relationships: romantic 4x5, implied background 2x3.

characters: ALL HUMANISED James, Gordon, Thomas, Edward, Henry, Percy, Flying Scotsman, Topham Hatt (who have talking rolls, everyone else is implied to be there or potentially name-dropped)

tags/warnings: brief mention of alcohol, kissing, anxiety/spiralling thoughts. Can't think of anything else.

Kind of hurt/comfort but mostly just emotional fluff. A slowburn oneshot, if you will.

Full fic under the cut ^-^

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

The anniversary of Sir Topham Hatt taking over from his father, (also Sir Topham Hatt) is a scant few months away. James won’t lie he’s been eyeing up the calendar – he’s been sensing a good opportunity – so he’s spent the past week or two voicing his …wonderings as to whether the Fat Controller will throw some sort of event, surely he should, he’s earnt one by now.

Thomas finally looks up, and eyes James over their mediocre breakroom cups of tea.

“You just want an excuse to dress up, don’t you?” he drawls, even as he idly stirs his tea, the spoon clinking against the cup.

James sticks his nose in the air even as he flushes just a little.

“And what if I do?” he huffs. “I have a lovely dress-coat that I ordered all the way from Manchester, and I haven’t even had a chance to wear it yet! A ball would be perfect! When was the last time we ever had a ball?”

Thomas stares into his tea.

“I don’t think we’ve ever had a ball,” he says, then he frowns. “Well, maybe when the queen came. But, y’know. That was the queen.”

“I’m just saying, we should have one,” James says, waving his hands. “I mean, even besides all that, surely Sir Topham Hatt deserves one. It’s been a long haul.”

Thomas rolls his eyes, but he does nod.

“You have a point,” he says. “You could ask him. Or are you hoping the gossip will reach him first?”

James laughs. “You know me too well,” he says. “Oop, it’s 1:40, my next train’s in five minutes. See you later, puffball!”

“Bye, bootlace,” Thomas calls back as James rises from his seat and hurries away.

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

It seems James’ plan has worked. Within the week, murmurs are already spreading about a ball. Hatt even sends out a letter of interest, to which actually most everyone replies with enthusiasm.

“Sir, would you let us go to the mainland to get appropriate formalwear?” James asks, eventually, when their paths cross at Knapford. “It would be a shame if we couldn’t dress to impress – the opportunity for such things comes so rarely. It’d be a real treat.”

Topham eyes him knowingly, but laughs and tugs at the lapels of his coat as he thinks.

“I have to admit, you raise a good point, James,” he nods. “I can’t let you all go at once, but… Hm. Perhaps I will organise some sort of schedule within the coming month.”

James beams. “Oh, thank you sir!”

“Before you get too excited,” Hatt smiles wryly, “Go take your next train.”

The clock overhead in the station chimes 10am. James flinches, before he nods at Hatt and hurries away.

It’s fine. He counts this as a win.

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

After work today, James ends up walking home with Edward. Not that they do this often, but, well, they only live a couple flats down from each other anyway. And besides! James has a favour he needs to ask as unnaturally as possible.

“Ugh,” he starts. “The ball coming up, I’m so nervous.”

“Nervous?” Edward repeats. “That’s hardly like you, James.”

“But I don’t know how to dance,” James complains, shooting Edward a kind of look.

Edward shakes his head, frowning in fond confusion.

“Now that’s a lie,” he says. “I’ve seen you tap, James.”

“But that’s not ballroom dancing,” James stresses. “I don’t know how to- say, to waltz. I can’t show up to a real, fancy ball not knowing how to waltz.”

And Edward lets out a little snort now that he’s catching on, his smile slowly growing and his eyebrow slowly raising.

“Not like you,” James finally lays down his honey trap. “I remember seeing you dance, once, Edward, you were wonderful.”

“And you want me to teach you.”

James clasps his hands, grinning. “Yes!” he exclaims.

“No,” says Edward.

“Ah! Why not?!”

Edward laughs, and keeps walking even as James stops, putting his hands on his hips dramatically as he pouts at the back of Edward’s head.

“I need you!” James calls. “Edward, it’s my time of need!”

“Uh huh,” Edward says, not looking back and not stopping.

Eventually, James is forced to rush to catch up, and he quickly manages to fall back in step with Edward.

“But I need a teacher,” he pleads again. “Edward, I don’t want to make a fool of myself!"

"You could have fooled me,” Edward laughs, before he rolls his eyes and shakes his head. “Look, if you really want a good teacher, why don’t you ask Gordon? He taught me everything I know.”

James stops dead again – but this time, he has a much more different, far more flustered expression on his face. Edward stops this time, too, a few paces ahead of James, and looks back at him with a knowing smile.

“Do ask nicely though, hm?” he tacks on. “You wouldn’t want Gordon to turn you down, would you?”

James’ flush only deepens.

“Sod off,” he finally says.

“Mm, this is my house,” Edward replies, smiling, and James realises he has in fact walked Edward all the way home – past his own place, too. “I think it’s you who may have to sod off.”

James flushes redder.

Edward laughs at him, in that fond knowing way of his that’s almost more infuriating than anything else, and waves goodbye as he heads up the path to his flat.

James balls his fists, before he lets out a hissing breath between his teeth, and walks himself home while he definitely, totally, does not stew over ask Gordon.

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

On Tuesdays, he has a small overlap with Gordon at Knapford at 10am.

So James is already loitering on the station platform as Gordon hops down from his engine, and Gordon spots him leaning on one of the pillars, attempting to look as casual as possible.

“Oh!” he says. “Hello there, little James.”

James hopefully manages to control his expression. He hasn’t decided if he is annoyed by the ‘little’ or if it’s grown on him, because Gordon has managed to make it sound …endearing, nowadays. Though James is, uh, may be imagining that bit. Probably.

“Hi,” he replies.

“…Were you waiting for me?” Gordon asks, and he draws in closer, pausing a good metre away and putting one hand in his pocket, resting his weight over one hip, and it’s not fair, because he looks so good and he cuts such an imposing figure in his work uniform that James has to focus to get through his sentence.

“Yes, actually,” James says, straightening up from where he was leaning against the station pillar. “A little bluebird told me you can dance.”

To James’ surprise, Gordon actually… stiffens a little. James watches his expression close up just a fraction, almost imperceptibly so if James didn’t happen to know the minutia of Gordon’s facial expressions well by this point.

“…What of it?” Gordon asks, folding his arms. He sounds somewhat… miffed.

James clasps his hands behind his back and smiles as brightly as he can.

“Teach me.”

“No.”

James pouts. “Please?”

“No.” Gordon repeats, more out of instinct, before he sighs, and looks down dolefully at James. “…Are you going to drop this, at all?”

“No,” James says sweetly. “Teach me?”

Really, James hopes Gordon will say yes without too much hounding. H-he does like the idea of learning off of Gordon. Whether Gordon denies it to not, he does carry himself in his day-to-day life with the grace of poise of a dancer. Now Edward’s mentioned it, James isn’t sure how he hasn’t noticed sooner.

A-and, well, really, he trusts Gordon. Gordon will make fun of him to his face, but he probably wouldn’t tattle on James’ potential two left feet to everyone else. And James doesn’t really want to… broadcast that he’s having to learn these things. Or something. He doesn’t know, it’s probably all a bit silly anyway.

Gordon tips his head back for a moment, and sighs heavily.

“Okay,” he says.

“Now, I know that you don’t-!” James cuts himself off. “Oh. Um. Thank you.”

“We’ll talk about this later,” Gordon says. “Catch up with me after work, if you’re serious.”

“I’m dead serious!” James clasps his hands. “I am.”

“Well then,” Gordon says, as he nods at James before walking past him, to go get some morning tea or something, probably. “That’s that, then.”

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

Gordon catches him after work, his expression somewhat intense as he grabs James’ arm and his attention. James pauses, looking up at him.

“Oh,” he says, “yes?”

“Tonight,” Gordon says, voice low, not far off murmuring into James’ ear. “Are you willing to start tonight?”

James lights up. “Yes!” he says, though he does his best to mirror Gordon’s hushed tone. “Where? When?”

Gordon snorts, amused, and pats his left trouser pocket knowingly.

“Hatt gave me a key to the ballroom they’ll be using,” he says conspiratorially. “We will practice there.”

James smiles, bouncing on the balls of his feet in excitement.

“…And, I was thinking after dark,” Gordon says softly. “…Just to, shall we say, preserve our dignity.”

James flushes a little, despite himself.

“What,” he says, “you think I’m going to be that bad?”

Gordon laughs, and lets James’ arm go. He also doesn’t answer the question.

“How’s 11?” he asks instead.

“…pm?”

“Yes.”

“…Gordon.”

“…10?”

James closes his eyes for a moment. Well, if Gordon is really that embarrassed to be found with him, then fine.

“We can do 11,” he says tiredly. “You’re the one with the earlier trains, anyway.”

Gordon snorts, and nods. He gives James the address.

“Do you have dancing shoes?” he asks, as James begins to walk away.

“I got some recently,” James says, waving his hand. “I only had tap shoes before, and I didn’t think that’d quite work out.”

Gordon laughs again, before he nods at James, seemingly satisfied.

“See you later,” he says, finally raising his voice back to his normal speaking register, before he turns on his heel and strides away.

James takes a moment to massage his temple. That was weird. That was weird, right? He’s not going nuts?

“…That was weird,” comments Thomas from across the room. “What on earth were you talking about?”

“Ah!” James practically jumps out of his skin, and jolts around, glaring at his coworker. “How long have you been there?!”

“Not that long,” Thomas says, as he pulls on his coat. “But long enough to see that was kind of weird. What did he want?”

“He’s doing a favour for me,” James says, before he shakes his head and starts to walk. Thomas falls into pace beside him, head tilting in curiosity, waiting for an explanation. “…Privately.”

“Ooh,” Thomas teases. “You finally told him?”

“What?!” James goes red despite himself, and gives Thomas a shove. “You’re delusional. There’s nothing to tell. Shut up.”

“Uh huh.”

“Shut up!”

James speeds up, hoping it’ll make Thomas leave him alone. It notably does not. In fact, Thomas tails him the entire way back to his flat, asking leading questions the whole while, and James has to slam the bloody door closed in the prat’s face until Thomas finally leaves him alone. And James can hear Thomas’ laughter through the door as he walks away.

James takes the moment to let his back thump against the door and to cover his face, screaming into his hands a little bit, just for fun. This is… James needs a lie down, or something.

He also needs to find his dancing shoes before tonight.

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

James trudges up to the hall, his bag with his shoes in it thrown over his shoulder, his coat thrown over top plain, casual clothes he doesn’t usually let people see him wear – he likes to be well presented at all times, but tonight he also needs to be comfortable enough to dance.

He’s so nervous. What if he can’t get it? What if Gordon gives up on him? What if this ruins their friendship? The building is dark, did James get the right time? The right place? He feels ill. Why couldn’t Edward have just said yes? If it turns out Gordon has stood him up, James is blaming Edward.

James tries the door handle. It’s …unlocked. He lets out a sigh of relief and slips inside.

…Wow. This room is huge. And that may be a stupid thing to say, considering it’s a ballroom, but James pauses, wide-eyed, by the door as he takes in the space. He didn’t even know the NWR had one of these.

And down the other end, Gordon is already there and waiting, though he’s lit a few candles, filling his end of the hall with a thin, watery yellow light, and he’s setting up… a tape deck?

“You still use cassettes?” James calls, and Gordon looks up at him. James hitches his bag up over his shoulder again as he crosses the room. “Way to join the modern world, Gordon.”

“What, would you have rather I brought a record player?” Gordon replies, as he inserts a cassette. “Besides, these are the tapes I learnt off. Figured it was a good place to start.”

James has to sit on the floor to swap his shoes over. Looking up at Gordon, who is still poking at the tape deck, James… drinks him in, a little. Gordon’s down to just his white button-up shirt, and he’s undone his tie and top two buttons, not to mention he’s rolled up his sleeves. James does his best not to stare at Gordon’s forearms. Gordon lets the tape start playing, and a waltz James doesn’t know the name of fills the air.

“Are you ready?”

James jumps, and shakes his head to clear it, and finishes lacing up his shoes. He rises to his feet, shedding his coat, and he puts his things to the side as Gordon watches him.

“…I don’t think I’ve never seen you in a just a t-shirt before,” Gordon comments, as James hurries back to stand in front of him.

And James looks down at himself, flushes, and wonders briefly if he should put his coat back on. It’s a long-sleeve t-shirt (red, of course), because he’s not about to let Gordon inspect his scars. It does have a lower neckline, showing the hints of some, though, and it leaves the scars on the back of his hands visible.

Gordon… doesn’t comment on any of that, though his eyes graze over them briefly.

“Feel honoured,” James jokes instead, shivering despite himself. “I don’t usually dress down.”

To his relief, Gordon laughs, and holds out his right hand to James.

“Then I do feel honoured indeed,” he says. “Now, lets begin before it gets any later, hm?”

James puts his left hand in Gordon’s, before he tries to play it cool as Gordon puts his other hand on James’ back. …Um, huh. His hands are big. And warm. James focusses on looking Gordon in the eye instead of reacting to the feeling of Gordon’s hands on him.

