#gold boots suit why you so difficult to get a full shot off?

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The Flash Suit went though quite a few changes over the years but which suit did you like best?

[beskarberry]

Devil’s Advocate

Bargaining with Beskar, Chapter 5

(The Mandalorian x f!reader)

“That your girl over there?” Mando followed their gaze wordlessly, reluctant to make friends right now while he was busy waiting for you to call him back to your side. “Thought so.” The stranger took a long drag on an inhalant, blowing vibrant pink clouds into the smoky room. “Sorry for your loss, Elios always gets what he wants.” Mando turned again to the stranger, fixing them with his black hole glare, but they only shrugged; watching the drinking game unfold between you and the devil himself.

Rating: Explicit

Word count: 11.2k whoops

Content warnings: VICES: gambling/smoking/drinking (reader drinks) Introduction of chapter-specific OC characters. Lots of angst to fluff, sexy times of course.

A/N: This might be more self indulgent than the first chapters but not because of the smut. I kinda go off about fancy clothes so long descriptions of costumes are a big chunk of this chapter.

<-Previous Next->

You hated everything about Canto Bight.

Everything about the city was so... artificial. The stadium flood lights, the glowing neon signs, even the ocean herself had been excavated from the planet’s stubborn sandstone surface instead of eroded naturally by the march of time. To you it was like looking at Corellia’s gold painted twin, a monument to the hubris of all sentient life.

 Even the patrons of the gilded city were fake; their clothes, their makeup, their personalities. Every aspect of them was perfectly curated to deceive and lie, whatever fanciful display would work best to cheat their way to the jackpot. You almost wished you could look past the falseness of it, experience the visual fanfare of light and color that reflected on every surface. You wanted the music and the art and the decor that had been so carefully picked and placed to mean something to you, to sparkle in your heart just as it sparkled in the eyes of the teeming masses. But, all for naught, the gleaming metropolis stung your eyes; and you turned away from it to admire the quaint little space that actually mattered to you.

 You shared the tight quarters of the cockpit with the two strange boys that had recently whisked you away to the stars. Mando was seated in the pilot's chair with his tiny green son perched in his lap, trying to get him to eat his dinner without making so much of a mess. You had already eaten, and you were turning the last hunter’s puck over in your hand, reluctant to get this chase started and take away from the familial scene beside you. It would have to happen sooner or later, and you gave the puck a squeeze to fire up the projector. A ghostly blue fog glowed up into the space above your palm, and the face that looked back at you was surprisingly fair; if not for his crimson skin and long black horns you wouldn’t have known he was Devaronian by his elegant features alone.

 Elios Blackwater was a dapper debonair, his high cheekbones angled sharply under devious eyes towards a sly, sharp toothed grin. The puck notes didn’t specify what he was wanted for, though from the looks of his charming smile and shifting eyes it could easily be anything from a gamblers quarrel to breaking hearts, with a higher reward for being returned alive rather than dead. He would most likely be in a heavily inhabited area, probably as close to Canto Bight’s aurelian heart as possible. You didn’t know why Mando had taken a bounty puck for such a densely populated world, and you would have loved to know what his plan was to get to the city’s casino center before you had arrived in his life. A pair of ragamuffin bounty hunters and their floating baby bucket would stick out like sore thumbs in this gilded mecca of gamblers. If you were going to get to your quarry without being arrested, you were going to have to blend in.

 “We’re going to have to do something about...this.” You said, waving your hand in front of your partner’s ferocious attire, though truthfully you weren’t dressed any more appropriately for the mission at hand. “They’ll see us coming a mile away.”

 He glanced down at himself with a tilt of his helmet, ignoring the mess his son was making of his meal. “What do you have in mind?”

 You weren’t entirely sure yet. From where the Crest was parked you could see the glittering city’s reflection sparkling on the water far ahead of you down the beach, a sight most would find alluring, but to you it was just harsh glare. Nearby where you had landed were other space craft parked up and down the gravelly, machine-carved beach; the pleasure cruisers of wealthy betters made your little scrapheap look even worse than it already did. You watched out the cockpit’s transperisteel window, noting the movement of patrons and their attending droids loading skiffs with piles of luggage, and got yourself a mighty fine idea.

"I think so, but you're probably not going to like it. Stay here." You rose from your seat and kissed the baby on the head, earning yourself a soft, mush-mouthed chirp before you slid down the ladder and let yourself out of the old rust bucket and into the salty sea air of the Cantonican night. Gravel crunched under your boots, and you took a moment to turn and glance back at the Crest, catching the faintest flicker of scope glare where Mando was nervously watching you from the flight deck. Ahead of you a large cruiser was being unloaded by droids, the owners having long since made their way to the casinos, and you made yourself known to the robotic servants with your most charming damsel-in-distress voice.

"Hello! Excuse me! My luggage is too heavy to carry, can you help me? It's just over here on my ship..." The droid nearest you made a stiff bowing motion and tottered after you with the loaded hoverskiff floating along behind. You guided the droid up the open ramp and into the bowels of the ship to where your difficult luggage lay. It never stood a chance, bits of wire and duraplast flew across the cabin like confetti from the blaster shot to its head. Mando lowered his gun back to his holster, freeing his hands to help you haul the skiff into the narrow cabin space, then quickly close the ramp behind you.

The sled took up most of the walking space in the ship, so you got up on top of it and began looting through the stolen designer bags, pulling resplendent finery out into the hazy light. The first tote was full of piles of silk sewn for something with more arms than the two of you put together, so most of those items were tossed to the floor. The second bag was just capes, each a unique and lovely pattern, but nothing more. You demolished the remaining bags, making piles on the floor for ‘maybes’ and ‘definitely-nots’ until you found what you were looking for: a humanoid woman’s clothes.

Most of the unknown lady’s elegant garments would be just slightly too big on you, but you were able to settle on a soft, garnet colored evening gown that would go just above your knees, with extra length in the back. It had a sloping neckline that plunged at your cleavage, and around the bell of the skirt were silver rhinestones that caught the light of the cabin like dewdrops, the weight of them giving the dress a wistful sway. You wouldn't be able to carry much in such a revealing article, but a blaster and a knife alone had gotten you out of more trouble than you would care to admit.

You were fishing through the feminine things for something to do about your hair when you caught Mando in the corner of your eye. He was leaning against the hull wall, just watching you as you made a fat mess of the Razor's interior. You smiled down at him from your floating perch and held up the fanciful garment that you had picked out for him to see. "You like it?"

"It doesn't suit you, mesh’la." He said with a lazy tilt of his helmet. You had begun to mentally keep track of all the Mando’a he used around you, and you were starting to notice his frequent use of affectionates. You spun slightly so he could get a good look at how the fabric moved in the light, but the hunter gear you currently had on took away from the loveliness of the expensive clothes. You guessed he preferred your killer garb anyway over the flimsy, delicate fabric. Or nothing at all.

"Well, it’ll have to do, and if you don't start picking something out for yourself I’m going to dress you up like a dandy.”

He sighed, long and tired before turning his attention to the silken pile on the floor. You went back to the luggage, finding some knee high boots that were close enough to your size, but had a heel height that was going to make your ankles cry. You picked out some tasteless accessories: some bracelets, and big, jewel-encrusted hair pins to wear as well. The glitzier that you were, the less you would be noticed in this bass-ackward town. When you had made your frivolous selections you hopped off the skiff to help Mando with his costume. He was worse at finding something to wear than you were, having only picked out some of his own black leather gloves and two pairs of pants that were not made for human legs. Mandalorian armor did not come off as far as your metal man was concerned, and you were going to have to find a way to hide his bulk. You convinced him to lose his cloak, chest belts, and the bandoliers on his hips and boots, anything to lighten the load. Loose silks and stiff fiber combos would be your best friend, and you cobbled together what you could for your beskar-burdened buddy.

After what seemed like an eternity you had him dressed to the nines, or at least the eights. You had covered his chest plate in a black silk shirt and stiff black vest. The shirt had wide bottomed sleeves and neat, tight cuffs that hid his vambraces well, but you still made him wear a cinched-waist blazer plus a long, black and silver cape that almost reached the floor. You found a dark red pocket square that matched your dress and tucked it into the pocket of his vest, a subtle, but unmistakable announcement to the world that he was there with you. It was a ridiculous amount of fabric on top of an already massive mountain of metal, but the look was very in-style for Canto Bight. All together he actually passed for something besides a murder machine, and you gave yourself a mental pat on the back for a job well done. Mando held still for you while you fussed with his outfit with only the occasional huff. As much as he didn't like the idea of walking so boldly through the gilded city, he did enjoy your brazen touch each time you added another article of clothing.

“And now for the finishing touch.” There was nothing you could do about his helmet, so you were just going to have to make it look as nice as you could. You hadn’t changed into your chosen disguise yet, so you strode through the messy cabin with ease until you reached the lock box next to the cot. Inside you found the krayt’s teeth that you had gifted him and pulled them out into the light, waving them at him as you stretched over the heaps of fabric on the ground. He raised his hands in protest.

“What if I lose them?”

“You can wear these or you can wear whatever the hell this is.” You held up an enormous chain of jewels that looked like it belonged in the treasure case at an arcade instead of around somebody's neck. “Besides, I know you won't lose them, you like them too much.” He tilted his helmet at you with disdain, and you realized that was precisely the reason he didn’t want to wear them, such lovely gifts should be kept safe and secure. But he let you press the precious trinkets into the recess of his helmet where his human cheeks would be anyway. The frozen pools of moonlight tied everything about his sin-city look into a perfect, glittery bow. You had grown to admire the look of him in his cultural armor, the ferocity of it, the utility and strength of the beskar that shined no matter how much damage it took; and you were a bit sad to see it hidden. The look of the man standing before you had a wildly different feel, though it was not one you were opposed to.

“You look nice, Din.” The sound of his own name coming from your lips made his heart swell, and he reached out for your hand on instinct to pull your knuckles to his brow in the sweet gesture of his people that you both now used. His movements caused the finery he was masquerading in to catch the cabin’s hazy light, and you got excited to put on your own costume and join him in looking like a fool. When he let your hand fall, you bounded over to your pile, throwing the hunting clothes off of yourself as you went. When you were standing there in nothing but your Tattooinian muck boots you cast a sly glance over your shoulder. As expected, the single black eye of your Mandalorian was locked on your almost-naked form, and you realized that in the time you had been together he had never seen you fully naked; just the parts of you he needed to get to in the moment. “How’s this? You like this better?”

When he didn’t answer right away you looked down at yourself and saw what he was staring at. You had forgotten about the marks of conquest he had put there when he had been driven to a sexual frenzy by the last quarry’s poison, still dotting your thighs with dark purple splotches. Not once had you been upset with him for his actions, you were just thankful you both made it through the ordeal alive, but he still looked at the damning marks with shame. He had been forced to break his protector’s oath against his will, inflicting injury to your precious body with his own two hands. You waited until his visor made its way back up to meet your eyes, and you reached out for him to give you his hand. He sheepishly obeyed, and you brought his hand to your lips, kissing at the all-black leather slowly until you heard him sigh through his modulator. You would forgive him a hundred times if you had to, and then a hundred more if it meant he could forgive himself. You pulled his hands to your waist and leaned up against him, enjoying the feel of new clothes on your skin and letting your hands run up his silken arms. “Well you can have this,” You nodded down at your bare everything with a mischievous grin, “As soon as we catch this fucko.” 

This was the last bounty you would need before you made the trip back to Nevarro, but you were still on the fence about how completing your mission made you feel. On one hand you would be free of the Guild’s relentless hunters, but on the other your partnership with the strange metal man and his adorable beanbag of a son would come to a close. You turned back to your outfit and began cinching a pair of thigh holsters to your legs, hiding your wincing face as the leather closed around your bruises; a blaster on one leg and a knife on the other. You pulled on the dress and fixed up your hair as best you could, then stepped out of your good boots and into the slutty knee-highs. There was only one loose end to take care of.

 “Where’s baby?” You glanced around the messy cabin, looking for your foundling. In the corner under a pile of capes there was movement, and you cleared the flashy finery away to reveal your bestest little friend. Big, glittering orbs looked up at you from the pile of fabric, and a tiny toothy grin shined from his cute baby face. “Heya booger, you ready to go?” You scooped him up in your arms for a hug before picking a big shiny scarf up to wrap him up with, then placed him carefully down in one of the gaudy designer bags. “If anyone asks, he is a pet.” The child didn’t seem to care, he was just happy to be included, waving his little pudgy baby hands up at you to hold. You squeezed his tiny paw, then turned to Mando, “You ready to go, Lord Beskar?”

He glanced down at himself, tilting his palms up and shrugging. “I guess so, I feel ridiculous.”

“Good enough!” You made for the exit ramp with a big stride, and almost broke your damn ankle on the first step, falling gracelessly into the arms of your partner. He caught you with ease, and your cheeks went red with his strong, gentle hands on you again for the hundredth time. You got to your feet, but you would be leaning heavily on him for most of the night until the boots were broken in. With you hanging off of his arm the two of you looked like a proper couple, just heading out for a night on the town instead of two bloodthirsty bounty hunters on the prowl. You might let yourself pretend though, just for the night.

You took a transport speeder from the beach to the city’s entrance, then made your way through the gilded streets, following the red blink of the bounty fob towards your quarry. You had to stop multiple times, the fucking boots making your feet hurt like you knew they would. Mando stood patiently with you each time, and more than once offered to just carry you. His visor would glide from side to side, always on the alert for anyone that might be following you, or worse, hunting you down. The tracking fob led you to the most obvious choice of casino: the tallest, brightest, shiniest temple of vice smack dab in the city’s center. 

The front entryway was dominated by a roaring, gushing fountain, shooting geysers in a perfectly timed pattern high into the Cantonican night sky. The fountain was lit up with bright, multicolored spotlights so that every stream of water and drop of spray glittered back in defiance of the stars that had inspired them. Inside, the casino floor was packed with patrons, ranging in size and species in an infinite array of wealth and power. Chandeliers hung high above you from the soaring cathedral ceilings, sending sparkling lights racing around the endless room like shooting stars. Every surface was bright and gleaming, dozens of pillars and statues illuminated by blinding limelight. Even the floor was magnificent, black and white marble with huge inlaid stars, guiding gamblers through the limitless space towards their wildest desires. Again you wished you could appreciate the extravagance of it all, though the way the lights streamed like mercury over the beskar of your pretend date made something else sparkle behind your eyes. 

 The smell of inhalants and alcohol burned in your nose, and you took a moment to make sure your purse puppy’s face was covered with something so he wouldn’t have to endure it as much as you were. The sound of gamblers and music and roaring competition was louder than the screams of the hyperspace engine aboard the Crest, the cacophony of it all making you anxious. You were thankful that you weren’t hunting this bounty alone, and you still held on to Mando tightly, letting him lead you over the cosmic marble floor through the streaming masses. The people paid you no mind, moving out of the way without casting a second glance. Your costumes were working exactly as you had intended, and you applauded yourself for how well you had deceived the City of Lies.

You had guessed that if your bounty would be anywhere, it would be at the center of attention, and you were right. Elios Blackwater sat at the atrium bar, surrounded by beautiful and interesting people. The glint of gold jewelry caught the radiant casino lights every time he moved, drawing the eyes of all those around him. He was telling some kind of wild story that had his little crowd hooked on every word, though you could tell from a distance he was all bullshit. Immediately you knew this was a man that was used to having everything he desired, never being denied a single whim in all his days. A plan began to simmer in your skull, and you knew right away your partner was not going to like it. If you were going to get the quarry alone, you were going to have to persuade him to leave the company of his fans, and you only knew one sure-fire method for a man of Blackwater’s tastes. You let yourself off of your escorts’ arm to turn and face him, pulling his hands to your hips and letting your own rest on his shoulders so that to any outsiders you two would be just another pair of passionate dancers making their way through the counterfeit cosmos. 

“Mando, do you trust me?” His hidden eyes were still glancing around the room, scanning for any lurking threats.

“Of course.” His words went right over your head, his ears too full of the sounds of potential danger to really hear you. You huffed and ran your hands to his bedazzled helmet, pulling it down to meet your eyes. 

“Pay attention, bucket boy. I need to hear you say it and know that you mean it. Do you trust me?”  He cocked his head, confused that you would have to ask twice. 

“Yes, ner cyar’ika, I trust you.”

“Good.” You let your hands fall back to his armored shoulders, pressing yourself up against him tighter. Your fingers fidgeted in the heavy material of his cloak, he was going to hate this. “Because I need to do something. Alone.” 

That got his attention fast. 

“No, it’s too dangerous here. I want you where I can protect you. What if there’s hunters?”

“I know, I need you to cover me, but from a distance. I think I can convince Elios to walk right into the carbonite freezer, but I can’t do it with you looming over me.” You wrapped your hands around the back of his helmet, pulling him down so that his forehead met with yours. “I wouldn’t ask you to do this if I didn’t think it would work.” He sighed between your hands, the steam of his breath slipping out from under the helmet’s edge. There was nothing he would rather not do than be away from you, but he did trust you, and he nodded against your embrace.

“I’ll call for you as soon as I’m ready, ok? Just keep your eyes on me, and don’t cause a scene. No matter what.” You couldn’t kiss him like you wanted to, but you still pressed your lips to the side of his beskar before letting go, pulling yourself away from his tender grasp. His hands still floated in the space where you had been as you turned away from him and made your way to the bar, the heavy purse bumping against your weaponized thighs with every flint and tinder step of your sky high heels. As you got closer to the bounty you could hear the shreds of his conversation starting to make their way over the noise of the casino.

