#especially the last sam quote | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

shurisneakers · 1 year ago

Text

unsolved (i)

Summary: Bucky doesn't even believe in the paranormal. So who the hell thought it was a good idea to stick him in a series about everything haunted for the internet's amusement? With his loose-canon of a teammate who has no concept of subtlety or any shits left to give, to make things even worse. (Buzzfeed unsolved AU)

Warnings: swearing, frustrated bucky at his little shit supreme, Very Loud reader, images and memes that all have alt texts.

A/N: yes this is literally harmless in a different font. do not ask me if anything doesn't make sense. i cannot explain. i resurface every 3 years to present you with ideas born from menty b's. ANYWAY shout out to my beloved ryan and shane. pls enjoy <3

Bucky doesn’t appeal to the youths.

Apparently.

On God, he cannot fathom why.

He had definitely left the house in the last six months, maybe. Smiled in at least two pictures that existed on the internet. He even knew what Discord was. Sort of.

By all accounts, he should be treated as the modern day icon that he was.

“The youths?” he repeats, the word so foreign on his tongue it felt odd to even say it.

“Your numbers are the lowest of the whole team.” The latest tech-dude, with a tablet twelve models ahead of the one Bucky had in his room, tells him monotonously. “Wilson, Romanoff and Barton score the highest. Everyone else lies around the middle. You are dead-last.”

Bucky has the audacity to look offended.

“Anything to say?” Their PR head, Maya, asks him, amused.

He stares, formulating the wittiest one liner he could in three seconds.

“I don’ care,” he mumbles.

Maya sighs. “Look, the team took the decision together. As far as I’m aware, you are still a member. You need some PR if you guys want to stay in the public’s good books.”

“No one’s gonna listen to me.” Bucky wasn’t exactly the poster child for American values. He couldn’t even vote until three years ago, and that came only after the full wrath of a Steve Rogers descended on the email inbox of the DMV.

“That’s why it’s important to get them to like you,” Maya emphasizes. “Or the idea of you at least. A very sanitized, corporate friendly version.”

His eyebrow twitches unintentionally.

“And also you signed the contract.”

Well. Shit.

Truth be told– and he has openly and rather loudly stated this on numerous occasions even especially when no one asked– he doesn’t understand why they need a PR team. The world has calmed down significantly over the last few years. Bucky hadn’t really been out crime-fighting as much as he was people-watching. There hasn’t been an earth-shatteringly dystopian-level event in the longest time, and there seemed to be a group of spandex-clad teenagers who seemed to do a good job at taking care of them when they did threaten to occur. Go kids.

Even if they needed PR, he could arguably understand the appeal of Sam and Nat and why the people would want to see more of them. Bucky, on the other hand, looked like he crawled onto Earth most days of the week.

“What do I have to do?” he asks ultimately, knowing there was no way to get out of this. “Interviews?”

The intern shares a look with Maya. Bucky shares a look with the ceiling.

“The team agreed to do a series of videos, each focusing on a different niche,” she begins, “Crash courses on science, pointing out mistakes in spy movies. Once a week.”

Bucky nods along. He can pinpoint Bruce and Nat for those.

Maya stares at him.

Bucky stares back.

“So,” she says slowly, like he’s a moron, “you would–”

“No.”

The intern sighs heavily like they discussed that this was going to happen. Bucky was getting predictable. This annoys him even further, for some reason.

“Only once a week, and it doesn’t have to be anything crazy–”

“I’m not doing videos,” he interjects. “I’ll tweet a few times. I’ll even go outside. But ’m not doin’ videos.”

A big step was to get the Avengers off Twitter after the regular shit-storm that occurs every time they’d quote-tweet another politician calling them shitheads. Getting them back on seems counterproductive.

“Fine,” Maya relents, looking at the intern. “We'll work something out.”

Bucky leans back in his chair, and meditating on ways he can weasel his way out of those too.

So they stick him in a couple of interviews.

Bucky, as the recluse extraordinaire that he was, does unsurprisingly terrible at them.

Variety does a piece on him that was supposed to take up 2 pages. They send back half a page worth of usable material and Bucky gets a lecture on how monosyllables don't count as answers.

He grunts in return. Maya’s itch to smack his shoulder with the rolled up draft increases.

They set him up for pap walks. Just him getting fast food for the team, or sitting in the park.

They don’t take into account that Bucky was trained professionally for years on how to hide, sneak in and out of places without a soul knowing he was ever there.

The paparazzi spend three hours waiting for him outside the pizza place, while he’s been home for two hours with two demolished pepperonis and an order of mozzarella sticks.

They give him access to his Twitter.

He tweets some dumb shit and gets shadow banned by that evening.

Maya is sick and tired, and the interns have shifted three times since the whole ordeal started. Bucky honestly feels a little bad. Maybe he should try to be like Scott, who not only wrote a book, finger-gunned at photographers, did an interview a week, but also agreed to a podcast and a video series about literally anything they suggested.

“Play nice,” Sam tells Bucky one evening.

It’s an off-hand comment, not even really looking at him while he says it.

Bucky doesn’t need to ask what he’s referring to, but he thinks that maybe he has gone too far.

He begrudgingly agrees.

Therefore, it begins.

They stick him in the background of a few videos. Just to interact, add his commentary on what was going on, suggestions.

Then the jokes really start.

“I just don’t got anything to add,” Bucky tries, in a failure of an attempt to justify his lack of contribution.

Maya only stares at him, but Bucky swears he can hear her curse quietly, even though her lips don’t move even a millimeter.

He is not put in another video.

And so he finds himself here.

In a meeting room that he’s convinced is barricaded from the outside so he can’t slither out the door again. Another intern with pink-tinted glasses that took up half their face.

Maya’s in the midst of explaining to him that sure, his numbers had gone up by a decimal, but that was because people had started editing him into the backgrounds of other pictures for other users to find in a perplexing take on Where’s Waldo.

“Videos seem to be working,” she ties it together. “But we need more than you just standing silently behind Captain Rogers.”

“But it’s working,” Bucky objects. “I don’t see why it has to change.”

Maya sends him a glare. Bucky decides then it’s good to shut up.

“Are you on the internet a significant amount?” the intern asks. The glasses on their face have changed colours to green. Bucky’s eyebrow furrows.

“No.”

For the next thirty minutes, he is subjected to a pop quiz about too many words ending with ‘core’, ‘coded’ and ‘eras’. He’s surprised that he knows what cottagecore is. He definitely doesn’t fucking know what a tomatogirl, nor does he want to.

“What do you like doing?” the intern enunciates, pulling up a spreadsheet of niches that had built a dedicated community around themselves over the years. “Makeup? Cleaning? Parkour?”

Bucky wonders if they’d really create a montage of him just micro cleaning the kitchen every week. It doesn’t sound half bad.

Beyond that, the only thing he can think of is woodworking, which Sam introduced him to. While he spends time creating little figures, he wouldn’t say it was–

“You really are dead silent,” the intern breaks his train of thought, tone almost that of wonder. “Guess the whole ‘ghost story for seventy years’ is more true than I thought.”

Bucky throws him a weary look, and works on unclenching the fist that tightened involuntarily.

“Was that necessary?” Maya’s voice comes coldly. “Take fifteen. Go find the other one we were supposed to meet.”

While sheepish and somewhat apologetic, the kid still looks relieved to be out of there. To be honest, Bucky isn’t really offended– he’s grown a thick skin over the years. But he also thought the guy was a little shit now.

Maya turns back to him, but Bucky finds that the table contains wonders far more interesting than the conversation at hand.

“Back to what we were talking about.” She ruffles through something on her laptop. “Puppets? History?”

He wordlessly shakes his head.

Been the former, seen too much of the latter.

Maya’s head tilts abruptly. “You like ghosts?”

He wonders if the prior conversation had anything to do with this insightful question.

Bucky shrugs. “Don’t exist.”

“Really,” Maya deadpans. “Aliens and multiversal baboons are fine, but no ghosts.”

“I’ve seen aliens and multiversal baboons. Never seen a ghost in my life,” Bucky argues right back.

“Other people have seen ghosts.”

“Good for other people.”

The door swings open right as Maya’s eyes narrow at him. Guess it wasn’t padlocked.

“Whatever it is you think I did, Maya, I didn’t. I think,” you announce in a volume too much for a closed room, stopping when you see Bucky sitting cross-armed and looking delightfully disgruntled. “Oh hey, Barnes. Fancy seeing you here.”

Bucky had met you. The newest addition to the team that had made a grand entrance a couple of weeks ago. He thinks you stay on the floor below him, but he has nothing backing this hypothesis other than the disco funk music that had started appearing at odd hours of the night.

“Please sit,” Maya cracks a smile at you that Bucky had yet to earn. “Sorry, I know our meeting is scheduled for later, but I figured we could kill two birds with one stone.”

You look between her and Bucky, who hasn’t moved an inch since you got here, much less even said hello.

“You must be really bad if Maya had to call me in,” you tell him outright. “I’m usually like, her last option.”

“Thanks,” Bucky replies dryly.

“Look, here’s my final pitch.” Maya sighs, before turning to you. “You’re new, and we need something to introduce you slowly to the public.”

“Oh, am I finally getting hard launched?” You grin, and Bucky doesn’t know what that means. “Just imagine me kicking my feet, giggling or whatever.”

“And he needs… an upgrade.” Maya’s thumb juts out towards Bucky who simply rolls his eyes.

“Right.” Your sight lands on him from across the table. “I’ve seen the memes.”

“What memes?” he grunts, because while the team had definitely seen them, it didn't occur to anyone they should show it to him. He loves them. Really. So much. Die for them.

You only look too happy to pull out your phone and start typing.

“Do you know what skinwalkers are?”

“No.”

“That’s what they say you look like, lurking in the back of all your friends’ videos,” you continue, swerving around your phone to show him.

Bucky doesn’t look impressed. He can’t say he blames them either, which makes him inexplicably maddens him.

“At least they’re calling you their boyfriend,” you add, entirely unhelpfully. “That’s gotta count.”

“Right.” Maya clears her throat. “The both of you–”

“Are getting paired together, I suppose,” you hum.

Bucky’s eyebrows pull together.

He barely knows you. Just a little bit on how you ended up here, that you enjoyed hanging out with the team, figuring out your place in the compound, and were seemingly doing a great job at it.

You were… loud. And open.

Bucky feels the compulsive need to compensate for that by doubling down on how silent he could get, as if the two of you couldn’t co-exist in the same space in equilibrium.

Maya pointedly raises a finger at you. “Do you believe in ghosts?”

“For the right price, I will believe in whatever you tell me to.”

Her face lights up brighter than Bucky's ever seen.

“Great.” Maya slams her laptop closed. “See you later.”

Bucky’s left staring as she exits, not even throwing the both of you another look.

“That was quick,” your voice cuts through the silence. “What was that all about?”

“Don’ ask me,” he grumbles, with a sinking feeling that he knew exactly what was about to follow.

“Ghost hunting?” Bucky echoes a week later, as expected.

“Yes,” Maya tells him simply. “Two of you. A series based on paranormal activity.”

“I don’t even believe in them,” he reiterates.

“That’s the point,” she emphasises. “Skeptic and believer. It makes for a good contrast.”

“Why us both?” He hopes it doesn’t come off as offensive. He just doesn’t see why he can’t do this with Sam. Even Clint, if a gun was really pressed to his head.

“I’m new, no one gives a shit about me,” you say brightly and full of promise. “Yet.”

“Exactly. It’ll be low key. Not an overwhelming number of viewers, no expectations. It’s perfect for launching one Avenger and re-launching another.”

“Sounds rad.” You grin, leaning back as your feet rest on the chair in front of you.

Maya looks relieved for a moment that at least one of you was on board. “No promises on anything. We shoot one video, and if it does well, we stick with it.”

“What if I don’t want to?” Bucky argues.

“Then you have until tomorrow morning to give us another feasible idea,” Maya dishes back.

Bucky retreats into his seat, arms crossed over his chest.

Truth be told, he considered himself to be the most boring person in the team and though he had made his peace with that, he was sure thar bringing that up now would entail Maya shooting him in the foot.

“Fine,” he agrees and the sighs around the room are loud.

He scoffs. So fucking dramatic and for what.

“Put her there, partner.” You stretch ungracefully over the large table, sticking out your hand.

Bucky eyes your hand. “Do you even believe in ghosts?”

“I do now, yeah.” You nod seriously. “Love ‘em. Can’t get enough of them.”

“One video,” Maya reminds him as a balm. “And if it doesn’t work, you’re off the hook forever.”

Off the hook? Forever? For Bucky?

Yay.

“One video,” he reiterates.

You roll your eyes before smiling when he leans forward to grab it. You yank it up and down clunkily. He blinks at you, letting go slowly.

“Thank fuck,” Maya groans, head dropping onto the table.

Your smile is wild. “Guess we’re doing this shit together.”

He doesn’t even have to look very deep in his soul. He already knows he’s going to suffer.

here’s my ko-fi if you’d like to support my writing!

to keep up with updates for this fic and others, please follow @shurisneakersupdates and turn on post notifications!

also i'd absolutely love to make this a community led fic like how harmless was! if you have memes or any paranormal ideas or just any prompts in general, please please send them my way <3

Next part

#bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #mcu fic #bucky fic #bucky barnes fic #bucky fluff #bucky barnes fluff #bucky angst #bucky barnes angst #unsolved fic #winter soldier x reader #Winter Soldier #bucky barnes #bucky

720 notes · View notes

sombrashe · 3 months ago

Text

content afab!reader, chubby!reader, josh and reader are in an established relationship, cunnilingus

note(s) until dawn is actually a game about a polycule falling out | sam is just kinda there but both josh and reader thinks shes fine af

Josh’s voice is soft as he calls up to Sam. You’re spread out on the sectional couch listening to their short conversation as Josh tends to the fireplace in front of you. The television above drones on quietly in the background. Stretching you blink slowly at him, Sam’s response coming back after a short pause.

“I’m going to take a quick shower before we head out.”

“Oh, well, do you need any help? Maybe with your hair?”

The last comment is a mumble and you scoff making your way over to the minx. When he finally notices your presence you lightly smack his chest with the back of your hand. He feigns hurt with a well-placed hand over his wounded heart.

“What, you want me to go up there and ask her to join us?”

His eyelids widen for a moment before relaxing.

“Really?”

“As if, like you’d be able to focus”

Honestly, Sam is gorgeous and you wouldn't mind her joining your personal soiree. Unfortunately for you, Josh gets distracted easily and your last threesome ended with you unsatisfied after he got overwhelmed. Dancing your fingers over his shoulder blade you take in the heat dancing in the air. Pulling yourself away you plop back down onto the couch and bounce a little as you settle in. Dragging a blanket over your lap you feel the fluffiness beneath your fingertips. The loft feels nice and cozy especially with the autumn chill settling over the city. Making his way over to your spot he crouches in front of you with a wolfish grin. Pulling the blanket slowly off your legs you watch him with thin lips. Keeping your protests to yourself as you assess exactly what his plan is. Finally, he leaves the blanket in a pile on the floor next to him. With gentle hands on your knees, he starts slowly pushing them apart so he can watch your dress slide up your thighs.

“Joshua Washington I didn't spend hours getting ready just for you to undo it all with this spiked libido.”

He gives you a simple chuckle and kisses the inside of your plush thigh. Huffing you shift to give him better access. He licks a stripe from his spot against your skin to your lace bottoms. A cute black thong he bought you for your anniversary months ago. Something you didn't have a chance to wear until now. And he absolutely loved it. He gives you a little growl as he creates a wet spot right against your clothed pussy. You want to argue with him, claim if he does this you’ll have to take a shower and you three will be late for dinner. A weekly occurrence, something Josh would rather die than miss. You know better. He won’t leave a mark that you don’t beg him to. Once his spit soaks through you're panting like a dog in heat. Something something he has you wrapped around his finger. Whatever quote Emily scoffs at you every time you have to hang up because he's grinding against your full ass. You couldn't care less, especially when he starts hitting that sweet spot deep in you. Hooking his thumbs into the legs of the lace you raise your hips to allow him easier removal of the infuriating fabric. Once he pulls them down around your ankles he claps his hands together excitement glowing in his brilliant irises.

“Here’s Joshy”

“Did you just quote Psycho at my vagina?”

He immediately looks at you genuinely appalled.

“You're not being serious.”

“You know I can never sit through those old movies, they have such long intros.”

“I really don’t know if we can continue. Psycho. God”

“Josh, I’m sorry I got Psycho and The Shining mixed up. If it’s any consolation I was thinking of the 1960 version and not that Bates Motel shit I know you hate.”

He takes a moment to think it over before responding. A long moment too and it has you shifting.

“You saved yourself with that.”

He taps his pointer finger against your knee during his response. Diving forward his tongue easily finds your clit. Surprise and pleasure flood your veins at the same time and it leaves you lightheaded. Gripping a fistful of dark hair at the back of his head you press him closer to your core. Forcing two fingers beneath his chin he slips them inside your soaked core. Wiggling them he’s limited in the amount of room he has to thrust. Focusing on using the tips of his fingers he slightly moves them in and out while pressing hard against that spongy part inside of you.

“Oh~ Josh, fuck.”

“I got you, babe.”

His voice is muffled but you hear him clear as a bell. Huffing you weakly grind yourself against his face feeling his prominent nose press against the fat of your lower stomach. Letting your head fall back against the back of the couch you relish in the moment. Pleasure floods your abdomen and you can feel it tighten as you get closer to release. He alternates between short licks and hard sucks. Something that works in his favor as the coil in your abdomen finally snaps and you flood his chin and fingers in your essence. Panting you leave your eyes closed for a few moments as you attempt to catch your breath. Pulling out of you with a slick pop you nearly jump out of your skin as something pops against your chest. Blinking, you see Sam handing Josh a towel for his soaked limbs. Looking down you take the fresh pair of underwear in your hands and slip it around your ankles. Grabbing the towel out of the air as Josh tosses it to you you take a moment to clean yourself up before pulling the dark blue thong up your legs and settling it snugly against you. Fixing your dress you give Sam an apologetic smile.

“Hope you two worked up an appetite.”

#something short because i used to have this reoccurring dream about him #until dawn #until dawn smut #josh washington #josh washington smut #josh washington x reader #josh washington x you #sombrashe writes

116 notes · View notes

tossawary · 1 year ago

Text

The last time that I rewatched "The Fellowship of the Ring" (extended edition, of course), my favorite new detail that I noticed is that the characters, once they set out on their journey, are pretty much always traveling from screen-left to screen-right.

It had been a few years since I'd seen the films and I'd learned more about filmmaking in that time. I'm completely biased regarding the LOTR films; they're not perfect, but I grew up on them, I love them. I was trying to take notes on all of the little details that made the world of the films seem so rich and so enchanting to me. The camerawork, character staging, and editing is one of the many things that just happened to jump out at me at this time.

When Frodo and Sam are leaving the Shire, the camera is set up in such a way that they start on the left side of the screen (<- that side) and travel across it to the right side of the screen (-> that side).

This way to go the farthest you've ever been from home. ->

As the hobbits travel from Bree to Rivendell, as the Fellowship travels from Rivendell to the Misty Mountains, all of those gorgeous scenic shots of the Nine Walkers show them moving from screen-left to screen-right. I haven't rewatched the entire trilogy lately, but in "The Fellowship of the Ring", it is so beautifully consistent.

There are a handful of reasons why this is done. In staging and editing, consistency regarding where the characters are placed on the screen is a storytelling tool. For example: the "180 degrees rule" says to generally keep the camera on one side of the characters within a scene, so that the audience can mentally keep track of the characters within the environment and focus on the action/dialogue. If we're watching two characters talking in a diner, even in the close-ups, one character will usually be kept on screen-left and be shown facing screen-right, and the other will be kept on screen-right and be shown facing screen-left. It feels stable. (People will sometimes choose to break the "180 degrees rule". It can be a tool to create a sense of disorientation and/or instability in the audience.)

In "The Fellowship of the Ring", the maps that the audience is shown of Middle Earth tell us that the Shire is located in the West (left side of the map) and everything else of relevance (Rivendell, Moria, Rohan, Gondor, Mordor) is East (right side of the map). As the characters consistently travel screen-right, the audience builds up a firmer mental map of Middle Earth and can better keep track of the characters' progress on their long journey. With every step that Frodo takes towards screen-right (->), we know that he is traveling East, taking another step towards Mordor.