“Put your hand on my shoulder,” says Gordon. “And don’t lean your arm on mine. You should be poised.”

James blinks, but nods, words escaping him, and he strikes the pose he thinks he’s supposed to – he can copy what he’s seen on Strictly Come Dancing at least this much.

“Good,” Gordon says. “Now, we’ll start with the waltz.”

James… James actually gets his head around it far quicker than he expected, which he is thoroughly relieved by. He does have his eyes glued to their feet, and he sometimes steps backwards when he shouldn’t, but, successfully, he hasn’t stood on Gordon’s toes yet.

Gordon spends the night teaching James a basic going-in-a-little-circle thing.

“I do expect you to memorise all the steps,” Gordon does say eventually. “But it will be less important for you, seeing as you’ll be following a lead anyway. As long as you can be reactive, read what is coming next, and follow it, then you should be fine.”

James’ arms feel heavy, his feet feel sore. It’s been a good long while since he’s had a dancing lesson of any sort. The muscles in his legs are reminding him of that fact so courteously.

…Gordon smiles at him anyway, though.

“Well done,” he says, and James blinks in surprise at the compliment. “It’s not often anyone picks it up that fast.”

“Was I quicker than Edward?” James asks, half-teasing as he steps back, taking his hands off Gordon and stretching a little.

Gordon laughs, his head tipping back, and it rings around the empty room. James finds himself smiling in response to the sound, he’s always liked Gordon’s laugh.

“Yes, James,” Gordon says. “You were indeed. Now, it’s… late. We should finish.”

James swaps his shoes back over and pulls on his coat, and Gordon blows out the candles and turns off the tape deck, though he leaves it where it is. And he swaps his shoes out, too, and turns to an already waiting James.

“I’ll walk you home?” James offers.

“…If you insist,” Gordon says, and he gives James a little smile that almost looks a little fond, if James dares to believe as such.

They walk quietly, not wanting to wake anyone, and James pauses as Gordon stops by James’ front gate.

“You don’t need to double back,” Gordon says. “I can manage the rest on my own, I think.”

“Oh,” James says. “…Of course. Thank you, by the way. I didn’t expect you to go quite this late.”

“You were doing well,” Gordon shrugs. “I didn’t want to…” he gestures vaguely with one hand, “…interrupt the flow of progress.”

James shifts on his feet. “When will we do this again?” he asks.

“Tomorrow?” Gordon offers, before he blinks at himself even as James looks up at him. “I-if you like.”

“Okay,” James agrees before he considers whether he should. “That’d be splendid.”

“Done.” Gordon says, before his lips quirk into a wry, lopsided smile, and he tacks on, “Sleep well, James.”

James nods, and hurries down the path to his front door without another word. It’s once he’s unlocking the door that he realises Gordon’s waiting for him to go inside before he leaves. So James waves goodbye, closes the door behind him, and watches through the peephole for a moment to see Gordon walk away.

His heart is racing. James hangs up his coat by the door, presses the flats of his palms to his cheeks to check whether they’re as hot as they feel before he stumbles his way to bed.

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

Time passes. At first, it was rough, returning to the habit of dancing every day, but a month has passed, and there’s only one month more until the ball, and James and Gordon have been meeting to practice by candlelight every night. James is even used to the adjustment of sleeping schedule now.

Is it silly that James really likes the candlelight aspect? It’s… romantic, if he may be so bold. Though on the other hand, it feels almost mean to take up so much of Gordon’s time like this. Yes, James asked, and asked again when Gordon said no, but Gordon is giving him far much more time than James had ever considered he’d be willing to give.

Which is very nice of him. But… James just didn’t expect it, he supposes.

Over those four weeks, Gordon has gone from bossing him through the steps and correcting his form, to… quietly complimenting him when James pulls off a nice piece of footwork. And there’s been more and more compliments than before, even though Gordon has gotten quieter. That’s the only way James can put it. Gordon’s been talking less and watching more – he must actually be quite quiet if you just leave Gordon be. And… Gordon has just been looking. At James. Sometimes, he seems distracted doing so.

And James can’t help but admit he’s guilty in return. James didn’t realise how dark Gordon’s eyes are, how warm and rich a brown they are – not until they’re looking down at him, glinting in the candle light.

It’s as James waves Gordon goodbye one night more, Gordon standing with his hands in his pockets under the streetlight, and Gordon smiles and nods and waits for James to close the door, that it all hits him.

James closes the door so Gordon can’t see his face as he flushes dark, and he puts his hands flat on the door and leans there, bracing himself as he flushes hot and flushes cold, and-

Cinders. Cinders and ashes. James has a crush on Gordon.

Like, okay, fine. Fine! James has ‘had a crush on Gordon’ for a while. He thinks the guy is big and proud and strong and pretty and handsome and all those good things, but James had actually always considered that fairly superficial. Maybe even bordering on jealousy, if he really wanted to try analysing himself. And that was the biggest reason why he never wanted to tell anyone, and why the idea of telling Gordon felt so mortifying. Because… what if it wasn’t real?

But now? This time? This is… this is a real, actual crush. James turns so he can put his back to the door, flopping there as he feels a little lightheaded, standing in the dark of the entrance hall of his home. He hardly knows what to do with himself like this.

A-at the very least, they’re good dance partners. It feels pretty natural, actually. James is surprised how natural it feels. They dance best when they aren’t bickering – and… Gordon and him haven’t bickered for a while.

James shivers, and marches himself into the kitchen to go drink a glass of water and then throw a glass of water in his face. He’s being melodramatic. Despite that, he almost feels like he’s coming down with something, now the realisation’s hit him.

It’s moments like this where James is glad he lives alone. No one to see him like this, no one to make fun of him. No one to ask weaselly little questions that make him feel more confused.

He shakes his head, grips the sink as he takes a big breath in and a big breath out, before he whisks himself off to bed. Maybe he’ll sleep it off.

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

Nope. Three weeks until the ball and James has to acknowledge that he is, in fact, in love with Gordon. He has to grapple with this night after night as Gordon’s hands are on him and he gets to rest his hands on Gordon, and he can spend the whole time studying Gordon’s face instead of having to look at his feet, because Gordon has gotten him good enough that James doesn’t need to watch his feet anymore. And Gordon’s even taught him multiple dances at this point, though James is still learning the tango. The foxtrot and the quickstep were easy enough. And sillily enough, he didn’t consider Gordon to be a man who knew how to tango.

The candlelight catches Gordon’s eye again, as they turn a corner, and it makes James’ breath hitch a little, before he swallows the rising guilt in his throat, and opens his mouth.

“If, uh,” he starts slowly, following Gordon’s lead as they do the fancier turn Gordon taught him, “if you ever want to learn how to tap, for any reason, I can teach you too, if you want.”

Gordon tilts his head. “Well,” he says, lips quirking into a little smile as he leads James through a promenade and spinning him at the end for good measure, “I don’t know when I’d need that, but I’ll keep you in mind.”

“Or even something like-!”

James can’t help the rising agitation in his voice, and to his- his- his horror? Gordon comes to a complete halt, making James stop with him, and he raises an eyebrow at James even as his hands feel so heavy where they rest in James’ own and on James’ hip. It kills the words trying to form in James’ throat.

“What’s all this about, James?”

Cinders, Gordon asks it so plainly.

“I feel guilty,” James blurts – before he can think about whether he even should. “For taking up so much of your time.”

Gordon pauses, pursing his lips, and he looks quietly amused for a moment, before he shrugs. “You’re not taking anything I’m not willing to give,” he says, and he gives James an enigmatic smile, and James wishes the man would stop talking in circles. “I don’t mind spending my time like this.”

I don’t mind you, is what Gordon’s eyes seem to say. James hopes his cheeks don’t look as hot as they feel. He’s almost shaking.

“But!” Gordon finally lifts his hands away. “If you really feel that way, then I’ll take a batch of your scones after this is all over.”

And James laughs at that, slightly too loudly, a burst of the frantic energy that was building inside him, and he smiles and nods and steps backwards so the gloom will hide his expression which most certainly must be moonstruck. “Done,” he agrees.

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

The time has been flying by. It’s now the week of the ball, and James should be excited. They’re still practicing by candlelight in the ballroom in the evenings, but the ballroom is slowly getting populated with things like tables and lights and decorations as the days pass, signalling the ball’s arrival.

James feels anxious! He’s not even sure why. It’s clearly not over his ability to dance. They can now run several dances start to end, and at multiple speeds, with ease. He’s even figured out that tango.

It dawns on him gently as he and Gordon are doing their latest lap, breezing down the entire length of the ballroom, that James doesn’t want this to end. He wants his candlelit nights with Gordon, stolen away from the chaos that daytime and the railway and their workmates present.

He likes this. He likes Gordon.

So when Gordon is asked to give his key back three days before the event, James can’t help but look distressed at the news. And Gordon laughs, he claps James on the back and tells him not to worry because he’s going to be fine.

Gordon doesn’t… get it, then. James takes a breath in, a breath out, and offers Gordon a smile and a little thank you. That’s fine. Gordon doesn’t… have to get it.

It has left him sitting in the breakroom, staring into his tea as he muses over it all, though. And while he doesn’t hear the approaching footsteps, he does hear the clink of a mug set down, and the thump of someone taking the seat across from him, and Thomas asking, “What’s got you so glum?”

James jumps, not realising he must have been wearing his heart on his sleeve, and offers Thomas a smile even as he goes to drink his tea to try hide his misery.

It makes Thomas eye him warily.

“Gordon’s not broken your heart, has he?” he asks.

James chokes on his drink, and splutters, “I beg your pardon?!”

Thomas laughs at him, leaning back in his seat, and James glances around the room to doublecheck that they are thankfully alone right now.

“Edward mentioned to me that you’d been having lessons,” Thomas winks, gesturing a cheers with his tea.

“That wanker.”

“I haven’t told anyone,” Thomas quickly follows up, eyeing James over his mug, before he smiles that cheeky smile of his. “Mostly because I know you’ll have my head.”

“Damn right,” James says, and he takes a pointed drink of his tea, not even wanting to know how red he’s gone right now.

“Easy,” Thomas raises a hand in defeat. “I guess I’m just checking in. You’re looking pretty put out.”

James sighs. His shoulders sag. He cups his hands around his tea and stares into it.

“I’m just in a little over my head, I think,” he mumbles.

“More like head over heels.”

“I’ll throw this at you. Don’t think I wont.”

That makes Thomas laugh, even as James tries to glare at him, before Thomas’ expression softens.

“James,” he says, in a quiet voice that makes James’ stomach drop. “In all seriousness. I’ve known Gordon for longer than you have, and… if he didn’t want to have you around, he simply wouldn’t.”

James gives up on trying not to flush.

Thomas opens his mouth again, before he clearly decides against saying more, and he gets to his feet, shaking his head before he drains the last of his tea from his mug.

“Think about telling him, maybe,” he suggests, before he pats James on the shoulder and leaves the room, leaving James to stew in his thoughts, and try to gather himself before his afternoon train.

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

The night of the ball itself is absolutely brimming with excitement. Everyone is dressed to the nines, in their fancy clothes from the mainland that Sir Topham Hatt let them all go get, and the energy is infectious. The crowd is full of people he knows and people he doesn’t, it seems all of Sodor’s invited, and about half of England too.

James himself is wearing his lovely red dress-coat, all wine-red and gold braid, his crispest white gloves, a cravat and a lovely pair of red boots he had to go buy from the mainland too, which are just perfect for dancing in after he’s spent the week breaking them in. And he’s grinning like a lunatic as he drinks in the room around him – the ballroom he’s only ever seen in half-light has absolutely exploded with life and colour and noise.

From behind him, someone clears their throat. James spins on his heel to see Gordon standing there, and oh! He’s looking absolutely resplendent in midnight blue tails of his own, adorned with silver braids, and a single red flower (a rose or a carnation, James can’t tell) in his lapel.

James grins as he sees it, feeling a little less self-conscious about the rich blue pocket square he added to his own outfit too.

He opens his mouth to speak, but Gordon beats him to it.

“You look just splendid,” Gordon says, awed.

James preens at that, he can’t help it. He then smooths down his coat and pointedly looks Gordon up and down in return, letting his admiration shine on his face. “I could say the same for you,” he says.

“Have you heard about all the invitations?” Gordon says, stepping in a little closer as someone slips behind him. “Hatt sent some out to celebrities who’ve been involved with the railway.”

“Oh, yes, I heard,” James nods. “I’ve even seen City of Truro here tonight! Fancy him coming along, Duck will be pleased.”

“Yes, yes,” Gordon says, glancing around. “But…”

James’s face falls in realisation. “Ah.”

“Yes. Not only did Hatt invite my brother, but he damn well accepted,” Gordon half-laughs, tugging at his lapels, straightening them, “and Hatt only told me this morning! And I know how Scott likes to present himself, so… I couldn’t be shown up.”

“Of course,” James agrees politely, but he purses his lips, reading the anxiety weighing down Gordon’s board shoulders with ease. “…Do you want to avoid him?”

“No,” Gordon says, almost too quickly, and he steps back to accept a couple flutes of champagne from a passing waiter and hands one to James, and James sips it politely before his eyes go wide, Hatt really didn’t spare any expense on getting the good stuff, huh? “I just… hope it will be less frigid tonight than the last time we spoke.”