“...And I said ‘Darlin’ if you didn’t want to take it home with you, ya shouldn’t have put it in your mouth!” The way he was telling his story gave you the impression that it wasn’t one you wanted to hear, and you started to regret your foolhardy plan. Gold rings and precious jewels sparkled all the way from his fingers to the caps on his horns, making it impossible for most to look away, a fact made apparent by his captivated audience. The beautiful boozers laughed and cheered at his every word, though from his stupidass sounding story you wondered how much of the affection was alcohol induced. You pulled a seat up at the bar a few stools away from the crowd and ordered yourself a shot of spotchka and a couple packs of cookies. You slipped the snacks into your bag for Din’s foundling, you would be needing him for your plan to work as well; and the promise of treats would keep his bright-eyed attention on you. 

The taste of spotchka was vile, but you had started your journey though the galaxy on the gigantic starcruisers that were built on your homeworld of Corellia, and you had gotten to know the taste of the sailor-favorite drink at a tender age. You sipped at your brew, listening casually to the Devaronian’s conversation, but never turned your eyes to him. Every once in a while another bar patron would swagger up beside you to offer you another shot. You turned down anything you didn’t order yourself, but you started telling them fabricated stories about your life among the stars, most of which were wild tales of fancy from old holovids you had seen. You wished you could turn around and find your favorite rust bucket, wherever he may be hiding among the festivities, and give him something to reassure him. A nod or a wave, anything to let him know you weren’t just making him jealous on purpose. 

Soon you were throwing back brightly glowing shots of brew, and a handful of interested patrons had gathered around you to hear about how you had jerry-rigged a star cruiser to run on spotchka when you were a space pirate smuggling kyber crystals for the resistance, among other things. When you had your head tilted back you cast a glance towards the bounty, and saw what you had been waiting for. His hooded eyes were watching you intently, he didn’t like that someone was getting any of the attention pie that he believed was his alone, and you knew it wouldn’t be long before he had to do something about it. Soon enough the dapper devil rose from his entourage, running a painted claw through his long dark hair before making his way to you, sauntering with every step.

Hook.

“Well hello there, darlin’, name’s Elios. What’s a pretty little thing like you doing chugging spotchka when you could be drinkin’ something as fine as you are?” The debonair’s words were long and slow, making sure that every drawn syllable would be heard. “Bartender! Get this lovely lady a real drink, if ya please.” You weren’t sure what counted as a ‘real drink’, but the dark liquid that was slid over to you stank even worse than spotchka with the strength of its proof. Elios couldn’t stand that someone else might be having more fun than he was, and he was determined to put you out of commission. He wanted to do it in such a way that you would be thanking him for it, preferably while on your knees. “What’s yer name, baby cakes?”

From the other side of the busy casino you could feel the void of a visor making the hair on the back of your neck stand on end. Mando was standing on the far side of the slot machines where the light was just a little less glaring, so motionless he might have been part of the decorations. He wasn’t sure what your plan was, or how you would talk the quarry into being captured without gaining the suspicion of the wandering security enforcers. He bristled whenever a bar patron started trying to make nice with you, and only got progressively more frustrated when more and more started hanging around you. When he saw the bounty slink his way over to you he wanted to dash across the marble floor and break his fucking neck just for being in your airspace. ‘Don’t make a scene, no matter what’ is what you had told him, and you had asked him to trust you. So he did as he was asked. Watching, waiting.

“Hmm, I don’t think you could handle it.” Oh, Elios didn’t like that one bit, nobody told Mr. Blackwater ‘no’ without consequences. He swirled a glass of the same dark liquid around in one perfectly manicured hand, his polished claws clicking on the side of the glass. You continued to ignore him, but you started on the new drink in front of you. Yucky, at least spotchka was familiar. He took your acceptance of the drink as an invitation to join you at the bar. 

“You’re awful sly, baby cakes, tell me yer name so I can make you forget it later.” His pointed teeth flashed out from his crooked smile, and you could smell the stench of expensive cologne and aftershave. You rolled your eyes big and wide so he could see just how unimpressed you were, but your nose was burning from how bad he smelled. This was a bad idea, but only because of how well it was going to work. Fresher soap, where are you?

“I’ll tell you what, if you can out-drink me, I’ll tell you my name.” His wicked smile split his face, showing off rows of brilliant white fangs. Party-boy could probably hold a few good shots, but you were raised by sailors, and you were gonna drink his ass under the table. 

“You’re on, sweet cheeks. Bartender! Another round!” Another set of shot glasses plinked to the counter, and vanished just as fast. Elios was eyeing you up and down, seeing if you were all bark and no bite. If he could just get you drunk enough…

Far from where you were drinking the Mandalorian you had asked to trust in you was furious, trying not to thumb the handle of his blaster that poked out from the side of his hip under his cloak. It would be so easy, he could hit the target from here and it would be over, you would be back by his side and not being drooled over by that fucking pathetic excuse for a man. 

“He has that effect on people.”

Mando’s helmet snapped on the sounds’ source, so lost in vicious thoughts that he didn’t hear the stranger come to lean against the wall by him. They were tall and thin, translucent green skin and a mop of hair-like cilia growing from their head to their flowy chiffon clothes. They looked exhausted. “That your girl over there?” Mando followed their gaze wordlessly, reluctant to make friends right now while he was busy waiting for you to call him back to your side. “Thought so.” The stranger took a long drag on an inhalant, blowing vibrant pink clouds into the smoky room. “Sorry for your loss, Elios always gets what he wants.” Mando turned again to the stranger, fixing them with his black hole glare, but they only shrugged; watching the drinking game unfold between you and the devil himself. 

“Another!” You hollered, but the glasses were already in front of you, then gone again. The Devaronian hissed back the sting of the high-dollar liquor, shaking his long mane that had started to come undone. You pretended to reel from the liquor's effects, leaning back just a tad too far on your seat. “Again!” The third round of shots came and went, and Elios nearly fell off his stool. Right where I want you. You waved at the bartender for the fourth and final shot that would probably put the devil right on his ass, but that’s not where you were headed with this show of tenacity. You had to get him alone before you made your capture, or the security enforcers that littered the casino floor would descend on you like vultures. 

You waited til he had thrown his drink back before you tilted yours, purposely spilling a few drops down your front so the booze would trickle down between your breasts. Elios nearly choked, and you knew you had his full, undivided attention. Din, I’m so sorry.

“Woo! I don’t think I can do any more, Mister Blackwater, you win.” you feigned, holding the back of your hand up to your forehead, trying to convince him that the room was spinning for both of you and not just him. His sultry laugh made your skin crawl.

“Please, call me Elios.”

Line.

“Well, Elios, you still wanna know my name? You’re gonna have to work for it.” You placed a hand on his leg, running your fingers up his thigh and around the edge of his waist, pulling at his pockets seductively to drive the point home. Does he have SCALES? What the fuck ew ew ew. He took the hint like a drunk takes to spotchka, flashing you a slurred smile. 

“Well… sugar lips, we can take this... elsewhere.” 

“Sure thing, Elios, lemme just have my attendant take my Poochie up to my room.” You held the heavy purse up so he could see the big black eyes hiding in its depths. 

“What the fuck is that thing?”

“He’s a pet, obviously.”

“What kind’a fuckin’ pet?”

“Purebred.” Your quick answer seemed good enough for Mr. Drinky, and he nodded like that made perfect sense. You raised your fist to the air and snapped your fingers.

The human fortress was at your side in a heartbeat, towering above the two of you. You stuffed the purse in his hands before he could ask where to point his gun. “Here, take Poochums up to my room, mama’s not coming home tonight, if y’know what I mean. Get him washed and fed, and don’t forget to scrub his feet!” 

“Yes Ma’am.” The bag was lifted carefully from your fake-drunk hands, and you tried to flash him your best ‘Please-don’t-be-mad-at-me-I-hate-this-too’ face at your partner, but you guessed the look was lost on his visor. The scene did not escape Elios’s eyes like you had hoped it would. 

“Now what in the Mmmmaker’s Mammaries is that big ass fuckin’ thing? That some kinda droid? It’s damn fancy.” Shit balls of hell.

“Uh.. Yes! This is the finest in personal assistant droid technology! See, look.” You grabbed Mando’s empty arm and pulled back sharply on the fabric, revealing the delicate button panel of his vambrace. “Only the best money could buy...” 

“I gotta get me one of those...” Elios stared bewildered as your personal petsitting droid turned and left. “Well, honey tits, you wanna take this upstairs?” Ugh.

“Oh suurrre… Oh Mr. Blackwater I’m ~soooo~ drunk ahaha…” You were barely buzzed, and you worried that your life among the stars had given your liver bigger balls than a bounty hunter. You wobbled on your stool, for phase two of your plan to work you would have to delay Elios as long as possible. You watched as the man whose heart you had stolen faded away from you, the fancy purse hooped over his shoulder and knocking up against his leg, cape billowing behind him as he went. Alright, Baby Beans, it’s up to you now!

Din was seething under his helmet, pissed as shit that this was what your elaborate ‘plan’ entailed. He was trying not to storm through the casino as he left to take your ‘Poochums’ up to your room, whatever the hell that fucking meant. How could he be so fucking stupid? This was exactly the same ruse you had tried to pull on him from day one. Seduction was your real talent, luring your lovers to their untimely demise. How many times had you pulled this stunt? Was this your master plan all along? Ouch. Play with his heart until you were free of your Guild warrant? Ow. You were just using him to get to Nevarro, then you would fuck off to the stars and leave him behind. After everything you had been through, he was just another notch on your bedp- 

“OUCH!” 

Din looked down to his side where the pain he was trying to ignore was coming from, and saw a fat green paw sticking out of the ugly expensive purse, digging vicious talons into the side of his leg. His foundling was trying to burrow through his thigh, and his claws might actually have drawn blood. “What, womp rat? What do you want?” There was something in the baby’s other hand, something golden and flashy. Din reached into the bag and pulled the embossed card from his son’s grasp. What’s this? There was a set of numbers etched in gold filigree in the top of the card, their shimmer blasting away the destructive void he had been spiraling into.

Key card! PENTHOUSE key card! You had tricked the bounty into getting close enough to you that you could pick his pocket without him noticing. You were luring Elios right into a trap, and your Mandalorian was the snare. Din felt a mix of emotion ranging from relief to shame, how could he even think for one second that you might be deceiving him? You had asked him to trust you, and he couldn’t even contain his jealousy long enough to make it through one hunt. He felt like such an ass, you were putting your skills to good use, at great risk to your own safety, just like he had asked you to from the beginning. This wasn’t just his hunt anymore, it was a joint effort between the two of you, and it was his turn to run the next leg of the relay. The heavy, silver-laced cloak was tossed to the side as he raced to the elevator, fluttering away behind him as he flew to beat you there.

Meanwhile, you were trying to keep the bounty from falling flat on his face, and the only way to do that was to hold him up yourself. His hands were all over you, the nick of sharp, neat claws catching on the fabric of your evening dress and scratching along your skin. I’m gonna break those fingers, motherfucker. He was slurring his words, making disgusting promises of what he was gonna do to you when you reached his private penthouse. You were just out of range of his boozehole, the lippy thing trying to steal a taste of you. Wobbly steps slowed you both down to almost a crawl, which was exactly what you were trying to do, anything to give Mando time to find the hotel room first. You passed a discarded cloak on the floor, the familiar silver inlay catching the light, and you worried that you might have pushed your partner too far. What if he left? What if he didn’t see the keycard and I’m heading up alone? Please be there, Din. Please don’t leave me with this fucking creep. You both reached the elevator, and Elios fumbled to find his wallet, thankfully having a spare key that he didn’t know he needed. The doors opened, and you realized you would be stuck in your own personal hell for the entire trip up to the top floor suite. Fucking super. 

Elios was getting impatient during the ride up, and it took every fiber of your being to keep from retching as his well-moisturized hands ran up and down your spine. The elevator door opened directly into the penthouse, and his perfectly manicured claws dug into your ass to usher you into the room. The top floor suite was dark, save for the lights of Canto Bight shining in through the cathedral windows. You took a mental note of the speeder parked out on the balcony, you would be needing it later. The Devaronian was at your ear, breathing hot, boozy steam around your neck until he was facing you. He went to bite at your mouth, but you stopped him with a finger to his lips.

"I wouldn't do that, if I were you." You whispered in your most convincing lust-laden voice. The devil chuckled and ran his slimy, forked tongue around the halting digit. Barf.

"Oh yeah, baby cakes? Why’s that?"

You batted your eyelashes and bit your lip into a wry smile before meeting his half-lidded eyes. "Because... you're going to make Daddy very angry."

His lips turned upwards in an aroused sneer, flashing his dazzling, daggerlike teeth, "How could getting a taste of that fiery little mouth’a yours make me angry, darlin’?"

Sinker.

"I'm not talking about you, I'm talking about him."

Elios didn't even have a chance to turn around to see where your eyes were looking before a black and silver fist broke his nose and sent his perfect teeth soaring across the room, throwing him down to the marble floor. Seeing his busted prettyboy face bleeding at your feet made you feel so relieved that a vicious shiver made its way from your head to your toes, and you let your body shake the devil’s touch off of you like a big wet bantha.

"Fuck! Oh fucking hell, Mando, you have -no idea- how hard it was to keep that up, he’s so gross! I’m gonna chuck his ass in carbonite so fucking hard his horns’ll break off!" Your partner was still squared up, just waiting for the interloper to try and get up and fight. He wanted the bounty to get up, flail, scream, any excuse to hit him again. But Blackwater was out cold, staining the white marble floor with his blood.

"You looked like you were handling it."

The deadpan tone of his voice told you that wasn't exactly a compliment, remembering the jealousy that had seethed out of him on Tatooine after that Trandoshan had tried to capture you. You had two choices: you could either try to defend yourself and your unconventional bounty catching method, or you could turn that jealousy in your favor. He didn’t remember much from his toxic encounter with the Ardennian, but you knew that every filthy, possessive thing he had said to you that night was still somewhere in that chrome dome of his; and you became determined to bring them to the light. You crossed one arm over your chest, raising the other to tap a finger against the corner of your lips.

"Oh? You didn't like that, did you? Didn't like that he had his hands on me? Touching things that don’t belong to him?" He didn't answer, but the creaking of leather from his fists tightening told you what you already knew. "Tell me, Mando."

"N-no." His visor remained fixed on the unconscious body still bleeding on the floor. Not good enough.

"No what?"

"No. I didn't like that." His voice was low and raspy, but only because he was trying to keep the boiling rage in his chest from blowing his fucking helmet off.

"Tell me what you didn't like." You stepped over the quarry to your man, running your fingers from his balled fists over his silk and steel arms until you were at his shoulders. You could feel the slightest shudder under all his layers at your touch.

"I didn't like him touching you. Nobody should put their hands on you, cyar'ika" His fists lowered to his sides but his visor was still on the floor. You let your hands wander up his neck to the bejeweled recesses of his helmet and turned him to meet your eyes.

"Why not?"

"B-because..."

"I want to hear you say it."

"Because you are mine." He growled through his helmet so hard that you swore you saw it vibrate, sending a delicious tingle though your spine. Atta boy.

“Again.”

“You are mine!” Even behind the beskar you could hear the clench of his teeth biting back deeper desires. His hands went to your waist, pulling you tightly to his chest. The fire coming off of him was scalding, you had pushed your luck too far with this one, and you could feel the volcano inside his ribcage boiling over. He was furious. His heavy armored head pushed against your brow, and you let your thumbs wrap around the bottom of his helmet to find the thinnest sliver of skin where the metal met the man.

“That’s right, I’m all yours.” When you had said that line to him the first time, you had been plotting your escape from his clutches, but as the reassuring words left your lips you knew there was nobody else in the galaxy you would have running their hands up your sides; and you mentally crossed ‘seduction’ off of your list of hunting skills for good. His oath of me'dinuir had swore him to your side alone, and now you knew without a shred of doubt that you wanted it to go both ways; whether you were Mandalorian or not.

You kissed at the bottom of his visor, so close to getting to feel the true, living flesh of him, and yet so far. You had to have him, you had to purge the demon’s touch from your body with the purifying fire of your protector’s rage. A choked, needy groan made its way out of the modulator, and you felt the heat of his breath on your skin. How desperately you wanted to taste it, fill your mouth with the flavor of him to replace the vile spotchka. You pushed up on his jaw, giving you just a tiny glance at his scruffy chin, and you forced your kisses into the tight, unyielding space of the beskar prison. It wasn’t enough for you, but it was a start, and you could feel his body starting to unwind at your touch. “Kiss me. Please, Mando.”

“Cyar'ika, it's not safe here.” He hated the sound of his own words, the denial of them crushing his very soul. You glanced around the dark penthouse and saw you were alone save for the crumpled devil on the floor and the designer purse that had been stashed in the corner of the room, its occupant still working on the bags of cookies. No eyes on us.

“I won’t look, just... lift your helmet a tiny bit, tin man, I need you, I need to kiss you.” You guessed you were safe enough from prying eyes, but you wouldn’t spill his name to the night just in case there were any sneaky listeners. You squeezed your own eyes shut and nipped at the armors edge again, and just ever-so-slightly began to push up on the unforgiving metal with your thumbs. You were just waiting for his hands to shoot up, to grab your wrists and halt your actions, but they were locked to your sides. Inch by inch you gradually lifted the armor, he would have all the time in the world to stop you, but when you felt the heat of his lips crash against yours you almost let your knees buckle out from under you. His strong arms were tight on your back, pulling you into him so he could kiss you harder.