Left to right may also instinctively feel like the way forward in a culture that writes and reads from left to right. Regardless of which way you write: if your film establishes extremely consistently that one direction is forward, then this visual language can be used to tell the audience that something is wrong if the characters start traveling from right to left. They might be lost! It builds suspense in the visual depiction of the characters going backwards and undoing progress! This all suits the lengthy hero's journey of LOTR very well, in my opinion.

There's an old joke that knowing how anything is made ruins the magic, and another old joke that knowing anything about filmmaking makes you insufferable to watch movies with, but I've never felt that way, especially not here. How does that quote go? It's still magic even if you know how it's done. (GNU Terry Pratchett.)

I find it enchanting, honestly, that so many people can work so hard for an effect that can seem so simple. Actors, directors, camera operators, editors, storyboarders, and so many others on the crew of the films consistently placed characters, sets, and props just so! So that the audience could more easily keep track of where everyone was and lose themselves a little more deeply in the story.

It's such a simple rule! And it works so well! Left -> Right. West -> East. Shire -> Mordor. Home -> Adventure. Known -> Unknown.

I personally recommend trying to keep track of character movement across the screen in films, especially if you have any interest in visual storytelling (films or illustration or something else). It's fun! It's impossible for me to unsee, watching "The Fellowship of the Ring" now, and I think it's a wonderful piece of movie magic.

#tossawary tolkien #frodo baggins #samwise gamgee #long post

965 notes · View notes

charlietheepicwriter7 · 9 months ago

Text

V The Mysterious Wayne Family

Dick Grayson V Gotham - Chapter 2

“Why can’t I sit in the front seat?” Danny demanded to know, crossing his arms from the back of Dick’s car.

Dick sighed, peering back at him with the rearview mirror. He’d been shaky as they escaped the apartment without getting attacked by the media. Did the idiot get sick? Was the media in this dimension such a big threat?

Truthfully, Danny didn’t know a lot about this dimension, despite having lived in it for around a year. That year was spent almost entirely homeless, spending only the last few weeks with Dick. Otherwise, he was sleeping where he could, spending his days in libraries and conning people out of cash as a child medium.

…Well, calling it “conning” was a bit of an overstatement. He did get people in contact with dead relatives and the like. He just… didn’t always quote them exactly, especially when it meant he could get enough money to eat for the day.

“It’s unsafe, Danny, you know that.”

Danny glared at him from his booster seat, which put him perfectly at eye level so he could lock eyes with Dick with the rear-view mirror. He hated this whole situation: the booster seat, his age, needing to rely on an adult, the stupid media, the stupid police, the stupid Dick�� Okay, he kinda liked the booster seat. It was based off of some hero—Superbman—who was an alien? But looked like a human?

That may be one of the biggest differences between this dimension and his hom–the dimension he was born in. Danny had been one of the only heroes back there, along with Valerie and Dani, if you could even call them heroes. In this dimension? There were hundreds. There were space aliens to normal people in costumes to other humans with powers, and while not all of them were heroes, a lot of them were.

And Danny hated how easy they had it.

Every day back in Amity Park was a fight for acceptance, a battle to convince people that yes, he was a ghost with good intentions, only for that trust to be lost the moment he wasn’t fast enough to stop a ghost from hurting someone, or got thrown through a wall trying to protect people. It was constantly one step forward and one step back, and nothing Sam or Tucker or Jazz said ever truly made him okay with it.

Despite everything, he hoped Amity Park was doing alright without him. He couldn’t go back—wouldn’t go back, even if he had an open portal and his powers, not after what happened—but hopefully they were doing okay.

He hoped his rogues had listened and stayed away from the Fenton portal. For their own safety.

Like every time he thought of his pa–the Fentons, the scars across his chest flared up. They might have been long-healed, but the pain always lingered, a sharp lance that lingered in the thin skin of his wound. Fiddling around in his pocket, Danny found his juul and puffed. Exhaling, a bubble gum smoke filled the cabin as the CBD started to work its way into his blood.

Dick coughed. “You know you won’t be able to do that in the manor, right?”

Danny grumbled, rolling down the window a crack.

“I’m serious, Danny. I know you need it, but the rules are different at the manor. You’ll need to go outside to smoke.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll smoke outside. Wouldn’t want your gramps to get bent out of shape.”

He laughed. “I think Alfred would be alright, once we explain your medical issues. It’s Bruce we’ll have to worry about. He’s got this thing about drugs… once he learns what’s in your juul, he do whatever it takes to get you off it. He won’t even listen if we tell him about your chronic pain, he’ll just think you’re lying!” Dick threw his hand up in the air. “Honestly, it’s just lecture after lecture with him.”

“He can suck a cock then!”

Dick laughed, all traces of anger gone as his bright eyes glanced at him through the mirror. “Say that to his face, and you get ice cream for a week.”

“Done!”

The illusive Bruce Wayne. Danny had heard the name from the TV that morning, and apparently he was Dick’s dad. Not that Dick ever mentioned him in the months they knew each other. Not that this Bruce guy ever visited on the occasions Dick managed to convince him to stay the night, nor in the weeks after his foster placement was finalized. Danny didn’t even know Dick had a dad until this morning, so clearly something was going on here.

If he focused on this case—the mystery behind the estrangement of Dick and Bruce—then he’d finally be able to get his mind off Mrs. Bennett’s case. The Shade had approached him early that morning, flickering in the moonlight, barely visible and just formed. Her case was so easy too; her killer was her son-in-law, she’d been awake when he killed her and he’d definitely left behind evidence too, but there was no telling if the other detectives at Bludhaven PD would find it. Or would care enough to find it.

Corrupt bastards.

Speaking of which—”Are we actually going to be able to consult on cases while we’re in Gotham, or was that just something you said to make me feel better?”

“I believe I said case, as in the singular one with Mrs. Bennett. But yes, I’ve already arranged it with the Commissioner.”

“But she works for the Damir family! We can’t trust her.”

“We can’t trust her when it comes to cases related to the Damir family,” Dick corrected. “Other than that, she’s decent at her job.”

“That’s not a compliment.”

“She’s better than the other officers in our department?” he tried again.

“Also not a compliment. I’ve met dead guys that are better cops.”

They bantered back and forth, but the closer they got to Gotham, the tenser Dick became. Dick wasn’t the type to get serious out of nowhere—the only times Danny could remember were when a case involved a gang or that one terrible time when some ugly-ass assassin with a stupid-ass name came to town—but whatever was waiting for them… must be bad. Right?

Gotham, Danny noticed as they drove through town, looked better than Bludhaven, like how rats look better than turds. Danny had heard the rumors about Gotham, mostly about all the dangerous villains, but there was clearly some money going into infrastructure. Beautiful gothic buildings dripping with gargoyles towered overhead, and there weren’t nearly as many boarded up shops and potholes.

It wouldn’t have been a bad place to set up shop if it weren’t for all the Shades around.

The ghost population of this dimension mostly comprised of Shades with the occasional Poltergeists and Wraiths. Ectoplasm wasn’t as accessible here; just traveling to this dimension had stripped Danny of almost all the ectoplasm in his body and he still hadn’t recovered, so his powers barely worked. But Shades were shadows of humans when they were alive, weak and incorporeal unless you were a ghost too, barely kept together with their obsession.

Bludhaven had a lot of Shades. That’s why Danny settled down there when he first arrived. He wanted to help people move on if he could, either by solving their murder or contacting their loved ones.

If Bludhaven had a lot of Shades, Gotham had a colossal number.

Shades clogged the walkways and the streets, dissipating when someone or something went through them and reforming in an instant. Some alleys were plugged with them and some alleys were empty. Danny watched with wide eyes. Ghosts were supposed to be rare. He’d thought ghosts were rare. But Gotham was plagued with violent crime… violent, unique, indescribable crime, worse in intensity from Bludhaven, but not quite there in frequency. There were women with their faces melted off, men ripped in half down the center, children blown to bits, creeping around the streets of Gotham.

Danny sunk down in his booster seat. “I want to go home,” he admitted quietly.

Dick sighed. “I know, kiddo. I want to go home too.”

He blinked away stubborn tears. Dick didn’t understand. This wasn’t Danny’s home, this dimension wasn’t Danny’s home, Dick wasn’t Danny’s home (as much as Danny appreciated Dick, he wanted his family, but they hated him, they attacked him, they—)

Dick continued talking. “But you know what? Everything’s going to be okay. Because my grandfather is going to love you. And Bruce— He’s a little rough around the edges and we might not get along right now, but he’s going to love you too.” Dick sounded like he was trying to convince himself more than Danny. “Tim’s going to adore you; he’s told me that he’s always wanted a younger sibling and I can’t blame him; his house looks so lonely and his parents were always gone. He’s staying with Bruce now as a foster since his dad’s in a coma, but he’s been family long before that…”

He listened to Dick continue to ramble about his family. Bruce was rarely touched upon in his stories, but Alfred was spoken of with unmistakable love (Danny never knew his grandparents, Mom and Dad were disowned years before he was born, he could probably guess why), and he clearly adored Tim (He could understand that, Danny loved Jazz with his entire soul, but what would it have been like if he had a younger sibling? Would his relationship with Dani have turned into this if they could’ve spent time together?). Dick continued with stories about his best friend and ex-girlfriend, Barabra (Sam and Tuck, Tuck and Sam, his friends were dead and it's his fault—), and even a few including Tim’s ex-girlfriend too.

He closed his eyes and tried not to think.

Before long, the car slowed to a stop. Ahead of them was a grand manor, the kind shown in those regency tv shows that Jazz loved watching, with obsessively maintained gardens and beautiful, clean exterior. A stone staircase led up to larger-than-life wooden doors; Danny couldn’t identify what kind of wood, but it was probably something expensive and old. Mahogany? That sounded like an expensive wood.

Dick put the car in park before turning around in his seat to look at Danny. “Alright, buddy. Are you ready to meet our family?”

“Your family,” Danny corrected mulishly, unbuckling his seat belt.

“Our family,” Dick said again, smiling. “They’re good people, and they’re going to be here for you.”

“Sure.” Sliding out of his seat and out of the car, Danny stayed slightly behind Dick as they walked up the steps and to the front door. Before Dick could knock or find the doorbell, the doors opened to reveal an old stereotypical butler. He even had a British accent! “Master Grayson,” he addressed Dick coolly, but when he looked at Danny, his expression softened. “And Young Master Daniel. It is good to finally meet you, and welcome to Wayne Manor. I am the family butler, Alfred Pennyworth.”

Danny ducked away. “Danny’s fine,” came his muttered response.

Alfred smiled. “Young Master Danny, then. Come along; Master Bruce is waiting for you both in the foyer.”

Dick grimaced. Did that mean something bad? What was a foyer, a fancy word for office? Was Dick going to get scolded?

They followed Alfred into the house (although, calling it a house felt like an understatement). It was even fancier inside, with marble floors and a glistening chandelier overhead. Danny felt significantly out of place in his jeans and ratty coat he’d pulled out of the trash.

There was a man pacing in the room (was this the foyer?). He was dressed in a fancy suit and built like a brick house, but looked similar enough to Dick in a weird funhouse-mirror way. The moment he saw them, his face smoothed into a banal smile and Danny immediately didn’t like him. “Dick! You’re home.” Striding up to them, the man immediately hugged Dick, who stiffly returned it. “Welcome back, chum. And who’s this?”

Dick’s smile was strained. “This is my foster son, Danny. Danny, this is Bruce; I was his ward until I turned 18.” Ouch. Not even a foster son, but a ward? That sounded like a significant step down from fostering. Danny glared at Bruce, who seemed taken aback by his hostility. Dick laughed nervously. “Sorry about him, he’s shy.” Now Danny glared at Dick.

Bruce’s smiled evened out as he crouched down, like that would hide his fucking massive body. “It’s nice to meet you, Danny,” he said. “I’m very happy you're here. Hopefully it’ll be a lot more peaceful now that you’re staying with us.”

Danny scowled. “Suck a cock, douchebag.”

Bruce’s smile dropped as Dick smothered a laugh. “Watch your mouth,” Dick scolded without any heat behind it. Danny smirked.

“It’s okay, Dick,” Bruce said, straightening up. “I’m sure Danny’s just shaken up from the sudden change. I’m feel the same, since you didn’t tell any of your friends or family that you were taking in a child.”

“Oh, so you can adopt a child without telling anyone, but when I do it—”

Alfred stepped in. “If you both could contain yourselves a minute longer, I can get the Young Masters settled in. I’ve already arranged a room for you in the family ward, Young Master Danny, if you’d like to rest? It is still rather early in the morning.”

“It might be better to give him a tour of the manor before anything else,” Dick said, eyeing Danny warrily.

“I’m not going to get lost.”

“Mhmm.” Dick didn’t believe him.

“I’m not!”

“Just like how you didn’t get lost at the precinct? Or at the morgue? Or at—”

“I never got lost on the streets!” Danny thought that was rather impressive. Besides, it’s not his fault the morgue was just empty hallways that all looked the same!

“The streets are labeled. Besides, you’ll never know where the in-house theater is without a tour.” Dick winked, like that was a big selling point.

Bruce interrupted them. “Why don't you give him a tour after we talk, Dick? It’s been a long time since we last spoke and I was hoping to ask you about your… recent life change.”

Dick pinched the bridge of nose. “Of course you want to start the interrogation right away,” he muttered, eyebrows furrowed. “Alright, but I don’t want Danny to hear this. Alfie, could you– Tim!” Following Dick’s glance, Danny found a teenager in his fancy pajamas standing on the stairs leading to the second floor. The teen, who looked enough like Dick to be his brother and Bruce’s son, rubbed his eyes like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “Tim can take you on the tour! Come on, Danny.”

Dick ushered Danny up the stairs to Tim. “Will you be okay without me?” Danny asked, not wanting to leave Dick alone with Bruce.

He got a bright smile in return. Danny didn’t trust it. “Of course I will, kiddo. Don’t worry about me, just focus on having fun with Timmy.”

Tim looked blearily between them. “What is going on?”

“You’re taking Danny on a tour so he doesn’t hear me and Bruce fight,” Dick told him plainly. “Danny, this is my brother and Bruce’s foster son, Tim. Tim, this is my foster son, Danny. You two have fun!”

Ignoring Tim’s protests that he hadn’t had breakfast yet, Dick pushed them up the stairs and into the immediate hallway, closing the door behind him. They stared at each other for a moment before Danny pressed his ear against the crack in the door. “When did Dick get a kid?” Tim asked.

“Like, three weeks ago, keep up.” Tim tried to say something again, but Danny shushed him. After a moment, Tim joined him in eavesdropping by the door.

Dick spoke. “I’ll start. I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you both I was fostering a kid. I was planning to inform you after the two month mark and Danny had settled in a bit more, but obviously that plan is out the window.”

“I accept your apology, Master Dick,” Alfred said, and there was a sigh of relief. “However, I would still like to know how this happened in the first place.”

“I’m more interested in knowing how you managed to foster him without us being interviewed as character references.”

“...I may have used my boss’ influence to make sure that only my co-workers were interviewed?” Dick admitted.

“Master Richard.”

“I’m sorry, Alfie, but he’s a flight risk! Do you know how many times I managed to get him to come home with me only for him to disappear in the middle of the night!? Fourteen times! Danny’s admitted that he ran away from his previous home, he still hasn’t told me his real last name, and he’s paranoid enough to give Bruce a run for his money! I’ve just barely managed to gain his trust. I didn’t need Bruce being Bruce to ruin it for us—”

“If you had asked me to stay away, I would have—”

“No you wouldn’t, Bruce! You’d pick and prod and try to uncover his every little secret because you don’t trust me to figure it out myself! If Danny had suspected that someone was looking into his past, he would have bolted, B. And I would have lost him forever.”

Danny nodded. He would have. Not that Bruce would have found anything about his past–the perks of getting stuck in an alternate dimension–but some rich asshole poking his nose in his business? Danny would have snuck onto the next bus out of the city.

“You can barely take care of yourself, Dick!” Bruce insisted. “If it was such a dire situation, then you could have contacted me and I would have–”

“–Lost him immediately because he has a strange hatred for billionaires?” Dick scoffed. “He wouldn’t let you get within six feet of him if you tried to take custody.”

“I–”

“He bites too.”

“Dick–”

“Hard.”

“Richard–”

“And it’s pretty bold of you to say I can’t take care of myself. Have you looked in the mirror recently? Because the word hypocrite is written across your forehead in crayon.”

“But I’m not the one who struggles to make rent each month.” Danny flinched. He’d known that Dick didn’t get paid that much, but was it really that bad? Didn’t Dick get a pay increase when he was made detective? Or was Danny taking so much money that it negated the pay increase— “Nevertheless, I’m not trying to take custody away from you, Dick. I’m just… trying to figure out how we got to this point.”

“We got to this point by not trusting each other,” Dick said tiredly. “And I still don’t trust you, not after what you did.”

Dick, I–”

“No, Bruce. This is my life. Besides you were only a few years older than me when my parents died and you decided to raise me on your own. It’s hypocritical for you to complain that I’m doing the same. Look, I’ve known Danny for over a year–”

“You mean you’ve hid this from me for over a year?”

“Bruce–”

“I knew I should have been suspicious when you got that foster license. You’ve been planning this for months–”

“Bruce!” Dick snapped, and Danny had never heard Dick that mad before, not even the first time they met. “Obviously I’ve been planning this for months! I’ve been planning this since the first week I met Danny! The only reason I got that damn license was for him!” He felt… warm. Danny knew that foster licenses were hard to get, but Dick had really wanted him since the week they met. Danny had been so… feral back then, he couldn’t imagine anyone wanting him, not even Jazz. Dick continued, voice barely audible through the door. “He’s a good kid. You don’t have anything to worry about.”

A sigh. “I just… don’t want you to do anything you’ll regret, that’s all.”

“Are you saying you regret adopting me?” The angry voice was back. “Adopting Jason?”

“That’s not what I meant—!”

Tim pulled him away from the door. “We shouldn’t be listening to this. Come on, let’s start that tour you need.”

Danny tried to pull away, but Tim was deceptively strong for his thin frame. Despite his struggles, he was halfway down the hall before he knew it. “Let me go, cocksleeve!”

“You don’t need to hear that,” Tim said. “Trust me, things always get… heated between them, when Jason is brought up. That’s not something you need to witness.”

Jason, huh? That must be the linchpin in this entire investigation. Dick had never mentioned a Jason before, but he was clearly important if the entire family got bent out of shape for him. Did Dick cut contact with Bruce because of this Jason? Did Jason force Dick to do it? Dick would never abandon his family like that, Danny knew this had to be true because of his determination in trying to take Danny home, but if he was forced to stay away… Maybe Jason is an associate of Bruce that Dick hates?

Danny finally managed to jerk his arm away. His entire hand ached. “You don’t have to drag me!”

Shock crossed Tim’s face, like he’d finally realized what he was doing, before it fell. “I’m sorry, Danny. I shouldn’t have pulled you. It’s just… Jason isn’t something you should hear about, at your age. I would appreciate it if you didn’t bring him up, especially around Bruce. Okay?”

Studying the boy, Danny agreed. Sounds like Jason’s some sort of criminal contact, so it was best to behave carefully. Danny kicked at the ground, scraping dirt off onto the carpet that ran in the center of the hall. “So, what do you guys do for fun around here?” He asked. “I don’t need a tour, I’m not a baby.”

Tim rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, I just spent the night in the library, working on a case? If you want to lend a hand with that?”

Danny narrowed his eyes. “I thought you just woke up?”

“...Just because I was in the library doesn’t mean I was awake the entire time.”

Ah, a fellow insomniac. His eyes narrowed further. “I only like interesting cases. What kind are we talking about? Fraud? Robbery? Some dinky school kid project?”

“Multiple homicides. If that’s interesting enough for you?”

“...Carry on.”

A/N: Anyway, I’m using @/jedipirateking’s age chart for the ages of Batman characters. Since we’re right before Under the Red Hood, that makes Dick 24. Danny is roughly a year younger than Damian, but was originally 17 before he was deaged.