James looks up at Gordon sympathetically, who muses on his statement for a moment longer, before he shakes his head like he’s shaking off water, and Gordon turns to him, smiling.

“But enough of that!” he exclaims, and offers James his arm. “I do believe we’re under distinct instructions to enjoy ourselves.”

James laughs, and takes it, stepping in closer as a couple tries to slip by them to get to the dance floor.

“Shall we go attack the hors d’oeuvres before Henry does?” he offers.

Gordon laughs, and pats James’ wrist with surprising tenderness, it almost makes James gasp.

“That’s a splendid idea,” he grins back, the ice finally melting from his face.

James’ heart totally doesn’t not skip a beat over the way Gordon says splendid.

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

It’s all fine. The evening goes fine! It’s now about 9pm, and the room is now lit with electric lights, candles, and strings of fairy lights. It really does make the mood more magical. James splits off now, to go natter with his friends. He gets heckled by Thomas and Percy, but they’re all laughing, and James has to compliment their formal gear too.

“It’s nice to finally get a flattering tailor, I’ll tell you that much,” Percy says, smoothing down his coat. “I don’t think I’ve ever owned a waistcoat before.”

“And I can’t remember the last time I actually wore a tie,” Thomas jokes, making a show of tugging his collar. “But really, James, I see why you wanted to dress up so badly. You look great.”

James plays up preening, and does a little spin for them. “Thank you,” he says. “Call me vain, but honestly, I do find it splendid to see everyone dressed up like this.”

“It’s true,” Thomas nods. “I’ve seen more pretty gowns tonight than I think I have in my whole life. Have you seen what Emily’s wearing? Showstopper.”

“So many sequins,” Percy nods.

James moves closer to their side so he can take in the whole room, and as his eyes graze over the dance floor, he realises Edward and Henry are out there.

And then he barks with laughter.

“What’s up?” Thomas asks.

“I see why Edward refused to teach me!” James laughs, and points them out. “Look.”

Henry is leading, god bless him, and he’s very, very carefully watching their feet. He’s not unconfident, certainly, but he’s not necessarily confident either, and glancing up at Edward’s face, who’s smiling encouraging at him, and not even wincing when Henry steps on his toes.

“That’s cute,” Percy says. “Good for them.”

And… watching them go? Maybe it’s the live music. Maybe it’s the candlelight. Maybe it’s the champagne. But James is suddenly possessed with the need to go find Gordon and drag him out onto the dance floor right now.

“Excuse me,” he says, and Thomas smiles at him knowingly, and James flips him off for fun even as he begins to weave his way through the crowd.

James finds himself outside, stepping through the grand French doors that have been thrown open to welcome the warm summer night. The spill-out area is filled with classy outdoor furniture, there’s fairy lights everywhere, the gardens have been completely redone and all the hedges are beautifully trimmed, and there, standing off to the side, is Gordon and his brother.

Gordon’s laughing along to whatever Scot is saying, but the way he has his arms folded across his chest, the set of his shoulders, the way his body is angled away from the conversation, it’s clear to anyone who knows him well that he’s a little too uncomfortable right now.

So James makes a beeline for him, and pops up by Gordon’s elbow.

“Hullo, Gordon!” he chirps warmly, and smiles as the tension just rolls of Gordon now someone else is here. “And, hello,” he says, polite yet slightly stiff to Scot, who nods at him and offers him the big smile of someone who is very used to meeting new people.

“Hello!” he says, and offers James a hand to shake, which James does take (and tries not to wince at the strength of his grip). “Who might you be?”

“James,” James offers. “I’m a good friend of Gordon’s.”

“Aha!” Scot’s face lights up far more genuinely this time. “Gordie was just telling me about you.”

James tastefully manages not to laugh at Gordie, more so because he’s jumping straight into oh broken buffers, what did Gordon say about him?

“My prized student,” Gordon jokes, lightly elbowing him, and James grins back.

“Speaking of,” he says. “I reckon we go show Henry and Edward up. They’re not too bad, but Henry can’t keep his eyes off their feet.”

Gordon and Scot both laugh at that, and Scot graciously lets them go.

“Thank you,” Gordon leans down to whisper in James’ ear as they walk away. “It always feels like an interrogation with him.”

“It’s alright,” James shrugs. “I… had a gut feeling. Anyway. You want to dance?”

Gordon seems to be keeping himself from glancing over his shoulder.

James frowns softly at him. “We don’t have to,” he adds.

“Oh, nonsense,” Gordon says, and the hand Gordon has on James’ shoulder squeezes gently. “I’d love to. Let’s let this song finish first.”

They have to muscle their way through the crowd, ending up slipping past Hatt himself, who pats Gordon on the back and offers James a smile and nod as they go past. Before long, they end up out on the dance floor as the next song ends.

“Any ideas?”

“My guess is waltz,” Gordon says, adjusting his cufflinks before he offers his hands to James. “They’ve played a couple fast numbers back-to-back.”

“You’ve found our warmup, then. How thoughtful,” James laughs, stepping into Gordon’s arms. It’s so easy to lay his hand on Gordon’s shoulder now, to feel Gordon’s fingers curl around his hand. James isn’t sure how he ever could have dreaded it.

He laughs again as Gordon turns out to be right.

The music starts, and it’s just so natural to follow Gordon’s lead. And they’re off! Off around the dance floor, and Gordon successfully steers them through the crowd, pulling James out of the way of a close call of a collision with a quick pivot and a spin.

As they draw back together, Gordon eyes him, and James blinks back.

“You alright?” he asks. “You look flustered.”

“Flustered!” James exclaims, trying to play it off. “Me? Never.”

And Gordon actually… laughs at that, laughs at him, and James is struck with the realisation that perhaps… Gordon knows.

Well, it takes two to tango, doesn’t it?

“Well,” James changes tune, and he smirks up and Gordon. “In truth, I was just so taken by how handsome you look tonight.”

Now it’s Gordon’s turn to stammer, to falter, and for the colour to leap to his face. James hasn’t ever been brave enough to flirt before, but clearly, it works, and if Gordon’s going play that game then James can match him.

“Obviously,” Gordon manages to catch himself. “You must’ve liked the blue.”

He nods towards James’ pocket square, and James shakes his head with a bashful little smile.

“And I can see you went to match!” he nods back at Gordon’s flower.

Gordon goes to speak, before his eyes widen, and he quickly pulls James in close as another, far less-coordinated couple barrels past them, before letting James migrate back to the normal dancing distance.

“You do mean it? You think I’m handsome?”

“Of course I do,” James’ grin drops into something far softer despite his best efforts, and he says his next statement with far more heart than he means to. “I think you’re splendid.”

Gordon meets his eyes with a look that James literally cannot describe with any other word except tender.

“We need to talk, don’t we?” he asks, so softly, it’s amazing James can hear it over the music and the chatter.

“I’m listening now,” he replies.

Gordon swallows hard, before they’re brought to a halt as the song ends, and they – along with the rest of the dancers – politely clap for the musicians, before the next song starts. A quickstep. James’ face lights up instantly, and Gordon grins.

“Time to do some laps?”

“Oh, absolutely.”

They are the fastest and most fluid pair on the dancefloor. James’ dress-coat flairs out behind them in a most stunning way as they go all but flying past, a whirl of red and blue, and James can tell people are watching, and he’s relishing in it, grinning so brightly as Gordon smiles back.

They’re left panting and laughing and stumbling off the floor as the song ends – as not only the crowd but the band applaud them too. Gordon waves it off with a laugh. James takes a playful little bow, before they both stagger off to go find somewhere to sit and catch their breath.

Edward appears out of the crowd, Henry in tow, as James and Gordon find some seats, and James passes Gordon a drink.

“That,” Edward says, “was the most impressive thing I’ve seen in a long time.”

James chortles and slumps back, slumps back against Gordon without thinking, feeling Gordon tense under him for just a moment before he… yields, and melts a little back.

“You were doing well, too,” Gordon nods at Henry. “James wasn’t learning to dance from square one.”

“Just let a man be jealous in peace,” Henry grumbles jokingly, plopping himself down next to James with an oomph. “I don’t know how you manage being on your feet for that long, sometimes. I even got new comfortable shoes and my back is still killing me.”

As James pats his arm in consolation, Edward turns to Gordon with a glint in his eye.

“Dance?” he asks, holding out a hand. “For old time’s sake?”

Gordon fights down his smile, but gets up with no hesitation. Though he pauses a moment later, and glances back at James. “I’ll be right back,” he says.

“Sure thing,” James waves them off with a smile. “Show them all up.”

That makes Edward laugh, and the two of them disappear back into the throng to go dance.

James leans his head back against the wall, letting out a big, contented sigh.

“You alright?” Henry asks, as he shifts on his seat.

“Yeah, I am,” James says happily. “Or, I think so.”

Then he eyes Henry, and frowns, before he reaches over to the seats beside them and starts stealing all their cushions.

“Here, you look miserable,” he says, and helps pad Henry’s seat a little more.

“Thanks,” Henry says breathlessly. “I thought I was going to be alright, I really did.”

“No, no,” James nods along, “I understand. Especially when you’re not used to dancing.”

“How long have you and Gordon been practicing?” Henry asks.

“…Two?” James tries to count back on his fingers. “Yeah, two months.”

“Oh, thank god you said months!” Henry slaps his thigh with a laugh. “If you had said weeks, I really would have to start feeling bad!”

James laughs at him, and he opens his mouth to say something, before he realises someone is standing over them, and the two of them look up, and James tries really hard not to let his jaw drop as he realises it’s none other than superstar Scot Gresley, the Flying Scotsman himself.

“Hello Henry, James,” Scot says warmly, and Henry greets him back. James almost asks how they know each other, but glancing between them, it’s the cut of their noses that reminds James of all the drama a few years back. Henry’s got a little Gresley in him, too, that’s right, he always forgets that they’ve met before.

“James, that was some wonderful work out on the floor,” Scot turns to him, and James tries not to flush and gape, and he plays it off as politely as he can. “Would you dance with me?”

James… stares. Blinks once or twice. Henry’s gone a little stiff with surprise beside him, too. Scot extends his hand, still offering a warm smile, and after a second or two, James hesitantly takes it, rising from his seat. Scot’s fingers curl around his hand, but it doesn’t feel as gentle or soothing as Gordon. And as Scot starts to lead James out onto the dance floor, James shoots a look back over his shoulder at Henry, who mouths ‘good luck’ to him as they go.

Before he knows it, James is out on the floor, being lead through steps he knows so well by the Gresley brother he doesn’t know at all. And somehow, Scott is even faster and even lighter on his feet, and James can’t even make small talk for how much he has to concentrate on keeping up – which, notably, does not help his nerves. And Scot keeps this up for the whole quickstep, before they pause as the song changes, James fighting to hide that he needs to catch his breath.

As a slow waltz starts, Scot… relaxes, slows down, and shoots James a wink.

“Just wanted to test how good a teacher my brother is,” he banters. “You’ve both done very well.”

James blinks and swallows hard, before he offers a polite smile of his own.

“Thank you,” he says. “Gordon is a good teacher.”

“…You seem to make him happy.”

James stumbles, now, sheer shock, and his head snaps up to look Scot in the eye. Scot looks back evenly at him, lets James stare. …Scot has Gordon’s brown eyes, but the strength of his sideburns, his eyebrows, the slightly harder set of his face, even his sharper jawline. It’s just… not quite his Gresley.

“I hope you treat him kindly,” Scot continues, his voice dropping, but James flushes and is so glad he’s wearing gloves because he’s gone all clammy. “Gordon deserves something good to happen to him, and you do seem to be a delight.”

“I…” James is – as uncommon as the phenomenon is – lost for words. His old anxiety sweeps through him, makes his knees weak, and he hopes he isn’t shaking.

“I’m not asking you this as a celebrity,” Scot suddenly adds, his expression crumpling with concern as he must read all that straight off James’ face. “I’m asking you this as his brother.”

“I-I… of course,” James says, biting his tongue about telling Scot about how much Gordon didn’t want to talk to him tonight, because if Scot is so concerned about Gordon, then they’d have a better relationship, wouldn’t they? Cinders. And ashes. He wants out. James looks away, and ends up seeing Gordon and Edward, who are surprisingly close by, and they’re both shooting him concerned looks.

James bites his lip now, hoping he doesn’t look as upset as he feels, though he’s never really been good at hiding it. Don’t hurt Gordon? James hasn’t dreamt of it, not now, not anymore. He’s realised Gordon doesn’t really ever talk about his past before Sodor, and that’s telling in itself, isn’t it?

It must be the fact James is being asked this by someone who has probably hurt Gordon in the past is the thing that makes it sting like this. …What? Can Scot see that James is no better? Is that what Scot means by warning him?

Scot says nothing more either. James closes his eyes for a moment, willing the song to end, but suddenly, someone taps his shoulder, and he knows that hand, which is such a strange thing to say, isn’t it? His eyes fly open, because thank god, it’s Gordon and Edward. They must have danced their way through the crowd.

“You remember my friend, Edward, don’t you?” Gordon calls over the hubbub. “He’d love to catch up with you.”