So much better than spotchka. He was delicious, his taste, his feel, his scent, everything about him was intoxicating. So much more so than the despicable brew you had been throwing back all night, and a thousand times better than anything Elios could have offered. Blech. You realized then why the bounty had smelled so bad to you, though his perfume was expensive and his clothes freshly pressed, he was wrong for you. The wrongness was so overwhelming that it had nearly made you lose your drink, and you didn’t realize how wrong something could be until you tried to compare it to what was right. Din was right, he smelled of leather and beskar and the sweat of a man that had nearly combusted when someone else was at your side. And fresher soap! Thank the Maker.

A soft leather hand went to your head, pulling you into him so he could taste you better. His tongue ran over your lips, darting into you to find yours so they could dance together. You bit him playfully, and the way his breath hitched in his throat sent the fire of your core shooting all the way to your fingertips; and you knew right then that not even kissing his forbidden face would be enough for you. You pulled yourself from his lips, the snap of teeth following your retreat, reluctant to let you leave from the heat of the moment. Carefully, you let the beskar slide back down to cover him, and the anguished whine he let out into the night air almost broke your heart.

“I know, I know, I’m so mean to you, aren’t I?” With him covered you glanced around the room until you saw the private bar. With your thumbs hooked in the pockets of his borrowed vest you guided the two of you towards it until the granite countertop knocked against your ass. You used his shoulders for leverage, hopping up onto the cold surface and wrapping your knees round his waist, happy to find exactly what you were expecting to throbbing between your legs. He pushed himself against you, the feel of his stolen silks on your holstered thighs giving you goosebumps. His heavy metal head fell against your shoulder, and you wrapped your arms around him to hold him close while he ground up against your heat. He couldn’t contain himself around you, though you wouldn’t want him to if he could. You rocked your hips in time with his needy thrusts, and the growls in your ear almost made you think he would come undone with his pants still on. Can’t have that now, can we? "Mando, please fuck me, I can't wait anymore."

You heard thunder rumble out of his chest, sending electricity from where he was pressed to your shoulder straight down to where he was pulsing against your core. He was going to bring you the stars, alright, but not the ones in the night sky. He pulled back so he could look into your eyes from behind his visor, bringing a hand up to caress your pleading face.

"No, I don't want to fuck you." Your eyes shot wide, shocked that he wouldn't want you when he was rutting so hard into you that you could almost feel the dampness of precum through his layers. He saw your face and shook his head. "Elios wanted to fuck you, all of those creeps at the bar wanted to fuck you.” His helmet shook, trying to loosen the words he wanted to say. “No... I- I want to be better than them, I want to give you something else, s-something more.” He was struggling, his inexperience making it difficult to say what was on his mind. All he knew was that he didn’t want to be like them, he wanted to be worthy of you in ways they never could.

“Then make love to me instead.”

 “Yes!” The words leaving your lips were like music to his ears, so much more lovely than any song. “I want to do that! I want to make love to you, cyar’ika, if you’ll have me?”

You laughed, nodding your head to hide your bright red cheeks. How he managed to be so ferocious and so sweet on the same day was a mystery you didn’t want to solve. He quickly glanced around the room one more time just to be sure you were alone, the light of the gilded city sending streaks of color over the charms you had pressed to his cheeks. Satisfied that you were the only ones awake in the room, he leaned away from you to rip the constricting blazer off of himself so hard the fabric around his chest and shoulders started to tear. Beskar plates twinkled in the limelight, sending stars flying around the room while he worked his pants open. The sight of him springing into view made your heart flutter, among other things. Long and strong, a pearl of precum glimmering in the dark of the penthouse. His hands went to your legs, the leather of his palms snagging on the straps still belted to your thighs as he pushed the elegant fabric of your dress up to your waist. 

“You’re soaked.” You wished you could see what he saw through his visor, the sound of hitched breath telling you he could see you blooming for him clear as day, drinking you in with his hidden eyes. He hooked a thumb in the wet fabric of your panties to pull them out of the way, using his other hand to grip his cock and run the tip over your entrance, bumping against your clit while he lubed himself with your slick. You had to lean back until you were laying on the cold granite countertop, tilting your hips to the edge of the bar so he could see all of you on display. He pressed himself up and in, filling you slowly so he could indulge in every inch that disappeared inside. Your stretched walls clenched around him, making him shiver with each coiled squeeze. The Mandalorian you were giving yourself to pulled himself out of you carefully before thrusting back into you again, fighting every animalistic urge to just plow you into the bar. He was going to make good on his word, he wasn’t going to just fuck you.

But maybe he should have.

“Bing!” 

The penthouse elevator door chimed, and both of you pointed blasters on the figure that walked out from the pink haze of the lift into the dark of the room. “Elios? I know you’re up here, I’m just going to get- Oh. There you are.” The stranger spotted the crumpled, unconscious body on the floor, crossing the room until they stood over him. “About time someone split that beautiful lip of yours, Lee-lo.” The stranger that Mando had run into on the casino floor turned their tired eyes to the pair of you, noticing your obvious state of passion. “Oh please, don’t stop on my account, that’s not the worst thing I’ve walked into up here.” They squinted in the dark, then gasped softly, “Wait, it’s you! Oh good! I saw you when you were dancing and was just heartbroken when Lee-lo came between you.” The tall stranger did a little dance. “Fucking Elios.” They kicked at the Devaronian on the floor, “All he lives for is breaking hearts. I’m glad you two made up.”

The wisp of a stranger bent down to the motionless figure on the floor, yanking one of the gold rings from his horns. They said something too low for you to hear, then got up and left in another cloud of pink smoke, the elevator door closing behind them.

You both lowered your blasters, trying to wrap your collective heads around what had just happened. Mando was still buried to the hilt inside you, and you could feel him pulsing with need; but he had been right from the beginning. You weren’t safe here.

“That’s probably not the only spare key. We should go.” You whispered, trying to get your blaster back to its holster under your dress. He groaned, he was getting sick of being torn away from you. He pulled himself almost all the way out, thrust in one more time for good luck, and released himself with a pop! He pulled you to your feet, helping you down from the bar and onto the Maker-forsaken boots you still had on. Fuck these. You ripped the boots off, chucking them somewhere into the dark and crossed the room barefoot to where the oversized purse held the foundling. You were happy to see him all tuckered out in a pile of cookie wrappers, probably not the healthiest thing for him, but it worked. Behind you, your armored companion was hauling the quarry over his shoulder none too gently, ‘accidentally’ knocking his bloody head against the wall as he turned back to you. You both made for the balcony door to the speeder you had noticed earlier, tossing the bounty in the back seat like a bag of garbage. 

The ride back to the Crest was thick with anticipation, you weren't finished with each other just yet. Mando pulled the speeder right up to the ramp so you wouldn’t have to walk across sharp gravel, chucking the bounty in after you so hard he slid through the messy cabin and smashed into the wall. You slung the damned devil into the carbonite chamber, punching the freeze button with gusto. The ramp closed behind your armored companion, barely giving you a chance to get up onto the hoverskiff that still dominated the cabin floor before the lights went off. You yanked the dress over your head, listening for the sound of more fabric hitting the floor, then the clanking of beskar being tossed carelessly aside. Belts and snaps and zippers went flying, and you had to try not to laugh at the absurd amount of clothes he had to take off. The skiff tilted with new weight, and the body of a Mandalorian was on top of you, warm lips hunting for yours.

He’s naked! Every piece of armor and shred of clothing was gone, and the feel of bare skin against your body was electrifying. His mouth crashed against yours, fervent kisses desperate to taste you again. You let your fingers tangle in his hair, pulling him into you to kiss back. He was hungry for you, biting at your mouth and tongue like a man starved. Plush lips made their way from your mouth down your neck, nipping at your throat and sucking the tender skin until you had bruises to match the ones on your thighs. His hands wandered down your body, rubbing at your breast and teasing your nipples until you were gasping for more. The devious digits moved on until his hand was between your legs, pushing at your folds and finding your clit to spin circles on. He was becoming an expert at finding what made you squirm and whine from his touch, rolling callused fingertips into you until you were making a delicious mess on the pile of stolen silk. 

But he wasn’t done there. The fuzzy kisses went from your breast down your belly to where his fingers were working into you. He pulled his hands from your soaked cunt and replaced them with his face, pushing his tongue up against the tiny ball of nerves that had so much power over you. Short, quick circles between long, languid licks had you arching your back and pulling his hair, demanding more. Lost in the heat of your thighs he was happy to give you everything, pushing the smooth muscle of his mouth into your slit and upwards against your clit until you were seeing stars again. 

Your hands couldn’t stop exploring him, from his thick head of curls to the strength of his shoulders. The muscles kept going, tight coils on his back and the warm, rigid wall of his chest. The trail of fuzz on his belly went up farther than you were expecting it to, and the fine hairs tickled your fingers on almost every inch of his skin. Your hands trailed over the numerous, vicious scars that marred his flesh like a road map of every near-death experience he had lived through. Gashes on his arms and burns on his sides had healed over into smooth, textureless skin, the marks of a seasoned hunter that nobody but their barer had ever seen.

Having drank his fill, he pulled his face from the apex of your thighs, pushing your knees apart and quickly sheathing himself in you with a ragged groan. Mando’a praises poured from his lips, some you were familiar but many you weren’t, though all of them made your heart flutter. Strong hands wrapped around your knees to keep you in place on the wobbly sled while he pounded into you, the feeling of bare skin on the backs of your legs making you wish you could see him in the light. But the darkness was the greatest keeper of secrets, hiding your love making from the condemnation of his creed. 

Make love. Though the phrase was just another on the long list of euphemisms used for sex, the pair of words weighed heavy with meaning in their new context. You wanted to explore the concept the way your hands explored his body, but the fire of your core was thrumming with heat, demanding your undivided attention. Din fell forward to your chest, the sweat of his efforts sticking to your breasts. Wandering kisses sent fire over your skin as he made his way over your peaks, sucking hard on their tender buds. Beskar-strong hips rocked against yours until you saw fireworks again, bearing down so hard on him with your orgasm that he sank his teeth into the crook of your shoulder. Bites made their way from where he had surely drawn blood on your flesh up your neck til they turned to kisses again. His brow pushed against your forehead, though your lips were right there he still defaulted to the only show of affection his armored inheritance allowed. Hot gasps of air puffed over your skin from the heat of his breath, and you knew he was close. You locked your legs around him, forcing him to pump every last drop of himself into you, painting your walls with his seed until it was spilling down your ass onto the piles of clothes.

The strength of his arms gave up, and he let himself fall against you, his face pushed against your cheek. You could feel his bristles brushing over your skin as his breath heaved, soft but scratchy. His hands wrapped under you and up your back, hugging you to his bare chest so hard the air was squeezed from your lungs. Fuzzy-lipped kisses dotted your cheeks and face, taking extra time to kiss your lips, each one a promise of more to come. You dragged your nails over his back, making him groan and shake at the touch. Never had anyone to scratch that itch, have you, tinman? Tight muscles loosened under your careful touch, making him sink harder onto you until you couldn’t tell where he ended and you began. 

You wanted to stay there forever, but as the sweat on your bodies cooled it became sticky and made pulling yourselves apart a chore. Both of you reluctantly made your way off of the skiff, clinging to the walls of the cabin while he hunted for his helmet in the dark. Lights came on gradually once his bucket was back in place so you could find your own clothes, and when you had both gotten yourselves put back together you piled everything you had stolen onto the hoverskiff and pushed it back down the ramp of the Crest. The Mandalorian was back in his beskar, and he cocked his vambrace back and shot a wall of fire onto the little sled, incinerating all evidence of your thievery and passion. The bonfire burned brightly on the gravelly beach of the Cantonican ocean, sending flaming ash into the light of the new dawn. 

You decided to keep the red pocket square that you had tucked in on his costume, though you weren't sure what you would need it for again. Sentimental. You went to the supply crates where your backpack and droid mask were kept so you could squirrel the thing away, when you caught the familiar glowing blue of spotchka at the bottom of the larder. The horrible color made you fucking nauseous after today, but even more distressing was that you realized it was just sitting there unsecured when there was an impish child onboard that could easily get into the bottled brew and make himself sick, or worse.

“Din, we need to put this somewhere safer.”  You held the liquid lantern up for him to see what you were talking about. “What if our foundling gets into it? He might get really sick or-”

“Our?”

Shit. “Sorry, your foundling. Your foundling might get-” Din crossed the small space of the cabin until he was standing close to you, the child in question tucked against his chest. The baby’s big, nebulous eyes glittered up at you, and you couldn’t help reaching out to rub his sail-like ears. He chirped happily at your touch, and as much as you wanted to keep your eyes on him, his father was towering over you, making you squirm under his tilted glare. 

“Say that again.”

“Your foundling.”

“No. The other word.”

“Our?” 

“All of it.”

“Our foundling?”  His helmet cocked to the other side, doing his big metal bird impression. The arm that wasn’t holding the child pulled you up against his chest, squeezed right against the baby in question. The familiar galaxy-erasing hug made you realize how many times you had thought of the child as your own, he was your little buddy, your missing baby when he had been stolen away, your secret weapon that you had hidden in your purse. But he wasn’t your child, he was Din’s, so for him to also be considered as yours…

“Ours.” Above you the word was spoken like it was new, as strange on his tongue as Mando’a was to you. “Our foundling. I like that.”

You couldn’t turn your head up to look at the man who had you wrapped against himself so tightly, but you could smile at the green little child that was flashing you his adorable toothy grin. You little fart, you thought with a laugh, you’re gonna make me go all soft. Almost as though the creature could hear your thoughts he squealed in delight, patting your cheeks with his fat baby paws. You let your arms circle around the boys that had made your life a roller coaster of emotion blasting through the endless sea of stars. It might be a hell of a ride, but you weren't ready to get off any time soon. The memory of the sands of Tatooine where you had been trying to forget the dangers of the universe was starting to fade away, replaced by the moment you were losing yourself in. You were happy to see it go, though your past self would be shocked at how comfortable you had gotten with a magic alien baby and a man with no face.

“Yeah… I like it too.” You hummed into the beskar, feeling Din’s arms tighten even more. You were glad he couldn’t see your face, because the lovely smile had vanished. This is all going to end soon. You buried your face in the tiny space between the foundling and his father’s armor, trying to ignore where the coaster’s rails ended. Only one stop left.

Nevarro, here we come.

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[sanstropfremir]

it’s the episode 8 review!!! how many episodes is this show supposed to even be?

the stages from the episode feel like such a grab bag.... i still don’t understand why they didn’t put all the skill stages together, and then did the normal two episodes of the third round. i guess it makes sense that they didn’t want to have six stages in one episode and then three in the other two, but eh. 

feeling kinda average on these as a whole, there’s a lot of good elements going on here but probably because of my own preferences (i don’t listen to ballads or blackpink) none of them really hit all the buttons. hopefully this will be a shorter review because i'm only going to do a quick rundown of the vocal stages; i dont really have that much to say about them because they are (intentionally) not very stage picture focused. i'll do the normal stage breakdowns for the other two though, even though i won’t rank them because we still need to see the other four!

vocal stages

sf9 + tbz + ikon

not much to say here other than wow, that’s RED. glad to see some more specific use of spotlighting and i always love when they light things on fire. i do wish they had fill lit with a brighter amber so we could actually get a bit more detail on their faces, especially because there’s six of them. i appreciated the simple blocking and only using one of the ‘stages,’ this stage didn’t need to be anything complicated and it wasn’t. i don’t love spinning camera shots because they make me a bit ill, and i'll forgive the constant cutting because it's a vocal stage and there isn’t any other real movement that we should be paying attention to. not my favourite of the two, i found it visually a bit too repetitive and complex at the same time. always love a crushed velvet suit though, so bonus points for that.

atz + skz + btob

i was braced for the worst and i dont know what kind of miracle happened but it was listenable! like i said, not a ballad fan but i could listen to eunkwang all day. i love a good plinth for a ballad stage, they’re one of my favourite devices in kpop design and i especially love it with a good groundlevel fog. glad they kept it black and white for the first half of the stage, it was in line with the blooming flower projections, and it made a very clear colour arc. they kept the visuals clean and simple with very little blocking at all, a very smart choice for this stage. not sure why they decided it would be the chanel time stage, which i disapprove of because i don’t like chanel, but i do love eunkwang’s shirt with the cameo buttons and the massive turnback cuffs, very 17th and also 19th century. i know they never do it because they dont read on stage normally but yes absolutely more thin chain pendant chokers on men, thank you! i also liked that there was emphasis on a more traditional lighting scheme, there weren't any crazy concert effects, just some good directional beam spotlights and the rear stacks in the climax. 

third round stages

ikon

costume

the first look for them is definitely my fabourite of theirs so far. there’s enough variation in the jackets that the base layer of tshirt and jeans don’t look too repetitive. and i do love a good statement jacket. my favourite is probably donghyuk’s because i'm a sucker for fringe always.

i don’t like the backup dancers costumes, but given the way i’ve reacted to every other all black outfit for this entire show i don’t think anyone was surprised about that. these ones particularly irk me because they’re very matte; there's pretty much no texture or pattern differentials to define the shape of the limb, which makes them disappear when theyre all grouped together (mostly on the women). i think they probably were intending to make a statement/emphasis on the hands because of the sleeve cutoff point, but there were so many arm movements that were just totally missed because the costumes were just black voids. most egregious parts are here, with the female dancers up center. i can barely tell what the movements are unless i’m paying specific attention to them because there's so many black shapes. maybe it was the point for it to be an indiscernable writhing mass, but it wasn’t my vibe.

don’t love this styling on lisa. i hate peeptoe shoes in general but peeptoe boots are the worst offenders. they make you look like you have duck feet, no matter who you are. especially with a flat cutout like that. a universally unflattering shoe, and i would know, i worked in a shoe store for two years. this whole look is just pg-13 rihanna cfda awards 2014 and really nobody should try to run up against rihanna.

also i have to mention this because it’s actually really bothering me, but lisa’s backup dancers are serving very allgemeine ss looks and i do not like it. generally when we see ‘military’ uniforms in kpop theyre usually modelled off older styles (pre wwii) of western uniforms that usually aren’t in circulation, and they’re usually non-matching and embellished in ways that are deliberately not military. i know logically that it's a budget constraint+they’re backup dancers+current trend thing but the clean lines with only button detailing and the all black and that specific harness shape? it hit my brain the wrong way. i mean, technically those uniforms are designer because hugo boss did them, but the uh..... girlboss move didn’t land for me.

this is my PERSONAL OPINION please for the love of all that is holy do not come yelling at me about this. it’s all under a cut, you chose to read the post.

set

very glad to see some busy kitschy sets! this is a massive build, since there’s essentially three full sets here: the temple, the jungle, and the first tiny room. and all of them are very heavily decorated. 

the starting room is just five walls on casters (wheels), that have been set into place with the cameraman and ikon inside at the start, and then once they exit the walls can be easily struck and rolled off set. simple, smart, and convenient!

i missed it the first couple times around but glitching out the projections in the temple for a split second was a neat little trick.

the silver and polygonal nature of the tiger/panther/cat(?) head is a bit disconnected from the gold and the aesthetic of the rest of the stage for me. the difference between the original room set and the jungle tracks, but the cat head isnt able to make the same leap for me. i'm also not a fan of mixing metals so maybe that’s why.

the tiger/panther/cat(?) head is a fun physical transitional device; i'm a big fan of tunnels and small transitory spaces like that and if they’re well dressed like this one they do so much for establishing place and mood.

i'm very sure i’ve seen this style of polygonal animal head with laser eyes before....i cannot for the life of me remember where or for what. i know wang yibo did a panther stage for sdc3 that had a human formation panther with green laser eyes, i wonder if i'm just crossing wires.