Dick: Yes, this is my feral street child. Danny: *foaming at the mouth, swearing*

Tim, internally: Oh! Dick must have already informed Danny about our identities! They work on cases together too, maybe we can work on one to bond? Danny, internally: Wow, rich people have weird ass hobbies

Danny: *so close, yet so far from figuring out the Jason thing* Red Hood: Did someone just walk over my fucking grave again?

Yes, some things are being kept vague on purpose. That’s for a better reveal in the future.

@starlightcat04 @maeashryver @widderwise @darkstarsapocalypse @sisma @luminanightfall @storm-fire98 @amyheart19 @collectingthegoods @redhoneysugarorange @lordfirecat2004 @screechingnoises @meira-3919 @dannyphannypack @satisfactionbroughtmeback @rowanaway-fromthisbs @i-always-say-yea @avelnfear @some-rotten-nest @ark12 @heirxofxtime @akikkobara @blep-23 @skulld3mort-1fan @markus209 @stargirl1331 @onlyhereforthechaos @inth3world @awkwardmaiden @fantasticbluebirdfan @currant-owo @alice-hazelwood @screamingtofillthevoid @crystalqueertea @gaelicholiday @gmkelz11 @mattybook1987-blog @bytheoldwillowtree @apointlessbox @chemical-pepis @ghostface3100 @idontgetpaidenoughforthisshit @bathildaburp @boo-ghosties @bubblemixer @halfalix @lyra689 @dragon-dancer16 @lunadoll36 @mimilikey @hellomygay @frogs-are-pretty-awesom @overtherose @cyrwrites @your-emo-nightmare @lexdamo @roman4517 @a-slytherinish-gryffindor @raginblastocyst @thegatorsgoose @fisticuffsatapplebees @olivethetreebitch @vixen-uchiha @ae-vixrose @joseph557 @kisatamao @gin2212 @thewondersoflebanon @d4ydr34min9 @malice-of-the-sunrise @tiblii @that-awkward-fae-nerd @aph-mable @dolfay @ghostreblogging @wackyattack @writer-extraordinaire @boo-ghosties @coruscateselene @emergentpanda-blog

#dp x dc #dc x dp #dcxdp #dpxdc #constantine jr au #c: danny fenton #c: nightwing #c: tim drake #c: alfred pennyworth #c: bruce wayne #c: jason todd #fictag dgvg

279 notes · View notes

f-t-e · 1 year ago

Text

I started watching SUPERNATURAL in November 2020. I know, I know. My partner and I had been isolating alone since March. The timing felt right. I went though a wild amount of upheaval and trauma over the next year and SPN was there for me through it all. It was THE show at THE time and it kept me afloat when I needed it the most. Since November 2021 I've written just about 110,000 words of SPN fanfic, a number that seems unbelievable to me, and that too has been a real blessing to my creative life, no matter what haters say. (why didn't I write my own novels in that time? Because I have a hobby, Karen, and I love it.) And I've read about 500000x that much fanfic, which has been the biggest blessing of all. (ETA: oh right, if you want to read my fic, you can find my stuff here, I wrote a fic where Dean reads books. Lots of books.)

I know I'm a nobody in this fandom but I thought on this, our #DestielDay, I would submit my own humble rec list. I've curated this very deliberately: every fic here has just about 4000 hits or less (most under 3000) and all were published in 2020 or after. So, sort of a rec list for some lesser known and newer fics, something you maybe haven't stumbled on yet. Especially thank you to @jewishcharliebradbury, her rec lists gave me a place to start back in the day and I have tried to model the depth and quality they brought to their lists. I tried to link to everyone's tumblr, but if I missed one, let me know.

Most of all, thank you to everyone who has EVER created something for this fandom, from 2005 to 2023. I am so thankful and, honestly, honored to be among your number. You're not supposed to be cringe and say a show saved your life...but SUPERNATURAL saved me, it really did. See y'all when the movie/reboot drops, to quote Ryan Gosling in The Notebook: IT WASN'T OVER, IT STILL ISN'T OVER. And I'm glad.

-----

Finale Fix-It & S15 and Beyond

What The Moon Was Saying by Amiril (@runawaymarbles)

This is hands-down one of the coolest “Dean Rescues Cas from the Empty” fics I have ever read and the concept is brilliantly structured to mirror the literal and metaphorical things Dean needs to give up and let go to get free. Every scenario is very satisfying and they make sense, is there any better feeling? Dean is very open in this, but in a believable way that still has edges. And, oh, the reunion is so good. Plus all the family stuff. Just excellent, exactly what you want in a fic like this: lovely, well-written, smart, fulfilling, all the pieces clicking, the show but better.

Awake and Annoying by skycruise

I love the use and passage of time in this one, it has some real impact, and I love the way Dean gets into the Empty (so smart, fits just right) and what I REALLY love in this one is the way it lets Dean be really clear-eyed and honest about his relationship with Sam, both the strengths and the weaknesses. And the last line, very clever and moving inverse of one of fandom’s favorite things.

Living the life you chose by allthismusic

THEEEEE post finale Sam Winchester-Outsider-POV this fandom needs. Sam is absolutely awesome in this, the most believable, loving, realistic mix of “I knew all along” and “I had no idea” versions of Sam, landing somewhere I think that’s really true and in character. It fills in and develops so many gaps and silences in what the show let Sam know in the absolute best way. Best Brother Sam is a weakness of mine and he really shines here, there for Dean in the best ways but also coming into his own, I love it so very much. (this author also has a very great 2022 Big Bang fic, hugely recommend that one too.)

your ear to the wound that whispers by EmandFandems (@lazarusemma)

Who doesn’t love a HANDPRINT FIC?!? And boy this is such a good one. It follows Dean and his thoughts on the handprint from the first touch all the way to fixing the finale and it simply buzzes with longing and desire, tenderness and rawness. It’s great insight in lot of ways into Dean’s journey. It’s short but fulfilling and oh that very perfect last line. (this author also has a lot of great Jupernatural content.)

Somewhere Off in the Dark by magickastiel

Another awesome fic that traces Dean’s shifting/growing feelings for Cas from when he shows up in his hotel rooms to a HEA fix it after canon. Dean, again, is handled so deftly in this one, his confusion and sorrow at all the times Cas is slipping away from him all the way through the things he won’t let himself know. He feels really true in this one, sharp and tender in the best Dean ways. Also it has an agonizingly romantic end, you love to end up there.

Pins and Feathers by theskywasblue (@buttherewasnogod)

This author has so many freaking good SPN fics, omg it was almost impossible to pick just one to include on this list. Go treat yourself with their entire list because there’s so much good stuff there! But this one, oh I am a sucker for a finale fix-it that lets Dean be this tender. While I LOVE fics where he just jumps right into Cas’s arms (and write them lol) I also feel like this is so true to Dean too: that “maybe I misunderstood, maybe I shouldn’t say anything, maybe he doesn’t still –” And on top of all that, it’s a “they go the beach” fic and it gets the details of it so right, sand in your toes and all. Tender, amazing slow-burn, real, hot, full of heart and longing and everything unspoken and just waiting. Very satisfying!

i loved you first by kalmialatifolia

A set of four short fics that create an entire world of feeling and emotion. These feel like little whispered stories told under the covers, very atmospheric. There’s one very sexy one, a haircutting one (so good) and they’re just intimate. All together a great set and did I mention they’re in the “Cas saves himself” genre which is mmmm an underrated treasure.

no other faith is light enough for this place by anonymous

A fix-it fic that has a particularly unique and beautiful visual of both how and why Cas comes back. The mechanics behind it are fairly standard but the way this author creates the visual of it, the sheer emotion and force behind it and how it happens, it really stood out to me and stuck with me. It’s Dean being brave enough to really feel and the way that just blossoms – lovely, aching, full-tilt wonderful.

no proof, one touch by TakeThisWaltz (@watchinghimrakeleaves)

One thing I absolutely cannot get enough of is fic where Cas is hiding out from Dean in heaven. It just hits. And the only thing better is Dean chasing him down and the WAY he does it in this fic, methodically and – well the method (sobs) it is so endearing and OBVIOUS and gives Dean a chance to shout in all the best ways. This one is just real sweet and kind of goofy and if they have to be in heaven, I want them to still be these same two dorks.

Stay by redbrickrose

This is a post S15x18 from Cas’s POV and I think it’s very true to where he would be in the moment of getting yanked out of the Empty: resigned, hesitant about what he has in front of him, still a little in shock. And then. And then. Sweet and simple and Dean gets a chance to say, say, say it. This author has a good post series AU and a lovely little spate of S15 codas, all good. And then wrote this in real-time in the week after 15x18 Despair and right before 15x19 Inherit the Earth aired (could you just sob over the possibilities?!) and then hasn’t wrote anything since and that’s a shame but, like, yeah I get it.

like a one-two punch by Muir_Wolf (@muirmarie)

Don’t you love a short fic that feels like it’s a whole novel? This goes AU after 14x20 Moriah but it is a truly delightful twist on how Chuck could’ve reacted there and it makes Dean sharp as a knife, which is one really resonant image woven through this fic. Great imagery here and so many clever solutions for the lazy plotting of S15, including simply one of my all-time favorites in any fic ever solutions to Cas’s deal (genius) and getting rid of Chuck. Brilliant like a puzzle box yet still full of so much fucking joy.

maybe i like pleasure pain by tothewillofthepeople (@kvothes)

The fact that this was written in October 2023 and is so agonizingly good fills my heart with joy and tells me Destiel will never die lol. Cas, in particular, is great in this – he’s having a hard time adjusting to being in a body and with all the fuzz of the world. I love fics where Cas struggles with coming back from the Empty and this uses a really unique approach to it: Cas facing sensory overload and not knowing how to feel but wanting it all. Lovely, hot, Dean is just right in this too.

Earlier Canon (pre S15)

Proverbs 13:12 by starlingcas (@angelcasendgame)

Many might say I am biased because Renu has beta’ed everything I have written in the SPN fandom and they can read my brain and make everything I write better. But it’s not just that. Renu has done something beautiful and delicate in this fic, which is about Dean and Cas getting trapped in a net together (forced proximity trope, yes please) and weaves a web of its own; pulling you in just as they are pulled together. This is set mostly in early S14 (before fixing the finale in the most heart-healing way) and captures that feeling so well. There’s so much that’s unsaid between them yet still conveyed and Renu absolutely nails that, along with the tender longing that was always there. This is a fic to relish.

you may tire of me (as our december sun is setting) by deludedfantasy

You know how the show just sometimes is like “uh so anyway uh then Cas…uh…left.” and it just doesn’t make one lick of sense? FINALLY FINALLY a fic where Dean says “I’ll go with you,” and then goes because he actually would do that. This is a post Tombstone fic so it is exactly where/when he WOULD go and it is tender and hesitant and aching in just all the ways it would be between the two of them at this time. It’s about needing to keep someone in sight, it’s about having another chance to say something so important, it’s slow and soft and just right for the characters in this place. I could read this one about 100 times.

the anatomy of flightless birds by cowlovely (@dollhousemary)

This fic is basically the way you feel when you get all cozy and snug underneath your favorite blanket. This is a domestic-life-in-the Bunker S9 fic where everyone behaves like they are in character and not just like they have to get Cas off screen because the writers panicked. You’ll just want to curl up in this fic and savor it the way you wrap your fingers around a hot beverage on a very cold day, there’s no better way to describe it.

virtue by JenTheSweetie

I think I’ve read this about 100 times and it still gets me everytime? It’s a five things fic about Dean and Cas hooking up and it’s all you’ve ever wished for. This is set in an amorphous S8 and it is not just agonizingly hot but also romantic and very funny. It feels really in character! Sam is hilarious, Dean is clueless but bowled over and letting himself be swept up, Cas is delighting in every second and smarter than he lets on and it ALL feels fated and lovely and sexy and just splendid. (this author only has 3 SPN fics but they are all so good and if you try sometimes, well you just might find is an absolutely brilliant deconstruction of Dean learning the differences between “needing” and “wanting.”)

Romance at the Motel 6 by shelia_amour

This fic makes me feel like Stefon from SNL. This fic has everything: Cas and Sam pretending to be married, just the right amount of jealous Dean, Dean randomly pretending to be married to Cas, Dean realizing maybe this isn’t so fake after all, motel vibes, Cas in Dean’s clothes, Cas getting bee slippers. If you are not sold on this already, we are very different people. So good, aches just right. (set in a kind of “whenever” of canon, but I like to put it somewhere in S8.)

que sera sera by Purple_Starflower (@hauntedpearl)

The epitome of how fanfic unfolds for us all the things that COULD happen. You can’t PROVE to me Dean and Cas never snuck off to snuggle and feed Dean’s touch-starvation early in S13. I had to check when I finished because I just couldn’t believe this fic was under 4000 words because it feels so full of touch, longing, the things unspoken, and all the ways Dean was reaching, reaching, reaching. The best kind of ache, and everything by this author is lovely.

the hard edge that you’re settling for by lesspopped (@trekkiedean)

This is some S10 Demon!Dean that made my stomach hurt and my heart ache and I absolutely loved it and I absolutely hated it and it all felt so REAL with who Demon!Dean was and could have been. There’s a TW for mildly dubious consent in this, but to me, Cas was so agonizingly true to who he was/where he was at this point in canon too. This fic is gloriously, claustrophobically intimate. I say unbearable because as a reader you know that this closeness, this intimacy, is what Dean wants/craves/deserves but can only give himself as a demon and the author does an exquisite job at getting all that across. Hurts so good!

four of swords by sundryvillians (eurythmix) (@perenial)

Can the world ever have enough post 12x12 fic? The answer is, of course, no. Dean and Cas bake bread and in the soft space of creating something with their own hands, get so close to the words Cas said. It’s about healing and anger and making something just because you are so tired of everything breaking. If that alone isn’t enough to convince you, let me also throw in this is another one of those “possible off-screen moments in canon” that gives them something honest and tender and raw and it feels so very possible.

Fifteen Prayers From the Faithless by koyas_cat

Short, achy, that sweet sting. A set of prayers for Cas from the beginning to the end, full of all the things Dean doesn’t let himself say outloud and just reflecting the changes in their connection over alllll the years. So good.

#spn #spn fanfic #destiel fic #fic recs #destiel day #deancas fic recs #supernatural #destiel #happy anniversary #don't forget you're here forever

405 notes · View notes

lucky-clover-gazette · 2 months ago

Text

kings rising highlights & annotations

chapters 16, 17, 18, & 19

indented text is from the book. some quotes have commentary, some do not. some comments are serious, and some are definitely not. most of them will only make sense to people who have read the series. and, like, there are spoilers. so please read the books first if you're interested!

also: part of the reason i'm doing such a close reading is to study cs pacat's style, especially in terms of how she does romance and erotica. there are "craft notes" that might seem weird, like i'm being redundant or restating something rather than analyzing, but those are more things that i want to remember/take away from the writing!

i'm going to tag these longer posts with "sam reads capri" in case anyone wants to read them all at once.

this is a google doc i wrote with overall content warnings for the captive prince series. it's not perfect, but i do think it's important to include.

Now those sentries flanked them. They were a permanent independent military garrison, the finest chosen from each of the provinces with scrupulous neutrality to serve a two-year term. They lived in the complex of supporting outbuildings, filling the barracks and the gymnasiums, where they slept and woke and trained with immaculate discipline. It was a soldier’s greatest honour to compete in the yearly games and be chosen from the best to serve here, to uphold the strict laws.

this feels like a parallel to akielion slavery, in a way? these are supposed to be some of the most honorable and strong people in the society, yet they’re subjugated in much the same way as slaves

‘You were jealous.’ ‘My father said that I had to learn to lead, not to follow.’

ongoing “kingdom or this” theme, choosing between being a indomitable ruler and being a vulnerable human person. damen has been on both extremes, a prince and a slave, and he needs to find something in the middle.

‘That’s Kydippe, she was Queen before Euandros. She took the throne from King Treus and averted civil war.’

hooray for women!

‘He looks like you.’ Thestos was carved in outline, holding a giant piece of masonry aloft. Laurent touched his bicep, then touched Damen’s. Damen let out a breath.

laurent is treasuring the last few moments he has with damen :(

‘These petulant remarks have never suited you. The mannerisms of a boy sit so unattractively on a man.’

not going to be a lot of analysis here. we all know how fucked up this guy is. in a way, the regent is the simplest character in the entire series.

‘You know, Nicaise really thought you would help him. He didn’t know your nature, that you’d abandon a boy to treason and death out of petty spite. Or was there some other reason you killed him?’

says the regent, who killed nicaise

'After all, you are an Akielon. There must be satisfaction to be had in getting the Prince of Vere under you. He is unpleasant, but that would barely register when you are rutting.'

“you like it simple” weaponized against damen

“you like it simple” weaponized against damen ‘He has freed Jokaste, because he knows that I would never trade a tactical advantage for a whore.'

there’s that misogyny we heard about

'And he has come here to give himself up for the child. He doesn’t even care whose child it is. He just knows it’s in danger,'

nicaise. just nicaise

‘He has knelt for me.’ The Regent said it in a calm, matter-of-fact voice, so that it didn’t penetrate at first. It was just a collection of words.

“it was just a collection of words” i have a feeling that this is how damen has avoided figuring it out sooner. intentionally not making inferences or connections, even if the words are being said. it’s similar to the way he probably suspected laurent of knowing the truth about him, but disregarded indicative phrases or foreshadowing. but now he has no choice but to understand.

In the panting silence of the hall, one of the kneeling sentries rose and began to speak. ‘You have drawn your sword in the Kingsmeet.’ Damen’s eyes locked on the Regent’s. Nothing mattered but a promise. ‘I’m going to kill you.’ ‘You have broken the peace of the hall.’ Damen said, ‘The moment you laid your hands on him, you were dead.’ ‘The laws of the Kingsmeet are sacred.’ Damen said, ‘I will be the last thing that you see. You will go to the ground with my blade in your flesh.’ ‘Your life is forfeit to the King,’ said the sentry.

really good writing here. love how it alternates between damen’s single-minded anger and the situation around him, using only the dialogue instead of environmental or emotional prose

Unlike Damen, it had only taken one of the Kingsmeet soldiers to restrain Laurent, his arms forced behind his back, his breathing shallow.

“the weaker man”

‘No,’ said Damen. ‘You heard what he did.’ Roughened, it came out of him. ‘You all heard him, are you going to let him do this?’

i think it’s really interesting and ironic that the people enabling this are supposedly the most honorable in the country. damen has given vere so much shit for its debauchery throughout the series and has regarded akielos as morally pure because it “treats its slaves well.” he’s figured out that he was wrong about most of this already, but this might put the final nail in the coffin. the worst thing imaginable, to the point that damen actively avoided entertaining the notion of it, is not condemned by the akielon justice system. the law protects the regent and punishes damen here, even though the regent is a terrible person and damen is doing the right thing. also cool how this foreshadows attorney damen.

‘Come, nephew,’ said the Regent. They went.

don’t need to analyze laurent here. i’ve already done it in chapters that foreshadow this moment. just going to quarantine it to the page and move on

‘I know you felt something for him. If you are going to be sick, do it quickly. We have to go. There will already be men coming to find us.’

shut the fuck up nikandros

Through the haze he heard Jord’s voice. ‘You left him? You saved your own life and left him with his uncle?’

shut the fuck up jord

Jord said, ‘You coward, you left him to—’ The words were abruptly cut off as Nikandros took hold of Jord and slammed him back against the wagon. ‘You will not speak that way to our King.’

shut the fuck up nikandros and jord

Released, Jord was panting slightly. ‘He wouldn’t have come back alone. If you think that, you don’t know him.’

damen never said that he did

What would Laurent do? He knew what Laurent would do. Stupid, mad Laurent had sacrificed himself. He had used the last piece of leverage he had: his own life. But Damen’s life was valueless to the Regent.

and laurent’s life is valueless to laurent. but clearly not to jord or damen or paschal or loyse or the soldiers or victims whose lives he has protected

He felt the limits of his own nature, which too easily swung to anger, and the need—stymied by circumstance—to bring about the Regent’s death. All he wanted was to take up his sword and cut a path into Ios.

he likes it simple. this isn’t simple. so what’s the opposite of simple, then? what would laurent do? what is the approach that ISN’T just ripping the grate out of the wall? guess we're about to see.