“Of course,” Scot smiles broadly, …the practiced smile, James notes. He turns back to James, then, and squeezes his hand gently.

“A pleasure to meet you,” he says, and it does actually sound earnest, which is nice. It doesn’t soothe James’ nerves, though. “I hope you’ll keep our talk in mind.”

“I will,” is all James says, and he lets Edward take his place with a grateful, if not a little faint, smile.

Gordon practically dances their way off the dancefloor now, and James is more than eager to follow where Gordon leads. They end up pushing and weaving past several of their friends and workmates as they go, and James must still look a little stricken because he gets a few concerned glances as they go.

Gordon ends up leading him outside, and James immediately takes a few big breaths in and out as soon as the cooling evening breeze hits his face. It’s too stuffy, too loud, too much in there.

And as soon as it’s quiet, as they’re in private, as James can breathe, Gordon takes him by the shoulders and turns James so Gordon can look at him.

“What did he say to you?” he asks, and his voice is… surprisingly dark.

“He warned me,” James says, and he does his best not to sound bitter, but he thinks he fails. “He said I better not hurt you because you deserve nice things. A-and he’s right, but it rubbed me the wrong way.”

Gordon scoffs. “Bloody rich, coming from him,” he agrees, before his hands slip down from James’ shoulders, skating down his arms to take James’ shaking hands in his own. “Are you okay?”

“Just needlessly upset,” James manages to smile, though his eyes are a little too bright to sell it. “I come here expecting a good time and I get both a personal dance and a personal threat from the Flying Scotsman. Not your average evening, I’ll admit.”

Gordon squeezes his hands. “I’m sorry.”

“Not your fault, Gordon,” James says, gently squeezing back. “I suppose I was insulted that… that he’d insinuate I’d hurt you on purpose. I care about you far too much for that.”

And-

They both flush at that. That’s the first time either of them has said it plainly.

“That’s… heartening to hear,” Gordon smiles softly at him. “And it only took me turning you into the best ballroom dancer on this island.”

And James laughs. The tension finally draining away, his stomach finally settling. He’s glad Gordon’s holding onto him now, because he feels light, and he wouldn’t want to float away.

“I have to admit it too, then,” Gordon’s practically whispering again, his voice rumbling low, and it makes James shiver. “I’ve… grown quite fond of you, too.”

James steps in a little closer, it just feels right.

“That’s good,” he says.

Then, looking Gordon in the eye then and there, the nerves come crashing back in, and James ducks his head, drops his chin, and starts fiddling with Gordon’s cufflinks instead.

Suddenly, there’s a hand cupping his cheek, and James can’t breathe. Gordon tips his head back up, and smiles at him – all soft and tender, all for James.

“Is this okay?”

“Bah!” James tries to laugh past his dark flush, turning his head away, withdrawing one hand to touch his cheek, he can feel the heat there even through his gloves. “You say that like I haven’t been in love with you for months!”

“Months…?”

James laughs again, bright and embarrassed, before he dares to look back at Gordon. His flush darkens at the painfully fond expression Gordon’s wearing, and James finds himself grinning.

“Just shut up and kiss me,” he says instead.

Gordon – several things cross his face in that moment. A flush of his own. Wonder, awe, tenderness, a little shock, and most importantly – Gordon rolls his eyes fondly and leans down to oblige him.

As their lips slot together, James makes a little noise of contentment, and drapes his arms around Gordon’s neck dreamily. Oh, this is good. This is what James has been dreaming about. Officially, this has been the best investment of dancing lessons James has ever made.

When they break apart for air, and James gets his breath back, he finally invites Gordon around tomorrow for those scones he promised however long ago it was, and Gordon has barely any time to accept before James kisses him again.

And… oh, for god’s sake. They pull apart again at the sound of applause from the doorway, and James turns to see… Edward and Henry, Thomas, Percy, god, even Toby and Henrietta, Emily, Rosie, Molly, Daisy, …is that all four of the Little Westerners? And more. It’s far too big a crowd, and James is suddenly wondering if him and Gordon was some kind of soap opera to the wider North-Western Railway, which makes him flush.

Thomas cups his mouth and hoots, “snog him again!”

James goes to yell back before Gordon pulls him in, and James immediately softens, looking into Gordon’s eyes, and he accepts the kiss Gordon gives him, Gordon wrapping his arms around James and dipping him with ease, and James lets Gordon hold his bodyweight as he frees one hand to lovingly flip off the crowd of onlookers.

They once again receive a round of cheers and applause. James doesn’t care, though, not when he can cling to Gordon and Gordon’s lips can brush his own, and Gordon’s breath can dance over his skin, and Gordon’s hands are on him, and this is real, and they’re…

James tears up.

“I love you,” he whispers, too quiet for anyone but Gordon to hear. “I love you. Thank you for putting up with me.”

“It was no bother, little James,” Gordon says, so very fondly, and James shivers again at the way his voice rumbles when he speaks low and quiet. “I love you too.”

It’s a shame the night has to end. James doesn’t want it to end at all. And here, kissing Gordon under the stars, it almost feels like it never has to.

thank you for reading! reblogs are always appreciated and feel free to let me know what you think of this ^-^

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

#ttte #thomas the tank engine #ttte humanized #ttte james #ttte gordon #ttte thomas #ttte edward #ttte flying scotsman #4x5 #romantic 4x5 #ttte shipping #ttte fanfic #ttte fic #ttte fanfiction #this is the first ttte fic ive been able to write in ages <3 feels pretty good man tbh #dj's writing

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tallulahbunny · 1 year

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Hey lovelies (Just a text-post, I’m sorry)

I just wanted to make a little post just to maybe humanise myself a tiny bit. I know looking at my account its clear I’m into some pretty rough kinks, and this is true. I do also absolutely love sharing myself online, truly. It’s brought me a level of empowerment and acceptance of my body I never thought I would reach.

However I just want to maybe super quick remind you that I’m a real person, with feelings (fragile ones at that). I’m a little worried of being vulnerable on here because I know that Is not really my type of content, and I’m very aware you probably just want to scroll to the boobs and rope and body (you have permission, go on).

I know I go for a kinda free use submissive vibe (which I do love with consent and trust) however I think posting myself like this has reached a slight level of dehumanising which is slightly harmful to my mental health. I’ve been having panic attacks and in part they’ve been due to my anxiety over this account.

I’ll still be posting, but I think I’m maybe going to try and post a little more carefree content. I’ve been so panicky recently about making perfect pictures. Perfect rope, perfect body, perfect poses, and it’s very exhausting because I hold myself and my content to a hopefully fairly high standard, but it’s unfortunately becoming impossible. The dehumanising messages are really taking their toll and there’s only so much of a wall I can put up. I’m hoping that even one of you reads this it might make you understand me as a human being a little more. That’s all I need.

Obviously I absolutely love receiving messages, but again, like it says in my bio, your best shot is being nice. If nice isn’t you’re thing, at least try and be clever with your message weather it be a scenario or degradation or threat or whatever you fancy. I really don’t fancy another message that just says “hoe” or “send me pictures”. And please, remember there is a difference between degradation and just… bullying.

Basically I think I’m going to try to just be a bit more expressive, a little more me and hopefully a lot more laid back so hopefully I can fully enjoy my time here. And I’m hoping that maybe I can start humanising myself a little to you guys. I’m not just boobs! Though understandably that has been most of my page so far ahah. If anyone has any asks they want to send ill happily respond and maybe that way you guys can start getting to know me, not just my rope and my body.

Thank you to everyone who has been so so lovely to me, it means so much, I hope you continue to love my content, and hopefully me as a creator. I’m so so sorry it got so deep for a second there, won’t happen again anytime soon

Now back to usual programming!

-Tallulah xxx

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onecinder · 1 day

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i love john doe's queerness in telltale batman

I'm gonna mostly be talking with my canon ending in mind, which is Bruce keeps being Batman and stays friends with Vigilante John.

But John Doe is like.. legit one of the only sympathetic, human jokers we ever got. I don’t count Arthur Fleck because we are left feeling horrified and sick in the end, no sympathy left at all, even if he started out so. In The Killing Joke he is also slightly humanised in the final moments when he refuses help -- a brief lapse in his insanity -- but thats like a breadcrumb. He’s still evil. But here in Telltale Batman, yes he ends up fighting Batman or Bruce and locked up in Arkham no matter what choices you make, but HE’S STILL SYMPATHETIC. The game wants the player to feel guilty and question their choices if they chose Villain Joker path, and STILL feel guilty and make efforts to better help and understand John in the Vigilante path. Especially since you can choose to keep John as your friend and Bruce visits him in Arkham. Bruce doesn't treat him like he's irredeemable, ever (unless the player decides he's gone too far. But it's telling that the friendly option is there, so the devs deemed it in-character enough for Bruce. At least in Telltale, His two greatest rules are that he won't kill and that no one is irredeemable.)

Anyway, no matter what you choose the player just feels bad for him, because although he is capable of manipulation and murder, the situations he is put in are just inherently unfair and tugs at your heartstrings -- if you have a conscience. In vigilante he was genuinely trying to be a good guy. We didn’t get that with any other Joker. We never got a joker who was friends with Batman (except lego batman kinda) and had an actually close relationship with him who wasn’t depicted as doing it for his own benefit, manipulating him, crazy or sick. He has a downward spiral just like Arthur Fleck but totally retains that humanity Arthur ends up lacking. He is canonically queer but he isn’t demonised at all, the player knows he was in love with Bruce (canon: "all i wanted was to be loved by you" along with several comments on Bruce's awesomeness and handsomeness) - but it was never outright depicted in a twisted light (there were undertones, such as John admitting he just couldn't say no to Bruce, and of course Bruce's manipulation of him, but that's a rant for another time. At least the relationship was authentic) Actually, it was the only GOOD influence on him since he was surrounded by criminals straight out of Arkham. And it wasn’t even that Bruce didn’t reciprocate ("you broke my heart, John"). Just that the circumstances didn’t allow him to.

Although Bruce was ultimately the one who influenced John onto the villain path (and the one -- not Batman, but Bruce -- who John loved) I don’t think the player would once think their relationship was a bad thing. Hell, at the end of the episode we got statistics - - iirc, the VAST majority of players (95% maybe? Correct me if I'm wrong) expressed regret over what their relationship could have been and told him they were of course friends once upon a time in their final moments in Ace Chemicals, vigilante ending.

Joker is usually depicted as a mass murdering psychopath, to varying personalities and characterisations. His queercoding has just been another aspect of his character lending to his insanity, and he's just pretty much been a prime case of the demonisation of queer people. (ofc there are exceptions like Lego Batman, where it's this love between him and Batman that ultimately saved the city, but yk the vast majority.) And of course there are moments like this where he's very clearly depicted as a creep (not sure which comic it happens in though):

John has been confirmed by Kent Mudle (director of the series) in a Tumblr ask to be bisexual. But unlike normal queer Joker depictions, John's queerness didn’t make him a villain, it was just a part of him, one of his many characteristics that made the player love/cherish him. Their relationship, John's gayness, was never a bad thing, it fostered a relationship with a person who tried to help him rehabilitate, had his best interests in mind and tried to help him become a better person... albeit, in Bruce's way. But hell, he was (hetero)romantically pursuing Harley and that turned out way worse than Bruce’s influence ever did.

IDK, I just love how for once his queercoding (well, it's canon but not in-game) is a good thing, never a demonisation -- and the bad parts of his and Bruce's relationship was not a result of the queerness at all.

#telltale batman #batjokes #joker #telltale john doe #telltale bruce wayne #my post #my analysis #onecinder silly rambles #lgbtq #bisexuality #telltale juce

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amerricanartwork · 7 months

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Y’know, I have a funny story with the ship between Innocence and Pebbles.

@eggobuggo , my sister, was playing The Sims and made the iterators in her own humanised forms, including her version of Innocence and Wind, along with Moon, Pebbles, NSH and Suns, all with their own personalities and stuff. She set up a generic apartment, put the gang in, and just had fun making them do silly shenanigans together, while I sit and watched her play.

In particular, we headcanon NSH, Pebbles and Innocence as Gen 3s, the newer modes, and so she made them into teenagers, which, with a DLC, have a whole new host of features that are not in the base game. This includes getting crushes (which weirdly enough, young adults and adults cannot get).

But anyway, one day, later into the game (the gang basically all were in the high end of the friendship scale with each other), the notif board popped up that Innocence had gotten a crush on Pebbles. Unfortunately for her, NSH and Pebs were already being all flirty with each other (Ragequit is where it’s at for us), making Pebble basically keep her in the friendzone. Ngl, my heart went out to her :,) Especially so, because they were all sharing a room. (space was tight)

After that, I began thinking about it in context of it in-universe, and ngl, I came to quite liking it as a ship, especially since I see Innocence to be less… asshole-ish (?), I guess, than what the general fandom makes her out to be (I mean it’s understandable, we only see her to leak the pic of Pebbles condition and that’s it.). To me and Eggo, she’s much nicer unless you really piss her off, which then, her more cynical and gossipy side of her comes out. She was actually more of on the friends side with Pebble before the shit went down.

At the time, I thought “dang, it’s a shame I won’t be seeing anything of it since she’s so obscure.”. This was a couple months before I began seeing art of them on the main tag.