OH nevermind it’s because it looks like the witcher medallion. wires were definitely crossed.

lighting

using purple/teal lighting for the jungle was a smart choice because purple is the direct compliment to the gold and also is much more flattering on humans than green. green is one of the colours that humans can see the most variations in, so when something is green when it's not supposed to be (like human skin), we register that very quickly and associate it with unease and sickness. you know how old fluorescent lights have that greenish tinge that kinda makes you feel ill? it's your cone cells and your brain recognizing that you’re looking at things that are not supposed to be green.

very clean colour arc, i love to see it.

sound

it’s.....fine? i don’t listen to blackpink and have no opinions on their music other than it's not my type. i dont really know what the thematic connection to the visuals is, which is not strictly necessary in a lot of cases, but i don’t particularly care for the conflation of ‘savage’ and a (presumably) precolonial religion that’s assembled from stereotypes of real colonized cultures. you can come at me about how ‘it's not that deep’ all you want but i am here specifically doing an in depth analysis, and i gotta point it out. i'm not here to pass judgement on you if you didn’t realize or don’t care or whatever, i'm just saying that it's important to consume content with a critical eye. what you do with that information is your own personal choice, but you should be aware of it at least. 

staging

they took a big risk eating popcorn right before singing, and we definitely got some residual mouth noises of them trying to clean out their teeth. eating on stage is difficult in general because you have to make sure it's not going to dry out the performers mouths, because they dont have access to water and it takes WAY longer to chew and swallow something than you would expect. there’s a LOT of testing that goes into making stage food and guaranteed it’s not made out of what it looks like or what its supposed to be; i worked on a production of amadeus were we did literal weeks of testing amalgams of different desserts to make sure that salieri could actually eat the ones onstage without totally drying him out, because fun fact about that show, salieri doesnt leave stage like, at all, so there was no way to get him water. poor bloke.

i thought the blocking of this was really smart. the long take from the ‘normal’ room and transition into the jungle was super slick, even if that weird circle the camera did while pointed up at the ceiling was unnecessary and pointless.

bobby’s ‘acting’ was extremely funny and that’s the only way people are allowed to act surprised now. edvard munsch scream style only.

the pacing is a bit off and this time it wasn’t mnet’s editing that fucked it up. as fun as it is to have a feature, clearly she wasn’t allowed within proximity of the rest of them for covid or other yg related reasons, but it made for some extremely long transitions, especially the one out of her verse. it kills the momentum of the stage in that beat, even though they manage to pick it up after.

this is a very simple little narrative arc that’s easy to follow and doesn’t require any extra explaining. which is exactly the kind of arc that groups should be doing at this stage in the game. this is a good formic step up for ikon!

i thought the turning off of the monitor at the end was fun and a good callback to them watching the videos at the beginning of the stage. a nice clean way to make it circular.

skz

costume

FINALLY something different on the skz boys! these were mostly fun eboy looks for them, and i like it on the basis that it's not the same as the last set of costumes.

bang chan out there with his thigh OUT and a (fake) bridge piercing? LOVE to see it. great work.

(copy-paste every thing i’ve said about backup dancers wearing all black)

the backup dancers that were dressed as bystanders/extras were great! they should have kept that with all of them because it would have given a little more shape to the choreography and establishing what function the backup dancers were supposed to have.

set

that is meant to be a giant rice cooker on stage, right? i think so because it's a god’s menu mashup? if that's not a rice cooker i have NO idea what its supposed to be

there’s only two large setpieces here, which was a smart way to go. i LOVE the subway car doubling as the truck, even if the truck itself makes no narrative sense. what a fun way to double the use of a single big piece. you’ll be able to see the way it moves in the full cam but it splits down the centre and there entrance doors at the back with attached stairs that bang chan and the dancers use to climb up.

lighting

not a whole lot happening here. i like the cool white leds in the subway car and the contrast with the more warm tones of the outside, which is good atmospheric establishment, but i can't discern a visible arc. 

not a fan of these projections; they’re in line with what we’ve seen from skz so far, which is: extremely literal. i dont think they’re that distracting, but they’re not to my personal taste. they really should have kept the comic panel theme that they did for changbin’s first verse, because that was inventive and fun to watch! and a great atmospheric indicator! i would love to see a bit more experimental projection use but it's hard when they don’t have a lot of time to build these stages and the lighting team is definitely working remotely.

sound

i love that they made the choice to do some actual talking, it’s a good gimmick and it works for the deadpool/comic book/fourth wall break theme, but australian accents take me the fuck out i am so sorry i cannot listen to either felix or bang chan speak english without laughing uncontrollably. 

i don’t like this arrangement but i'm not surprised about that, given my predilections. i'm also tired of skz shouting STRAY KIDS in every performance they do. i know on music shows it's probably more relevant and yea producers tags are a thing but we’ve been watching this show for nearly two months at this point. we know who you are, you can stop yelling. be more creative with it!

staging

my biggest issue with this stage is that it doesn’t have a payoff. there is an arc here: they’re stealing the truck, but why are they stealing the truck? who are they stealing it from? who are they fighting against? it's kind of important in a stage where the theme is stealing and fighting someone that you tell us who that is. in both of ateez’s previous stages were they were both stealing (rhythm ta) and fighting (wonderland), they made sure to show us who the villain was. there needs to be tension for a big blowup climax to actually pay off. whether it be against a a balloon arm kraken or a fascist government. this stage could have reached that next step if they’d just done a little bit more exposition. 

there were a lot of fun choreo moments here, and this is probably my favourite choreo of theirs so far. i thought the whole first bit in the subway car was excellent and a very fun play on those viral videos that we used to see roll around every so often of dancers doing routines in subway cars.

did it need the guns? not in the slightest. more on this point later. i could talk more about weapons and weight here, but i’ve done that several times already.

like with the tbz game of thrones stages, theyre relying a little too much on the audience's preconceptions of the source material in order to carry the theme. the guns are there because deadpool likes guns, but they don’t actually use the guns for anything? the most we get of the stealing segment is felix and the safe, which admittedly is a great bit with him leaping over and under the ‘laser’ lines (theyre likely led strips). because comic books are by nature procedural and deeply tied to narrative, it's unsatisfying when there’s no tension and no payoff.

HOW did we manage to get two stages that are blackpink covers with remote/tv static gimmick and durags? i know the slot machine of kpop tropes is not very big but surely the probability of hitting triple sevens on this one was pretty low. i’m pretty meh on both of these stages overall. skz was unsatisfying but i loved the choreo in the subway bit so that bumped it up a little ahead of ikon’s in my personal preferences, but i'm reserving my actual rankings for next week. assuming we get the other four stages next week and they dont do something stupid and only show two. which they very well might. i’ve stopped trying to understand why mnet does things the way that they do. 

as always the ask box is open, drop your comments/questions/personal opinions, i love to hear ‘em! but don’t be rude just because some of this is touchier subject material.

[no6secretsanta]

Gala Grind

WOO SECRET SANTA! 

@allxkka this is for you! YOU ASKED FOR AN AU, high school, college, or theater and well, THIS HAPPENED. All three of those things get mentioned in this fic? So… : ) Hope you enjoy.

(should be up on my archive by now, if it isn’t, it will be shortly)

---

Hours earlier, Nezumi had watched as the average hotel lobby transformed into an expensive-looking Gala hall, courtesy of staff members with dead eyes. At the time, he’d found it impressive, the way the white cloth tables, goody-bags, and endless floral arrangements were able to grant the blank room a weighted sort of potential energy.  

Now, though, he was confident that he had only watched the room go from one form of emptiness to another. Goody-bags were swept under chairs in an unending flood of expensive champagne and cheap conversation. Nezumi could feel the flowers wilting.  

“What’s the name of this company anyway?” he asked the man sitting across from him. The placard at his seat read: “Yoming”.

“Civitas Rosis. You don’t know of us?” Yoming replied. As he spoke a shiny gold watch on his wrist caught the light.

Nezumi’s finger traced the rim of his champagne glass - of course it was empty, now when he needed it most. “I’m a plus-one,” he said. “Guest of a guest. That is quite a name." 

"It’s Latin. The title is from one of our parent companies we outgrew,” Yoming said, with the air of a proud conqueror. “The taking of their title was a sort of symbolic representation of our independence. We’re the kind of place that never forgets the little steps that helped us get where we are.”

“Oh, I see. A real rags-to-riches Cinderella story.”

“We consider it more David and Goliath,” Yoming said, dark eyes glinting. Nezumi envisioned a future where he strangled him with his necktie, unbuckled the watch from his wrist, and pawned it off for a lifetime supply of macaroons. It was a bright future.

“Of course,” Nezumi drawled. “Although…in this David and Goliath story David would have to put on Goliath’s skin after he took him down. A little too graphic to market, don’t you think?”

The businessman fluffed up like an offended bird. “What did you say your name was?”

“My name? Rikiga,” Nezumi simpered, and then flashed his teeth. “Most sincere apologies. Are you always so defensive or did you steal that from your dead parent company too?”

The silence between them stretched for a full minute - not that anyone could tell over the boot-licking and networking chatter that filled the rest of the dining area. 

“Who are you guest of?” Yoming asked, slowly.

The caterer, Nezumi thought, but he wasn’t about to get Shion into trouble with his millionaire undercover boss. He pointed blindly at the name plaque next to him. Yoming’s face scrunched.

“Tori, I should have known.”

Nezumi had no idea who this Tori was, but he felt a fleeting sort of guilt for the resigned way Yoming said his name, and the speed at which he stood.

“Good day, Mr. Rikiga,” Yoming said in a tone of voice that made it abundantly clear nothing good was about to happen.

“A pleasure meeting you!" 

Yoming was dialing a number on his cellphone with frightening speed as he ducked out of the room. Poor Tori.

Oh well. It was time to leave that table anyway. First though…

The goody-bags were mostly filled with useless nonsense: Business cards and Civitas Rosis plastic shot glasses and salt-shakers, but there was a gem at the bottom. Nezumi dumped the junk into Tori’s abandoned bag, but rescued the carefully-wrapped bag of cookies and a card to Karan’s bakery - painfully sincere amongst all the company-labelled knick-knacks and trappings. 

Like a certain someone.

Nezumi exhaled. He probably shouldn’t have picked a fight. He hoped this minor tiff wouldn’t reflect negatively on Karan and Shion’s impeccable skills and service. He popped one of the cookies in his mouth, chewed.

"Nezumi!”

Shion. He was clumsily weaving through the tables - balm to Nezumi’s exhausted soul, relentlessly appealing in his all-black formal catering uniform.

“You look nice,” Nezumi swallowed appreciatively, before popping another cookie in his mouth, looking him up and down.

Flattery and exhaustion warred on Shion’s face. He pulled out the seat next to Nezumi, but then pushed it back in, evidently, deciding standing would be better.

“Something to say, Shion?”

“I have a favor to ask,” Shion said.

He held Nezumi’s hand in both of his. Nezumi stopped chewing.

 —

“Please Nezumi, their singer is sick!” Shion grumbled, following Nezumi into the bathroom so they could keep the conversation private. “They need someone to sing a few songs and say just a few nice things about the company and I know you’ve done galas before—hey. Don’t look like that. You have the training for this!” 

“I dropped out, Shion,” Nezumi replied, colder than he meant to be.

Training was a bit of a trigger word if he was being completely honest. As a proud college dropout, he had recently come to terms with the fact that the best thing his stint in academia had given him was ecologist-turned-caterer Shion.

Shion was not deterred. He shook his head, quickly slipping an OUT OF ORDER sign onto the door to the men’s bathroom.

“Listen to me—"

“—Why are you carrying that?” Nezumi asked, temporarily distracted.

“Sometimes caterers need some time alone,” Shion clarified without hesitation. “I’m not giving up on this. You’re the only one who can do this Nezumi, and your voice is beautiful. You have soul. That’s all an audience needs. A diploma doesn’t matter— You taught me that.”

Ugh, Nezumi had. Theoretically. Shion had been miserable in grad school, signing up for all the most difficult labs to challenge his own brilliant mind. It had been a mistake. A brilliant mind wasn’t what his professors wanted— cutting corners was, and Shion wasn’t going to do that.

Shion had dropped first. A month later, Nezumi made the same call, but for very different reasons.

Pursuing a degree in theater, in all honesty, had been a mistake.

His heart had wanted it, though. Nezumi’s stupid heart, still beating, ever-longing, ready to make important life decisions with the loudest possible voice no matter how deeply he buried it in his chest. His heart had won him over during the lonely years after high school— singing in bars for tips. It had convinced him that with education maybe that could be a job—his full-time job. A job where he wouldn’t have to scrape by and beg.

So, he had saved. He had saved and he paid for some classes. An education. Rags-to-riches, right?

As it turned out, Nezumi paid a lot for academia to teach his heart what his head knew already: love was disappointing. Love didn’t fill your stomach, or your pockets. Love left you with debt—left you with dreams. Singing wasn’t a career—it was a survival mechanism.

So yeah, he didn’t much like to be reminded of his training. He didn’t particularly like to be reminded of his soul, either.

“Shion—” he started, but Shion kissed him before he could finish, pressing him gently into the wall of the nice hotel bathroom. His heart took over— no more thoughts— as he wrapped his arms around Shion’s shoulders and felt the fabric of his stupid hot catering uniform. Warm. Shion was so fucking warm, all the time.

He had just about forgotten what they were talking about when Shion broke away, eyes impossibly bright.

“I know you,” he whispered, voice low and urgent enough to send a tiny, tiny tremor down Nezumi’s spine. “I know you, Nezumi, and you love to perform. Why are you resisting? What’s holding you back? Let me help.”

His hand was on Nezumi’s cheek, and Nezumi felt his resolve crumble.

Dammit. Damn him. Damn this. Damn the excitement in Nezumi’s veins, the stupid thrilling call of the stage. Damn this man, this infuriating, wonderful man that knew Nezumi’s stupid, stupid, stupid, theatrical heart.

“I’ll sing, Shion,” he said, finally, meeting the torrent that was Shion’s eyes. “I just can’t promise any miracles. Don’t get your hopes up.”

“I’m not asking for miracles, Nezumi,” Shion replied, grinning victoriously. His lips were red; his cheeks appealingly flushed. “Just you. Just your voice. That’s always been enough, you know.”

Nezumi’s heart may have lost when it came to his college education, but with Shion…Well. Maybe the debt was worth it.

—-

Nezumi stood in front of the crowd, microphone in hand. His set list and suggested script sat on a music stand in a black binder. No one would have to know there was actually no paper in the binder, but rather that everything had been hastily scrawled on a napkin by the company treasurer.

Nezumi tapped the microphone once. Feedback echoed through the gala hall, but hey, it caught everyone’s attention so mission accomplished.

“Having fun tonight?” he offered to the stuffy suits and ties. He was rewarded with polite applause.

God, Nezumi thought. Sounds like a fucking golf game. He almost missed the constant cat-calls of his bar. Almost.

His heart was beating though, thudding in a way that clearly never got the message this was stupid and pointless. His eyes scanned the crowd and found Karan and Shion at their modest table in the back. He smiled, for them, slipping into the role of gala MC.

Shion really did look great in that uniform.

“Let’s give another round of applause for our lovely host Civitas Rosis — long may they reign!”