‘He thinks he’s alone,’ he said.

for a long time, yeah. until he got stuck with you. which he hated at first, because he felt an irrepressible connection to his worst enemy (the mutual moral arbitration and “yes and”ing of books 1 & 2), but ended up treasuring your connection so deeply that he made himself alone again to save you.

It was what he liked, public humiliation coupled with private chastisement, his reality validated by all those around him.

1) parallel to kastor sending damen to be a slave 2) akielion slavery except it’s seen as honorable which is somehow even more humiliating than forced submission, and there’s nothing to chastise bc they’re groomed to not have opinions. but spot on with “reality validated by all those around him”—the strong over the weak, as a sign of status and power. it’s all the same.

‘You’re right, I can’t fight my way in.’ From the beginning he had been a tool, a weapon to be used against Laurent. The Regent had used him to hurt, to unsettle, to shake Laurent’s control; and finally, to destroy him. ‘I know what I have to do,’ he said.

damen is going to play this veretian game of mock trial and win

He expected to be challenged at the outer gates by soldiers warned and wary, on the lookout for him. But perhaps they were on the lookout for Damianos, the arrogant young King at the head of his army, not a single man in an old worn cloak, a hood that came down over his face, and sleeves to hide his arms. No one stopped him.

this entire thing is a long-awaited subversion of damen to be more like laurent. all the things he hated about laurent, claimed not to understand in previous books, he’s now embodying in this plan, because he understands laurent and why he’s developed these mechanisms in the first place. and he can finally see how coming at issues with this sort of deceptive, restrained, and calculated approach can be extremely effective, especially when everyone—including laurent—expects the opposite from him.

laurent, despite everything, does not expect damen to be able to solve this problem. he can’t just throw a sword at it or rip it out of a wall. damen likes it simple. but what laurent doesn’t understand is that damen loves laurent more than he likes it simple, and that means he’s willing to endure complication in order to protect him. something that laurent has gotten very good at doing for others, but wishes for no one to return. it’s a good thing, then, that damen has never done the things laurent has wished for him to do.

And when he turned the first corner, he saw the palace as everyone saw it: disorientingly, from the outside. There, small as specks, were the high open windows and long marble balconies that invited the sea air in during the evening to cool the baking stone. To the east was the long, columned hall and airy upper quarters. To the north, the King’s quarters, and the high-walled gardens, with their shallow steps and winding paths and the myrtle trees planted for his mother. Memory was sudden; long days training on the sawdust, evenings in the hall, his father presiding from the throne, himself walking those marble halls with surety and unconcern, an unreal former self, who spent evenings in the great hall laughing with friends, being served as he wished by slaves.

he is finally approaching his home as a man and not a king, and understanding how the privilege he’s always felt was an entitlement resting on the backs of people subjugated to maintain it

A yapping dog cut across his path. A woman with a parcel under her arm jostled him, then shouted at him in southern dialect to watch where he was going.

dogs don’t care that you’re the prince. an oblivious random person running an errand doesn’t care that you’re the prince. no wonder laurent mainly has gotten along with animals and oblivious random people in these books. both damen and laurent have been held captive by their own roles as people in power, and they can free each other by unifying the kingdoms and changing what being a person in power MEANS.

He kept walking. He passed the outer homes, with their small windows of differently sized rectangles and squares. He passed the outer storehouses, the granaries, a stone revolving on a millbase, pushed by oxen. He passed the shouts of a dozen market stalls that were all selling fish, pulled from the ocean in the pre-dawn. He passed the traitor’s walk, thick with flies. He scanned the tops of the spikes, but the dead were all dark-haired. A burst of a cavalcade came trotting out on horses. He stepped to the side; they trotted past him, red-cloaked and regimented, without a second glance. It was all uphill in the city, because the palace was built on the peak, with the sea at its back. He realised as he walked that he had never done this on foot before. When he reached the palace square, a feeling of disorientation came over him again, because he only knew the square from the opposite angle: as a view from the white balcony, where his father used to emerge sometimes to raise a hand and address the crowd.

after a lifetime of limiting his own perspective to maintain systems of power and his illusion of personal peace, damen finally watches the road. and the palace—literally held above the rest of akielos to be his home as rightful king—doesn’t feel like home anymore.

‘Halt,’ said the guard. ‘State your business, traveller.’ He waited, until he had the eyes of everyone near the gate on him, then he let the hood of his cloak fall back. He heard the shocked murmurs, the outbreak of sound as he spoke, his words, clear and unmistakable. ‘I am Damianos of Akielos, and I surrender to my brother.’

starting out the laurentian problem solving speedrun by literally doing what laurent did with the regent (kastor is thematically damen’s regent). honestly genius, both on damen’s part and pacat’s.

If it worked, if he was in time—how long could a trial last? How long could Laurent stall for time?

damen assuming that laurent would even bother to stall… i don’t think that’s how laurent works, given his internal narrative during the torture scene. in that scene, he persisted because he knew that the survival and victory of people he cared about hinged on his survival. in this scene, laurent believes that the survival and victory of people he cares about hinges on his death, so it’s pointless to put up a fight. (“objection!” says damen)

He needed them to take him into the hall to face Kastor. He had given up his freedom for that single chance, gambling everything.

kastor, who had made damen a slave in the first place. damen understands the exact kind of cruelty kastor is capable of, his overwhelming desire to make himself the stronger man over damen. he finally accepts that this cruelty and victimhood exist because he saw it in the regent and laurent. even if he’s unwilling to admit it about kastor and himself, he knows. and that’s why he came up with this plan in the first place.

He sat under guard on one of the low seats and didn’t scream in frustration, as time passed, and then more time.

classic damen understatement <3

One was an officer. Another carried irons. He stopped dead when he saw Damen. ‘Cuff him,’ said the officer.

buddy i think there’s one in the way

The soldier holding the irons didn’t move, his wide eyes staring at Damen. ‘Do it,’ came the order. ‘Do it, soldier,’ said Damen.

this is a big moment, i think, relating to the “honor in submission” theme. the intentional appearance of submission in order for damen to reclaim his power. i said this maaaany annotations ago, but damen and laurent’s experiences with trauma in these books are on different timelines. laurent is nursing years of trauma, and knows how to use the appearance of his victimhood to his own advantage. but damen’s trauma is extremely fresh, and thus far he’s only been able to deny it, become disoriented by it, or lose himself in it. but now, almost like an echo of a younger laurent biding his time and committing to the bit in the regent’s court, damen is figuring out how to let his trauma work for HIM.

This was a complex political proposition for the soldiers.

i guess they like it simple (i'm never letting that line go)

The first person to recognise him was a household official carrying a vase which smashed, dropping from his hands.

okay, dramatic.

A slave, caught in a crisis of etiquette, fell half to his knees and then stopped, agonisingly uncertain whether he should complete his prostration.

i adore this subtle moment of a slave seeing royalty in a position like theirs and reconsidering whether they actually need to kneel in the first place

And there wasn’t one throne on the dais, there were two. Kastor and the Regent sat side by side, presiding over the hall.

wrong unification!

It was strange—he had waited for so long to face Kastor, and now he found him simply extraneous. The Regent was the sole intrusion, the sole threat. Kastor looked satisfied. He didn’t see the danger. He didn’t understand what he had let into Akielos.

of course, damen still can’t Notice everything quite yet. but he’ll get it eventually

Alive, alive, Laurent was alive. Damen’s heart leapt, and for a moment he just stood and drank the sight in, giddy with relief.

how far we’ve come :’)

He was still wearing the short Akielon chiton that he had worn to the Kingsmeet, but it was dirty and ripped. Skimpy and showing the signs of rough wear, it was a humiliating garment for him to stand in before the Council.

obvious, but this is a foil to his veretian clothing which signified confidence and invulnerability

Like Damen, he had his hands chained behind his back.

are they both double-cuffed on one wrist

The physical act of standing for hours in irons must be taking its toll, the sheer ache of muscle exhaustion, the rough treatment, and the examination itself, the Regent’s questions, and Laurent’s steady, determined answers.

i think damen’s projecting here. when he was in this position, he had given steady determined answers. he had experienced and withstood exhaustion rough treatment and examination. the sympathy he feels towards laurent at this moment is really sympathy he hasn’t been able to fully give himself, because he has always been unable and unwilling to truly accept himself as a victim.

But he wore the clothes and the chains with disregard, his posture, as ever, coolly untouchable. His expression could not be read, except for, if you knew him, the courage that he sustained though he was alone, and tired, and without friends, and he must know that it was close to the end.

but this is how laurent differs from how damen perceives himself, in this position. laurent’s pride means nothing to him, as long as his submission means that the people he cares for are saved. damen’s pride means everything to him, and i think even now he’d say so. but the thing is, that we saw how damen was just as willing to lower himself to protect the akielion slaves in book 1. damen is so fascinating as a narrator because he does not understand himself at all, but we as the reader can understand him perfectly based on the things he chooses to acknowledge or ignore. frustrating to read at times, but the exact narrator this series needs. these books would not work nearly as well with laurent as full-time narrator.

It was clear from the open look of horrified recognition on Laurent’s face that he had not expected Damen—that he had not expected anyone.

laurent’s not stalling, the regent is dragging this out to torture him

On the dais, Kastor made a small gesture to the Regent, as if to say, You see? I have had him brought for you.

the only thing kastor can actually get credit for doing independently in this entire series was making damen a slave and sending him to vere, and i’m pretty sure that was jokaste’s idea in the first place

(edit from future sam: i know he also killed the king. it comes up later)

‘No,’ said Laurent, swinging his gaze back to his uncle. ‘You promised.’

laurent immediately assumes that the regent somehow made this happen, rather than damen doing it of his own free will. ow.

‘This is Damianos of Akielos. He was captured at the gates this morning. He’s the man responsible for the death of King Theomedes, and for my nephew’s treason. He is my nephew’s lover.’

of course the regent (and kastor) took advantage of damen’s “weakness” and spun it to make themselves look powerful, which puts damen in the perfect place to turn the tables. damen didn’t even really intend for this to happen, consciously i think he surrendered out of desperation more than any rational plan, but SUBconsciously this was literally the perfect move. and we’re about to see damen slowly realize this, and pick up steam as he figures out exactly how he can leverage and subvert this perceived weakness to get what he wants. just like laurent!!!

He had not been brought here to face Kastor or to answer for their father’s death. He had been brought here as a final piece of evidence in Laurent’s trial.

the first time the regent used a captive damen against laurent, damen refused to play along. this was an unexpected response by both the regent and laurent, and it bought d&l necessary time to become stronger in each other’s company.

now, the regent is once again using a captive damen against laurent. but this time, damen decides to play the game too. his willing cooperation in the trial the regent has created is within itself unexpected defiance, and that’s why we love damianos of akielos both as a person and as a really fucking well-written character. he has grown and changed in so many satisfying ways throughout the series, but the defining strengths of his character—willful and defiant integrity—have always been consistent. “i speak your language better than you speak mine, sweetheart.” = “i’ll cooperate in the trial you’ve rigged to your own advantage, and i’ll win.”

Mathe gestured to Damen. ‘Now we see the proof of all these claims. Damianos, the prince-killer, is here, giving the lie to all the Prince has been saying—proving once and for all that they are in league. Our Prince lies in the depraved embrace of his brother’s killer.’

sounds like mathe didn’t put in the effort and/or critical thinking to properly understand the captive prince series by cs pacat

He was suddenly an exhibit, a kind of proof none of them had imagined: Damianos of Akielos, captured and bound.

full circle babyyyy

‘Nephew, Damianos is restrained. You can speak honestly. You are safe from harm.’ Laurent weathered the slow, caring touch, as the Regent said, gently, ‘Is there some explanation? Perhaps you were not willing? Perhaps he forced you?’ Laurent’s eyes met his uncle’s. Laurent’s chest rose and fell shallowly under the thin white fabric of the chiton. ‘He didn’t force me,’ said Laurent. ‘I lay with him because I wanted to.’

BIG LAURENT MOMENT!!!! “i am not a victim! i did this by choice because i wanted to do it, and i will not lie even if the truth makes me look weak!”

we can see exactly how damen has influenced laurent in this moment. there is no strategic advantage to being honest or blunt here. in fact it invites the very things laurent fears—perceived weakness, shame, uncertainty. the regent is giving him a chance to perhaps save himself, by blaming damen and seeing him punished instead—an option laurent did not think was previously available to him. but laurent does not consider this for a second, and instead does the exact opposite of what his uncle truly wants and expects him to do: he KEEPS IT SIMPLE. laurent cooperates with the image the regent is creating of him, and both we and laurent know that IS defiance. because for maybe the first time ever, laurent knows without a doubt that the image the regent portrays of him isn’t fucking true. he knows that with damen, unlike the regent, he wasn’t a victim. he was willing, he was not forced, and unlike his early stunts in vere, he is not allowing the implication that damen assaulted him to stand. he isn’t hiding or lying or restraining himself. he's not using the way people perceive him as weak to his advantage. laurent has committed to many bits in his life, and when convenient those bits have been some complicated semblance of reality. but this is the first time that laurent simply commits to the TRUTH.

(i love this scene so much. it’s all synthesized so well. it’s a perfect demonstration of how damen and laurent have have changed themselves and each other for the better. i have complaints about this book more than the others, but the trial is fantastic.)

Damen could feel it: in a day’s worth of questioning, this was the first admission.

THAT’S WHAT I JUST SAID!!

‘You don’t have to lie for him, Laurent,’ said the Regent. ‘You can tell the truth.’

even if laurent doesn’t know it yet, he isn’t just doing this for damen—he’s doing it for himself!

‘I don’t lie. We lay together,’ said Laurent, ‘at my behest. I ordered him to my bed. Damianos is innocent of all the charges brought against me. He suffered my company only under force. He is a good man, who has never acted against his own country.’

the self loathing runs deep but still this is a laurent w!!!! the truth is that he hates himself, but at least he’s owning it, and specifying that his self-hatred has fuckall to do with the dumb bullshit the regent is accusing him of. all while being a better version of himself, defending damen in a situation where he had perviously maligned him, which he would not have grown enough to do without damen’s company!!!

‘And what am I accused of? That I have lain with Laurent of Vere?’ Damen’s eyes raked the Council. ‘I have. I found him honest and true. He stands before you wrongly accused. And if this is a fair trial, you will hear me.’

perfect. he knows it isn’t a fair trial, just as he knew it wasn’t fair for him to be punished instead of the regent at the kings meet, just as he now understands that the slavery system in akielos is neither fair nor just. the “good vs nice” theme has finished marinating, and now damen is using the false niceties of his society to do good, basically calling the regent and kastor’s bluff. “IF this is a fair trial, you will hear me.” = “in order for you to maintain the power you’ve been given by the system, you will have to let me to use the system to challenge your power”

‘You will hear me,’ said Damen. ‘You will hear me, and if when you have heard me you still find him guilty, then I will meet my fate alongside him. Or does the Council fear the truth?’

this is his true calling. let’s be so fucking real. i’ve never even jokingly called damen a himbo for a reason, and that reason is that he’s extremely good at thinking critically and constructing compelling arguments if he just lets himself acknowledge reality.

The Regent said, ‘By all means, speak.’ It was a challenge. To have Laurent’s lover in his power pleased the Regent, as a demonstration of his larger power. Damen could feel that. The Regent wanted Damen to entangle himself, wanted a victory over Laurent that was total. Damen drew in a breath. He knew the stakes. He knew that if he failed, he would die alongside Laurent, and the Regent would rule in Vere and in Akielos. He would have given over his life and his kingdom. He looked around at the columned hall. It was his home, his birthright, and his legacy, more precious to him than anything. And Laurent had given him the means to secure it. At the Kingsmeet he could have left Laurent to his fate and ridden back to Karthas and his army. He was undefeated on the field, and not even the Regent would have been able to stand against him. Even now, all he had to do was denounce Laurent and he could face Kastor with a real chance of taking back his throne.

every time damen has had a moment like this, his integrity and honor have prevailed. even when he HATED laurent and would have benefited directly from his assassination, he had intervened because he thought it was a dishonorable attempt on laurent’s life. and then he’d left against his own instincts, because he did not respect or know laurent and laurent did not respect or know him. in book 2 he had many moments like this, and had all but admitted to himself that he was not willing or able to take them. even when they were divorced in the first part of this book, when laurent was actively antagonizing him out of spite, damen never let nikandros or anyone else intervene.

now, after everything they’ve been though? this isn’t even a fucking question. if it’s damen we’re talking about, when it really comes down to this question, it never really has been.

But he had asked himself the question in Ravenel, and now he knew the answer. A kingdom, or this.

committing to the bit, once and for all.

‘I met the Prince in Vere. I thought as you did. I didn’t know his heart.’ It was Laurent who said, ‘No.’ ‘I came to learn it slowly.’ ‘Damen, don’t do this.’ ‘I came to learn his honesty, his integrity, his strength of mind.’ ‘Damen—’ Of course Laurent wanted everything done his own way. But today it was going to be different.

their conflict is their love!!!!!!!! they challenge each other to be better, and the world becomes a better place because of it!!!!!!!!

‘I was a fool, blinded by prejudice. I didn’t understand that he was fighting alone, that he had been fighting alone for a very long time. ‘And then I saw the men he commanded, disciplined and loyal. I saw the way his household loved him, because he knew their concerns, cared for their lives. I saw him protect slaves. ‘And when I left him, drugged and without friends after an attack on his life, I saw him stand up in front of his uncle and argue to save my life because he felt he owed me a debt. ‘He knew that it might cost him his life. He knew he’d be sent to the border, to ride into the very same plot to kill him. And he still argued for me. He did it because it was owed, because in the very private code with which he ran his life, it was right.’ He looked at Laurent, and he understood now what he had not understood then: that Laurent had known who he was that night.

you should try re-reading the series damen, it’s craaaaaazy when you know the twist

Laurent had known who he was and had still protected him, out of a sense of fairness that had somehow survived what had happened to him.

damen and laurent have different traumas, but this description applies to both of them perfectly. from the moment they met each other, they were no longer suffering alone. even if they hated that fact sooooo bad.

‘That is the man you face. He has more honour and integrity than any man I have ever met. He is dedicated to his people and his country. And I am proud to have been his lover.’

Damen said it with his eyes on Laurent, willing him to know how much he meant it, and for a moment Laurent just gazed back at him, his eyes blue and wide.

just had to get a “he gazed” in there. wouldn’t be lamen without it

The Regent’s voice interrupted. ‘A heartfelt declaration is not evidence. I am afraid to say that there is nothing here to change the Council’s decision. You offered no proof, only accusations of an unlikely plot against Laurent, with no hint as to who the architect of it might be.’ ‘You are the architect,’ said Damen, lifting his eyes to the Regent, ‘and I do have proof.’

LET’S FUCKING GOOOOOOO!!!!!

‘I call Guion of Fortaine to speak.’

obsessed with how damen just immediately launched into defense attorney mode. did he do like mock trial as a teenager.

‘Very well,’ the Regent said, leaning back in his seat and gesturing to the Council. Then they had to wait, while runners were sent to the place on the outskirts of the city where Damen had told his men to camp. The Councillors got to sit down, and so did the Regent and Kastor. Lucky them.

oh that “lucky them” is so telling. damen is PISSED. we know this because he’s usually the king of understatement and underreaction in his narration, but is being salty about this minor inconvenience. imagine how he’s going to be with the the regent, if inconvenience gets such a reaction

Not only Guion, but all the members of Damen’s party: Guion’s wife, Loyse, looking white-faced, the physician Paschal, Nikandros and his men, even Jord and Lazar. It meant something to Damen that he had given each of them the option to leave, and they had chosen to stay with him. He knew what they risked. Their loyalty touched him.

except you, guion.