Soooo… I guess I’m somewhat of an og Milkshake (as is the fandom name) shipper???

Just, seeing you and others make art about them is almost surreal in a way, since the only reason I really considered them as a ship was cuz of a random event in a life sim game lol.

Also @eggobuggo, I hope you don’t mind me sharing the story. :)

Wow, that seems like quite the story! And I do agree, after witnessing something like that in a totally different game it must be pretty surreal to see the ship gaining popularity in the actual RW fandom now too! It's nice to get another seal of approval from an original Milkshake shipper!

For me, it's also a bit strange because it's something I've considered for a really long time as a lingering "oh, wouldn't it be cool if I could make this work?" idea. The obscurity and lack of content for UI to draw inspiration from, both canon and fanon, definitely added to these feelings and the difficulty of imagining a working portrayal of the ship, hence I've only recently felt confident enough about the relationship and UI as a character to act on it. So after Pura coined the ship name and made a lot more art of it, then other artists started expressing approval and even drawing it themselves, it almost feels like I'm watching the ship enter the mainstream (Tumblr) fandom consciousness in real time, which is honestly pretty cool, especially since it feels like I had a hand in it with that initial ask! And even if I wasn't the very first to consider it, I'll definitely continue supporting this ship!

For some other thoughts though, I totally agree on Innocence not being mean in reality, though for me she's not mean or gossipy at all and more so has a kind-of opposite major flaw that tends to cause bad things unintentionally. As much as I can understand interpreting the character as a genuinely mean person, I thought it'd be interesting to imagine that her leaking the rot simply caused others to perceive her as mean, not that she's that way in reality. After all, I don't think we ever see direct dialogue from Innocence in canon, and the only evidence I can find of her being mean is Wind's speculation on her motivations. I also took inspiration from @shkika's Innocence, but I just wanted to see if I could take those ideas further to create my own unique interpretation.

Also, it's actually pretty coincidental you're telling me this too, because in regards to what I've come up for my Milkshake portrayal, Innocence having an unrequited crush on Pebbles for a really long time is actually really important for both plot and character arc reasons! I've been developing my own take on the classic worm-off-the-string iterator AU idea with @hail-strom for like the past week or so and the ship as of now plays a decent role in that, but the unrequited crush acts as subtle, yet major context for Innocence's actions throughout, which in turn slowly influence Pebbles especially as he starts to reciprocate those feelings (much to his alarm)!

Anyway, thanks for sharing that with me, and thanks for giving me a chance to ramble about this ship more! I'm honestly so happy to see it growing, and all support counts!

#inbox #rain world #rw shipping #rw milkshake #rw trinkets #unparalleled innocence #rw ui

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truetealtears · 1 year

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Another thing that I realised about why the how to train your dragon finale doesn’t make sense, and this one really annoys me; is that apparently, Toothless is such a main character specialist little boy ever that when he becomes a simp and goes underground with his flock, all of the dragons in existence everywhere just follow him???

Which I mean, no??? Ignoring the fact that he just automatically becomes the alpha of the underworld (which is total bs in its own right), him deciding to stay there somehow sent a broadcast to all dragons to come join him? Did he @ everyone in the dragon discord or what?

Also for a character so smart how did Hiccup think that sending all of Berk’s dragons away would get rid of all dragons. And since it apparently did, how did he think that would be a good idea? They’re a well established and key part of the ecosystem (nvm his society but that’s different), do you know what happens when you remove, not just a species, but an entire fucking Order of animals from the environment??? I’ll give you a hint: it’s bad, really bad.

There must be other colonies around the world, with other alphas. Like that’s literally the plot of the previous two films; we had the red death as a sort of queen bee, and then the big guy as the ‘king’ but called the alpha cuz the 2nd film was where they coined the term and made it into a whole thing. These colonies are scattered all over the place but somehow the Berk colony (not even the only group of domesticated dragons, as the 3rd film likes to show, but not tell, us. What happened to those societies?) packing up and leaving made them all decide to leave too (again how tf would they even know, pheromones and broadcast calls and what ever else don’t travel across the entire planet).

So even if that did happen, you’re telling me Toothless just walks in with his little prosthetic tail (which will eventually decay, causing his death because he is a disabled dragon that would not survive without it) and new gf (my issues with the light fury are worthy of their own post someday), comes face to face with the other colonies alphas, (aka the equivalents of other red deaths, big dudes, etc) and just wins??? A red death alone would, and nearly did, eat him alive. He survived that fight (chase sequence honestly) due to Hiccup’s brains, allowing them to exploit the previously established (but then never mentioned again) weaknesses of dragons. Not Toothless’ strength and certainly not his brains, because he is a dragon, but then ofc the third film had to make him disturbingly smart.

Like that’s not a dragon anymore that’s a guy in a fursuit. He becomes far too humanised over the course of the series. Take the first film; where he was a surprisingly clever animal, but still an animal, and compare that to the 3rd. Like the jokes in the first are that he’s a big goofy animal trying to imitate Hiccup/ communicate with him in his own dragon way, in the third he’s literally acting and emoting like a human (which he shouldn’t be full stop). There’s a difference between an intelligent animal picking up on some of the behaviours they see constantly (spending all those years with Hiccup) and him straight up acquiring a human brain. That scene w the bird dancing can be funny but why tf is Hiccup gesturing and communicating with him in a way that would only work with a person. Try that shit with the original toothless, or literally any other dragon, and see how that goes.

In fact, put toothless (and the light fury) next to any of the other main dragons in the 3rd film and watch the difference in behaviour. The 2nd film started to push it with him and cloud jumper, but it was still somewhat at a level where it was believable that some dragon species were smarter like that, eg the intelligence of corvids vs other birds. The best example of being well trained and in tune w their human without becoming an almost uncanny valley human/dragon abomination is stormfly (cloud jumper is close but like I said they’re pushing it)

Honestly even at the end of the second film they were starting to main character-ify toothless; that scene could’ve still played out the same without making him glow, it annoyed me then and it just got worse in the third. Night-furies went from a unique but still plausible species (as in still an animal) in the context of this world to almost mythical beings who keep coming up w new bs powers.

The way the conflict was resolved in the first film was plausible and believable for the creatures they just spent the entire run time analysing (fire proof on the outside, not so much inside. Plus all the other stuff the kids were doing. Ik it might have felt a bit cliche and childish like ‘look we’re all using the tactics we told you about earlier!’ But that’s literally why they were taught them, to fight dragons). The second wasn’t totally far off, it explored dragon social dynamics and explained the concept of alphas and how they work (also clearly intending for you to look back and realise the red death was the alpha, they even play basically the same buzzing noise for when they’re under control) but then they made him glow at the end. It would’ve been so easy and plausible to say something like ‘oh most of these guys were part of the red death colony, which they watched toothless kill so they already accept him as their alpha’ but instead he had to have a mc power up moment. The third just went ‘fuck it he’s an anime character now’. Like think about it, basically none of the tactics and things we were told/shown were facts about dragons in the first, come up in the later movies. Like yeah ‘they don’t need to explain all that to us again’ but there’s a difference between that and just completely erasing it from the world building.

Night-furies are the equivalent of like some deep sea species we didn’t know much about back in the day because they were only seen when they came up to the surface on rare occasions, then we got a hold of one and everything checked out when compared to related species but unlike them it’s capable of bioluminescence which is like ‘oh cool, interesting.’ But then a couple years later it turns out if you stress it out it can somehow become a superconductor for some fucking reason. A couple more years later and it seems it’s capable of fucking teleportation. Can you see what I’m getting at here?

Ik the films were always going to end with the dragons leaving. Like in both book and film the first line is: ‘ONCE, there WERE dragons…’ I just hate how it ended up being done. As a Zoologist it has me screaming, crying and throwing up.

‘Oh well of course it’s bad to you, you’re putting a kids movie under professional scrutiny’ NO BECAUSE THEY DID IT SO WELL IN THE FIRST FILM. Watching it told me they knew how to do this right and then the sequels were worse instead of better. I’m not even saying they had to go further in-depth and stuff for the sequels to be good, what I’m saying is I was at least expecting them to keep to the same standard instead of letting it fucking plummet.

Idk man the first film was so good at establishing the dragons as actual animals and exploring them as different species but then it felt like with each consecutive film they fired more and more of whatever zoologists they had on the writers team for the first.

#httyd fandom #httyd #httyd 2 #httyd 3 #httyd critical #httyd toothless #httyd the hidden world

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arcielee · 8 months

Text

Interview With a Writer

This is the 20th segment of my IWAW series. I will break it down into volumes, so this is the wrap of Volume 1!

Thank you so much @fan-goddess for giving me the time to respond to my questions and allowing this series to continue. 💜

As always, Interview With a Writer is my ongoing series of the talented souls on Tumblr and ao3, and their brilliant writing!

Name: fan-goddess

Story: 10 Things I Hate About You

Paring: Ettore x Female!Reader

Warnings: Non canon Ettore, warnings vary per chapter.

So, when did you start writing?

I started writing early teens for a variety of fandoms. It was all on Wattpad drafts as I’d make all these plots, but find I’d be terrible writing actual stories. The first thing I wrote for was a cringey Draco Malfoy fanfic which is on my first ever Wattpad account that still is lying about somewhere.

After a couple years though I then transitioned to Tumblr, where after joining the HOTD I started writing and enjoying it and finding my passion for it.

Where did the plot for 10 Things I Hate About You come from?

The idea mainly came from me thinking of the movie, as me and two of my friends were talking about watching it together since one of them hasn’t ever seen it.

I was thinking about the poem scene on a bus ride and was wondering about how to possibly apply it to writing, wondering who would a reader hate to love, and one of the first characters I thought of was Ettore.

Then it came to me applying different lines to him, which in the original I think had some different lines to the one that was posted, but as I was trying to post the original I accidentally deleted it. Which lead to me immediately trying to write all the lines I could remember.

It was originally supposed to be a one-shot, but thought why not when people asked for a part two. The idea to do the different view point chapter came from @flowerandblood on tumblr, since I thought of their writing style which enables the reader to see both viewpoints of the scene, and I was interested in exploring in this.

Can you explain your interpretation of Ettore? What drives him? Why is he this way in 10TIHAY?

I wanted to stay as close to the movie character as possible, and if you’ve seen the movie, there is a scene that shows Ettore attempted SA. Of course, I never wanted to write a scene like that, so I decided to write a mixture of canon him and another version of him that didn’t involve the scene from the movie.

What drives him in this story is his need for contact he doesn’t even know he needs, which he finds in the reader. He gets obsessed by it and this entire need to own her, like you would a pet really. He’s drawn on this path of her since she involuntarily makes him feel emotions he never felt before her, and he just becomes utterly addicted to it, which in the end he interprets as what could be love.

Was there anything in specific that inspired your Reader portrayal?

Not necessarily? I wanted her to have struggles. I wanted to clearly have this idea shown that no one is perfect. I don’t specify the crime the reader committed, as it’s really up to interpretation (unless someone does request a one-shot with a crime specific).

I wanted her to have that split mindset of wanting to stay like her Earth self, and the mindset of wanting to give into this desire for Ettore, who draws her in.

Plus, like Ettore, she craves this contact that makes her human and down to earth. A same need, but for different reasons.

Do you think they complement one another well?

It’s a mixed thought, really. For Ettore, it’s good they complement each other since she effectively manages to humanise him in his own way. But for reader, it’s not so good since-thanks to Ettore-she’s embracing this dark side of herself that she never would’ve never thought to connect with if she hadn’t met him.

But I don’t know if I believe that they belong together entirely, since whilst they embrace a side of each other, they also simultaneously have the ability to destroy each other. They’re a weakness to each other and only Ettore really understands could be possibly exploited, which is one of the reasons he felt so conflicted about the relationship.

Do you think you will do a sequel? Or do you have any other WIPs?

I have no plans to do a sequel. But when I finish writing/editing my Abraham series I plan to open my requests, and I am interested in doing one-shot requests expanding on this story's universe. They wouldn’t be apart of the 10TIHAY universe though, but I did have one possible request on ao3 where a person asked about what would happen if reader was the one obsessed rather than Ettore, which I am interested in possibly exploring.

Do you have a personal favorite story you'd like to share?

I have so many to be honest I doubt I can name just one! Especially since I have favourites for certain fandoms I’m in too. One of my favourites though is ‘Girl With a Pearl Earring’ by flowerandblood on Tumblr. I did photography and it inspired me both in regards to writing and in photography too.