The sarcasm didn’t slip through to his voice but judging by the rewarding scowl on Yoming’s face and the expanding smile on Shion’s— it was understood by the parties that needed to hear it.

Shion, to Nezumi’s surprise and delight, couldn’t stand Yoming either. He had apparently been flirting at Karan for almost the entire party, and Shion, for all his gullibility, had a bullshit detector that could rival Nezumi’s. When he had heard about Nezumi’s earlier argument, seconds before Nezumi was shoved to the stage, his face had changed. There was a rare, vengeful glint in his eyes as he whispered: Honestly, I’m glad you did— now maybe I’ll be able to resist arguing with him, myself. Maybe.

Fuck, Nezumi loved him.

It was a stray thought, but a true one, and one Nezumi didn’t have time to over-consider as he picked up the mic and began to sing, voice echoing through the lobby.

Yoming, pleasingly, had a deep scowl on his face, but Karan was mouthing the words next to him. Yeah that wouldn’t last.

Nezumi’s life hadn’t really gone according to plan.

He was a college drop-out singing in a hotel lobby that meant nothing to him, and for a company he couldn’t stand.

But still, he smiled as he sang. It wasn’t to survive— wasn’t for an ill-advised money-making dream, but for the caterer watching with enamored eyes in the back of the room.

It was fun. His heart pulsed in his chest, poor, but satisfied.

It was his best performance yet.

[for-a-muse-of-fire]

chivalry fell on its sword

the wench and the witcher

“chivalry fell on its sword”

Fandom: The Witcher (2019)

Paring: Geralt of Rivia x Fem!POC Reader

Summary: Geralt witnesses one of the many perils involved in your profession. It rattles him enough to try and do something about it.

Warnings: Mentions of blood and violence. Geralt and reader continue to be foul-mouthed little darlings.

A/N: Holy crap, guys, I wrote something that wasn’t smut. “You know what that is? Growth.” Full disclosure, there is no real, actual plan for where I’m going with this series, thing. I’m just here to write shit.

@coconutxraikage​ ; @pantrashtic​ ; @kingniazx​ ; @onyour-right​

“Geralt, is this really necessary?”

“Yes.”

You eye the dirk in your hand. “I cook with these, I don’t fight with them - I’ll fucking stab myself.”

“And that’s why we’re here – so I can show you how not to fucking stab yourself.”

You glare at him. ‘Here’ happens to be the courtyard behind your tavern. The witcher has been with you for three days, warming your bed and keeping you company – even your regulars have started to get used to him. Well, mostly. At the very least, they’ve graduated from ‘outright hostility’ to ‘passive distrust’.

Baby steps.

Your only problem with Geralt’s extended visitation is the fact that he’s become annoyingly protective. He mostly keeps out of the way, doesn’t expect you to change anything about your daily routine to suit him, but having a very large, somewhat menacing companion at your back takes some getting used to. No, you’re not exactly what most people would term as ‘threatening’, but you’ve managed the damn place for near-on five years. Belligerent drunks are simply a hazard of the job. You have a very particular way of managing people when they get out of hand at your establishment, and while it does work – most of the time, kind of – the previous evening was a wholly different story.

_-_-_-_-_-_

“I think you need to leave, friend!“

How the bastard had managed to get this drunk on your watch was beyond you. You were going to have a talk with the staff about over-serving. Right now, you’re more about getting the sod’s hands off the barmaid – he’s ignoring you in favor of trying to drag the poor girl into his lap. “Hey,” you bark again. “I’m talking to you – “

Your hand grabs his shoulder and yanks. The girl he’s pawing manages to worm free as the drunk reels about with a shout of indignation, “Get yer fuckin’ hands off me, daft bitch!”

You have to laugh at that, “I may be a daft bitch, but I’m the one who’s name is on the lease here. You’re harassing my waitstaff, now get the fuck out.”

The bastard scoffs at you and has the unmitigated gall to turn his back on you; you see red. Somewhere behind you, you here the rumble of your name – Geralt, trying to tell you to stand down. You ignore him, obviously, because who’s going to take you seriously if you can’t deal with one drunken shithead? With an irritated growl, you grab said shithead by the back of the collar.

“That’s it – “

“Get off, you fucking slut!”

CRACK. Your vision flashes white for a second, like a firecracker has gone off next to your face. The impact of the back of the drunk’s hand sends you stumbling into the nearest table, bell thoroughly rung. You manage to catch the end of the table before you go spinning to the floor.

Geralt shouts your name. Behind you, your assailant gloats, “Come on, girlie. More where that came from.”

There’s blood in your mouth. You spit, grimace, and grab the nearest heavy object you can find; one of your solid clay pitchers.

It’s makes a satisfying “thunk” when it cracks the drunk across the face.

“Fuck you, prick,” you gasp.

_-_-_-_-_-_

 You’d woken up this morning with an impressive shiner, but that son of a bitch had been dragged off with a shattered jaw, according to the gossip. By your standards, everything had been taken care of, but Geralt didn’t seem to be of the same mind. He’d grumbled something about men and fragile egos - ‘reprisals’, blah blah blah- then hurried you through breakfast, and promptly dragged you out of doors.

So, here you were. Staring at a knife. “Geralt, come on – “

“No, you need to be able to protect yourself – “

“ – I’ve managed just fine for most of my life, thank you very much – “

“You have a black eye – “

“ – and I caved that other guy’s face in!”

“That was a lucky shot and you know it!”

You startle so violently that you almost drop the blade on your foot; you don’t think Geralt’s every actually shouted at you before. He’s glaring at you while a muscle in his jaw ticks and you feel you’re your own temper start to bubble – he can’t just yell at you, and you’ve a mind to rip him a new asshole, because fuck him your goddamn face hurts and you don’t have time for this, but then he’s marching up to you and you give a small grunt of surprise when he grabs you by the shoulders.

“You can’t…” He growls, obviously frustrated, before he continues. “You can’t just hope for the best, sweetheart. You’re tough, and smart, I’ll give you that much, but if someone bigger comes along and decides you’ve got something they want…”

He trails off, lets you go, and paces away. You open your mouth to argue, but then he turns and pins you with those pretty golden eyes – oh.

Oh.

He’s worried.

It’s… unexpected? Yes, that’s the word.

But not unwelcome.

You drop Geralt’s gaze and look at the thin blade in your hand. It’s quite nice, actually – small and light enough to palm against your wrist. Hell, you could probably slide it down the front of your dress, if you ever needed to.

“… So I don’t just jab them with the pointy end?” you finally ask with a weak smile.

The witcher blinks, narrows his eyes, and finally exhales on a chuckle. You tamp down on your smile and do your best to keep your sarcasm in check with he begins instruction. He helps you find the balance point on the dirk, shows you how to hold it underhand, then overhand, followed by a breakdown of how to easily switch your grip.

Next is vital points on human anatomy. You learn that the fastest way to drop a man is to stab him through the neck and let him bleed to death. Stabbing for the heart his more difficult; if your blade glances off a rib, it can get stuck. Same thing with the kidneys in the back – hard to get to, but effective if you can manage it. Geralt shows you on his own torso. You stand in front of him while he guides your hand, keeping the sharp point of the dagger tucked to your wrist and away from his vital parts.

“Aim for the middle, if worse comes to worse,” Geralt tells you. “Stab the bastard and get the fuck out of there – he’s not going to be moving very quickly with a blade in his gut.”

With that, he draws a small-ish knife from his boot and moves to stand beside you. He slowly walks you through defensive stances, watching you like a hawk to correct anything he sees as a potential opening. Each movement is numbered and he has you drill through each one, first in order, and then in random patterns of his choosing. You only realize how long you’ve been at it when your arms start to ache. Tending bar can be hard work, but this is a different sort of practice – you’re a little winded, and a little sweaty, but you grin and shake your head when Geralt asks if you want to stop.

“No,” you tell him. “No, I think I’m getting it. Give me more.”

There’s a fierce kind of pride behind his eyes when he nods. Flipping the grip on his blade, he turns to face you and raises an eyebrow. He attacks with slow, even movements and you counter just as slowly. It’s like dancing. When you stumble or misstep, he stops, and the dance begins again.

You only make it through two sequences, at first, but then it’s three.

Then four.

Then five.

And then you realize that Geralt hasn’t stopped to correct your form in some time. He’s gained speed, as well, and you’re able to keep up. You find yourself watching not just the glint of his blade in the sunlight, but the tension and flexion of his arm, or the way he twists at the waist – all of it gives you a clue as to where he might go next. The dance flows back and forth over the cobblestone courtyard, accompanied by the whispering of your blades when then slide together and deflect. Geralt’s smooth, flowing steps push you back towards a wall, but you find an opening, spinning under his arm and back to the center of the courtyard. The witcher is hot on your heels, sweeping a wide arch that you duck under.

Then Geralt missteps. You swipe forward without thinking and leave a thin line of blood on his forearm. He swears and hops back.

Shit – you drop your blade immediately, let it clatter onto the stones below. “Geralt,” you gasp. “Fuck it, I’m sor �� hmph!”

Geralt sweeps you up, careful of his unsheathed weapon, and kisses you quite thoroughly. You’re startled for a moment, but it doesn’t take long for you to relax; you melt into his touch and wind an arm around his neck. When he finally draws back, you’re more than a little breathless, and it’s not just from the training.

“Good,” he murmurs. Honey-gold eyes stare down at you, and he lifts one hand to gently push your sweaty curls away from your face. “You did good, sweetheart.”

You’re only a little sorry when he lets you go and picks up your knife, holding it handle-out for you to take. “Find a place to keep that,” he says lowly. “Your bodice, your boot, your garter – doesn’t matter, long you can reach it without fumbling. Understood?”

You smirk. “Understood,” you confirm.

Geralt gives you one of his almost-smiles, offers you one more brief kiss, and turns back for the tavern. “Just think how good you’ll get when we have you working at this every day,” he calls over his shoulder.

You blanche. Every…

Shit. “Son of a bitch,” you mutter as you follow the witcher inside.

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

But You Can Never Leave [Chapter 5: Don’t Even Think About It]

Hi y’all! I’m so sorry I’ve been gone for so long...finals and job hunting got the best of me. I will be updating more frequently going forward. As always, thank you so much for reading!! 💜😘

Series summary: You are an overwhelmed and disenchanted nurse in Boston, Massachusetts. Queen is an eccentric British rock band you’ve never heard of. But once your fates intertwine in the summer of 1974, none of your lives will ever be the same...

This series is a work of fiction, and is (very) loosely inspired by real people and events. Absolutely no offense is meant to actual Queen or their families.

Song inspiration: Hotel California by The Eagles.

Chapter warnings: Language, very very very little sexual content.

Chapter list (and all my writing) available HERE

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You’re in the crowd at The Rainbow, although you aren’t sure why; this has already happened.

Freddie is skulking across the fog-draped stage as he belts out the chorus of In The Lap Of The Gods...Revisited, all glistening tan skin and teased hair, a pillar of nimble black leather; John is only a silhouette in the mist. Brian looks like something that’s crawled out of a cocoon: leggy and insect-like, the sleeves of his flowing white blouse like a pair of wings. And Roger...Roger’s in the back, of course—“the hardworking one in the back,” he always says—with a glittery black kimono-like shrug hanging loosely off his bare shoulders. He’s drumming feverishly, sprays of Heineken flying off his floor tom, his forehead and blond hair dripping.

“Whoa, whoa, la la la, whoa...

I can see what you want me to be,

But I'm no fool,

It's in the lap of the gods...”

Somehow, as the fog clears, Roger’s eyes find you in the crowd. He grins in that effervescent, blameless way that he does. And now you know for sure that this is a dream; because there’s no chance Roger could see that far without his glasses.

There’s a banging noise coming from somewhere, but it’s muted, distant, splintered like an echo.

Dream Roger is fading away, dissolving as the lights shade to black on the stage. He disappears, and then Freddie does too, and then Brian, and finally John. The crowd you’re standing in is a sea of churning, indistinguishable faces.

The banging grows louder, closer. You can hear a new voice now.

You swim up from unconsciousness and punch into daylight. You’re laying on your back in bed in a small, rustic hotel room; it takes you a second to remember what the world looks like now. It’s not November at the Rainbow Theater. It’s December 11th, and you’re in Rome.  

You sit up in bed and turn towards the door. Whoever is out there is knocking so forcefully that the distressed wood rattles on its hinges.

“Hey, Dorothea Dix, wake up!” Freddie is shouting through the door.

You rub your eyes as your feet touch the cool teak floor. The band flew into Rome late last night, and has one full day to burn before their concert on the 12th. You’d pitched the idea of visiting a few museums, the Colosseum, the Pantheon, the Roman Forum, St. Peter's Basilica, maybe even the Baths of Caracalla or the Temple of Venus and Roma; but it had been difficult to get anyone to commit at 2 a.m. when you were all exhausted and dragging luggage into the modest, quite geriatric hotel. Queen may finally have a Top 20 album in the U.S., but the streets aren’t paved with gold just yet.

“Darling, need I remind you that this was all your idea, you simply must wake up this instant—!”

You swing the door open. Freddie is standing in the hallway in a vivid yellow-and-black jacket and white jeans, tall boots, dark hair huge and curly, folded aviator sunglasses peeking out of his pocket.

“Get ready, bitch,” he says, grinning, then slips the sunglass over his dusky eyes. “All those gorgeous marble blokes with their cocks hanging out aren’t going to ogle themselves.”

~~~~~~~~~~

You start with the ruins, then end up at the National Roman Museum after lunch. Brian and Chrissie meander through the halls of cracked marble goddesses and heroes and piecemeal fractions of bodies, their hands intertwined; Chrissie took a few days off work to meet the band in Rome, and she’s glowing with the thrill of being reunited with Bri. Freddie is contemplating the displays, tapping his chin thoughtfully and chatting as John nods along and sketches in his notebook. There’s a photographer scurrying around snapping photos of the band for some magazine, to the vexation of the museum employees. They scowl from the corners of the rooms, their suits pristine and arms crossed, muttering to each other in Italian.

Roger leaps in front of a hulking statue of Perseus and mimics the pose. “What do you think?” he asks you, wielding an invisible spear. “Am I courageous? Divine? A mirror image?”

“You’ll have to work on the hair. And gain like a hundred pounds.”

He wrinkles his nose. ���Pounds?!”

“Whoops. Kilos. A lot of kilos. But I think I like you as you are. Can I see your hands?”

Roger falls out of his pose, smiling. “Yes ma’am.” He presents his palms for inspection. The first weeks had been hell for him as his hands were worked into touring shape, repeatedly blistered and worn raw, iced and treated and bandaged by you each night only to be pummeled all over again the next day. Of course, Roger hadn’t described it that way; he shrugged at the blood and swollen knuckles, his eyes already alight with the promise of future shows. That’s just a casualty of fame, love, he’d told you. I’d take it all again and more. The last of his blisters have healed now into discolored callouses, rough whirlpools of memories from cities like Glasgow and Bristol and Helsinki and Munich. “I can get more pounds too, you know. I’ll be swimming in them. I’m gonna buy you a mansion when we get home.”

“Not so fast, blondie.” You graze your thumbs over his rugged palms and release him. Aside from your annoyingly incessant concern for Roger, your job hasn’t proved to be too taxing: there have been sprains, minor lacerations, severe hangovers, some alcohol poisoning, and one case of syphilis that you identified and sent the unfortunate man to a doctor for, all of which afflicted the roadies rather than the band.

“How’s Jo doing?” Chrissie calls over from where she and Brian are scrutinizing a sculpture of Apollo. She tosses Roger a smirk.

“Fine,” he replies briskly. “It was amicable. She understood. Nothing personal, just with the tour and everything we knew it wasn’t going to work out. Bad timing, that’s all.”

“Hm. That’s not exactly how she described it.”

Roger sighs, irritated. “Well, Chris, I really can’t control what she chooses to tell you, can I?”

“Shhhh. Play nice, love,” Brian coos, massaging Chrissie’s shoulders.

Roger pops a cigarette between his lips and moves to light it. A museum employee rushes over, waving his arms frantically. “Per favore, signore, no smoking near the exhibits—!”

“Oh, right, right. Sorry.” Roger tucks the cigarette away, then turns back to you. “Okay, no mansion then. What’s your fancy? Diamonds and gold? Tigers on leashes?”

“A harem of sensual Italian men?” Freddie suggests. Chrissie bursts out laughing.

“I hope not,” Roger says.

“You know what I really want?” you say, eyeing busts of Hadrian and Nero.

“What?” Chrissie asks.

“A camera. A really good one. To document all of this, our adventures. I mean, I know we have...” You wave towards the magazine photographer, who’s mostly snapping shots of Freddie and Roger. “But it would be nice to have my own photos. Carry them around in my wallet, force strangers to look at them, cover my refrigerator with them, all that sentimental stuff. So the minute you kids start making real money, I’d like a nice Canon. Or a Nikon. Or whatever the best camera is.”

“The Canon F-1 is quite good,” the photographer offers.

“Perfect! Clearly, I know nothing about cameras. And will need a hefty instruction manual. But I’m still excited.”

Roger winks. “I believe in you.”

As you all wander into the next room, Freddie spies a grand piano and sprints to it. He slides onto the bench and begins testing the keys. A distraught museum employee appears instantly.

“Signore, please, this is for the museum staff only, please signore!”

“Oh relax, darling, I won’t break it.” He begins experimenting with some light, jazzish melody.

“I love Rome,” you decide as you stroll past the Aphrodite of Menophantos. “Are you sure we can’t stay here forever?”

John frowns as he shades in whatever he’s drawing in his notebook. “It’s too bad we couldn’t make it to Florence.”

Freddie rolls his eyes from the piano. “Deaky, darling, this Dante’s Inferno obsession has got to go. It’s positively morbid.”

“He ends up in paradise,” John protests wryly.

Freddie snorts. “Yes, well, Florence is a three hour drive each way. Next time perhaps. Once we’ve all got private jets and Nurse Nightingale over there has her posh camera.”

“And we’ve acquired trophy wives to pose with us,” Brian jokes. Chrissie squeals and shoves him good-naturedly.  

“We could go to the beach,” John proposes.

“A seaside rendezvous?” you say playfully.  

Freddie hums and nods as his fingers fly over black and white keys.

“Signore...” the museum employee begs. The photographer circles Freddie and the piano, snapping picture after picture.

“The beach?!” Roger whines. “It’s too cold for that! We can’t swim, we can’t sunbathe practically naked, what’s the point? And we’re checking out that club tonight. The one by the hotel, what’s it called, Fred? El Fuocolio?”

“Il Fuoco,” Freddie corrects, amused.

“Ah. Forgive me for not keeping up with my Italian.”

“We don’t all listen to opera, you know,” you tease Freddie. He peers over at you thoughtfully, then continues playing. “I’ll go to the beach with you, John.”

He almost drops his notebook and pencil. “Will you?”

“Of course. I’ll have fewer opportunities in my life to see the Italian seaside than get tipsy and evade dodgy men at some bar, most likely. Although I will miss seeing your dancing.”

“Aww!” Now Roger is dejected, his huge blue eyes pleading. “You have to come with us.”

“Next time,” you promise him.

“This time.”

“Next time.”

“Fine.” He points at John. “Don’t let her get eaten by a shark or run off with some Italian playboy.”

John grins. “I’ll do my best.”

Two burly security guards arrive and begin shouting at Freddie in Italian. “Oh fine, fine!” he snaps as he stands and abandons the piano. The museum employee beams triumphantly.

“Fred, I think we’ve tormented them enough,” Brian says.

“Bri, can we go to the beach too?” Chrissie asks. “Please?”

“It’ll be chilly.”

“I have a jacket. And I can borrow yours if necessary.”  

Brian chuckles. “Okay. We can go. Ostia’s the closest one, I suppose.”

“You’ll love it,” you tell him. “It’ll be like time travelling. You get to stand on the same shore that the ancient Romans did, bury your feet in the same sand, watch the same sunset. That should appeal to an astrophysicist such as yourself.”  

“How poetic,” John muses.

Roger comes to you, shrugs off his black leather jacket, drapes it over your violet sweater.

“Roger, don’t—”

“I’ll miss you,” he interrupts, smiling, then presses his lips fleetingly to your forehead.