He knew that Laurent didn’t like it. Laurent wanted to do everything alone. But it wasn’t going to be like that.

lamen truly is the love story for me. it’s not enough for a romantic interest to be like “you’re not alone uwu <3” with such gentle softness that their partner finally believes it. it’s gotta be like “i’m not going to let you believe that you’re alone just so you can reinforce your own self-protective/destructive trauma responses. you’re loved, i brought receipts, deal with it” to truly hit

(which is interesting, esp with the series’s themes of coercion and free will! in a lot of ways it is a relief for someone to ignore your protests and boundaries, when they truly do mean well and want to help you and know what’s good for you. it’s just that most people who are forceful and coercive don’t have those intentions, or don’t actually know what they’re talking about. but this is a rare but earned moment where we know that damen is right, that laurent’s beliefs about himself should be challenged, and that they both will be better for it. they’ve always challenged each other in many ways, and throughout the series they’ve been making their way to being truly balanced in terms of power dynamics. laurent knew that damen had killed his brother the whole time he was antagonizing damen, but they still weren’t on even footing. damen eventually learned the truth about laurent’s awareness of his identity, but they still weren’t on even footing until they actually dealt with the baggage involved. in that one sex scene where damen took total control, i commented on how it felt like laurent wasn’t really letting himself be present, and damen lost himself in something that wasn’t there. but then in the following sex scene, laurent made SURE to be present. it's always been slightly uneven with them, up to the point where laurent freed jokaste and gave himself up to the regent. he's always had a lie of some kind to hide himself behind, to isolate himself with. but not now. he's not alone, and damen is not going to let laurent tell himself that he is. damen pushes past laurent's boundaries and within this narrative it's a good thing, and that is a huge part of the fantasy of captive prince and lamen's relationship. because we know that damen truly loves and cares for laurent and is doing this for his sake, and the core of their relationship is willingly challenging each other and allowing themselves to be challenged.)

Mathe resumed his role as questioner as the spectators craned their necks, disliking the columns because they obstructed the view.

‘Laurent of Vere is guilty of every charge brought against him,’ said Guion.

raise your hand if you’re surprised. nobody but damen should have a hand raised rn

‘You swore to tell the truth,’ said Damen. No one was listening to him.

two steps forward one step back with damen thinking the best of people who don’t deserve it. although i guess that’s what made lamen possible, because most people would not have reconsidered laurent after the shit he pulled in book 1. i say again, this series would not work with a non-damen protagonist

‘He tried to coerce me to lie for him. He threatened to kill me. He threatened to kill my wife. He threatened to kill my sons. He slaughtered his own people at Ravenel. I would vote him guilty myself, if I were still a member of the Council.’

guion you got your son killed, after inviting the regent to [redacted] him. sit down.

It had a symbolic power, the six of them standing on one side of the hall, and Laurent—in his thin, tattered Akielon clothing held in the grip of his uncle’s soldiers—on the other. Laurent spoke. ‘No final advice? No uncle’s kiss of affection?’ ‘You had so much promise, Laurent,’ said the Regent. ‘I regret what you became more than you do.’ ‘You mean that I’m on your conscience?’ said Laurent. ‘It hurts me,’ said the Regent, ‘that you feel such animosity towards me, even now. That you tried to undermine me with accusations, when I have only ever wanted the best for you.’ He spoke in a saddened voice. ‘You should have known better than to bring Guion to testify against me.’ Laurent met the Regent’s eyes, standing alone before the Council. ‘But uncle,’ said Laurent, ‘Guion isn’t who I brought.’

it’s like we’re in book 1 again. ahem. laurent: have you had your fun? don’t you want to taunt me one more time? regent: you already hate yourself more than i ever could. if you had just submitted to me, things would be better for us both. laurent: you’re the reason i hate myself. you did this to me. regent: if you understand the power i have over you, you really should have known better than to fight against me alone. laurent: i’m not fighting alone.

as always, i don’t remember exactly how much of this has been intentional on laurent’s part. had he counted on damen bringing loyse? i don’t think so, right? he really had meant to die, but now that the game has changed (damen is here, he’s brought the squad) laurent is back to planning, and has been since the moment their involvement was accepted. he even had time to think it through, which is like the most dangerous resource to give laurent!

‘He brought me,’ said Guion’s wife Loyse, stepping forward.

fucking GENIUS on cs pacat’s part. i wrote a long post months ago about women in capri, but like the gist of it was that there are normal rational compassionate people, women and otherwise, in this world, but we just haven’t gotten to be around them. because most of the people in power, and therefore the ones featured most prominently, are corrupt out-of-touch assholes. and the members of this series’s cast who don’t fall under this description exist to supplement damen and laurent’s insane dynamic. so it is genius to pull in this seemingly insignificant grieving woman whose motivations and emotions are simple, raw, understandable, and thematically linked to laurent and damen’s experiences with the regent as the person who ultimate seals the textually misogynistic regent’s fate. it’s not just about gender, or even primarily about gender—it’s about empowering the disempowered.

‘I have something to say. It’s about my husband, and this man, the Regent, who has brought my family into ruin, and who ended the life of my youngest son, Aimeric.’

YES.

‘Loyse, what are you doing?’ said Guion, as all of the hall’s attention riveted on Loyse. She paid him no attention, but continued to walk forward until she stood alongside Damen, addressing her words to the Counci

YEESSSSSS!

‘In the year after Marlas, the Regent visited my family in Fortaine,’ said Loyse. ‘And my husband, who is ambitious, gave him leave to enter the bedroom of our youngest son.’

the amount of contempt in “my husband, who is ambitious”…

Guion was looking from Loyse to the Council, and he gave a laugh, braying and too loud. ‘You can’t be giving credence to any of this.’

a foil to damen and laurent in this setting. immediately dismissing the testimony of his partner in favor of his own pride and status. stay classy, guion

No one answered, the silence uncomfortable. Councillor Chelaut’s gaze shifted for a moment to the young boy sitting beside the Regent, his fingers sticky with powdered sugar from the sweetmeats.

the poetic irony of this normalized part of the regent’s court turning the court against him when viewed in a new light, or just called out at all, especially by a woman whose son he abused!!!

‘I know that no one here cares about Aimeric,’ said Loyse. ‘No one cares that he killed himself at Ravenel because he couldn’t live with what he had done.'

parallel to damen defending laurent, except she does think he was alone. which is so deeply sad, and pretty much true.

‘So let me tell you instead about what Aimeric died for—a plot between the Regent and Kastor to kill King Theomedes and then to take his country.’

the truth is terrible, but it also empowers loyse to enact change. things can’t be better until we see them for what they really are. i’d say that’s a major series theme when it comes to relationships and politics.

‘These are lies,’ Kastor said in Akielon, and then he said it again in thickly accented Veretian. ‘Arrest her.’

seems like damen speaks better veretian than kastor, if kastor’s is deeply accented. kastor stays losing!

It was plain from Kastor’s face that he had realised for the first time that he was not in control of the hall.

shifts of power truly are the powerhouse of the captive prince series. both in a narrative way and a horny way

‘Arrest me, but not before you’ve seen the proof.’ Loyse was pulling a ring on a chain from her gown; it was a signet ring, ruby or garnet, and on it was the royal crest of Vere. ‘My husband brokered the deal. Kastor assassinated his own father in exchange for the Veretian troops you see here today. The troops he needed to take Ios.’

i’m going to be so real, it’s been months since i read prince’s gambit, but i’m pretty sure the signet ring was foreshadowed. which… holy shit. laurent hadn’t expected all the damen stuff to happen, but i’m pretty sure he had been priming this piece of ammo against the regent the entire time. he’d just thought that he’d lost the opportunity to use it when giving himself up, or had given up sooner than that. or had he only learned this from loyse after aimeric’s death?? idk maybe the book will tell me now. i hope it does bc i do not feel like digging back for foreshadowing i’ve been doing this for hours

wait no FUCK the ring was for nikandros!!! right???? yes it has to be. it couldn’t have been both things at once, and loyse telling laurent only makes sense after aimeric’s death. so yes the signet was foreshadowed, but it was a different use of it. although i guess the existence of a signet ring holding significance was foreshadowed partially so it would work again here.

‘She’s not a traitor. She’s just confused. She’s been deceived, and coached, she’s been upset since Aimeric died. She doesn’t know what she’s saying. She’s being manipulated by these people.’

“she doesn’t know what she’s doing. she’s being forced. she’s a victim, because we’ve made her a victim.” FUCK NO!!! we’re not doing that anymore!!!!

Herode and Chelaut wore expressions of repressed distaste, even revulsion. Damen saw suddenly that the obscene youth of the Regent’s lovers had always been repellent to these men, and the idea that the son of a councillor had been used in this way was disturbing to them beyond measure.

could have been way more disturbing way sooner, but better late than never ig

But they were political men, and the Regent was their master.

POWER SHIFTS! POWER RESTING ON THE SUBJUGATED CAN BE TOPPLED AT ITS FOUNDATIONS!

He was right, Damen realised. Laurent hadn’t brought Loyse to clear his own name, but to clear Damen’s. There was no proof that would clear Laurent’s name. The Regent had been too thorough. The palace assassins were dead. The assassins from the road were dead. Even Govart was dead, cursing boy pets and physicians.

maybe. just maybe. you both are good and both deserve to be happy. at the same time. your names can both be cleared. we are so close.

“boy pets and physicians” ironically the two things that end up getting the regent convicted

They were connected in some way. He was suddenly sure of it. Whatever Govart had known, Nicaise had known it too, and the Regent had killed him for it. And that meant— Damen was pushing himself up abruptly.

i LOVE how damen pieces this together. it wasn’t a laurent machination, the laurent machination had been to save damen alone. but damen said “no, laurent needs to be saved too.” and figures out a convoluted thing that even laurent hadn’t clocked, which just happens to involve nicaise, who deserved better, just like laurent deserves better, just like everyone under the regent’s power deserves better, except guion.

‘No,’ said Paschal. ‘He died because of this.’ He took from the folds of his clothes a bundle of papers, tied with string.

does he always just like carry that around?? i guess it makes sense if it’s like dangerously sensitive information, and also from his dead brother

‘The last words of my brother, the archer Langren, carried by the soldier called Govart, and stolen by the Regent’s pet, Nicaise, who was killed for it. This is the testimony of the dead.’

okay yeah he kept it on him bc it got stolen once and the person who stole it got killed about it. that tracks. also tracks why he hadn’t spoken up sooner.

‘I am Paschal, a palace physician. And I have a story to tell about Marlas.'

LOVE how it’s marlas

‘Diplomacy failed. The talks fell through. Theomedes wanted land, not peace. He sent away the Veretian emissaries without hearing them.'

not surprised

For the first time, he wondered what had happened behind Veretian lines to cause it. He thought of a King convinced it was the best way of protecting his people.

love this subtle damen character development moment

‘Instead, Veretians fell. I was nearby when the word came that Auguste was dead. In grief, the King pulled off his helm. He was careless. I think in his mind, he had no reason left to be careful.’

so the regent was the reason both auguste and the king died. they went out there on bad advice because they were desperate to protect their people. and damen thought they were cowards, and believed that his killing of auguste was honorable and fair.

damn.

He began to untie the string, drawing it away and opening the papers. They were covered in writing. ‘Nicaise gave it to me for safekeeping. He had stolen it from Govart, and he was scared. I opened it, never expecting what I would find. In fact, the letter was to me, though Nicaise didn’t know it. It was a confession, in my brother’s handwriting.’

i’m glad that nicaise has a part in this, even if he isn’t here to see it.

And then Damen looked at Laurent. Laurent’s face was completely devoid of colour. It was not an idea that Laurent had entertained before, that much was clear. Laurent had his own blind spot when it came to his uncle. I didn’t think he’d really try to kill me. After everything . . . even after everything.

just like his father and brother—a bleeding heart. but that gives him power, just as much as it makes him vulnerable. all of the people rallying around him, dead and alive, are proof of that.

Damen thought of his father struggling to breathe in his sickbed

it’s so funny to know that yet another Thing kastor did was someone else’s idea first. come on, dude.

‘You can’t believe this? The lies of a physician and a boy whore?’ Guion’s voice was jarring in the silence. Damen looked to the Council, where the oldest of the Councillors, Herode, was looking up from the papers. ‘Nicaise had more nobility in him than you,’ said Herode. ‘He was more loyal to the Crown than the Council, in the end.’

‘The Council has been deceived into treason,’ said the Regent, calmly. ‘Take them.’ There was a pause, in which his order ought to have been followed, but wasn’t. The Regent turned. The hall was thick with his soldiers, the Regent’s Guard, trained to his orders, and brought here to do his bidding. None of them moved. In the strange silence, a soldier stepped forward. ‘You’re not my King,’ he said. Pulling the Regent’s insignia from his shoulder, he dropped it at the Regent’s feet.

this is the most devastating defeat possible for the regent. for reasons i think i’ve already explained.

Then he crossed the hall as the Council had done, to stand beside Laurent.

okay actually THIS is the most devastating defeat for the regent. lol

His movement was the first drop that became a trickle, then a flow, as another soldier pulled his insignia from his shoulder and crossed, and another, and another, until the hall was loud with the sound of armoured feet, the hail of badges hitting the ground. Like the tide drawing away from a rock, the Veretians crossed the hall, until the Regent stood alone. And Laurent stood facing him, with an army at his back.

‘Herode,’ said the Regent. ‘This is the boy who has shirked his duties, who has never worked for anything in his life, who is in every way unfit to rule the country.’ Herode said, ‘He is our King.’ ‘He’s not a king. He’s no more than a—’ ‘You’ve lost.’ Laurent’s calm words cut across his uncle’s. He stood free. His uncle’s soldiers had released him, striking the irons from his wrists. Across from him, the Regent stood exposed, a middle-aged man used to commanding public spectacle, now with it turned against him.

He took the black square of cloth from the slave who had carried it, and placed it over the head of the sceptre. ‘This is absurd,’ said the Regent.

“from the slave who had carried it”

‘You think you can defy me?’ the Regent said to Laurent. ‘You think you can rule Vere? You?’ Laurent said, ‘I’m not a boy anymore.’

And he saw that Laurent understood, that Laurent knew, somehow, about the scrap of paper that Damen had found that morning in the empty wagon in their camp, its door standing open. That he had carried it in careful fingers on the long walk to the city. The child was never yours, but he is safe. In another life, he would have been a king. I remember the way you looked at me, the day we met. Perhaps that, too, in another life. Jokaste

okay uh sure. cool. wasn’t really worried about that with everything else going on but good to know i guess. anyway

(i'm still murky on how much of this laurent had anticipated, vs what damen thinks laurent anticipated because damen thinks laurent knows everything, vs what neither of them anticipated. it's fine.)

‘What’s happening?’ said a young voice. Damen turned. The eleven-year-old boy who had been sitting beside the Regent’s throne had pushed up out of his chair and was staring, confusion in his wide brown eyes. ‘What’s happening? You said we’d go riding after. I don’t understand.’ He was trying now to go to the soldiers who were holding the Regent down. ‘Stop it, you’re hurting him. You’re hurting him. Let him go.’ A soldier was holding him back, and the boy was fighting him.

fuuuuuuuck. breaking the cycle, but still. breaking.

Laurent looked at the boy, and in his eyes was the knowledge that some things couldn’t be fixed.

nicaise. closure, self-forgiveness, grief as fuel for a better future. sad and real and finished.

He said, ‘Get that boy out of here.’

the most merciful thing laurent could do: protect the boy from seeing this

It was a single clean stroke. Laurent’s face didn’t change.

interesting to compare this to nicaise’s beheading. “damen saw laurent react, then make himself not react.”

i find this to be a very satisfying way for the regent to die: killed by a coalition of the people he had crushed on his way to power, by the same means he had used to kill nicaise. and for once, laurent did not have to get his own hands dirty to see justice done.

‘Put his body on the gates. Fly my flag on the walls. Let all my people know of my ascension.’ He lifted his eyes, and met Damen’s gaze across the length of the hall. ‘And unchain the King of Akielos.’

sounds like the kings have risinged

‘You came,’ said Laurent. ‘You knew I would,’ said Damen.

... but did he, though? maybe he thought you'd come to defeat kastor, but i don't think laurent thought he (laurent) was going to survive this.

‘If you need an army to take your capital,’ said Laurent, ‘I seem to have one.’

yeah laurent does not agree. damen you’re still maybe a little off the mark here, but that’s okay, it’s good to encourage laurent to value himself and trust in his community. i just hope that your idealistic misjudgments of character don’t end up getting you stabbed in the next chapter when you expect your murderous brother to act honorably

Even men fighting for their lives could not overcome a lifetime of observance and directly strike against their Prince. He had a clear path.

i really like how this chapter is placed after the very optimistic and empowering trial sequence. because there is still so much cynicism to the monarchy, to these systems of power, to people like kastor who don’t take chances that are given to them, and those things can still cause harm. they can especially endanger people like damen, whose greatest strength and weakness is his stubborn determination to live in a world that is good. and where laurent benefitted from learning from damen in the last sequence, and his cynicism was ultimately proven wrong, damen is proven wrong in this one. kastor does try to kill him when he shows mercy, the system is still being observed in ways that resemble the past. but damen isn’t alone, and laurent is there for him when he miscalculates—unlike jokaste or any of his other allies when kastor stripped him of his dignity and sent him to vere as a slave. and together they’re going to do their best to change the world for the better, even though the world is complicated and sometimes cynical. that, to me, is the most empowering way this story could possibly end.

He turned left. Instead of heading towards the main doors, he made his way to the viewing hall, where slaves were displayed for their royal masters. He turned into the narrow corridors along which he’d been taken on that long ago night, the fighting becoming distant shouts and clangs behind him, the sounds growing muffled as he ran. And from there, he descended down into the slave baths.

the trauma speedrun…

His body reacted, his chest constricting, his pulse kicking hard. For a moment, he was hanging suspended from those chains again, and Jokaste was coming towards him across the marble.

damen ptsd hasn’t magically healed. fits well with previous annotation about this final scene and why it works

All he could do was wait for Kastor to appear at the top of the stairs. Damen stood, his sword in his hands, and tried not to feel small, like a younger brother.

stronger man on top, etc

Kastor came in alone, without even an honour guard. When he saw Damen, he gave a low laugh, as though Damen’s presence satisfied in him some sense of the inevitable.

kastor: disney villain damen: he can’t be that bad

He thought of everything that Kastor had done—the long, slow poisoning of their father, the massacre of his household, the brutality of his own enslavement—and he tried to understand that these things had not been done by another person, but by this one, his brother. But when he looked at Kastor all he could remember was that Kastor had taught him how to hold a spear, that he had sat with him when his first pony had broken its leg and had to be put down, that after his first okton Kastor had ruffled his hair and told him that he had done well.

see previous recent annotations about damen seeing the best in people being a double edged sword (literally)

Why did you deserve it more than I did? Because you were better at fighting? What does wielding a sword have to do with kingship?’ ‘I would have fought for you,’ said Damen. ‘I would have died for you. I would have been loyal—would have had you by my side.’

i love how damen answers the question without even meaning to answer it. damen is more honorable than kastor not because of his lineage or skills, but because he acts honorably. if kinghood is meant for the honorable (which uhhhh personally i’m not a big fan of royalty stuff bc i think that’s lame but we’re staying within the narrative and kastor’s logic rn), then that is why damen deserves to be king while kastor does not

He made himself stop before he gave voice to the words that he had never let himself speak: I loved you, but you wanted a throne more than you wanted a brother.

a kingdom or this, and kastor chose a kingdom. and didn’t even get it. lol

‘You know I can’t beat you in a fair fight.’

the narrative knows that there is no such thing as a fair fight, but damen fundamentally will always believe that there should be.

‘I didn’t want you made a slave. When the Regent asked for you, I refused. It was Jokaste. She convinced me to send you to Vere.’ ‘Yes,’ said Damen. ‘I’m beginning to understand that she did.’

damen knows that’s a lie, and that the regent happily accepted damen as a slave as a gift from kastor so he could torture laurent. he also knows for a fact now that jokaste had been trying to protect him—from kastor.

I’m your brother.’ Kastor said it, as Damen took another step, and then another. ‘Damen, it’s a terrible thing to kill your own family.’ ‘You’re troubled by what you’ve done? It gives you a moment’s pause?’

kastor going into damage control mode because he thinks damen is going to actually do it. fucking coward

Kastor lifted his head and looked at him, and Damen saw a thousand unspoken words in his brother’s black eyes. ‘Thank you,’ said Kastor, ‘brother.’ And he drew a knife from his belt, and ran it straight through Damen’s unprotected body.

the paradox of a better world, as experienced and perpetuated by damen: have to believe in it for it to exist, but you’re going to experience pain and suffering because of that belief

‘There can’t be two Kings of Akielos.’ Kastor was coming down the steps towards him. ‘You should have stayed a slave in Vere.’

there actually can be two kings, but they’re named damen and laurent. hope that helps.