#interview with a writer #iwaw20 #bts #of their brilliant writing #writing community #10 things i hate about you #ettore x reader

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powderblueblood · 7 months

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any additional thoughts on fandom and writing? I liked what you touched on earlier and wondered if there's more you'd like to share

HELLO! Need to start this off by saying everybody’s different everybody’s valid whatever ya want ya should go and do I’m not the king of even MY OWN little shitheap

BUT

I’m gonna throw these out willy nilly style and ye can chat to me about them again if you want. I may not be phrasing myself impeccably here because I’m a toucheen hungova but bear with

- writing dialogue is a hard exercise YES but a worthy one, nothing takes me out of a story faster than bad dialogue. I’m not saying you have to be cracking jokes and that but especially with fic, it serves to study the way a character talks in the source material beyond the use of just one nickname. scribble out a whole scene that’s just dialogue, no action! It’s fun. It’s good

- PERSONAL OPINION ALERT I have become so much more keen to read x OC stories or more specific x reader stories because I find the over generalisation of x reader fic extremely repetitive and boring which is moreso a me thing and I know that. But I’m just saying. If you ever want anyone to chat to about your fandom or indeed fandomless OCs…. Please hit my fucking line

- shy!reader…. Enough. I want a reader with the right allocations who is fast and thorough and sharp as a tack they’re playing with their jewellery they’re putting up their hair they’re touring the facility and picking up slack I want a reader with a short skirt and a lonnnnnnnng……………………………… jacket

- i also think we should be brave and write characters that aren’t immediately beloved by the children. actually nothing is more humanising, pathetic and funny than trying to get a middle schooler to like you

- more characters of colour, forever, thanks sm

and since we’re here, here’s the stuff about the stranger things fandom in particular that I personally feel as in are my personal onion not doctrine not law. But

- steddie to me is very much any two guys syndrome. I don’t get it, never have. Harringrove makes more sense to me and I don’t even fucking go there but I actually think that it could make an incredible talented mr ripley au wait WHAT

- write ronance messy already. I know no one owes anyone anything but that wouldn’t stop steve being mad upset that his best friend is dating his ex girlfriend that he floated the idea of having six kids with. like. sorry. also write Nancy having complicated feelings about robin and Steve. also writing Nancy having complicated feelings. also write Nancy

- i feel alienated from the fandom at large and that’s actually fine, esp being an older person. the space I’ve begun to cultivate on here isn’t for everyone but I wish youse the best and I hope you have fun

#powder room talk #anonymous #posting this with the anxiety levels of an animal being hunted for sport but ultimately say it with me #so what and who cares

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lee-hakhyun · 1 year

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omg the jarring differences bw this SYS and the SYS we read about AND the SYS who became the disaster of floods. I’m getting just nauseous thinking about it. yes they’ve got equal opportunities in the apocalypse, no matter how sick that is, but like THEYRE STILL KIDS. Orv takes that away a lot quicker bc SYS is under KDJ’s protection and yk they don’t feel like kids anymore. They’re capable of killing anyone. Even in KDJ’s 3 year absence. But …

they were kids. they are kids. in an apocalypse. god fuck even thinking about her mental state makes me wanna puke rn.

how are you holding up, Lee Hakhyun? when you don’t even have a fourth wall to shield you from this like KDJ? she was a character to KDJ from the start, maybe that’s why it was easier on him. he introduced her to us as the ‘Disaster of Floods’.

But UGH. Idk where I was going with this but…

The side story is so good with humanising everything and yk throwing u to the ground and showing u the reality of the scenarios,,, that we forget bc KDJ is so strong and so is Kimcom by the end. It’s so easy to forget… I feel like I’ve been slapped.

it really hurts seeing this sys. and being exploited by the adults around her.. i hope lhh can help her out in this round.

and about this round. the 41st. sys is probably going to play a big role here, disaster of floods and all lhh was already thinking about ditching joonghyuk, maybe he should take sys just keep her away from him. jhw would be happy at least (mostly a joke, but i'm worried..)

it seems like generally the more times people have read orv the easier it is for them to adapt. lhh is making it through the scenarios. but if he keeps losing people.. singshong is making us see these readers that we can sympathize with. and then making them suffer. orz

#orv side story #orv spoilers #ask

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localgirlbecomesobsessed · 15 days

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This is ridiculous

Xena x Leo (established)

Sho watches as a trapped Xena and Leo wheel around the dorm.

They are the silliest cuties

Not proof read but trying my best

“What am I looking at right now?”

Sho asked exhausted as an amused Alan leaned against the door frame, he had just come back from the truck it’d been so busy all day and he just wanted to come back and crash out…instead he’s watching Xena and Leo both sit in a tricycle going in circles around the pit.

Leo was sitting in Xena’s lap, his legs locked around her as he grumpily scrolled through his phone, his head hooked onto Xena’s shoulder, who was holding onto the tricycles handles tightly as she tried to guide it somewhere else.

“Xena got into another fight…she got injured so Leo put her in the tricycle as punishment but he got stuck too…”

A passing student snickered at the two as he informed an exasperated Sho who could only face palm in response, as they watched Xena give up and succumb to her fate of being on a tricycle forever, she wrapped her arms around Leo and snuggled her head into his chest, sighing in defeat. Leo frowned having to adjust his position as he propped his head on top of hers, scrolling through his phone with pure concentration.

“Why’d Xena get in a fight?”

He turned his head to Alan as he nudged his head at the tricycle duo.

“Frostheim gen students tried to pick a fight when she was with the blond first year, I don’t know what they said but it made her snap.”

Alan sighed as he rubbed the back of his neck, unsure of what make of an exploded Xena, the sight was impressive but not one he wishes for her to go through again.

The tricycle was making its rounds closer towards them and Sho could see Xena sporting the beggining of a black eye.

“It was 9 vs 1-she won.”

Alan sounded almost proud as he fought a small smile, Xena took down most of them, Alan and Leo only appearing when there was two left and it was them being there that distracted Xena and allowed one of them to get a couple of jabs in…Alan felt terrible about it and had been closely watching them as they escorted her back to the dorms, leaving the pile of students on the campus floor. He left the pit to get Xena an ice pack and when he came back the two were trapped on the tricycle of doom, they thought it was funny at first but now it’s been two hours and all three of them were losing the will to live.

Sho raised an eyebrow as the two cycled up to him.

“You look like the kids from the shining if they had even worse codependency issues.”

Sho announced, hands on his hips as he heard Alan try to cover his laughter with a cough-failing miserably. Xena cackled and Sho could see Leo’s shoulders shaking from silent laughter.

“You look like a humanised version of Barbie dream house dog.” •_•

Xena deadpanned.

Alan choked on his water as he tried to revive himself, Leo giggled before abruptly stopping turning to look at Sho with feigned annoyance.

“Sho get us off this fucking thing, if I do one more lap of the pit, I’ll unalive myself and Xena.”

Xena scoffed as she tried to lean back to grab her phone off of Leo, who just held it further out.

“I’ll kill myself right now if you don’t give me my phone back Leo.” •_•

She was annoyed as Leo just scoffed at her and continued to read whatever he seemed to be enthralled by. Sho snatched the phone and looked at Leo in disappointment, he was reading one of Xena’s manhwas.

“Don’t fucking look at me like that, It’s surprisingly good, she doesn’t take shit and the love interests aren’t annoying POS.”

Sho looked at the title ‘reporting for duty,duchess!’

It was the one xena binge read the other movie night that Leo complained about repeatedly as she wasn’t paying attention to him or the movie, but now he’s changed his tune and it seemed he started from the very beggining and was now on chapter…67.

How long have they been like this?

Sho handed back the phone to an impatient Leo, who just scowled at him as he settled back into Xena to continue reading the book. She sighed as she started fiddling with Leo’s hair, doing little plaits or curling it in her hands as Leo sat compliant, distracted by the manhwa and trying not to melt at her touch as it felt heavenly, he nearly turned into a puddle of goo when she started gently clawing through his hair.

“I would like to be released from this prison immediately.”•_•

Xena huffed out as Leo grumbled at her pouting as she stopped her ministrations, he leaned back as he tentatively brushed against her eye frowning to himself. Xena flinched as she awkwardly blinked at him wincing even more as that made pain shoot through her. It was slowly swelling shut and was in desperate need of an ice pack, Leo’s frown deepened as he sighed, his fingers dropping down to brush against her split lip.

“She also needs an ice pack, the old one melted and Alan has abandoned us.”

Alan shook his head as he tossed an already prepared ice pack.

“I’ve been waiting for you two to make your rounds back to me, I’ve texted Professor.Nicolas, he’s sending…Dante with some ointment for you and he needs to talk about the incident.”

Xena groaned as she hid her head into the crook of Leo’s neck, who started using her back as a table to lean on, as he used one hand to hold the ice pack against her eye and the other to continue reading.

Sho grimaced for her, Dante already told her to be more careful when it comes to Frostheim, they seemed to really have it out for her due to her closeness to Jin and…her general personality(and status).

As if on queue, Dante wheeled in, looking at the two idiots stuck in a tricycle with a look of anguish as he sighed leaning against the arm of his chair as the tricycle’s wheels squeaked as it drove itself over to Dante.

“Another fight?”•_•

Xena avoided eye contact as she stayed hidden using Leo as a shield for Dante’s oncoming lecture. She did give a noise of confirmation, Dante nodded as he filled out his report.

“Did you wait for them to lay their hands on you first or…?”

•_•

A beat of silence echoed throughout the room for a couple of moments as Xena sheepishly looked up.

“No.” •_•

Dante clicked his tongue as he wrote down the info.

“I’ve already got Kaito’s statement, you’re not in trouble…that badly, given the circumstances-but the chancellor has left it up to the captain of Frostheim to decide the punishment.”

Sho could see Leo’s ear prick up at the information, he could already feel the wave of jealously and schemes waving around his head.

Dante chucked a brown paper bag over to her, Xena catching it as Leo leaned back, curious to see what’s in it.

“Thank you Dante.”^•^

Xena sang as she looked at the items.

There was the promised ointments from Nicolas, a couple of chocolate bars and snacks (some of Xena’s favourites) and a bike bell.

“Alan said the bell was broken, you fools must’ve broke it when you tried to force Xena into it, pissing it off and forcing you two to stay with it.”

Xena guiltily looked at the bell that was extremely crumpled, probably from when Leo held on to the bar as he practically dunked her into the chair. She slid it off, changing it for the newer model as it started dinging incessantly, annoying Leo who had almost caught up with the manhwa, he slammed his hand over it crushing the bell once again, Xena looked at him wide eyed as he grumpily slumped against her, continuing to read the rest of the chapter.

The rest of them stayed in silence, Xena tried to awkwardly fix the bell only to break it further as she let out a strangled noise.

“Leo.”

Sho said taking a deep breath as the citrine eyed man glanced up at him with a look of pure innocence as he pretended not to hear what had been previously said.

“Sho~have you figured out how to get us out yet.”

Dante snorted at his audacity after clearly purposefully breaking the bell. They all know he heard them, something he realised as he fluttered his eyelashes up at Sho.

That innocence fell quickly as he smirked at Sho as spun himself around, his back was facing Xena as he grabbed her hands gently and wrapped it around him as he smoothly swapped her feet on the pedals for his, allowing her to wrap her legs around him as she sighed at the feeling of being able to move her legs, even if it was only slightly. She has also decided she doesn’t mind life on the tricycle deciding that cuddling or being cuddled by Leo as he reads manhwas she recommends is a life she can get by… •_• though the thought process is much like a stranded pirate trying to find happiness as they cling to a shred of happiness on a deserted island.

He had a devious look on his face as he held onto one of her hands, tracing the cuts on her knuckles as Dante looked at Leo unimpressed.

“Leo, you’re not that stupid.”

Surprisingly, it was Alan who broke the moment as he glared at him, Leo just grinned as he pressed a kiss to Xena’s hand.

“I’m not.”

He flinched when Xena’s gripped tightened around his hand, her weird smile sprouting as she leaned over his shoulder.

“Leo…did you rebreak it on purpose.”

He leaned back into her as he finished the latest chapter of the manhwa.

“Yep.”^~^

•_•

She laughed a little maniacally as she looked at him in disbelief. Leo kissed her cheek nuzzling into it as Xena melted at his touch, falling into his sweet trap once again as a small smile spread across her face as he pressed another kiss to her cheek. She couldn’t stay mad, at least they know they can easily fix it with another bell.

“Why-”

Sho paused his questioning as he watched Leo tenderly pressed the cold pack against Xena’s face as she searched through the paper bag for a chocolate for the two to share. He watched as Leo tried to leisurely check over her injuries once more as Sho’s brain finally clocked what was going on.

Sho shook his head as he walked over and flicked Leo’s forehead. Leo was being extra clingy with Xena all because she got a little beat up, how cute…but what a dumb fucking way to go about it.

“You’re such a fucking idiot man.”

Sho announced grinning at him as Xena nodded in agreement hiding a small smile as it dawned on her, blushing as she felt the tips of her ears burn.She chose another manhwa for Leo to read, she pulled him a little closer and snuggled into him, humming happily as Leo demanded a completed one, not wanting to be left wanting more and having to wait nearly a year for another chapter. (True Pain)

Alan disappeared for a couple of minutes and came back with a huge obnoxious clown horn, looking defeated and disgusted at the object as he tensely walked past Dante who had stopped paying attention not wanting to be apart of whatever was currently going on and instead was filling out the paperwork from Xena’s incident.

Alan clambered over to them, pulling the handles and thus the tricycle towards him as a disgruntled Leo swore at him and told him to fuck off as he silently honked the horn at Leo in defiance .

Though, Leo ended up Taking a selfie with the four of them despite the acidic words thrown Alan’s way; only due to to ridiculousness of the current situation, both Xena and Alan have a poker face as Alan is mid honking the horn, Sho threw up a peace sign and a wink whereas Leo threw up a heart instead, he added it to Xena’s Instagram story and whipped out his own phone and he added it to his as well.