~~~~~~~~~~

The four of you take a crowded, decidedly unglamorous bus to Ostia and walk the beaches under the fading afternoon sun. It is chilly by the crashing water, and the wind whips across your cheeks forcefully enough to sting; but none of that stops you. Brian and John collect seashells, and Brian retreads all the details of the tour—all the things he wishes he could do over, all the things he wants to change going forward—as John listens, smoking and nodding when appropriate. You and Chrissie kneel in the cool sand and shape castles with your hands, giggle about how messy and lopsided they are, scribble notes in the soft sifting remnants of stone and quartz: Chrissie loves Bri, Buy Sheer Heart Attack today, Queen was here. And you’re thinking about Roger more than you should be, and Chrissie knows it; but she’s not going to say anything about that now.

When the boys come back, Bri sits in the sand next to Chrissie and begins to decorate her castle with the shells he found: scallops and clams and tulip shells and oysters and tiny lightning whelks. She claps and hugs him, leaps into his lap, pulls him in for a kiss.  

“This is terribly unfair,” you say, staring morosely at your now even less impressive sandcastle.

John appears beside you and offers a massive pink conch filled with very small, pristine, glossy shells. You gasp and clasp a palm over your heart.

“Really?!”

“Yeah,” he says, puzzled. “Who do you think I picked them for?”

“You’re the best. The absolute best. A treasure. I owe you my life. Wait...” You pick up a thin shard of driftwood and write into the side of your sandcastle: John Deacon, and then a heart encircling it. “You are officially lord of the sandcastle.”

“A prestigious position, surely,” he says, smiling, then passes you the conch. “Go on.”

As you place the shells, he finds a dried bit of seaweed and impales it on the piece of driftwood, then plants the makeshift flag on the tallest tower of the castle.

Brian glances over and shakes his head, his mess of curls shivering. “Chris, love, I fear we’ve been outdone.” Then he nods to the words you and Chrissie carved with your fingertips. “Leaving letters in the sand?”

“Promotional material,” you quip; but you can tell the wheels in Brian’s magnificent mind are whirling.

As the sun sets over the Mediterranean Sea, golden speckles of light floating disembodied on the waves, the four of you get gelato and browse through bookstores and wander down cobblestone streets. And on the bus ride back to the hotel, Brian points out constellations as you hold the conch shell in your lap and doze against John’s shoulder.

~~~~~~~~~~

Brian and Chrissie depart to get dinner when you arrive back at the hotel, taking the rare opportunity for a date night. You try to think of a more romantic destination than Rome. Paris? New York? Venice? Probably none of those. You push the images that flood your thoughts away: candlelit meals with violins serenading in the background, the warm cascading glow of streetlights, tossing coins into fountains older than either London or Boston, gazing over the table and into the ensnaring oceanic eyes of the person who won’t be there. Roger.

“Do you think Roger and Fred are back yet?” you ask John in the lobby. He’s still got his notebook in his jacket pocket, but he won’t let you see it.

“I doubt it, but let’s find out.”

You ride the elevator to the band’s floor, still clutching the conch shell, as John fields ideas for dinner.

“Roger’s going to want pizza and beer, but we might be able to get Freddie to go for something more swanky. Actually, he’ll probably order dessert first. There’s a restaurant down the street that I heard has phenomenal tiramisu and lasagna.”

“Oh god. I would kill for a good lasagna.”

“No need for all that,” John says. “We don’t have enough cash for your bail.”

“If they serve lasagna in prison, you can leave me here.”

“But then who would patch up our debaucherous roadies?!”

You laugh as the elevator lurches to a halt and the doors open. “Just call me up in prison and I can talk you through it—”

You step out and turn down the hallway; then all the air vanishes from your lungs. Roger’s fumbling with his key as he tries to get into his room...and pressed between him and the door is a raven-haired, modelesque woman in a short red dress. His eyes are closed, her tongue darting between his lips, his free hand skating up her bare thigh and beneath her dress. And suddenly you’re being dragged back into the elevator, John’s arms locked around your waist. He hits the button for the lobby then reaches for you uncertainly.

“Are you okay—?”

“Yeah, I’m fine, I’m totally fine, I’m...” But for some reason, your throat is burning and your eyes are blurring with tears. You try to blink them away and they drop down your cheeks like rain.

“You’re not,” he realizes softly.

“Goddammit,” you choke out, sobbing.

“Hey, don’t do that,” John pleads. “Please don’t do that, please don’t cry—”

“Oh god, I’m so sorry, this is so stupid...” You fan your face and try to wrangle your breathing. The way he was touching her...I can’t forget the way he was touching her. “I am so stupid.”

“You’re not,” John flares. And when he opens his arms you rush into them, burying your face in his jacket as he pulls you closer, drowning you in his warmth. “You’re not stupid,” he says, quietly but severely. “You’re wicked smart and wonderful and perfect, so you’re not allowed to say anything to the contrary. Alright?”

“Okay,” you whisper. And it occurs to you—as your breathing slows, as your tears subside—how incomparably comfortable this feels, homey even.

John clears his throat. “Hey, not to break this up or anything, but you’re sort of stabbing me with the conch shell.”

Incredibly, you laugh as you back away, swiping at your eyes. “Sorry.”

The elevator doors open, and John leads you out into the lobby. “Here’s what’s going to happen,” he says. “We’re going to go to that restaurant on the corner and I’m going to order a lasagna—”

“John, I don’t think I can eat anything.”

“Doesn’t matter. Did I say you were going to be forced to eat it at gunpoint? No I did not. I’m going to order a lasagna, and if you want some awesome, and if you don’t we’ll just sit and talk. And you can nibble table bread or drink so much wine you forget today ever happened, whatever you want. You make the rules. But we’re going, and I’m ordering lasagna.”

“Okay,” you reply, sniffling, smiling up at him gratefully.

The restaurant is teeming with tourists, and you end up seated at a tiny table near the back with very dim lighting and a roaring fireplace. It’s deliciously hot, burning away your misery; or, at least, making it feel as if it might belong to someone else, as if maybe you heard about it from a friend or in a song, maybe even dreamed it. You take Roger’s leather jacket off and hang it on the back of your chair. When the waiter arrives, John orders for you.

“One lasagna, the biggest one you have, and extra table bread, and uh...” He skims the menu. “Two red wines and a Coke. And a sparkling water. So the lady has a selection.”

“Si, signore. Grazie.”

When the waiter leaves, John lifts off his jacket too, then unbuttons his shirt to his navel. The sweltering glow of the firelight dances across his pale skin in a way that is mysteriously distracting. “Well, it definitely doesn’t feel like December in here.”

“I’m sorry, maybe they could move us—”

“No, that’s alright, I know you like it. And one should be sweating in Southern Italy, don’t you think?” He tears off a hunk of bread when it arrives and plates it for you. The conch shell lays on the table by the salt and pepper shakers, to the visible confusion of the waiter.

“Thank you. For everything, John. Really.”

He gazes at you with those blue-grey eyes that can look like either clouds or steel depending on the occasion. Tonight they are misty, like the froth over waves, impossibly soft. “It doesn’t mean anything,” he says gently. “I don’t know if that helps at all, but I think it should. It doesn’t mean anything to someone like Roger, what you saw tonight.”

You sigh. “I guess it doesn’t. And I’m sorry, I know it’s ridiculous, I know that, and I’m just so frustrated and...and...I get it, I get that I have no right to care about anything Roger does, which is why I feel like such an idiot for reacting this way, but I just...I just...I’m just so...so fucking torn up about it and I’m sick of being surrounded by it all the time and I’m...I’m so...I’m...look, I’m sorry, can you button your shirt or something? That’s very distracting.”

“Oh, it’s distracting, is it?” John asks, grinning.

“Don’t you dare—”

He undoes several more buttons. “How about now, are you sufficiently distracted?”

“John, no!” you wail, laughing.

“I wouldn’t want to do anything to distract you from your tortured inner monologue...” He removes his shirt entirely and tosses it to the floor. “How are you now?”

“Very distracted,” you wheeze.

“Excellent.” He smiles, resting his face in his hands, the firelight flickering over his bare chest and shoulders, reflections of flames in his eyes. “See, you don’t look so sad now.”

“No, I guess I don’t.” You bite into your hunk of bread. But still, the way he was touching her...  

John sips red wine and smirks teasingly. “You know...if you ever get tired of the celibate lifestyle...I’m always game.”

You laugh, shaking your head, and open the Coke bottle. “That’s very much appreciated. But I don’t just want sex.”

“I know,” he replies, solemnly now. “You want him.”

“That’s pretty pathetic, isn’t it?”

“I don’t think you’re pathetic at all.” That seems like it must be a lie, but John sounds genuine.

“You’re my best friend, you know,” you tell him. “I don’t know what I would do without you.”

“Certainly not get treated to authentic Italian lasagna.”

You chuckle. “I’m sure that’s the least of your talents. Veronica is a very lucky woman.”

John nods, staring down at the table now, pushing crumbs around with the back of his hand. “If you say so.”

And, in the end, you managed to eat your half of the lasagna after all.

~~~~~~~~~~

When you get back to your hotel room, it’s very late in Italy...which means it’s only early evening in Boston. You pick up the phone and resolve to use the last of your miniscule weekly allowance for a long distance call.

Your mom answers on the third ring. “Hello?”

“Guess where I am right now.”

“Hopefully on a date with that nice Roger boy.”

“Oh my god, Mom.”

She titters pleasantly. “Tell me, dear. Germany? No, no. Spain.”

“Rome.”

“Oh!” she sighs, steeped in nostalgia. “Daddy and I went there on our honeymoon! Ages ago, of course. But it was wonderful, otherworldly. Like getting lost in a fairytale. How do you like it?”

“I love it,” you murmur. “Mom, can I ask you something?”

“Always, dear.”

You twirl the phone cord around your fingers anxiously. “How did you know that Dad was the one?”

“Hm.” She pauses; and you can envision the way she takes a step back and glances up at the ceiling whenever she’s thinking something over. Oh, maybe I do still miss parts of Boston. “Well...you know Daddy wasn’t single when we met. And neither was I.”

“Yeah, I think I remember that part of the story.”

“I’m not sure if I can explain it, dear. Truly. I...” She drifts off, pondering it. Finally, she says: “I’d had plenty of other boyfriends. I’d been interested in other people. And people are all so different, they all have something unique to offer to your life, whether good or evil. But when I met your father...I just felt like I couldn’t live without him. Suddenly nothing else seemed possible if he wasn’t in the picture. Like if he wasn’t there I’d spend the rest of my life missing him. Does that answer your question?”

“It does, yeah.” You close your eyes and feel the dark Mediterranean night air breeze in through the open window. The conch shell has found a temporary home on top of the antique dresser. “I love you, Mom.”

“Aww, I love you too, honey. And you’ll make the right decision, whatever that is.”

You look out into the constellations that Brian introduced to you earlier, Aries and Fornax and Perseus. “I hope so.”

[entertheembrace]

Two - The First Evening

Thank God I'm back in my room.  I don't remember the New Orleans sun being that brutal.  When I walked out of the hotel earlier this morning, the sun nearly blinded me.  It was just as bad coming back to the hotel.  And my face feels like it has sunburn even though I couldn't have been in the sun for more than 15 minutes all day.

After dropping my things on the bed, I went to the laptop and sat thinking of where to start.  I needed to eat but wanted information first.  I couldn't spend much time on the computer until I ate.  I've been so hungry all day; it's been hard to concentrate.  Even with 2 full meals and quite a few snacks throughout the day, it seems like I can't satisfy the hunger I'm feeling.

I did a quick Google search for the band Anarch.  The results showed 1,174,839 entries.

This is about normal when you consider reviews, news articles, regular websites dedicated to the band as well as all of the Twitter, Facebook and blog sites that mention the group.

A quick perusal of the most recent data showed that the band was playing tonight at a club called The Cathedral.  I had to meet with David and Harry to take a few prospects out to dinner, but that shouldn't last too long and the band didn't start playing until 11:00.

I still wasn't feeling great, but a quick shower and some food should pep me up enough to make the show.  I figured that was as good a place as any to look for Marie.

As I was about to walk to the bathroom, I noticed that Google was also showing a second profile whose counter read 11,285 pages so far.  A quick look showed what appeared to be an ancient religion or cult.  Obviously, this is where the band got their name.

I was about to delete these search results, but then decided to leave it..  Maybe Google would show the connection from the band to this cult.

After a quick shower, I was off to the restaurant.  As hungry as I was, nothing on the menu appealed to me.  I still wasn't feeling good and my nostrils were being assaulted by the various smells of…people.  Not the exotic food from the restaurant's kitchen, but of all the people in the restaurant.

Like today, in the Convention Center.  It seemed like I could smell each individual person and could attach each odor to its owner.  Perfumes, colognes, deodorants, I could place them all.  Then there was the smell of sickness.  Its hard to explain, but I could smell someone's illness.  I don't know how I knew it, but I did.

Most disturbing of all, though were the women.  Not all of the women, just the menstruating ones.  I could smell that strong and pungent smell on them.  That, however, is not what was disturbing.  What was disturbing was the fact that I was somewhat aroused by that particular odor.

What was wrong with me?  I was obviously suffering the after effects of whatever Marie had slipped me.  I should probably go back to my room and try to sleep this off.  But, this was maybe my best chance of finding Marie.  I had to go to that club.

As I left the restaurant, I was thankful to see that the sun was nearly set and I was starting to feel better.  Except for the fact that, despite the full meal and dessert I just ate, I was growing even more hungry.

I found myself approaching the club around 10:30.  I thought that if she was a groupie, then Marie would probably be there early.  Of course, she may be backstage with the band, but there was nothing I could do about that.

As I approached the club, I began to get nervous.  The kinds of people hanging around the club were not the kind I hung with at my Saturday night poker games.

I realized my tan pants, white shirt and blue blazer was going to stick out among all of the black leather and lace.  My face was also lacking the heavy makeup and piercing that seemed to adorn the many faces that were looking back at me.

I was hoping I would be able to find Marie without having to ask around.  If I started asking around for someone in this crowd, I would no doubt be marked as a cop at best.  Those who didn't think of me as a cop may look at me as an easy target, just like Marie had done the night before.

Upon reaching the club, I began to notice two distinct groups of attendees.  The first and, by far, most numerous were the nouveau Goths.  This group was done up in dark, heavy makeup.  Their dress had a Halloween-like feel to it and they looked as if they were going to a book signing with my beloved Anne Rice.

The second, smaller group was much different.  Members of this group looked older, but not in age since some appeared to be no more than fifteen, but their eyes. Their stares looked much older.

This group lacked the gaudy make-up, but still had the Goth-like look upon their faces.  And their clothes looked…authentic.  And they looked comfortable in their clothes like they've been wearing them since they were first in vogue a hundred years ago.