A shocked, familiar voice to his left. He and Kastor both turned their heads. Laurent was standing in the open archway, white-faced. Laurent must have followed him from the great hall. He was unarmed and still wearing that ridiculous chiton. He needed to tell Laurent to get out, to run, but Laurent was already on his knees beside him. Laurent’s hand was passing over his body. Laurent said, in an oddly detached voice, ‘You have a knife wound. You have to staunch the blood until I can call for a physician. Press here. Like this.’ He lifted Damen’s left hand to press against his stomach.

laurent is here for damen because damen believed in a better world, and tried to see the best in laurent. if he hadn’t done that, he would bleed out and die right now. ultimately it is damen’s way of thinking that prevails, and that’s why he’s our protagonist.

Then he took Damen’s other hand in his own, clasping their fingers together and holding his hand like it was the most important thing in the world. Damen thought that if Laurent was holding his hand, he must be dying.

god they’re so.

There was a snick as Laurent locked Damen’s gold cuff to one of the slave chains scattered over the floor. Damen looked at his newly chained wrist, not comprehending. Then Laurent rose, his hand closing around the hilt of Damen’s sword. ‘He won’t kill you,’ said Laurent. ‘But I will.’

SEE RECENT ANNOTATIONS.

also wow, i am a SUCKER for unfathomably soft treatment of the person a character loves, and then resolute violence towards the people who hurt them. which is like laurent’s whole thing. they’ve both changed, but some things are always going to be the same.

and of course, the continuing use of the cuffs and chains. in the same way that damen didn’t give laurent a choice but to believe that he wasn’t alone, laurent isn’t giving damen a choice but to survive this encounter with kastor.

Kastor had reached the bottom of the stairs. ‘I’m going to kill your lover,’ he said to Damen, ‘and then I’m going to kill you.’ Laurent stood in his way, a slender figure with a sword that was too big for him, and Damen thought of a thirteen-year-old boy with his life about to change, standing on the battlefield with determination in his eyes.

kastor you have no idea how cunty laurent is with a sword

Damen had seen Laurent fight before. He had seen the spare, precise style that he used on the field. He had seen the different, highly intellectual way that he approached a duel. He knew Laurent as an accomplished swordsman, a master even, of his own style. Kastor was better.

okay fine whatever.

Kastor, at thirty-five,

kastor you cannot be acting this way at age thirty fucking five.

Kastor lifted his sword. Damen tugged uselessly on the chain as Kastor advanced. It was like watching a former self, unable to stop his own actions.

damen is SO convinced that kastor is going to win this, because he won in marlas against auguste. and then beat laurent when they fought. buuuuut

And then Kastor attacked, and Damen saw what a lifetime of single-minded dedication had forged in Laurent.

damen is often wrong, especially about laurent. and kastor isn’t damen.

Years of training, of pushing a body never intended for martial pursuits to its limit in hours of ceaseless practice. Laurent knew how to fight a stronger opponent, how to counter a longer reach. He knew the Akielon style—more than that. He knew exact move sets, lines of attack taught to Kastor by the royal trainers that he could not have learned from his own sword masters, but only by watching Damen with meticulous attention as he trained, and cataloguing each movement, preparing for the day that they would fight.

and laurent had LEARNED from damen.

And because Laurent’s life had been dragged from its course, because he was not the sweet, bookish youth he might have been, but instead was hard and dangerous as cut glass, Laurent was going to take on Kastor’s best sword work, and force it back.

laurent, specifically as a character with trauma, means so much to me. sometimes people push back against the idea that trauma makes you stronger, because it’s often used as an apologetic platitude: “you experienced bad things, but it’s okay because you’re stronger.” i disagree with that implication wholeheartedly. but personally, i do think that trauma made me stronger, simply because it forced me to adapt in ways i would not have otherwise figured out. and to me this is a neutral fact, not a tragedy or uplifting platitude. trauma made me stronger, whether i like it or not. the uplifting part, for me, comes in the ways i can use that strength to fight for a better life and a better world. and that feels very close to the ethos of laurent’s character, and the captive prince series as a whole.

It was a simple misjudgement on Laurent’s part: a dip in the marble altered his footing and affected his line, his blade cutting too far to the left. He wouldn’t have misjudged if he hadn’t been tired. The same had been true for Auguste, fighting for hours on the front. His eyes flying to Kastor, Laurent tried to correct the mistake, close the gap into which a man could drive his sword if he was ruthless, and willing to kill. ‘No,’ said Damen, who had lived this, too, jerking hard on his restraints, ignoring the pain in his side as Kastor took the opening, moving with merciless speed to cut Laurent down. Death and life; past and future; Akielos and Vere. Kastor let out a choked sound, his eyes shocked and wide. Because Laurent wasn’t Auguste. And the stumble wasn’t a mistake, it was a feint. Laurent’s sword met Kastor’s, forcing it up, and then, with a neat, minimal motion of the wrist, driving forward into Kastor’s chest.

damen is always going to miss things, about laurent and everything else in the world. this often means he is blindsided in upsetting ways.

but sometimes he misses things like this. and it’s good, once in a while, for him be proven wrong :)

(as i’ve said, that’s the core of lamen. endless power shifts. and i love it.)

Laurent was already turning, already at Damen’s side, on his knees, his hands firm and strong on Damen’s body as though he had never left.

“anyway”

Kastor’s death he felt as the death of a man he had not known, or understood. Losing his brother—that had happened a long time ago, like the loss of another self who had not grasped the flawed nature of the world. Later, he would face that.

“another self who had not grasped the flawed nature of the world” damen if you want to know more about that guy you can read my bazillion annotations of your narration

Later they would lay Kastor out, taking him on the long walk, inter him, where he should be, with their father. Later he would mourn, for the man Kastor was, for the man he might have been, for a hundred different pasts and might-have-beens. Now, Laurent was beside him. Aloof, untouchable Laurent was beside him, kneeling on the wet marble hundreds of miles from home, with nothing in his eyes but Damen. ‘There’s a lot of blood,’ said Laurent. ‘Luckily,’ said Damen, ‘I brought a physician.’

‘I killed your brother.’ ‘I know.’

would have been a useful conversation to have three books ago, but i’m not complaining about what we got instead

Damen said it, and felt a strange empathy pass between them, as if they knew each other for the first time. He looked into Laurent’s eyes and felt himself understood, even as he understood Laurent. They were both orphans now, without family. The symmetry that ruled both their lives had brought them here, at the end of their journey.

okay sorry to criticize right before this wraps up but this paragraph wasn’t necessary

‘It was one kingdom, once.’ Laurent wasn’t looking at him when he said it, and it was a long moment before he lifted his eyes to Damen’s waiting ones, and Damen’s breath caught at what he saw there, the odd shyness of it, as though Laurent was asking instead of answering. ‘Yes,’ said Damen, feeling light-headed at the question.

that was literally a marriage proposal, right???

(interesting how we never get “i love you”s. although i think we have gotten many of them, just not in so many words. and those words being what They Are is very specific to our real-life culture and media.)

‘No, don’t move,’ said Laurent, when Damen pushed up onto an elbow, and then, ‘Idiot,’ when Damen kissed him.

i’d be lying if i said this didn’t immediately make me think of catradora

He pushed Damen firmly back. Damen let him. His stomach hurt.

damen bringing us home with one last understatement

It was not a mortal wound, but it was nice to have Laurent fuss over him.

The thought of days of bed rest and physicians was made sweeter by the thought of Laurent alongside him, making barbed remarks in public, and in private, newly tender. He thought, Laurent alongside him for all the span of his days. He lifted his fingers to touch Laurent’s face.

“my husband is a bitch and i love him so much”

‘You know, you’re going to have to unchain me at some point,’ said Damen. Laurent’s hair was soft. ‘I will. At some point. What’s that sound?’

never really letting each other go

He could hear it even in the slave baths, muffled but audible, the sound ringing out from the highest peak, a peal of notes, proclaiming a new king. ‘Bells,’ said Damen.

i know a lot of people really love this conclusion, and while i don’t dislike it, it doesn’t feel like it hits as hard as it could. when exactly have we heard bells before? i just scanned the prologue of book 1 and didn’t see them. i get the themes of kings rising (obviously) and the future, but i’m also wondering if there’s some obvious thing i’m missing that really makes this HIT. like, “he was watching the road” kind of hit. which i’ll be reading too, by the way. so it’s not quite over yet :)

final thoughts: see the past three books of annotations. i’m really happy i did this, and i'm so thankful for everyone who followed along with me. looking forward to the short stories, which i actually haven’t read except for the summer palace. let me know your recommended order, if you want!

#capri #sam reads capri #captive prince #kings rising #lamen #laurent of vere #damen of akielos

56 notes · View notes

winnie-fred · 6 months ago

Text

LOTR in a modern world headcanons? I think yes.

I did this on one of my old accounts that i ended up deleting for some reason, i don’t remember, but here. Back on my Lord Of The Rings BS, let’s gooooo. This’ll be the fellowship with everyone intact, no one is dead.

As always requests are open and let me know if you want more!

LOTR x GN! Reader, general headcanons for if you had to take care of them today, in 2023. Enjoy!

The ring most likely has no power in this dimension, so yay Frodo is free from torment!

Sam loves watching cooking, gardening and home renovation shows, and he gets very invested in the former two. You learn a lot you didn’t really need to know from his commentary

Once Pippin learns about pyjamas and fuzzy slippers he never goes back, you literally cannot get him out of them

Boromir and Aragorn, being human and coincidentally two of the most responsible members of the fellowship, are the easiest to take in public to the grocery store and such.

You can pass off the hobbits (if they cover their ears with their hair) as children, and Gimli is your friend with dwarfism.

Gandalf you can pass off as your grandfather, and Legolas looks pretty normal if you cover his ears.

Pippin is the type to bounce in his seat in the car and ask “Are we there yet?!” every 5 minutes

Frodo really likes to draw, especially when there’s so many cool places and movies to draw inspiration from.

Movie nights? No horrors. The hobbits are terrified by ‘em.

Movie nights are literally so difficult because they all have such different tastes

Merry really likes James Bond movies.

Pippin is obsessed with nail polish when you introduce him to it. Boromir gets his repainted every time the polish come off. His nails need serious help after a while

Pippin and Merry often start pillow fights, and drag everyone else into it

If you have space for a garden or plants in your home, Sam is on it. He finds it calming, so now you have some home grown plants :)

Taking the hobbits in public? Bad idea. You can trust Frodo and Sam, but Merry inevitably drags Pippin off to do something dumb and possibly dangerous.

Gandalf has an old man rocker. There is no discussion.

The hobbits do the classic “getting one sibling to ask for fast food because whoever’s in charge will say yes”, they get Frodo to do this because he has the best puppy dog face and he’s unsure about asking for things normally.

Pippin and Merry cannot handle too much caffeine or sugar or they go crazy

You thought Legolas’ hair was good before? He steals your hair care products and his hair is literally perfect.

(He’s also willing to do skincare with you, not that his face needs it. Again, flawless)

Game nights are so chaotic. You can’t play a lot of games since they don’t know what many things from this world are, so games like Trivia and Charades are off the table

Gimli and Legolas verse each other in video games, often enough it ends with Legolas winning and Gimli rage quitting

Aragorn is so responsible he’s literally the perfect man to do anything with, and he can hold the fort down if you need to leave

Pippin is so clingy, he trails you wherever you go and asks you random questions but it’s adorable

Boromir insists on carrying your stuff, bags of groceries, all that

Frodo often goes to the library to find new books to read, with you of course

There’s a whole debate on whether 3D or 2D animation is better, i would not get involved if i were you.

Pippin and Merry are also avid fans of quoting their favourite movies, once they see them

Legolas and Frodo are the best listeners, they will just sit there and not judge or try to give you advice they just. sit there. like the perfect men they are.

Legolas would have a meme for everything. Like any situation. You text him like “PIPPIN FELL DOWN SOME WELL WE DON’T EVEN HAVE A WELL HELP” and he just has a meme that fits the situation perfectly.

Frodo and Legolas would watch Avatar: The Last Airbender together because it’s their favourite show. Aragorn jumps in also.

Those three are also avid tea drinkers.

Boromir likes Game Of Thrones. I don’t know anything about it, he just does. Please confiscate Pippin while he does.

Pippin gasps dramatically whenever a plot twist surprises him.

Sam loves to cook, and he does a lot of cooking in the house once he arrives. You two just work together in the kitchen (if you can’t cook, he’ll teach you) and have nice sweet conversations

Legolas is great at doing people’s hair. If you ask him to, he’d probably agree, though he’d probably be a bit flustered as that is a courting ritual in his culture.

Ask Legolas to talk to you until you fall asleep. His voice is so heavenly istg-

The hobbits get sleepy when their hair is played with and it’s adorable

Won’t lie this hyperfixation came back then it circled back to TMNT and today i watched these films with my friend and now i’m back to LotR love. Most of this has been sitting in my drafts for a couple weeks.

Anyway, I think that’s about it from me, I hope you guys enjoy! :)

If you want to request, rules are pinned on my page! Let me know if you want a general part two or a set of modern headcanons for a specific character. I love LOTR in the modern world content so much.

Have a good day, and remember that you are loved!

#lotr #ord of the rings #x reader #lotr x reader #gn! reader #frodo x reader #sam x reader #merry x reader #pippin x reader #aragorn x reader #legolas x reader #gimli x reader #boromir x reader #gandalf x reader #platonic headcanons #everybody lives #im not making aragorn a single father no sir #lotr in modern world #repost from my old account!

115 notes · View notes

lol-jackles · 1 month ago

Note

It's been a while since we talked about SPN. So I wanted to ask you what you think of this essay on Sam (if you have the patience to listen to it, it's about 20 minutes). For some things the author's opinions are legitimate but for others, in my opinion, they are not. Especially for the finale, on which I do not share this opinion at all. www*youtube*com/watch?v=xLCB4RhiP5A&t=4s

I'm not even going to add the link, which tells you what I think of Rachel's opinion. I only agree that season 4 was a bit of a misfire.

Three minutes into the video and I was already bored with her complaints over the "lack" Sam's autonomy and pov. Her Dean blaming got old really fast. Yeah, Dean is unfair towards Sam but 1) that's what brothers do, and most importantly 2) that's what happens to main characters, they constantly get shitted on. One of the biggest reliefs in real life is realizing you're not the main character. In The X Files, Mulder is called a loser even by the freaks and rarely given grace. Nobody apparently trusts Bode in Fire Country despite saving lives. Xena was always getting reminded of her less stellar past in Warrior Princess.

Sam girls get mad when stuff from Sam’s past gets brought up because they think he’s being unfairly punished for it. At least Sam’s past is valid enough to be mentioned. Cas’s storyline gets the LOL treatment and Dean’s arcs are always getting dropped; his hell trauma, tenure as the torturer’s apprentice, Michael’s vessel, demon, MOC, all are dropped and largely forgotten.

Probably the only time the AAs and I are in agreement is Dean's pov means squat because Dean isn't being talked about by other characters. Dean and his pov mainly revolve around Sam. To quote a casual observer I found on tumblr: Sam gets the larger story arcs in the show and Dean gets more of the “silly and fun” filler episodes.

As for Sam's autonomy, my guess is she and I have differing views on the meaning of the word. IMO, autonomous characters often have these traits:

A tendency to resist authority (Sam rebelling against John, Dean, Lucifer, and Chuck)

High level of self-assuredness (Sam knows himself outside the hunting lifestyle)

A need for personal space and privacy (Sam is a private person and admits not sharing his deep personal issues with Dean)

A preference for independence in social situations (Sam is not a follower)

An innate desire for control and decision making power (Sam's life long issue, demon blood infection made it worse)

A desire to set and achieve individual goals and aspirations. (Sam's consistent endgame through the entire series)

A character with autonomy means they have ability to act independently and make decisions without being influenced by others. They have strong sense of self, able to think critically, are self-sufficient and able to take responsibility for their actions. Doesn't that last sentence sound like Sam Winchester to the tee?

Oh yeah I very much Disagree with her take on the series finale. Sam didn't die a bitter old man, what the heck was Rachel watching??? Sam peacefully passed away in his house with his beloved son at his side. Sam's son was clearly a well adjusted young man with a happy childhood. Happy well adjusted offsprings don't come from bitter parents. Sam wasn't bitter, sad yes, but not bitter because he accomplished the goal he had since his own childhood: to have a normal life outside of hunting and raise his own family. Most SPN fans were happy or satisfied with the finale because the Winchester legacy lives on.

#supernatural #sam winchester #dean winchester #main character vs narrator

46 notes · View notes

fannyyann · 1 year ago

Text

Keeping up with the Florida Panthers (aka Sara Civian interviews Matthew)

EP Rinkside: What's something away from the rink that’s making you happy these days?

Matthew Tkachuk: I would say, just, I'm lucky at this time of year. Especially across the whole country, it seems like it's freezing everywhere. It's beautiful down in Florida. And we just moved into our new practice rink recently, so that's been awesome.

EP: There was a quote floating around from (head coach Paul Maurice) from before the nine-game win streak and before you started getting hot on the scoresheet. He said people are going to say “Matthew Tkachuk is back,” and he's going to say you never left. Did you see that?

MT: I did, yes.

EP: How did you feel about it, and what's your relationship with him like?

MT: Well, Paul's been a very important part of my last few years. He’s one of, if not the best, coaches that I've ever played with. He's been very important for my development, and I just think that he trusts my game, and I trust my game. I wouldn't say (the puck) was going in early, but I haven’t changed one thing, I'm still doing the exact same thing, it's just finding a little bit more success right now.

It’s been a great year for our team and as of late, it’s picking it up a little bit for myself. Hopefully, we can just keep trending into the second half of the year here.

EP: How important is that trust between a coach and a player and how is it developed?

MT: I just think that he's always given me the right leeway, but still expects me to play the right way. He knows that there's some parts of my game that (are unique) I need to maybe take a little bit more chances than the average player. He gives me full leeway to do that, but also expects me to work my butt off and to lead by example.

EP: We always talk about “buy-in,” it's kind of cliché at this point, and you guys obviously have that factor. But how does something like that start?

MT: I just think being so close to winning it all last year has made it very, very easy to come back this year and have that immediate buy-in from the guys wanting to win a championship here. So many returning guys who are so close and so upset with not finishing it off. There's a lot of motivation.

EP: Do you have a favourite moment from last season's run?

MT: I would say, probably all of the series-clinching wins, the series-winning goals. The overtime winner in Boston, the overtime winner in Toronto, the last second one at home against Carolina.

All three of those are by far the greatest goals I've ever been a part of.

EP: I feel like we're not as a society talking about Sam Bennett enough. Can you give us a little bit about what he's like off the ice and what it's like to play with him?

MT: He just plays so hard.

He was one of the first guys I met when coming to Calgary, and we've been so close ever since. I'm so happy that we got to play together again down here in Florida. He was the first guy I talked to when I got traded, and we've just been so close for eight-plus years now.

It’s so fun that we're able to play with each other still, we just have such great chemistry on and off the ice. He just plays so hard and he complements my game so well. And off the ice, we're just super close and have a great group of guys that pretty much do everything together away from the rink.

It makes it so much fun to come to the rink every day, work with them, and then when we leave the rink, do stuff together.

EP: If you became the commissioner of the league today, what's the first thing you'd change?

MT: Overtime until somebody scores. No shootouts. And no back-to-backs. I don't know if we need any more back-to-backs right now.

EP: Other than you, who has the best chirps in the league?

MT: I'd say the guy who chirps a lot on our team is Brandon Montour. He has some good ones. Nick Cousins has got some good ones. (Ryan) Lomberg, too. They all have some good ones.

EP: Best advice your dad ever gave you?

MT: Two things: Compete and be a good teammate.

EP: Last year you gained some recognition outside of the hockey world, and it kind of sparked, like, a debate about personality in the NHL. I've always wondered What you actually think about this whole conversation, like, do you like being kind of the personality guy in the NHL?

MT: Well, I’m never going to not be myself. I grew up with great parents that taught me great things and around a great family. I’ll carry that for the rest of my life. I’m not trying to do anything, and some guys are (quieter) and that’s OK. This is just how my personality is.