After the photo moment, A solemn look took over Alan’s being as he leaned down to look at the two of them.

“I’m sorry it’s come to this.”

Alan ruffled Xena and Leo’s hair as they just looked at him bewildered as he hovered the horn over the handle. Wincing as it fused to the bars….he didn’t want to use it, the cursed object being one of the most annoying things Darkwick had brought to his door…besides the trio of course.

The way he was acting it was as though he was sacrificing Xena and Leo to the damned thing. They watched in slight horror as Alan quickly retreated, looking fearfully at the horn.

The most obnoxious honking noise to ever exist screeched from the horn repeatedly. Leo shot up taking Xena with him as she was still wrapped around him, she scrambled to keep herself balanced on Leo as he flew away from the loud mechanism, like a cat with its heckles up.

She was about to drop her legs so she could walk normally but Leo stopped her, pocketing her phone as he hoisted her up. He was practically trying to run out of the room to escape it just as Alan and Dante were doing.

The horn kept honking happily as Sho approached it, trying to pinch it in order to make it stop when instead it let out a higher pitched screech almost deafening Sho and causing him to leap back and join Leo and Xena in escaping the pit.

“It’ll tire itself out.”

Alan announced slamming the door behind them as the hungry honking monster tried to follow them.

“It’s just happy, it’ll calm down soon.”

He said more firmly as they looked at him incredulously, it sounded as though he was trying to assure himself and not the others.

Dante glanced between them all, nodding a goodbye at Xena as he silently wheeled away, tired and absolutely done with the situation, he didn’t bother to speak with them only due to the smile fighting its way onto his face as he tried to remain stoic.

Alan looked at them in exhaustion, the three beaming at him as they tried to fight back the laughter. Xena had her head propped on top of Leo’s as he held her securely, her arms lazily wrapped around him as they both had their own matching Cheshire Cat grins spread across their faces.

“Why did you have a clown horn cap?”

Xena asked innocently, watching as Alan just sighed walking away as Leo cackled at him.

Leo was about to semi kidnap Xena again and take her to his room, when Sho grabbed onto his arm.

“You’re coming shopping with me…both of you.”

He did just want to crash out after his shift and dealing with well…whatever this was, but the thought of the basically empty dorm fridge and his own private fridge forced him into action, he almost forgot about it…weirdly enough the continuous honking and smell of Xena’s chocolate reminded him of this complication.

They were both about to whine when Sho held his hands up and flicked them both in the forehead, indignant cries from the both about being injured and traumatised from the day they’ve had went ignored by their chef.

“Cap I’ll make you something too!”

Sho called out as he dragged the other two to where bonnie was.

He didn’t think Alan would reply as he usually didn’t or would just send a thumbs up via text, yet this time the loud honk of a clown horn echoed throughout the dorm in response as the three couldn’t stop laughing, Alan proudly peeked his head out and smiled to himself as he sauntered back to the car he was fixing earlier before hurricane Leo came along.

———————————————————

Sho and Leo huddled over the phone watching eagerly as the shaky cam footage of Xena’s fight lit up Sho’s phone. She was currently sitting at the kitchen counter with her headphones in as she was deep in research for a case a vagastrom student asked for her help in. She had loud heavy metal music blaring through and couldn’t hear a thing but they wanted to make sure she couldn’t see them watching it either.

The footage was shaky and far away as they filmed discreetly, not wanting the frostheim group to see.

The group were screaming at Xena who stood there stoically until something the leader said apparently hit a nerve as she perfectly launched a K.O punch, knocking him out immediately. Leo snatched the phone from Sho and started making multiple adjustments so they can hear better, he replayed the video bringing the phone closer to them so they could hear better.

They couldn’t hear much but what they could hear made both of their bloods boil as the launched assault about Xena’s appearance, injuries, family and how shes cursed were all spat at her in a vile venom, words that left the girl unbothered outwardly and Leo could tell she wasn’t too bothered by it…so what was it that set her off?

She didn’t throw her fist until they started mentioning Leo; the words muffled even after Leo went to the lengths of activating his stigma, the quality of the video to blame as all he could hear was his last name before Xena knocks the guy out cold.

He glanced back over to her, her bandage wrapped hands typed away at her computer, her black eye had faded fairly well after using Nicolas’ ointment, her split lip was fixed, leaving only a tiny scar at the corner of her lips, she was mesmerising and she ended up like this because of him…

Leo frowned as he realised he was most likely the catalyst for Xena’s fight.

Sho muttered as he started writing down the names of the students he could identify, preparing their downfall as he started compiling what student belongs to what family.

Leo rewatched the video zooming in on Xena’s beautiful furious face as a cat like grin spread across his face, his heart thrumming as realisation hit him hard.

He was the catalyst for Xena’s fight.

#tokyo debunker #tokyo debunker oc #xena #leo kurosagi #tokyo debunkers #shohei haizono #alan mido #xena x leo #Leo could’ve just said he was worried about but no…into the tricycle she goes

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writing-for-life · 10 months

Note

Let's go choose violence:

3, 8, 9, 25 for The Sandman :3c

Rubs hands gleefully…

3. screenshot or description of the worst take you've seen on tumblr

Of course not screenshotting as everyone’s entitled to their opinion, so this is just a thing *I* find hard to understand/get my head around:

“Neil Gaiman ran out of ideas, and that’s why he killed off Morpheus.”

I mean, you could say he wanted to conclude his arc, and with that I agree. And thank fuck he did, because if Murphy were still alive, we would need to suffer the horrible takes that DC has foisted upon us ever since. But it is so completely incomprehensible to me when I read that there was no sign that Morpheus would off himself before World’s End or TKO. That it came out of nowhere, that it made the whole thing completely depressing and insufferable and sends a "bad" message.

It all was right there, from the start. You can’t read "The Sound of her Wings" and not see that he’s absolutely haunted by the narrative, and how much comfort he finds in her. And you don’t need to read the whole thing and then just see it in hindsight (it's something I hear/read quite often). It’s clear as day if you are willing to go down the line of thinking that the Endless aren’t people but concepts. I personally think that’s where people can trip up. And I even get it--of course we want to humanise them because we are human. But they are not. They are mirrors and foils that are supposed to make us think about our own humanity (and we recognise it in them, but that still doesn’t make them human--they just show us human traits and what this mortal coil is about. Carry it and abandon it in equal measures).

8. common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

Everyone apart from me of course 😂

"Hob Gadling is any shape or form the personification of hope, and his sole purpose is to (squee! UwU) save Murphy from his bleak existence".

No he ain’t. Hope is Hope, and she is a little girl (blows a raspberry right in your face). If Hob''s anything, he is humanity in a nutshell: ugly, self-serving, opportunist, but also feeling, caring and redeemable. But especially the first part is harder to woobify.

Did I also mention I have this take that making Dream's relationship to Hob all about romance and sex forgets about the importance of friendship, and why it's actually so important for the plot? Plus, that we have a tendency to erase male friendship and hence lean into toxic masculinity if we make every glance and every touch and every close emotional bond about: "Oh, they want to fuck?", and that's decidedly *not* progressive? Yeah, about that... (ship them, it's fine, no problem whatsoever, just be aware it's not the *only* take, and I will stick my neck out now and say: it won't be canon).

9. worst part of canon

That’s a tricky one because I can make sense of pretty much everything to be fair, but if I had to choose, it’s that Morpheus’ failed relationship to Nada created ripples that basically doomed every black woman connected to his arc (not *all* black women, I think that’s actually a misinterpretation, as is that Morpheus is racist, which he conceptually can't be). And as soon as he’s dead, we get token Gwen who isn’t doomed by the narrative anymore. And said Gwen *really* is a token black woman with no true agency of her own—her entire purpose is to serve the redemption of the slave trader. And that Neil actually confirmed this was *intentional* in The Sandman Companion. I get why he made that narrative choice, but to me, it still looks bad. I have hopes though he moved on from that take and we don’t get to see it in the show (the signs are there, so fingers crossed).

25. common fandom complaint that you're sick of hearing

Ties in with 3: That The Sandman should have a different, “more hopeful” ending.

But quite a few others:

You *should* write fanfics about XYZ because there’s not enough of it.

You *should* elevate supporting characters to main characters because they are ABC.

You *shouldn’t* focus so much on the main character because he’s a guy/male-presenting (I mean, he’s the protagonist, so there’s that).

You *should* ship m/m because it makes problematic dynamics less problematic.

You *shouldn’t* ship m/f because it’s heteronormative. My favourite: Johanna Constantine is bi, you *shouldn’t* ship her with a guy, because again: Heteronormative. Erm, I hate to break it to people (and speaking from experience): That’s how being bi works, and we like m, f and nb equally? And we happen to want sex with m, f and nb? And we pretty much have blinkers on when it comes to falling in love with a *person*, or what we find hot/sexually arousing? And I swear if I read shit like that once more, I’ll get heteronormative out of sheer spite and will smite people.

You *should* or *shouldn't* ship. Both fine. And/but there's certainly more to The Sandman than blorbofication and allosexualisation of everything.

So yeah, pretty much anything that involves a *should*. You can do whatever the fuck you like as long as you don’t lose your ability to critically engage with it. Plus, the space has to be welcoming for everyone, and that’s sometimes hard for creators and people who don’s serve/like the main flavour. And therein lies the problem, because critical engagement doesn’t always happen, and a lot of good stuff disappears in amongst the noise…

#asks answered #asks #today I choose violence #will it tag this? of course I will >>>#the sandman #dream of the endless #morpheus #hob gadling #hope beautiful lost nebula #nada sandman

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engineer-gunzelpunk · 3 months

Text

Its been a bit of a while since I put some fiction up. I'm gonna introduce another character while I am at it, because why not.

Here I introduce "Puffing Billy" or as his human name is, William Vauclain the 1st. Esq. or Victorian Railways NA-class 2-6-2 T 2A, one of a pair of original Baldwin Works locomotives sent to Australia; one of many "Puffing Billies" that chuff along the Narrow Gauge Belgrave to Gembrook line in the Dandenong Ranges.

(Baldwin Works of Philadelphia in the early days of the Victorian Railways produced a lot of locomotives for them, the so called "Yankee" locomotives; to my limited knowledge, a Baldwin D3 is preserved at the Newport Railway Museum, all the rest have been scrapped including 1A and 2A; but 2A lives on has my fictional char...)

All the remaining NAs, including the ones that chuff around the Puffing Billy railway today, were built at Newport Workshops.

Here he meets Heavy Harry in for the first time, in the midst of the Scrappings...

The Man In Black

Preamble

Sometime in the late 60's

“You call me ‘cute’ again, and I will break your kneecaps! I might be short, but your knees and shins are perfectly in reach, you great galoot!”

The tiny, short, potbellied narrow gauge engine in human form stares with unblinking hostility at the black clad titan and his slighter red-haired companion. The big Man In Black merely stares back with an inscrutable expression.

He is only 5ft’’, 1’, but he is very round, squat and powerful. He is clad in an old-timey American engineers outfit, complete with striped hat and thick gloves. The only tell of his locomotive being is the lamp affixed to his hat.

He kept this affectation long after he got humanised, no matter how much the humans that ran the joint discouraged him from doing so. It amused him to tease and vex railfans by wearing such an out-of-place set of clothing on an Australian preservation railway.

He is not at all impressed by the pair of tall timbers in front of him dressed like delinquents.

Yobbos.

He had been in the country long enough to know what a ''yobbo'' was, if they played the fool on his railway he’d chase them off.

Others he’d cut to pieces with dour humor if they ever even so much as smirked at his get up.

The Man in Black takes a puff of the cigarette.

“Stroppy little bastard, aren’t you?”

“I’d be ‘stroppy’ if some so-called 'King of the Railways' came over to my abode and started throwing their weight around! I haven’t seen you in the entire time we’ve existed, and now that the VR has destroyed your railway, you show up to mine!

Whaddya want?!”

“I never said I was the king of anything. No Gods, No Masters…”, said the Man In Black, the red-head shaking his head from side to side.

“Nae, not a word of it!” said the red head.

“Then why are you even here, all the way in the Dandenongs? Don’t you have a heritage railway of your own to puff around on?”, the little tank engine stood proud, chomping on his cigar.

“You have no idea who I am and why I have come, haven’t you?”

“All I know is that there’s this guy, this Big Harold fellow, who you seem to be, who’s some kind of king of the VR locomotives… well, you aren’t my king!”

“Well, then it’s a good thing I’m not looking for subjects then…” said the Man In Black.

“Then why have you come all the way over here, surely its tiring for your big self to be walking around like this…”

Silence for a few moments. A nerve had been struck.

“I’ve heard you are a stroppy bastard, Puffing Billy… It just so happens I really, really like stroppy bastards...”

Puffing Billy is suspicious, narrowing his eyes to slits. “What do you want from me…”,

“First, I want to know who built you…””

Puffing Billy is taken aback… “You came over all the way from where you live just to ask me that?

‘If it’s that important, its Baldwin Works, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States of America to you!”, he gesticulates, pointing sassily at the Man In Black.

“Hmmmm, Billy from Philadelphia… shall I call you ‘Billy From Philly’ to distinguish you from the other Puffing Billies here?"