At first, I don't know why I even noticed the difference in the groups.  Then I realized that it was how they noticed me that separated them.

While the costumed-laced revelers looked upon me in my suit with a kind of humor and disdain, the other group seemed to follow me with their looks.

Some stared at me while others simply nodded or even gave a little smile.  They all seemed to look at me with some kind of knowing glance that made me feel that I was somehow a kindred spirit to them.

I shook off this feeling and pushed my way into the club.

The first thing that hit me was the smell.  Incense, again.  That makes sense in a club called The Cathedral.

The club was housed in what was at one time a glorious church that closed its doors due to the decreased number of faithful in the parish.  It was un-consecrated and sold at auction.

Inside, the décor was that of a church including statues of the saints, wrought iron chandeliers and a stage in place of the high altar.

The owners were probably burning incense to help add the authenticity of the place.  If Marie hung out here enough, this scent would easily get stuck in her clothes and cling to her skin.

It was then that I realized that the incense smell seemed to be emitting from some of the attendees like the body odor coming from some of the others.

Every time I followed the scent to its source, I found one from the "comfortable" group and they always seemed to be staring at me with that knowing look.  I was becoming decidedly un-comfortable with the comfortable group.

I circulated around the club looking for any sign of Marie.  My increased sense of smell was little help since the only fragrance I can match with her was the incense smell that seemed to be coming from at least a dozen of the concert goers.

The crowd began to surge as the lights coming from the faux candles in the black chandeliers began to dim.  Movement on the stage signaled that the band was about to start and still I had no sign of Marie.

Anarch started and the noise pierced into my brain.  While I'm no old timer, it was difficult to recognize what I was hearing as music.  The sound was loud, fast and harsh.  The lead vocalist began screaming the lyrics rather than singing them.

When I looked up to the stage to see what kind of man could make such sounds, I was taken aback.  The man was nothing what I expected.  While his skin was pale and his long, curly hair was black, he didn't look like a Goth.

He wore no shirt and had on black pants and boots and almost looked like Jim Morrison in the day of The Doors.  He wore no make-up and had no tattoos or piercing that I could see.

His face was young.  It could almost be described as angelic.  He was breathtaking. I knew, from the Google search that I looked over, that he went by the stage name Lazarus.

As he screamed into the microphone, he seemed to look at the crowd like he knew every one of them.  No eyes closed or pointing to the sky.  This guy was making eye contact with everyone he looked at.

The crowd began pumping fists, throwing their heads back and forth and wriggling their bodies in time with the music.  That's when I noticed that some of the crowd wasn’t in time with the music…at least not completely.

The main rhythm of the song matched the majority of the gyrating crowds, but I was hearing a back beat that didn't quite match the song or the crowd.  I thought maybe I was hearing something in the background or maybe imagining this song within a song.

I looked around to see who else noticed this and was sorry as soon as I did.  My new friends, the comfy crowd, all seemed to be swaying and moving in time with each other, but at a different tempo then the rest of the audience.

I watched this group and tried to concentrate on the other noise and soon was able to pick up the rhythm in time with their movements.  Soon I was hearing a whole different song and the original thrash music was just background noise.

I looked around to be sure that everyone else was still banging their heads to the original song, but the other group, my group, had a song all to themselves.

It was a haunting sound that shook me to my soul.  The voice was beautiful, but seemed to be balancing on the edge of a razor.

I looked up at the stage and the singer was looking right at me.  He locked my gaze and I felt as if I was falling under a spell.  My eyes closed as I swayed to the mysterious music and began to feel not unlike the feeling of being in Marie's presence…

Marie!  My eyes shot open and I quickly turned around just as I saw a figure near the stage heading out a side door.  From the back, it looked like Marie but I couldn't be sure until she turned her head back and smiled at me.

I hastily started pushing my way through the crowd hoping to reach the door before I lost sight of my target.

I made it through the door and saw the hallway which Marie was walking down.  Her dress was a severe contrast to the sea of black I'd just left.  It was white with one bare shoulder and a gold braided belt around her waist.  This made me think again how Marie looked Egyptian…except for the paleness of her skin.

Her hair was in one, long braid and tossed over her one covered shoulder.  As I approached her, I noticed another tattoo, this one on the back of her bare shoulder.

I didn't remember seeing this one last night, but then there are many things from last night that are not clear in my head.

This tattoo was different than the one I saw up close and personal last night.  Where the first one had the beautiful artwork of a Renaissance piece, this one looked like it would be more at home on a Nazi SS uniform.

The ink was all black.  The design appeared to be a "T" with triangles moving down the vertical and a type of fanfare hanging from the horizontal.

When I finally was close enough, I grabbed her arm and turned her around.

"Michael", she smiled, "I'm so happy to see you here.  I didn't realize you were a fan.  Are you hungry?" she asked as she turned back to the door she had reached.

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I am" I answered, "but first I'd like to ask you a few things".

"I'm sure.  Would you like some dinner?"

"What I'd like" I responded tersely, "is some answers!"

"Well, if you'll come with me, I'll see if I can fulfill both of your needs at once."  With that she was through the door and I was left alone in the hallway.

The last time I was alone with Marie, things didn't work out so well.  But, if I didn't follow her, I may never get the answers I needed from her.  And, it seemed, the longer I waited, the more questions I was coming up with.

I decided to follow her into the room, but I certainly wasn't going to accept anything to eat or drink from her.  The last thing I needed at this point was for her to slip another mickey in my drink.

The room beyond the door was dark and the quickly moving shadows showed me that the light in this space came from candles.  I closed the door and began to focus in the dimly lit room.

In the center of the room was a man, naked and sprawled out on a lounge. What I at first took to be a dark space in the room focused into a naked woman with skin the color of milk chocolate and hair dyed a deep bronze.

The woman had her back to me and was straddled across the man's thighs riding up and down on him while kissing the man's neck and chest.  I could see a tattoo on her lower back but it was too dark to make out any of the details.

The sound of a wet kiss drew my attention to the man's side where another woman knelt on the ground beside him.

While clothed in what appeared to be tight, black leather pants, she was topless and her very ample bosom was pressed into his ribs.  The short, blonde hair was cut in a severe style.  The tattoo that seemed to cover her entire shoulder and upper arm also hinted of masculinity in this woman.

The man appeared to be fondling this blonde's breast, but then I realized that the woman was holding his hand close and appeared to be kissing him up and down his arm.  

I looked around the room for Marie but didn't see her.  While the tightening in my pants was drawing me forward, I fought off the feeling.  I would not cheat on my wife again.  Rita may forgive me for one slip over 16 years, but not a second in as many nights.

I began looking around for another exit out of the room, trying to be quiet so as to not draw unwanted attention to myself.

Suddenly, both women stood up and away from the man so I got my first real glimpse of him.

He lay there, naked and stretched out.  His skin, like so many in this Goth world, was pale and I could see dark spots on his neck and chest that appeared to be some kind of artwork.

Realizing the absurdity of just standing there like some voyeur, I decided to ask the man if he noticed Marie walk through the room. Though, with what he had going on on his own, I doubted he would notice Godiva herself riding naked through the ménage a trios' room on horseback.

In the closer candle light, the pale skin looked sicklier then the milk colored skin that those like Marie had.  Then I noticed that the artwork on his chest that I thought was a tattoo was moving...running would be a better term.

The coppery smell that hit me made my stomach leap and I realized that it was blood running down the man's chest and dripping down his arm.  The pale skin that looked like illness a minute ago now had the pallor of death.

My first reaction should have been to run, to get out of the room and away from the club, but it wasn't.  I stared in fascination at the blood and my mouth went dry as my stomach flipped upon itself again.  I felt drawn to the man and was about to take a step towards him when I felt a presence close at my side.

"Hungry Michael?"  I turned to see the beautiful black woman, still naked, standing beside me.  Her eyes glowed red to match the blood that was running down the sides of her mouth and dripping onto her breasts.

I spun to run out of the room, but the last thing I remember was connecting face first with the door jam.  Then there was nothing but blackness.

[vfdbaudelairefile13]

Misery Loves Company Part 2

Chapter Sixteen:

The One Where Klaus Goes Ballistic

Klaus sighed as he and Violet to a good look around the room. The couches had pillows embroidered with silver. The chairs were all painted with gold paint. And the tables were made from wood chopped away from some of the most expensive trees in the world. But the two orphaned half-siblings were not interested in all of the Squalor’s fancy stuff. They were only interested in the rescue of their sister and friends.

As Klaus hit the button on the Squalors’ automatic curtains, his and Violet’s heart fell into their chests. The phrase ‘Dwarfed in comparison’ is a phrase that means that one thing seems small when compared to another thing. And when Klaus had hit the button on the remote and the curtains had parted, both children felt everything about their lives become dwarfed in comparison to how trapped they felt, because as the curtains parted, their worst nightmare stood smirking at them as though he was already one step ahead of them.

“Does this seem like a nightmare? A bad dream?” Olaf asked as he glared at the two helpless children, who stood frozen in place. “Because that’s the effect I was going for.”

Violet and Klaus opened their mouths to say something. Both unable to speak because Olaf had the element of surprise. Which is usually an unfair advantage and is found when one person has sneaked up on another. Typically when this happens the surprised party is too stunned to defend themselves. The children were too stunned to scream or run. They didn’t even think about calling out for either one of their guardians to save them. They merely stood there and stared at the terrible man who had somehow found them rather quickly. They weren’t sure if this was a good thing or a bad thing.

Olaf looked at them with a nasty smile, enjoying the unfair advantage of surprise as he could see that Violet had her usual glare plastered on her unamused face while Klaus’ breathing became hollow and short. The children could see that he was in another one of his nefarious disguises. Both children were not fooled by his pair of shiny black boots with high tops that almost reached his knees, his ridiculous monocle that furrowed his brow. The two siblings knew that Olaf was wearing the boots to cover up the tattoo that was permanently on his left ankle and they knew that his monocle was to make it difficult to see that he had only one long eyebrow over his shiny, evil eyes rather than two. And they knew that he was wearing a pinstripe suit to fit in with the rich residents of Dark Avenue instead of the greedy, treacherous, abusive kidnapper who belonged in a heavily guarded prison. Violet snuck a glance towards Klaus, who seemed different. He wasn’t shaking, he wasn’t retreating behind her. Klaus felt like he was going to be sick. Too many emotions were heating him to his core. He was fighting so many urges.

Olaf took a step closer to the children. Smirking at each of them deviously and slowly. Offering them each a different smirk that was laced with different intentions. “Well, I have nightmares, too, orphans. I wake up in the middle of the night screaming and the only thing that comforts me is knowing that the two of you will soon be screaming yourselves.” He smiled at Violet and Klaus as he took a few steps closer to them. Violet and Klaus slowly walked backward. “Just like three other wealthy orphans who just so happen to be in my clutches and trust me when I say that their screams are the highlight of my day.”

Before Olaf could even react Klaus had charged at him. His anger taking full control as he charged. Within what felt like a mere second, he reached the villain and with a strength that he didn’t even know he possessed, he grabbed the villain by his shoulders and proceeded to throw him against the large window that he had hidden next to. Olaf, being consumed by the element of surprise was too stunned to react. He hit his back against the window with a large THUD! And he grunted in agony from the sheer force that Klaus had used. He and Violet were both surprised that the window didn’t crack under the pressure that was applied. Before he could move away from the orphan boy, Klaus gripped the man’s throat. Olaf could see that behind the boy’s teary eyes was a lit fire that was fueled by pure unbridled hatred and a thirst for revenge.

Hot, angry tears slowly streamed down his face as he stared down the villain unable to speak. He opened his mouth but all he could do was growl. Olaf wasn’t scared, he was definitely shocked and slightly intimidated but he wasn’t scared. He had seen Klaus at his lowest point, he knew how to break the boy. He just never realized that Klaus could possess this level of anger.

Violet stood in the same spot, looking from where Klaus had been standing not two seconds ago to the scene that was unfolding before her. She rolled her eyes. “Or we can do it your way, I guess,” she muttered referring to how Klaus had agreed to go along with her plan to pretend like they didn’t recognize Olaf. Klaus held a tight grip on Olaf.

“ You son of a bitch!” Klaus hissed in Olaf’s face. Olaf had never seen the orphan boy this angry before, even if he was shocked, he reveled in the fact that he could do this to Klaus. “ Where the hell is my baby sister!”

Violet frowned when she heard Klaus refer to Sunny as his baby sister but she didn’t say anything. She hadn’t known her brother for very long but she had never imagined Klaus to be this violent especially what she had seen back at Prufrock.

Olaf smirked at the boy who held a firm grip on his throat. “Are you asking me if she’s alive? Or where she is? Because you know I’m not gonna tell you that.” the villain hissed back, all the while keeping a smirk upon his face.

Klaus leaned in closely to Olaf. “ Give me...back...my sister!”  he hissed again. Olaf could hear the desperation that hid in Klaus’ voice, right passed the anger. He noticed the boy’s grip briefly flinch.

Olaf intensified his glare into Klaus’ teary eyes. Klaus’ breathing was still rigid but not because he was having a panic attack because he was still consumed by anger. “Hmmm,” Olaf replied, contemplating his options. “Let me tell you what, why don’t I go get you a bag of flour. That worked so well for you back at Prufrock,” his face changed to one of fake surprise. “OH! Wait... It didn’t.” He hissed at the boy.

Klaus growled again as his free hand shot up and punched Olaf square in the face. Violet looked at her brother surprised. She glanced over at Olaf wondering what he would do to Klaus next. Olaf merely laughed.

“ What’s so funny!?” Klaus hissed.

“ You…” Olaf replied, feeling Klaus’ hand around his neck tremble a bit. His grip loosened allowing Olaf more room to breathe. Olaf grinned. “ Do you really think you scare me when I’m the one who broke you?”

Klaus’ face turned sour, he closed his eyes. He tried to keep his rage at the forefront of his mind. Violet watched as Klaus’ arms twitched slightly.

“Klaus?” she asked worriedly.

“Now,” Olaf said as he pushed Klaus’ hand away from his throat. “Who do you think should be punished for your little outburst?” he asked tauntingly. “Your cry baby boyfriend?...”

“Don’t touch him!” Klaus hissed through gritted teeth.

“Oooh, or the pretty little poet…”

“If you’ve laid a finger on Isadora…!”

“Oh, I know, ” Olaf grinned from ear to ear as Klaus slightly shook. “ Your baby sister. She does need to learn a lesson or two...maybe then she’ll behave,”

Violet stepped forward watching as Klaus went from slightly trembling to punching Olaf in the gut. Violet had never seen someone’s eyes go so dark before, not even Olaf’s. Olaf hunched over grunting.

“ Let me make this abundantly clear,” Klaus hissed at the villain through gritted teeth. “ If you lay a finger on Sunny..if you even look at Isadora...if you say a word to Duncan. I’ll have you wishing that we never crossed paths.”

Violet felt chills down her spine as Klaus threatened Olaf. She was unsure where this cold demeanor came from. But she was impressed.

Olaf glared at the orphan boy as he stood back up. “Ooooh, someone’s all tough now that’s he’s got a protector,” Olaf mocked looking pointedly at Violet, who flipped him off. He chuckled a bit. “It’s like you and Sunny reversed roles,”

Klaus’ eyes widened as Violet glared at the villain.

“What are you talking about?” Violet asked.

“ What have you done to Sunny?” Klaus asked, his anger subsiding being replaced by fear.

“You see I’ve learned something in Sunny’s short time of being my captive,” Olaf replied tauntingly, circling the young boy like a shark. “That baby sister of yours isn’t so tough after all. I’ll admit she definitely has a lot of bite rather than bark but... you can always train a puppy to be obedient. ”

Klaus stood shell shocked as the hatred and anger leaked from him. He felt his adrenaline slow down as Olaf pushed him against a wall. Violet grabbed the man pulling him away from Klaus. “Don’t fucking touch him,” she warned as she stood between Olaf and Klaus.

“Good point. I’ve already broken that brat,” Olaf says pointing a scrawny finger at Klaus. “Maybe I’ll do what I did to Klaus to that little annoying boy twin...and maybe I’ll be worse. I mean after all, I only need one twin for those pretty sapphires and I do prefer the girl,”

Violet felt sick to her stomach. “They’re triplets and if you’ve fucking touched Isadora!”

“...give them back,” Klaus whimpered from behind her. Violet turned around and saw the Klaus that she recognized. He was slumped and shaking. He no longer looked directly at Olaf and he was happily standing behind Violet, using his sister as a human shield. Whatever side of Klaus that had been present when he first saw Olaf in his newest disguise was gone now. Olaf deteriorated his anger, much to Violet’s disappointment. It felt well-deserved for Klaus to get a few jabs at Olaf. “...take me...just give them back.”

“ You are certainly not worth three prisoners, let alone one,” Olaf informed Klaus. He turned his gaze solely on Violet. “...but...little miss Snicket, here, is worth at least two prisoners.”

Klaus and Violet could feel their stomach’s churn. “ Leave Violet out of this!” Klaus cried. “ Give her back! You can have me!”  He pleaded to the disguised lunatic.

“Now, what good will you do for me? ” Olaf asked Klaus laughing. He glanced towards Violet again. “Now…” he pushed Klaus out of his way so he can get closer to Violet. Violet flinched when Olaf grabbed her arm. “...if the pretty orphan wants to take the little baby’s place...I could offer you a trade.” He says to Klaus.

Violet frowned. Thinking that Klaus’ response would be in favor of getting Sunny back, at no cost. She wouldn’t blame him though. Sunny was his real sister, after all.