EP: Can you give me three words to describe the current Panthers?

MT: Oh, I would say very fast. So fast. Close – we’re a super close team. I've never seen a team like this where, you know, we're going to dinner on the road and we're having, you know, 15 people reservations and everybody hanging out with each other. it's been awesome. Fast, close, and fun. Nobody has more fun than our team.

#matthew tkachuk #FAST CLOSE AND FUN #i'm beside myself thanks #his relationship with paul makes me sooooooo #florida panthers #2324

149 notes · View notes

bonzos-number-1-fan · 4 months ago

Text

TMAGP 30 Thoughts: Concrete Evidence

Our finale is upon us. Albeit more of a slightly extended episode than it is double-length. It's more like 10 minutes longer than a standard episode and while I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing I do think it sort of sucks to set expectations and then not deliver on it. Especially when it was a Kickstarter stretch goal. I worry the epilogue is going to feel like the last 10 minutes sliced off of this one too. Either way it was a great episode all in all.

Spoilers for episode 30 below the cut.

This episode follows the classic late in a season episode formula. By which I mean lots of it is really explicit about what it means but some bits are the sort of thing I like to pull out and analyse. So a lot of the plot beats aren't things I need to cover but there are lots of quotes I do want to dig into. Starting with Sam and Celia on the train, which is a real culmination of Celia's general game plan so far. While it's made abundantly clear by the end of this episode her manipulation of the characters has been a fairly constant part of her characterisation so far.

CELIA It sounded like you’d have gone anyway. At least this way I can make sure it all goes to plan. SAM (small laugh) There’s a plan? CELIA Besides, you’re not the only one who’s curious.

That quote really sums up her whole deal this season IMO. She's always been pushing characters to do one thing or another. As soon as her intentions are brought up she'll avoid the question and move the conversation on to something else. It's been happening basically since she was introduced and I'm really glad to see it built up into something satisfying.

Man, poor Colin. I was hoping we'd get some sort of escalation of his storyline this episode but it looks like that'll be more of a season 2 affair. Similarly that looks to be where Gwen is headed too. She's finally got the job she's after but as Lena warns, and as we're all well aware, she's woefully unprepared for it. Mr. Bonzo, Ink5oul, Lady Mowbray, and Needles will all likely play larger roles in season 2 because of it.

I'm not going to get into the details much but I did really enjoy the Custodian's statement. Lots of fun vibes and little details with his character all around. I would've liked to see him stick around in all honestly and crop up again. His fate is quite interesting though because it's showing a lot more from [Error]'s abilities than has previously been showcased. She made Drowning Victim drown but her statement was all about drowning so that's not too crazy, this is much more tangentially related and a far more extreme effect on the victim. Hard to know how much that means but it might be worth pointing out.

The Hilltop Centre is a lot different to what I was expecting. It seems much more like a supernatural hub than the prior incidents concerning it let on. I'm wondering if this is unique to this universe or a constant throughout them. Without getting too much into the details it could be fallout from TMA's ending but this wound that Celia talks about strikes me as a little odd in that context. There was seemingly only one of them at Hilltop. Unless the world Celia came from is also where Darrien 3 came from, as he arrived from that point, then that wound is drawing in everyone from other realities. However if that's the case then there are some fairly major questions about the metaphysical underpinnings of it. It got "better" when Sam was thrown in but there are also clearly a lot of other people coming through as the Custodian mentions.

It wasn’t all death though. Sometimes people… arrived. Not often, but every now and then you’d find some thin, emaciated soul wandering around, lost and confused.

It wasn't just Darrien 3 that came through, multiple people arrived in the same manner. A manner we know isn't how Celia got here because her reaction to that incident was that it wasn't the same. So is this wound just an amalgamation of all the imbalances from all the various universes? We know why Celia wants to "balance" this because it's trying to pull her back, hence the "sleepwalking", and it would eventually win out. How it works on a larger scale is sort of hard to say. It seems like it will just be there forever until everyone who's not meant to be in this universe has left. That seems like a very tall order based on what we've seen. Speaking of balance.

The institute, alchemy, all of it. It’s all about balance. Dua prima, four elements, seven planets, it’s all the same. You’ve got to keep things balanced.

This is a very interesting quote. There are two possible interpretations for this and I'm not sure it's intended to be seen that way. Each of the things Celia lists here is either correctly numbered or off by one. So she might be saying that these are things for which balance is important, or she's saying these are unbalanced things and need correcting. Either works well with her point here.

Dua prima is not really actually a thing as such and is both the biggest indicator she's talking in terms of them being off by one, but also the biggest indicator she's not. Paracelsus' tria prima is a fairly important concept in alchemy as a whole and if you've read more than a few of my posts you'll have seen me mention it. In short sulphur, salt, and mercury are representative of three fundamental properties. Combustibility, permanence, and fluidity respectively and in addition represent the body, the soul, and the spirit. Paracelsus didn't arrive at this idea on his own however and it's largely an addition to Jābir ibn Ḥayyān's work. Jābir, or Geber as he's sometimes known, had this theory of metals that stated all metals were a mix of sulphur and mercury. Additionally sulphur is associated with masculine qualities and the sun, while mercury is associated with feminine ones and the moon. It's not ever called dua prima so far as I'm aware but you could reasonably make that argument.

This same logic can be applied to her mention of the four elements in which fire, air, earth, and water would make up a classical set of four but can also be considered off by one as aether is a later yet—still classical—addition. Alchemy has seven "planets" each with a corresponding metal but our modern definition puts seven off by one as we would say there are eight. However with all that being said I'm more inclined to believe she meant these things were balanced as they are. I said that the dua prima was also the best indicator of that and for the reason why we've got to go back to episode 19.

Doing mummy and daddy Stasi proud, I’m sure. Not that anyone cares as long as it all balances, right? Not too much mercury or the world ends, not too much sulfur or we all go mad…

At the time I said this was two of the three primes of tria prima, which it is, but in this context it doesn't appear that the lack of salt was an omission. Salt just might not be a part of it at all. It's fairly hard to say exactly how important this will be though. It certainly seems quite relevant but it's also something they might be making up rather than anything more firmly rooted in existing alchemic lore.

I don’t- when I first awoke I knew nothing, nothing but the dream of things that sliced my who from me with claws like scalpels… They would hunt me and toy with what it meant to be me peeling away my layers first my name, then my memory and then… …and then the fearless one reached in and grasped me, tore me out, leaving my story to fall away like autumn leaves…

I think Celia's statement has very little to get into really, I just wanted to mention that it was a nice detail. Another if you know you know and not a topic I get into here. [Error] also has a line here I think is interesting but it requires getting more into TMA than I care for so I'm going to leave it. I'm not 100% sure what to make of it either as of yet.

And there we have it. Season 1 is wrapped. Well other than the epilogue, What If?, fluff episode, and trailer. I don't have much of a bow to tie on this really other than to say I've really enjoyed this season and I'm excited for where it's going to go next.

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

Prediction Follow Up

Celia is going to get [Error]ed and exposition dump about her whole deal. - That happened but the exposition relevant to the show's plot didn't occur via that.

Alice gets got and she's got some secret twisty trauma. - Didn't happen.

Teddy can give her a lift and we'll hear what was on his mind. - Also didn't happen.

Speaking of [Error] it seems likely that Celia is going to reveal at least what she knows about Archivists. - This didn't not happen but also didn't really happen exactly.

With [Error] being this season's antagonist it's likely that she's going to get defeated in the finale. - Kinda sorta maybe.

It could be a gaping maw in realities that sucks our cast off to someplace new. - Got some of our cast at least, so lets say 3.

Hilltop is likely to play some role in defeating [Error] and if I had to hazard a guess I think it's likely we'll see some of the great cosmology at play here - Kinda sorta.

I think we're also going to see a good bit of Gwen going behind Lena's back too... I don't think we'll necessarily see anything major happen but I do think it's a pretty likely hook for season 2. - Yeah, that all basically happened.

Final Score 10/10 - Being incorrect does not impact my self-worth.

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

Season 2 Predictions

Honestly, I don't have much to say for this. It's probably going to be still follow the same characters, Sam will deal with whatever new universe he's in, Celia will play dumb but Alice won't buy it, Gwen will fail to deal with her new responsibilities, Teddy will reveal some awful secret, Colin will go further into the deep end, and there will probably be some sort of Magnus-based twist.

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

Incident/CAT#R#DPHW Master Sheet and Terminology Sheet

DPHW Theory: 3366 is a very pleasing set of numbers. This one matches episode 8's Architecture (Liminal) -/- Hunger too which I mention for the thematic symmetry. They're quite different incidents but has some similar elements. Which I think is a good indication of my theory's strength. You'd expect some sort of parallels to be able to be drawn if these numbers were ratings in categories as I've laid out. It's not definitive proof but it's more than I've had to talk about here for a while.

CAT# Theory: CAT2 is another obviously "wrong" one for the Person/Place/Object theory IMO. Hilltop is a place but Hilltop didn't cause it and it didn't happen to Hilltop. [Error] made a dude turn into concrete. Fairly useless to pin that one on the location. I think there are more than enough of these obviously faulty ones that I can stop mentioning it come season 2. Hopefully I'll have my own theory to talk about by then too.

R# Theory: We've finally got our first S. It's been long awaited if only by myself. Generally, I'm very pleased with this. An S on this case is some of the best evidence I've had that I'm correct about the general purpose of Ranks. A still living concrete man is undeniable evidence of the supernatural. No amount of explaining it away changes the fact a man turned into concrete and lived to tell the tale. It's still not 100% certain if Rank is purely about evidence or more about urgency in general but I do think now it's fairly clear that if I'm not entirely correct it's the right path.

Header talk: Transmutation (Human) -/- Isolation (Urban). Very little to talk about on that one but it's interesting to see the continued difference between transformation and transmutation.

#the magnus protocol #tmagp #tmagp theory #tmagp speculation #klaus = kl4-u5

44 notes · View notes

bcacstuff · 3 months ago

Note

The conspiracies continue. Latest, Sam got dropped off by a PR woman in the car with him then the same PR and car picked up Cait and Sophie so as Sam and Cait would not be seen arriving together. Now, there is no doubt that they are free of TPTB's shackles and happy to be seen together out and about. But wait, this last sentence contradicts the previous one which claims that they feel free to roam about and don't care to be spotted together outside work. Wish I can say I can't make this stuff up but I'd be wrong and after writing all this also feel dizzy from the spin.

Oh Anon! Told you the only thing you get from it all is a headache (or a dizzy spin for that matter).

It's not only on that side.... I mean, I could have written the whole scenario for the rest of the night. Anons making guesses;

Even worse already accusing him and calling him out!

Note: Not me writing this and not me endorsing this!

All without any substantial evidence, just putting up a wet finger in the air and it's all obvious what weather we'll have at Christmas!

Mind you Anons, Vicky had her birthday (as well) that Friday and was celebrating it with her sister who posted a pic of her with a (rather poor looking) birthday cake. She looks all happy with it

So shame on you especially those last 2 Anons.

And sorry... you can be nasty about me not going to look into this all but for all I can say is the hair of the woman in the car looked a lot more dark than Vicky's.

All the maybe this or maybe that in the comments and in my inbox wont bring anything either, only more speculation and guesses either positive or negative.

The fan posting the video on Twitter removing it later on, which of course adds more to the suspicion and chaos on all sides...

The shipper obsessed with my blog and can't help herself mentioning me all the time whether relevant or not, busy taking screenshots from my posts and comments on it, marking them with her yellow marker and sloppy red underlined [might I suggest monosnap to her to make it look a little better] as if the yellow marker isn't enough. Not missing a chance to twist words, telling half truths, meandering about grammar and quotes from uninteresting lexicons, putting it all in the worst perspective she can create, all to make her own poor lies more credible....

Did I miss something?

All that why I enjoyed a good movie [to the trolling Anon, movies do have breaks and there's also a pause button on my device].

Thanks all for not disappointing me, this fandom is totally predictable. Nothing new on the horizon!

31 notes · View notes

live-laugh-legolas · 3 months ago

Note

So the fellowship is invited to an all expense paid trip to Disney World! Thank you saving the world guys! #its a small middle-earth after all

They have a family suite package with the Disney dining plan, multilightning lane passes ( these replaced fast passes) for free!

Character dining?

Disney Resort hotel of their choices?

rides of their choices ?

Ears of their choices?

Shows/ fireworks/parades????

Character meet and greets??

How do they get there?

Who gets lost in the park?

Disney T-shirts/ Disney bounding?

What's in in their theme park bags?

Who's the theme park mom???????

Over planing/under planing?

Who embraces the Disney magic the most?

Favorite park snacks????

The fellowship at Disney World

Character dining/Meet and greets:

-Sam is so happy

-Legolas is scared

-Please don’t interact with Boromir because he doesn’t know what to do

-All the characters pay attention to Aragorn; like he’s the target of their play

-Gimli tries to get the actors to break

-Frodo chats with the ones who are allowed to talk

-Merry and Pippin quote the movies to the characters which gets old but not to them; really niche things though so the actors might not even know what they are talking about

Rides:

-Pippin loves It’s a Small World

-Aragorn gets motion sick on rollercoasters and any of the 4D experiences; strictly boat rides and designated “I’ll wait for you at the exit” person

-Gimli is mad he is too short for some of the rides

-Merry and Pippin are wearing wedges in their shoes so they can ride (don’t do this; danger danger)

-Frodo loves the 4D rides

-Legolas is an adrenaline junkie; he always sits in the front of rollercoasters and will go one them over and over

-I’m not even positive Gandalf went to the park; he might just be drinking by the pool

Favorite park:

-Aragorn and Frodo love Epcot

-Legolas and Merry like Animal Kingdom

-Sam, Pippin, and Gandalf like the Magic Kingdom

-Boromir and Gimli like Hollywood Studios

Ears?:

-Aragorn won’t wear the ears or any of the hats

-Frodo and Sam have matching classic ears

-Gandalf wears sparkly ones but under his hat as a little “surprise”

-Legolas and Pippin don’t like the feeling of the headbands; gives them headaches

-Gimli doesn’t have any headwear because he refuses to give into any of the overpriced capitalism

-Merry has a Goofy hat

Shows and events:

-Boromir will be pissed if they miss the parade

-The hobbits try to get the characters to copy their movements; Frodo and Sam just wave; Merry and especially Pippin get a bit wild

-Legolas lives for fireworks

-Gandalf thinks he can do better fireworks

-Aragorn is just happy that the hobbits are happy

Walking in the parks:

-Boromir and Gimli argue over the map and both end up lost because they were so distracted that the others just left them

-Merry knows the parks by heart

-Sam claims to know the layout but then gets confused and blames it on “that wasn’t there last time”

-Frodo just follows Aragorn

-Aragorn goes where Frodo wants to go

-Gandalf disappears but then shows up randomly again with a new food item

-Legolas runs ahead to find what they are looking for so he can come back and guide them

-Merry and Pippin are determined to break into the underground tunnels and they recruit Legolas to help

-They do not succeed; maybe if they asked nicely for a tour but no, they wanted to sneak in

“What’s in my bag tag”:

-Boromir has a Fanny pack

-Sam has a practical backpack but Aragorn ends up carrying it

-Sam also has an autograph book and pen at the ready

-Aragorn may have a bag but he ends up not bringing it anymore because he ends up holding my everyone else’s stuff while then go on rides and meet characters

-The hobbits hand their trash to Aragorn

-Legolas never brings anything

-Gimli tries to bring in his own water and food so he doesn’t have to pay the obscene prices; doesn’t work and he’s bitter about it

General thoughts on Disney:

-Gimli hates them and thinks it’s all bullshit propaganda

-The hobbits love the parks so much

-Boromir gets stressed in the parks and tries to plan to do everything in a timely manner

-Gandalf goes to the hidden bars

-Aragorn has a membership card thing or whatever so he doesn’t have to pay for anything because he has points

-Legolas likes the history of the parks

———————————————————————

These are based on my memories of Disney World in Orlando FL. I did no research and that’s why I didn’t include resorts and stuff because I’ve only stayed at two of them

I’m not a big Disney person tbh but I have fond memories of visiting the parks as a kid. It’s a Small World was my favorite.

44 notes · View notes

thelaurenshippen · 1 month ago

Note

okay i know im very very late to the party but i need to say that after listening to the entirety of tbs in the last month and a half and reading 2/3 of the books (sfp is arriving in a few days and i will be reading it then) i want to thank you for such an amazing experience. i had SO much fun and felt so many emotions while listening to all 7 seasons, and i have never felt more seen. especially when it comes to adam, who is actually me in a scary number of ways, from my love of shakespeare and baking and music to my gayness to my experiences with insecurity and loneliness and depression and sh, and a million more things. reading the infinite noise made me feel like you ripped every part of me out of my head and put me on the page to publish in the best way possible. your writing is going to stick with me for the rest of my life, and i cannot express how grateful i am to see myself represented in so many ways. so i guess what i'm saying is thank you, and you have touched my heart more than any other writer has in a very very long time, if ever. your work, and the work of everyone else who was part of the tbs universe, means so much to me. you have inspired me and helped me learn more about myself. i hope you have a lovely day :)

oh my gosh, you're gonna make me CRY! I am always over the moon to get these kinds of messages and I really love hearing that people relate to any of my characters, but especially Adam (and Sam of course) - Adam is so much of my teenage experience put into words and while I hate that anyone can relate to the rougher parts of that experience, it means so much to me when people do, because it means that neither you nor me are alone.

there's a line from "The History Boys", a wonderful play (and movie!), that is perhaps the only quote I have memorized verbatim because of how often I repeat it:

The best moments in reading are the ones in which you come across something - a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things - that you thought special and particular to you. And here it is, set down by someone else, a person you have never met, maybe even someone long dead. And it's as if a hand has come out, and taken yours.

that's all I'm ever trying to do with my writing. and I'm so grateful you're reaching back <3

#lauren answers things #literally want to print this out and paste it in my notebook thank you #the history boys #the bright sessions

23 notes · View notes

sheepheadfred · 3 months ago

Text

Ectoberhaunt Day 13: Isekai: Old Hero New World

Summary: Danny doesn't know how he got here, but science seems to have advanced a lot... and gotten very animal focused?!

(cw: alternating pov)

Ao3 link

An explosion in the lab and a tumble through a random portal inside the realms later, Danny has no idea where he is.

Blue skies, green plants. He knows he must be on Earth, but where?

Doesn't help that the green is getting closer as he moves upwards. Oh, he's going down!

Are those trees?

Oh yeah, he also seems to be falling!

Danny sure hopes he's in ghost form. Not looking forward to if this is how he kicks the bucket for real. Either way, this is gonna hurt.

No energy to scream and barely conscious as it is, snapping branches snuff out any awareness he momentarily had.

The Wild Kratts crew are relaxing in the Tortuga when Koki gets an alert by some Wild Kratts Kids. It was Aiden! Something strange happened in the forest near his home.

Something had a big crash in the woods and it seems to have scared the animals near by and the kids are worried.

Could it be one of their usual villains? Maybe, but they tend to be more subtle than this. Hopefully it's not a new villain they need to worry about.

The crew packs up and heads to the North American Eastern Woodlands, full of concern and mounting dread.

Danny wakes on a bed of broken branches and is surrounded by trees walling him in, the sun shining through the canopy. A squirrel napping on him scurried away as he sat up to take in his surroundings more clearly.

How long was I out?

He's not Sam and can't identify plants on sight, but he's pretty sure this forest is local or at least similar to what he's used to. He thinks these might be oak trees but don't quote him on that. It just seems likely that he at least stayed in the U.S. is all.

It'd be easier to find out where he is if he could check the stars but, sadly, it's the middle of the day. No stars for him. A shame.

Checking himself for injuries, he finds that he must have changed back after crashing. The timing for it makes the most sense for one.

Hoping he doesn't have a concussion or any broken bones that he can't feel, Danny starts to walk through the forest. Too worn out to fly for now.

That and he doesn't know if its safe to risk it or if someone would see Phantom and call the GIW or something.

Danny limped forward in the direction he chose randomly and saw the sun peaking brighter through the trees. Hoping that it means there's a clearing, he speeds up as much as he can.