Puffing Billy laughed for the first time since meeting the Man In Black, “’Billy From Philly’!?, Ha! Only took about a half a century for someone to come up with it, but I like it!

But I presume there's something more to this…”

“Yes. There was nothing arbitrary with what I said about me liking ‘stroppy bastards’. I heard you are the stroppiest of all in this state…”

“Uh huh…”

“You and your humans have managed to stave off the scrappers during the Lokodammerung, haven’t you? And Operation Phoenix?”

The little engine scratches his head.

“I can’t lie, big fella, it was a very tough going for a while. We did close a while, but we opened up because the humans wanted us operating, and managed to wrangle control of the railway ever so slowly from VR to the Preservation Society. We won a huge battle and we’re damn proud of it!

‘But we can’t just physically fight the scrapping, Big Harold! Its impossible!”

The Man In Black only smiled his ironic half-smile.

“Oh yes we can… but not as an end in of itself, we aren’t martyrs. We do that, we lose.

‘We can’t simply fight them, we need to make things easier for our human allies and ourselves and to make things more difficult for them… we need to buy some time for our kin and an opportunity for our human brethren to rescue them...”

‘This is what I need you, your cussedness and your gift with machinery for…”

“I’m listening…” said the newly minted Billy From Philly.

#rws #ttte #thomasallgrownup #real locomotives #victorian railways #Red And Black Steam On Southern Metals #Heavy Harry OC #Puffing Billy #VR humanisation #VR gijinka #humanised locomotives #humanisation #VR H-class Pocono H220 “Heavy Harry”#VA NA-class 2-6-2T “Puffing Billy”

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gingerbreadmonsters · 2 years

Text

return to me

or: learning, growing, walking hand in hand.

gn!reader, no content warnings except blake-typical creepiness, some yandere-flavoured obsessive goodness. in the emptiness of night, you’re all he sees. look. i had a lovely little idea for blake that was all ready to go - he was going to get a nice day out with his listener, i was going to humanise him, show that he's not all bad… and now look what he's done! well. this is what you get for crossing me. enjoy your grapes, mr blake. i hope they're sour. a big big thank you to my love @haradasaya for proofreading! 💕💕 limerence, inspired by R.E.M.’s nightswimming and fe3h: cindered shadows chapter 6. the moon is low tonight. blake being left in awe in just over 2400 words.

There are very few beautiful things in the world, anymore.

(Some, but not many.)

Beauty is, unfortunately, a vanishing art. Everywhere, all around, at every moment the world becomes more and more diseased, more and more dull. The earth turns to rot, the water turns to scum, and beauty is swallowed by oblivion.

It's simply a fact of the universe. Entropy. All things tend towards their own destruction.

You might argue, of course. You might say, of course not! There are plenty of beautiful things out there still - all kinds of places and creatures and objects. There's a whole universe full of things out there! And everyone has different ideas of what's beautiful anyway, so how can you even measure how many beautiful things there are in the world to begin with?

Well then, if you did say that, you would be met with disbelief, probably. A look, incredulous, that tells you don't be stupid, honey. Not all things are beautiful, and there are some things that aren't beautiful to anyone. I ought to know.

You see, there are some very special people who just understand the order of things. Who just feel it, the natural order of the world, the way things are supposed to be. A feeling that can't be taught, but cultivated - a feeling that Blake, himself, is learning at this very moment to know and comprehend.

And because he's one of these precious few, one of those fortunate enough to have been shown the truth, he knows. Humans have always been funny about extinction and the loss of things. Take and take and take until there's almost nothing left, then either praise its survival as a miracle, or grieve its final death as gone too soon. He knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, how rare and precious beauty truly is these days. Something reserved only for the most unique, most particular, most wondrous of things.

There is an order in the world, he has learnt. All things that do exist must exist within the laws of the world that allows them to be, and those laws dictate exactly where they fall in that great hierarchy of being that natural existence requires. That is to say, in all the world, there can only be one thing that is the most beautiful. Only one thing that stands above the rest, a single prize that puts all else to shame.

Is it any wonder, then, that he holds you so dear?

It's true, I'm telling you, he would say, if you laughed. You'd probably laugh. Entirely uncaring, unaware of the gospel that he imparts to you, and yet so utterly charming in your blissful ignorance. Everything has its order, everything has its place. Not everything can be beautiful to everyone, and some things aren’t beautiful to anyone at all. Seriously.

You might stare at him, incredulous, disbelieving. Yeah, right. How can you say that? It’s impossible. Where do heads end and necks begin?

Very well, trickster god, he would say, taking your challenge head-on. The museum is quiet, nobody there but the two of you. Let me explain it a different way.

Take a map from the display stand, take a badge from the visitors’ information desk. Exhibition hall is up the steps straight in front of you, and don’t forget to exit through the gift shop. The explanation wouldn’t be very complicated. You’d have no trouble understanding if he helped you.

Let’s start at the beginning. The most basic. All things that exist must exist, right? The criteria for being 'a thing that exists' is 'it must exist'. And if it exists, then it must have properties of some sort. Physical or metaphysical, it must have some sort of properties that distinguish it from all of the other 'things that exist'. Otherwise, all 'things that exist' would by definition be identical, because they would have no defining qualities to separate them from each other, as 'existing' is their only quality. Does that make sense?

You’d nod. I… think so? Never took you for the existential type. The tourist map creases in your hand as he leads you across the main museum floor..

So, we now know that all things that exist have at least one property that defines them as separate to everything else that exists. All of them must possess a unique combination of properties that distinguishes them from every other thing, in order to exist as a single, discrete thing. Look around you. Everything you see, every individual thing, is different. Colour, shape, size, volume, weight, material, age, spatial location - no two things are the same. In the whole universe, there can be no two truly identical things.

You’d look a bit more unsure on that bit, but he’d power through. It’ll all make sense in a minute.

If no two things can be truly identical, then surely it stands to reason that all things can be categorised. Can be ordered. By some measure, by some means, all things can be sorted. No two things can draw with one another, there’s no need for tiebreakers - one by one, all things must stand in line. If you can differentiate all things, then you must be able to put them into distinct categories.

It makes sense, right?

Each thing can fit into several different categories at the same time, but my point still stands. If you can put them into categories and they’re still unique - as we already know they must be - then you must be able to categorise them again. Over and over, smaller and smaller boxes, until everything fits neatly into place. Until everything is in order.

Hmm. You probably wouldn’t look convinced. Not to worry, it’s not that important just yet. The first time is always the hardest.

Leaning over a display case, examining the contents, your breath might mist on the cool glass. But what about things you can’t see? Things you can’t touch? Things that not everybody experiences the same way? Like feelings, or colours, or sensations. Which colour is the best? Which rollercoaster is the most fun? You can’t put them all in order. There’s no empirical way to do so. Your theory falls apart.

Does it? Your point is fair, considering that you don’t know any of the metaphysics at play here yet. If you could feel those feelings forever, you’d be able to compare them. It’s true, you can’t capture the best moment of a rollercoaster in a bottle. But if you could, wouldn’t that let you sort them just like anything else?

You’d open your mouth to retort, but he’d beat you to it. He always does.

We don’t have the means to do that, of course. But theoretically, if it were possible to measure every moment of your life - and it is, we just don’t know how to do it yet - then you’d be able to break them down to their base components. And once you’ve done that? Well. The only thing left to do is order. The only thing left at all is order.

You’d shake your head. Gently, he’d hold your chin as he repositioned your audio guide from where it would be about to slip.

You always sound so cute when you think you’re right. But everyone feels things differently, and not everyone will feel the same about the same things. If you’re terrified of rollercoasters, you won’t call them fun at all, but if you love them then you’ll say they’re the most fun you’ve ever had. By your logic, all people will have different categorisations for different things, which necessarily means that there can be no single universally applicable categorisation for everything.

Oh, you’d look so proud of yourself, voice echoing in the corridor as he holds the door to the next gallery open for you. Checkmate.

You poor thing. If only, little trickster god. You put up a good fight, but alas - the metaphysical theory behind it disproves you.

But h-

We can talk about it later, dear. He’d pretend to examine the object label on the wall to your left, brushing off your misplaced concern - you don’t really need to hear him explain all that. Far too boring, far too dense and dull. A singular waste of time and effort, especially considering how precious little time he gets to spend with you as it is.

Marble and varnished wood and wrought iron. The museum is vast and full of fascinating things. Easily enough to fill an afternoon and then some. Take your time.

Walk with him.

Beauty, it is said, is in the eye of the beholder. Blake disagrees. Whoever said that had clearly never met you. It’s difficult to understand, and harder to accept, but the black-and-white of it is undeniable - surely someone has to be the one to know. Surely there must be someone who bears the precious burden of truth. Eight million people. Why shouldn’t it be him?

(Perhaps he’s biased. Forgive him. He is, after all, only human.)

Ugliness and filth and corruption. How is it that you stand above it all? So perfectly ordinary, yet more than he could ever hope to imagine. Circumstance tries to destroy you, time and time again - maybe you realise, maybe you don’t. It doesn’t matter. He knows, and as long as he’s here, you will always be protected. What’s the point of power if you can’t protect the things you love? You are beautiful, it's true - but weak, naïve, deprived of the knowledge of the world that you so desperately need, bereft of the guiding hand of truth. A flimsy, delicate creature. A precious, fragile soul. Nothing more than a butterfly, wandering blithely towards a hurricane. Blake has always been handy with a net.

(Nobody could deny it. Say what you will about Blake, but he's never been the type to take things for granted.)

It’s one thing, to have been shown the realisation of ruin. It’s another, to rally against it. Don’t you understand? He had to go away, to leave you lonely for a while, but it wasn’t his fault. He had to know the truth, and the truth is painful, the learning even more so. What man wouldn’t feel lonely, without you by his side? You’ve spoilt him with your presence, and in your absence a plan was made. Well, perhaps not made. Finalised. Solidified. Crystallised. The seed of the feeling has always been there, ever since you met - at last, it was time to water you, each tiny drop by his own careful hand.

The old Blake, that helpless, stupid creature - now remade in the dawning of the new day, baptised in the ocean of righteousness. The architect of his own future, and now yours too. Truth is truth is truth, and the audio guide in your ear speaks with his voice.

After all, who did you think made this place?

The victorious curator, hand in hand with his prize exhibit. Your frozen form, lovingly suspended in smooth resin, falling eternally but never hitting the ground. It’s all dedicated to you, it’s all for you, every shelf and hook and souvenir postcard. Would you call it greedy? Would you call it selfish? What is an archive, if not for the preservation of the collector? What is a museum, if not a prison cell of the past? Wall to wall, every facet of your being shimmers under the light. Every smile, every breath, every eyelash that you've ever wished on, kept forever in endless magnificence. If he’s selfish, so be it. His most glorious altar, and the god to which it is dedicated.

Turn up the volume of the audio guide, darling. Are you listening?

(It's funny, he guesses. He spends all this time waxing poetic about how all things are unique and special in the universe, in a world that doesn't even really exist. At least, not to anyone else. If it looks real, seems real, feels real - how are you meant to know the difference? Some people are just born lucky, and how fortunate, then, that he is the way he is. Puppets very rarely know the faces of their masters, and Blake has always been gentle with your strings.)

High ceilings catch the echo. This place, his greatest gift to the one he loves more than all else. Galleries go on forever and the cinema room plays an endless loop. People like to have weddings in museums, don't they? The sky outside is bright and white and nothing at all, and nighttime means nothing to a world that cannot end.

Look at you. Oh, just look at you. Encased in glass, resting gently on your wire skeleton, arm outstretched towards the skylight. Submerged in vinegar, no bubbles, leaning your head against the side of your big glass jar. Ice crystals glitter on your frozen tongue, marble fabric hangs immobile from your granite shoulder, familiar pairs of painted eyes gaze across the exhibition floor. You’re right behind him. You’re all around him. Every wall, every case, every frame - your lovely form fills them all. All things are equal on the altar of his adoration and he is your greatest disciple, raising the knife up in his hands and swearing on your name that he will bring you back to life. Watch over him, bless him, smile upon him. Just you wait. One last miracle.

Butterfly nets on every window. If you love it, never let it go. Here, you have always been perfectly preserved.

If only, if only, if only. The rest of the world would be so much simpler if that, too, were in his hands. The chosen one, with you eternally his first choice. As it is, he surveys his domain - marble stretches leisurely out in front of him, and a gilded ceiling hides the panicked wings tangled in the mesh, fluttering mournfully just outside his field of view. Sunsets come and go, the audio guide sings and sings, and the dust never settles.

Flesh and stone and the unending centuries of you. He kneels before you, kisses your hand, gazes into your eyes. The sound of church bells rings throughout the universe. Here, he doesn’t have to wonder. As ever, your devotee.

(It is said that the statue of a saint might speak to a believer. What are dreams for, if not the realisation of miracles?)

Tell me, honey. Your smile is as beautiful as ever. Do you think this is real?

Maybe, this time, you’ll reply.

masterlist

this is an original work by @gingerbreadmonsters - please do not repost or misattribute

#redacted asmr #redacted audio #redacted blake #redacted angst #redacted closeknit #ginger writes #gingerbreadmonsters

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