The closer he got, the louder and more distinct voices became in that direction.

They sound young.

Once he reached the edge of the forest and into the clearing, his legs gave out. He has been walking without rest since he woke up and Danny can't even remember when he last ate.

As he blacks out, his only thought was how he must look to the kids who had to be nearby.

Hope this doesn't traumatize them.

The crew arrives on scene. The clearing near the beaver pond seems undamaged but they know better than to just judge without investigating.

The area is eerily quiet, especially for this time of day.

Jimmy pulls them in for a landing and the others get ready to disembark. Kratt brothers Martin and Chris make their way to the concerned children first thing when the Tortuga landed.

"Ok, just to be clear. What did you hear?" Martin beat Chris to the punch in asking.

"There was a big crash deep in the woods. And then the whole forest went quiet. We haven't seen almost any animals since." The older of the two brothers answered, the younger one nodding to confirm he heard it, too.

After deliberating with the others, the Kratt brothers were about to venture into the woods to investigate. About to.

Because right before they could, a boy, early teens at oldest, stumbled out of the forest looking like he had been through a very rough hike.

Meanwhile, miles away but in the same forest hours ago:

The whelp didn't notice him?! What an insult. The halfling is quick to notice the presence of a ghost, even if due to that 'ghost sense' of his. To not be noticed means it was on purpose or something is wrong with his prey. Yet he seemed to be functioning like usual!

Skulker hovers above the treeline, watching Danny plummet into the leafy abyss.

"Pathetic. The whelp really must be slipping if he failed to notice me. Although his parents were right there and disrupted the sanctity of my hunt! They have no respect for actual hunters. Closer to savages who target indiscriminately than a hunter who can tell which prey is worth the effort and which are bottom feeders best left alone. Even the whelp knows that! They are more akin to Plasmius and his cruel experiments on the recently dead and never born than true hunters." The ghost thought out loud to himself, mentally marking his observations down as he flew. Grumbling along the way. "It should not matter where the hunt took place, even inside the cursed residence."

He left to find something more fun to hunt in the meantime. The whelp was no fun when he doesn't bring a challenge!

And he didn't have to search long.

He didn't happen upon a creature catching his eyes but another hunter! One with a different style and class than he's seen the human world have before! Even if he hasn't really seen most of the human world. He won't stay, of course, but he can observe these new methods and see if he can add them to his own style. The possibilities are endless.

Coming into consciousness was never fun as he was forced to take stock of what is wrong. Danny is sure more damage to his person happened since the last time he did so. A few hours ago. He thinks.

He has never been good at telling time on a good day, let alone on a day where he hasn't been aware of time's passing.

Sitting up, he realized his burns he can now feel have fresh bandages on and that he is not alone or surrounded by trees this time.

He seems to instead be in some kind of medical room. Not professional and it lacks the smell of antiseptic and buzzing of florescent lighting of a hospital. One less thing to worry about, he supposed.

I am getting real tired of not knowing what's going on.

A young woman poked her head in the room. She had a tan complexion, neatly tied back hair, and a bright yellow jacket. Her face lit up once she saw him, kind brown eyes landing on him.

"Hey, we were worried about you!"

Danny doesn't know this woman nor why she'd be worried. Sure he was hurt, but he got hurt all the time!

In lieu of answering with words, he used his very confused expression and pointed to himself to ask and make sure.

"Yes, you! What kind of kid goes hiking in the middle of the woods without any gear or ways of communication?"

Oh yeah, my phone should still be in my room. Haven't had the chance to tell anyone something happened. That and something was in the lab, of course I went alone!

"Someone who woke up there and just started walking." Danny was still groggy having just woken up, his mouth moved before his thoughts caught up with him.

"Just woke up there?!"

Ooops, guess that was the wrong thing to say.

"Sorry? It was the middle of the night when someone broke in and the sun was up when I woke up in the middle of all the trees."

Her face looks sickened.

SHIIIT. WHY CAN'T I SAY THE RIGHT THING?!

"What I meant was 'Hi, my name is Danny, what is yours?'!" he near panic shouted out of sheer embarrassment.

Taking a second, the woman in yellow tried to get her thoughts in order while making sure her mouth worked. Hopefully better than his as he keeps putting his foot in his mouth.

"R-right, I'm Aviva and you're on the Tortuga. The headquarters of the Wild Kratts crew."

"That was a lot of words that you said. I don't know what a 'Tortuga' or a 'Wild Kratts' is but it's nice to meet you, Aviva." Danny answered her with a polite smile and an attempt at a handshake which she thankfully returned.

"Well, it seems we both have questions. How about I get the others so I'm not the only one trying to clear this up with you? Or you can move to the main area when you're ready. Ayaiyai, I am not the team medic. I think I'll grab someone else to clear you and get you something to eat and drink. They'll want to know you're awake, anyway."

All he could do was not as she left the room muttering to herself like mad with a dazed expression.

Great, more strangers. At least I can get answers soon. Hopefully.

Martin and Chris were investigating the forest. Something mysterious is happening and they don't like what they've been seeing.They found the spot of broken branches a good ways in like something fell from way up high.

They sure hope it wasn't anything alive because they doubt whatever it was would have survived the fall. But given that there are nothing but broken branches, either an animal dragged it off or the fallen object got up on its own.

It wasn't just that. If it was just whatever fell, the forest wouldn't be as silent as it is. It's giving them an eerie feeling.

Chris searches for clues from the trees as the climbing brother while Martin checks from the ground.

Heavy boot prints and purposefully damaged plant life hints at someone dangerous out here. They worry about the kid they found who came from this direction and woke up here according to him if Aviva's report is accurate.

They decide to continue investigating a bit longer before heading back. Their animal friends could be in danger and a kid has been targeted!

Only, they didn't need to continue looking. The air grew colder when before the sun kept them warm and now it's like the sun can't reach them. A deafening silence even more noticeable over the lack of forest noise, and a new sound of the whine of small rockets like a jet pack.

Out of the corner of their eyes they could see a silver suit of armor and flaming green hair. A net suddenly sprung out at them and they barely managed to dodge!

The only thing they heard from this new villain was him calling for a 'whelp' and that nothing else in the area would be worth his time, but that they would do for now.

Danny made his way to the main area of this building he woke up in, having gotten tired of waiting, when he heard an alarm. Still exhausted, he braces against the wall after the noise assaults his ears.

What the?

Now fully awake, he tries to understand what has everyone in such a tizzy.

Two men were on a video call on the big screen talking to Aviva, a ginger, and a black woman he has yet to meet. Talking about a new villain searching for some rare creature he called a 'whelp' while stomping around in a metal suit.

A new villain? Wait... 'Whelp'? Oh no.

Danny is now glad no one noticed him because now he can sneak out as Phantom. His reserves are still low but if Skulker is here looking for him, then he's gonna get him!

Not gonna let some innocent civilians get hurt because he's too tired. He never let that stop him before!

... Though, he will have to be smart about his powers. They don't know about him, maybe even ghosts in general, and he doesn't want to ruin a forest because a ghost followed him all the way out here.

On his way out, he got to see the place from the outside and he just knows his friends would be jealous once their worry moves out of the way. A turtle ship! Not too unbelievable from what he's seen but it's amazing. A combination of both Sam and Tucker's passion!

Well, I can always be fascinated later.The dead never rest, after all.

He snaps out of his momentary awe and leaves towards where he first woke up. Following the now twice over haunted forest trail.

Further into the forest, the brothers were dealing with this guy. Or trying to at least.

It's like this anything they do goes straight through him!

Don't get them wrong, they are glad they are being targeted instead of some poor animal but c'mon! This guy has to be getting tired at some point! Even if it's just his suit getting overused.

He kept demanding information of where whatever creature he was looking for was. Which, even if they got what he meant specifically by 'whelp' and 'half ghost' they'd never rat out any creature to someone who'd want to hurt them, anyway!

And then, he decided since they aren't helpful, they might as well be target practice! Who does this?!

They're on the back foot, trying to get away when suddenly a blast of green energy comes from behind. Shooting right in between the brothers and hitting the suit or armor guy square in the chest. Pushing the villain back a few feet and leaving a strange, charged smell in the air.

Whatever that was, the new villain grinned at the arrival.

The crew back at the Tortuga scrambled.

A new villain, a hunter by the sounds of it, is looking for a creature he calls 'whelp' or 'halfling'.

And to make matters worse, when Aviva went to check on the injured kid and he was gone. He vanished as if he was a ghost!

She was the one to check on him because he already met her and now she's even more worried about him! She's glad they already sent the Wild Kratts kids who called them here home. It wouldn't do to worry about their safety, too!

He said he just woke up in the middle of the woods and some of his wounds are older than just the last few hours he has to have been hiking for. More like stumbling! He's lucky the direction he picked led him to other people!

How did he up and leave without anyone noticing, anyway? Even if they were busy, someone should have heard him leave! Right?

No! Don't beat yourself up for this, Aviva! Focus on the task at hand for now! A new villain is in these woods now and the injured kid disappeared! They could be connected somehow!

She jumped on a Buzz Bike after letting the others know she was on her way, and left towards the action.

The brothers Kratt only had a moment to turn their head to see the newcomer before things started happening again. The world felt like it was on pause between the blast and the newcomer floating in there, feet off the ground, as they gave a sassy and confident smirk.

Whoever this was had the physical appearance of a young teenager with snow white hair and glowing green eyes, shining the same color that is lighting up his outstretched fist. He seemed to be glowing the same white as his hair and off-putting aura that the man before them was. An aura that wasn't that noticeable before now is amplified. The rest of him was in black and white like a strange bodysuit with a stylized D on his chest. An emblem like their paw print ones on the power suits.

The power suits!

That gives them and idea.

Before they left to find some creatures, they could hear the robotic armor and newcomer exchange banter like they knew each other.

"Ah, so you finally show yourself!"

"Skulker, you asshole! First you broke into the lab and shot me in the back and now you are just throwing a tantrum because I'm not here to entertain you! What the hell!"

"You know full well how this goes, ghost child."

"But at 2 AM?! I just managed to pass out. And because you attacked in the house, the house's defenses activated! I am so tired of you and I'm running on negative sleep!"

Wait... the 'whelp' was this KID?!

The newly dubbed 'Skulker' refuted the accusation that he blew up whatever lab the kid was in. Then shouting about some kind of 'Frootloop' was the last they heard before they made a retreat.

Who that kid is doesn't matter right now, it's time to find some creature powers to help him out. They don't want to leave the kid alone with that guy for long, he looks and is acting like he can handle it but he's clearly very tired. Skulker is very clearly armed and dangerous!

Aviva made her way to the boys, having no idea where Danny wandered off to and only able to focus on one thing at the moment, when the brothers quite literally crashed into her. Leaving them all sprawled on the ground for a hot minute before picking themselves back up.

"Guys?! What is going on?"

"We wish we could tell you." Martin replied first, taking a second to process things.

"What we do know," Chris chimed in, "is that what we need is some creature power. There is a dangerous villain farther in and we need to help that mystery kid fighting him!"

"What? Is there someone else out there? Did you say 'kid'?"

"Yeah, and we need to help them. They showed up out of nowhere to help fight off Skulker, that's the villains name apparently by the way, but they seemed really tired just after one hit!"

"What?!"

"Yeah. We need to help them! Hopefully after we can learn who this person is, too!"

"Well, more than being the 'whelp' Skulker was searching for!"

The boys ran off in different directions, finding a different creature to transform into.

Aviva was left there, stunned.

Today has been so confusing.

And not the fun way.

She's going to help even if she doesn't know everything that's going on or so help her!

Aviva gets back on the Buzz Bike and heads for the action.

Danny has less energy than he thought!

One blast and he's already struggling to not change back again.

Damn Skulker! First his ghost sense wakes him up and then he comes at him from behind, pushing him into this mess!

Sure, maybe the lab explosion was probably not entirely his fault but there's a whole lot else from that night that was.

Danny is pretty sure adrenaline and rage are all that's keeping him moving, but what else is new?

Having to doge and weave through the trees while Skulker can go right through them, apparently finding it fun to have trees as obstacles. Frustrating but he knows the alternative is the fight above the trees and he's not sure he could stay in the air long enough for that.

Exhaustion dragging through him, right to his bones even in this form, is his body's payback for not resting enough even if he never really gets to.

One wrong turn and a failed dodge later, and he slammed into a tree. Winded, tired, and in a daze. Struggling to catch his breath, all he can do is lean on this tree that caught him mid-flight. Collapsing under his own weight.

He was sure that this was it for him, when suddenly a large green bird and a human sized bipedal blue wolf, he thinks, started attacking Skulker from two different sides.

It wasn't until they spoke did he realize that they were the two men Skulker was fighting earlier! At least Danny thinks so? Today has been wild for him. But he is pretty sure he at least heard their voices back at that giant mechanical turtle.

The green bird man took the fight to the sky, Skulker following him. The ghost is curious and confused, yet intrigued. He hopes they aren't some rare creature for him to hunt, too!

While one went off to take the fight out of here, the blue brother stayed behind. The man came up to him, concern etched onto his face.

"Hey, kid. Are you alright? Standard question, I know, but a response would be good." This was said in a light tone but caution was in his voice.

Shit, is he talking to me? Great, hope my mouth works properly this time.

"Yeah", a groan escaped him as he tried to stand while the world spun, "Just trying to find the bus that ran me over."

"Buddy, I can say with certainty that getting up right now is not a good idea for you."

"But if I don't fight him, who will? He could hurt someone! Besides, I'm used to this."

The man frowned, looking a bit heartbroken. Danny didn't understand why, especially while in this state. No one else minded he did all this stuff. Danger is the price to pay for living in Amity Park, let alone being a Fenton!

"How about this, you tell me what you usually do when fighting him and we can let my brother know? He's the green bird you saw earlier."

Danny wanted to protest but he could barely see straight. Can he really trust these guys? He wants to but his head is pounding too much to think clearly.

"I don't even know your name, wolf-man."

The blue wolf man paused, before chuckling a bit, "Oh, right! I'm Martin and my brother is Chris. We're the Kratt brothers! Most people we run into are able to recognize us so I forgot you probably wouldn't know."

"Huh", Danny's mouth tried to work as he processed this. Martin and Chris are apparently big names here! But all he could say was, "Didn't know a bird and a wolf could be related like that, are you adopted?"

"Wha-", he looks at himself and realizes he's still transformed, " Oh! No this is from my creature power suit! Our friend, Aviva, invented them. Programming and form and everything! Animal DNA and nature know-how takes care of the rest!"

Huh! Technology sure can be impressive! Especially when it's not centered on his and other ghosts' destruction!

"Oh." Apparently he cannot talk today, "I'm Phantom."

While trying to remember what else he was asked, an explosion shook the trees, stopping any further conversation.

Coming back down through the trees was Chris, plummeting right on top of them, screaming.

Martin moved to catch his brother. To keep him from getting more hurt and to keep Phantom from being directly impacted. A glow of green and blue signifying the crash to cause their deactivation.

The light from their de-transformations caught Phantom's eye. They can change just like him! He thinks he can trust them with this, after all.

Oh, no! But that could be bad if Skulker decides to want them for that!

Wait... Skulker!

"Ya gotta remove his head."

The now human looking brothers look at him in disbelief. Chris showed confusion as well as only Martin had context for that.

"Oh, right! Chris, this kid is Phantom! Phantom, this is Chris!"

"Bro, that only answered one question."

Danny just realized they are both looking at him.

Right, it's not obvious. Forgot.

"The head of his suit. It comes off," Danny tried to explain while his head and mouth were not working right, "then ya gotta use this."

He hands them the Fenton Thermos.

"For soup?"

"Nooooo, ya gotta uncap it and just point it at him once the head is off. It'll get him to stop."

Dannys instructions were not as clear as they should be but they had no choice but to try it.

Able to get around the trees better and with Skulkers attention back on Phantom, they managed to knock his head off.

And they were really not prepared for what happened next.

With the head now off, the body just went limp.

Like no one was inside.

Then they looked at the head in their hands and tiny, green feet were sticking out of them. Kicking wildly.

"Use the thermos!"

Phantom's strained yell startled them that they dropped the thermos and almost dropped the head.

Only to be picked up by Aviva, coming in clutch.

Danny tried to explain what to do, but he's unsure if what came out made sense.

Well, either it did or she was able to intuit what needed to happen, as she did exactly what she needed to do.

She pointed the thermos and aimed it at the knocked off head. Skulker finally was able to force himself out of his robotic head right before the beam hit him.

His booger-y form is visible for all to see and cursing them all.

Danny laughed at his small form, feeling good about this.

"Hey, guess what! I can transform like you guys!" Danny exclaimed, impulse making an executive decision.

And Danny let his transformation rings wash across his body, passing out again for the second time that day. Oblivious to the three adults' shocked faces.

Back in the Tortuga, hours later:

"...And that's what happened. I'm pretty sure that the portal spit me out somewhere completely different or even a different dimension. I don't have time to keep up to date on most news usually, but I'm pretty sure either of my friends would be raving about you guys. One's an extreme activist and the other is a tech nerd who'd totally geek out about this ship."

Danny, bandaged and rested up, explained all that happened leading up to here since he was last home. He slipped in some things about his home and his friends and family. Even ending with what he thinks is a lame smile and jazz hands.

"Everything I learn about you makes me more concerned." One of them said. Danny thinks her name was 'Koki'.

"Yeah, dude. That is seriously messed up," JZ chimed in, "This guy wasn't even one of the more dangerous ones? Are you sure you should even go back?"

"Speaking to the choir, dude. I'm well aware how messed up my half life is. But it is my life, y'know? I need to be able to get back."

Despite the adults' clear hesitation about sending him back, they don't want to trap him here away from the people he loves. That's what their villains try to do when they kidnap baby animals! With what they old him, he can at least trust them to help him get home.

Somehow.

"How will I get home, anyway? I can do some basic engineering from being around my parents' stuff my whole life but I'm not sure where to start!" Danny had to ask. He feels like he can ask them despite the uncertainty. It's not often he comes across adults he can feel this way about.

"Oh, I can help with that!"

"Aviva? I thought you did animal based engineering and inventing?"

"Si, I am. But if I managed to crack time travel, even just a bit, then I don't see how I can't do this, too!

"Now, that is some confidence! Time travel? Do tell!"

"Oh!" The brothers simultaneously looked at her and Danny, "She invented a time trampoline!"

"We went back in creature time to meet extinct animals!"

They practically talked over each other out of excitement.

"A trampoline?!" Danny could hardly believe that human made time travel existed here, let alone one that functioned like a trampoline!

The group laughed good naturedly at his reaction, as understandable as it was.

"I think we all agree that you can stay with us until a way home is secured. Bet you never got to fly in a giant turtle ship, before?" Jimmy casually tells him in his usual, laid back tone.

"You bet I haven't! I did successfully land a NASA shuttle once, though. That was a story and a half for sure. I've done a lot of flight simulators in preparation to be an astronaut!"

It felt good to be able to passionately talk about what he loves with others who can share back different passions.

"Ah, a future space boy, huh?," JZ responded, "Thinking about life on other planets?"

"One of the many things to think about regarding space!" Space talk really brought out Danny's energy.

"Oh,"Koki added, "bet he doesn't know about tardigrades!"

"What are those?"

"Tardigrade, or a water bear, is a small creature, usually only visible with a microscope that can survive in even the harshest environments. Creatures like the tardigrade show us that life could be possible out there in ways we never thought possible." It's like all of them took turns infodumping that he wasn't able to discern who said which part as he took in the information.

"Those things sound so cool! How do we find them?"

"I guess we can show you. You are staying until you can go home after all!"

He's looking forward to future adventures while they last. To learning about animals he never once though twice about and giving their villains a good scare.

"Oh yeah," a thought just occurred to him, "what does 'tortuga mean? Like why did you make that the name of your giant turtle ship?"

"Danny," Aviva said with a smirk,"'Tortuga' means 'turtle' in Spanish!"

Danny's face lit up red in embarrassment and everyone laughed at his expense. He felt warm and welcome here, a way he hasn't back home in a long time if ever.

If animals and how they work were taught anything like this, I don't think I would have failed that class as badly. I think being here will be fun while it lasts!

Sam and Tucker are gonna be so jealous!

35 notes · View notes