But to her surprise, Klaus growled angrily at the villain. “You will not touch Violet!”

Olaf shrugged, squeezing Violet’s arm. “Let me go,” she hissed.

“Fine,” Olaf sighed as he released Violet’s arm. “I will have to touch my...new toys, then. I always had a habit...for breaking them. You would know that from experience, right, Klaus? Well, good things there’s two of them.”

Klaus could feel his inner core start to shake as Olaf reminded him of that dreadful night. He tried closing his eyes but it made the experience all too real as if he had been transported back to that night. He could smell the scent of his own blood, he could feel Olaf ripping him apart. He began to cry. “ Don’t...they….they didn’t do anything to you.”

Violet had had enough. She got into Olaf’s face, grimacing at the smell of his breath. “ Don’t you dare touch the Quagmires!” She warned. “ Or Sunny!”

Olaf ignored her, too focused on causing Klaus a meltdown. “Now, the only question is which twin would be more fun to break? Personally, I’d say the girl...there’s just...so many ways to break a girl orphan,” he explained staring at Violet. “Especially when that girl orphan needs to learn how to behave .”

Klaus began to shake harder, grabbing onto Violet for support.

“But then again,” Olaf continued glancing to make sure no one was approaching. “The boy twin might be just as fun as you are, Klaus?”

“ If you…” Klaus cried.

“If you touch any of them...we will…” Violet began, she couldn’t concentrate properly. The way Olaf was talking had her fearing for her and Isadora’s safety.

“What?” Olaf interrupted. He looked to Klaus. “Cry?... Glare?” he looked back at Violet. “Hit me with your ridiculously large backpack?”  

Violet stood in between her brother and the notorious villain. “Where...are they?” she asked again. Gritting her teeth in anger

Olaf smirked and walked around the children. “What? You mean you don’t know? I thought everybody could smell wealthy orphans when they were in arm’s reach.” As he said this he grabbed both Violet and Klaus, causing Klaus to jump and Violet to smack both of his hands.

“If you know what’s good for you,” Violet warned. “You won’t touch us again,”

Olaf shrugged. “Not to worry, though. Soon all of you orphans will be in my clutches. Two Baudelaires...Two Quagmires...and you, Miss Snicket will all be in my clutches. This pesky citywide manhunt may have foreshadowed me from taking the Quaggies and Sunny far away, but not for long.”

“YOu mean ‘forestalled’,” Klaus corrected from behind Violet. Olaf rolled his eyes in response.

“But we’re gonna stop you,” Violet said. “Mr. and Mrs. Squa-” she began to yell.

Olaf lifted the black cane that he had been using as a walking stick. He placed it on Violet’s shoulder causing her to stop yelling for their guardians. “You see...I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Olaf warned, another dark grin plastered on his face.

“Why wouldn’t we?” Klaus asked. “The Squalors will call the authorities and…”

“And you’ll get your happily ever after that you’ve been fighting for? I see you still believe in fairytales,” Olaf said mockingly. “I mean you can call for the Squalors and they can call for authorities…” he began.

“That’s what I was trying to do,” Violet said annoyed, interrupting the villain since he had interrupted her. “Mr. and Mrs. Squa-” she tried again.

But Olaf raised a hand, indicating for her to wait. “But...think of the poor Quagmire twins and their sparkly, sparkly sapphires,”

Violet and Klaus’ heart sank in their chest. “ They’re not twins, ” Violet hissed.

“And think about poor, poor little Sunny and her enormous fortune,” Olaf hissed staring more at Klaus than Violet.

Klaus’ face dropped. “ Leave our sister alone,” Violet warned.

“If I’m somehow recognized and taken to jail, the little Quaggies and Sunny will never be found in their, super-duper secret hiding place and they will starve to death like castaways on a deserted island,” Olaf explained smirking at both children.

“Fuck you. We’ll find them,” Violet countered.

Olaf shrugged. “Fine. Do what you please. But I am the only person alive who knows where they are,”

“B-but you said they’re in arm’s reach,” Klaus countered. “They can’t be far,”

“Is that a risk that you two really wanna make?”

Violet and Klaus looked at one another. Both having entirely different answers to this question. Violet knew she was resourceful enough to figure out where they are. They couldn’t be far if Olaf is still pursuing her and Klaus. But Klaus knew that Olaf was cunning and clever. He remembered when Olaf shoved Sunny in the birdcage back when the two Baudelaire siblings had lived with him to make Klaus more complacent to his new living situation. Olaf had asked him a similar question back then and the answer was the same.

“Yes,” Violet replied.

“No,” Klaus replied at the same time as Violet.

Both half-siblings gave each other an incredulously look. As Olaf smiled. “Seems you both aren’t on the same page,” he said placing a hand on Klaus’ shoulder, causing the boy to flinch. “I mean...it makes sense as to why Miss Snicket is willing to gamble little Sunny’s life... she has nothing to lose,”

“Fuck you!” Violet yelled. “Sunny is my sister, too! Tell him, Klaus.”

Olaf ignored her, focusing more on Klaus. Klaus glared at him.

“Sunny is our sister,” he told the villain but both Violet and Olaf could tell that there was no compassion in his voice. He was too busy trying to figure out why Violet would be so stubborn to risk the lives of Sunny and the Quagmires.

Olaf rolled his eyes, releasing his grip on Klaus’ shoulder. “If you know what’s good for your baby sister and those twins,” he told Klaus, “You’d control her…” he pointed to Violet. Olaf could see the Squalors were approaching the room. He frowned.

He turned his back towards the approaching Squalors and glared at both children. “So what are you NOT going to tell the Squalors?” he asked in a patronizing tone.

Violet didn’t answer, as she simply glared at the villain. She hated that he had the upper hand. Klaus sighed, his shoulders slumping. “Your true identity,” he answered in a whimper.

“Good boy,” Olaf replied in a patronizing tone, smiling.

Violet looked from her younger brother to the villain. She refused to allow this fucker to win. She was going to think of some way to rescue Sunny and the Quagmires undetected. She took out her white ribbon from her pocket, her fingers gracing the black ribbon she had given to Isadora that had found its way back into her possession. She began tying up her hair. Klaus noticed what she was doing and snuck Violet a worried smile.

______________________________________________

Jacquelyn Scieszka glared at the special edition of The Daily Punctilio that Mr. Poe had left on her desk. Her eyes were twitching as she read each and every word, using a red marker to underline everything that was inaccurate about the paper. Like Olaf’s name and the names of the kidnapped. But her eyes fixate on ‘Susan Baudelaire’. Oh no.

She walked to her desk that was located outside of Mr. Poe’s office and immediately picked up the phone. You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.

She waited impatiently until finally before the last ring, the person she was calling decided to pick up the phone. Good thing, too, Jacquelyn wasn’t in the mood for these stupid fucking games.

“H-hello,” the man on the other end replied.

“ You’ve got to be fucking kidding me, Snicket!” she hissed. She looked around the bank to see if anyone had noticed her tone but everyone went about their business.

“Hello, Jackie,”

“Don’t ‘Hello, Jackie’, me, Jacques,” she replied.

“So what has you calling so early in the morning?” he asked, already knowing the answer to his ridiculous question.

“Have you read today’s edition of The Daily Punctilio? ”

“Actually, I don’t read that hogwash,” he replied.

“Well, I don’t disagree with you on that one,” Jacquelyn admitted.

Jacques could tell even if she was agreeing with him, Jacquelyn was still not happy.

“Well let me read a passage for you,” she said after a moment of silence.

As Jacquelyn read the newspaper word for word, Jacques' face turned dark and sour.

“He…”

“Yeah, you left them and now he’s got three of them,”

“Where’s my niece?” Jacques asked desperately.

“Give me a little bit on that one. Poe will surely tell me,” Jacquelyn responded. “But your niece isn’t the one in complete and utter danger,”

“He’s going to go after her still, right?”

“Most likely,” Jacquelyn replied. “He may have a Baudelaire and two Quagmires but if he wants Lemony’s inheritance…”

“Then he’ll need her,” Jacques replied. “And when he strikes, I’ll be there,”

Jacquelyn didn’t like where this was going. “Jacques...maybe this is too dangerous for you, specifically. Look what happened to Lemony…”

“What happened to Lemony?”

Jacquelyn sighed. “Jacques...you can’t keep living in denial. Olaf murdered your brother and he will surely do the same to you if he finds out that you are trying to rescue these kids.”

“Did you find a body?”

“Well, no. The building collapsed and the fire burned nearly everything in its path...but…”

“Then he could still be alive and hiding,”

“Why would he hide though! His daughter is in danger. You’re going to sit here and tell me that your brother would abandon his own daughter when he risked his life for two children that weren’t even his!”  

“Maybe he isn’t abandoning her!” Jacques replied back defensively. “Maybe he’s injured and he can’t help her. I have to help her!”

“Jacques…”

“No, this is my fault. I left them and now he has three of them. Find out where Poe sent my niece and I will look for Sunny Baudelaire and the Quagmires,”

“I still think that someone else should handle this case,”

“No,” Jacques replied. “My brother. My niece. My fault. I can do this,”

“Let me send you help at least,”

“Larry is still recovering from his time in the freezer,”

“I meant your sister,” Jacquelyn replied. “I could try reaching her again. She must have found that stupid sugar bowl by now,”

“No,” Jacques replied. “If you think it’s too dangerous for me, it’s too dangerous for her. Leave Kit out of this,”

“Violet is her niece, too. Lemony is her brother, too,” Jacquelyn pointed out.

“I don’t care,”

“You sound like Lemony,”

“Thank you,”

“Not a compliment but okay,”

“Look, I will find these kids. I promise. I will rescue them and I will take all five to headquarters and they’ll be safe in VFD,”

Jacquelyn paused. How could he still believe that? She thought to herself. She was starting to not believe that. “Find them...but don’t take them to headquarters right away. Bring them to me,”

“Why?”

“Just...trust me,”

“Okay. You’ve never let me down before,”

“Wish I could say the same about you, Snicket,” she joked.

“I am going to fix this. I know I know I shouldn’t have left them at the school. Just find out where Poe sent my niece and get back to me,”

Before Jacquelyn could reply, Jacques hung up. Jacquelyn sighed as she looked around the bank, everyone was still busy with the hustle and bustle of a mid-afternoon day in the banking district. She opened the drawer of her desk that held her spyglass. She frowned when she looked at it. She pressed her fingertips to it, feeling how cold it was. She gave a low chuckle as she thought about how it fits. VFD was a cold and calculated...what did Violet call it?....cult. She shut her drawer as a woman in a black skirt, yellow top approached her desk. The woman was carrying a rather large book. Her hair was in a messy bun and her eyes seemed tired behind her glasses. Jacquelyn smiled at the woman.

“Hello, is this the Vice President of Orphan’s Affairs office?” the woman asked.

Jacquelyn smiled. The woman’s voice was like music to her ears. “Y-yeah,” she replied. “I’m Jacquelyn Scieszka,” she replied holding out her hand.

“I’m Olivia Caliban,” Olivia replied shaking Jacquelyn’s hand. Both women pulled their hands away rather quickly. Both feeling the sparks that ignited when their hands touched.

“Right this way, Olivia Caliban,” Jacquelyn replied standing up from her desk

[meltingalphabet]

I Should've Known

I should’ve known something was off about Juniper.

For starters, her name was Juniper. That should have been my first reg flag. But when her photo popped up on tinder, my thumb hesitated over her face. Yeah, it was a bathroom selfie and yeah, her lips were pursed in an annoying semi duck face, but fuck she was hot.

My thumb slid across my phone’s screen as I swiped right.

Our first date was at a bar near her work, somewhere in Midtown. She wanted to meet up on a Tuesday. I’d have preferred a weekend night, but whatever. I’m flexible.

When the catch is hot enough...

It was some douchey place with a sports reference for a name. Foreplay or something. The place was filled with frat-boy-now-financial-advisors taking advantage of the happy hour specials and attractive bartenders in tight tank tops.

I grabbed us a table in the back, behind the giant jenga and pool tables.

My phone buzzed with a text message. Running late. Be there in 10.

I rolled my eyes and took a sip of my cheap lager. She better be worth it.

My beer caught in my throat as she walked past the bar into the main seating area. She scanned the room for me, her long blonde hair over one shoulder. She wore a fitted button up shirt, unbuttoned at the top, and a pencil skirt. Her long thin legs ended in a pair of pink pumps. A little bit of spice in an otherwise fairly conservative business outfit. I felt my groin warm as my eyes lingered on her calves.

Her face lit up with recognition when she caught my gaze. Her tinder picture didn’t do her justice. Her nose and chin were round, her face an oval with a slight widows peak. Her lips were full and rosy pink. Her blue eyes wide with excitement. I raised my glass and smiled my most charming first date smile.

Five hours later, I lay in her bed empty and satisfied. Overall, a decent first date. As I listened to the water running from Juniper’s bathroom, I decided with drowsy comfort that she would make a great sacrifice.

We dated for a few months. Juniper was hot, cheeky, and wild in the bedroom. Things were going great. Until she invited me to her parent’s cabin for Christmas.

My father passed away earlier that year, so no one was waiting for me. I had to keep Juniper close for this year’s offering and I figured it was the season of family. As they say, the more the merrier.

We weren’t able to drive up to her family cabin till Christmas eve. Juniper worked as a legal secretary, and the office didn’t give her much time off, so it wasn’t till around 3pm before we  were loading Juniper’s luxury crossover. It’s ok, I thought. Still plenty of time.

She wove the car through snowy back roads and explained to me what a “snow tire” was. I had only recently moved up north from Florida and I thanked Christ she didn’t ask me to help drive. But I had never seen snow before and its beauty struck me. I watched out the window as we passed the sparkling white landscape, mesmerized.

Her parents, both lawyers, were loaded so I don’t know why I was surprised when we pulled up to the “family cabin.” The two story mini-mansion was built from polished wood and stone. Large columns stretched up from the ground to the roof, creating a sharp awning that sheltered the double glass front doors and floor to ceiling windows that spotted the modern exterior.

Juniper parked her car at the top of the driveway, expressing obvious annoyance that all three spaces in the garage were already taken by her parents’ and sisters’ cars.

I peered out the passenger window at the house. Large soft snowflakes fell lazily to the ground, illuminated by two spotlights shining from the front yard onto the cabin’s facade. The light reflected off the snow, giving it the illusion that the heavens were raining gold.

“Wow, I know I’m from Florida, but…” I paused. “This isn’t really what I was picturing.”

Juniper lowered onto the wheel to get a better look at her family home. Her face glowed in the warm light from outside. She chuckled, “yeah, I know. But don’t be fooled, it’s not all fancy.” She eyed me mischievously, “the cell service is fucking shit.”

“Ah.” I nodded, as if that one fact brought her whole family back down to earth.

“You brought your swimsuit, right?”

I laughed at the joke. “Oh, of course.”

Her smile fell. “No, Calvin, I’m serious. You brought your suit, right?”

I looked out at the snowy wilderness around us, unsure how to respond.

Juniper sighed. “For the jacuzzi! I’m sure my dad has an extra pair you can borrow.”

“Oh, great.” I said without much enthusiasm.

Big wet snowflakes coated us in the few minutes it took to unload the car and jog to the house. The door closed with a thud and Juniper dropped her bags, kicking off her pristine duck boots before bounding down the hallway.

“Amber, Clover, where are you guys?!”

I placed the box of meticulously wrapped gifts I had been carrying down and grabbed a quick look at my watch. 5:14. Perfect. The ride up was faster than I had expected. Still plenty of time.

I looked around to see that I was standing in an entrance room. The wood floor and walls glowed with the yellow light radiating from a huge chandelier hanging above my head. It was made of light grey branches braided around each other, their bark smooth and manicured as if they had naturally grown like that.

Feminine squeals rang down the hall from the back of the house. I stood there, awkwardly unsure what to do. At least I looked the part. Juniper, dissatisfied with my wardrobe, had bought me a tan wool coat. She explained that my faded leather jacket was neither weather appropriate nor fashionable. I had moved up to the city during the summer and my closet hadn’t been prepared for the blistering winds and snow of the north. I’m lucky I had Juniper to help with that. At least according to her.

Snow clung to the shoulders of the department store coat as the warmth of the house embraced me. I could feel the chilly wetness of melting snow sink into my knit beanie. A matching scarf was wrapped around my neck, the fibers clinging to my moist lips unpleasantly.

I grabbed at the scarf with my gloved hand and pulled. In my defense, I wasn’t used to the lack of individual fingers and the clumsiness of a hand wrapped in thick wool. I had half of the unwieldy piece of clothing in one hand while the end hugged my throat tightly when the Mills family entered.

“Oh no! Baby!” Juniper’s voice was filled with amusement as she rushed to help me. She took the scarf and carefully untangled it from my neck.

A gravelly voice boomed, filling the space, “June mentioned you were from the South! Guess you guys don’t really need winter accessories down there, huh?”

Juniper continued to help me undress out of my winter outwear as I turned. Behind her stood a beast of a man. He towered over my 5’11” frame, his shoulders broader than a football player’s. His beard was thick yet neatly trimmed. He wore a fitted flannel shirt and pressed jeans, making him look more like a lumberjack who modeled for L.L. Bean on his off days than a lawyer.

My mouth hung open for a moment before I regained my composure. “Mr. Mills, it’s nice to meet you.” I extended my hand around Juniper, who was still working on my coat. “I’m Calvin.”

“Matthias, Matthias!” He roared joyously, pushing Juniper out of the way as he pulled me into a tight embrace. My body was engulfed by his meaty chest. I’m not ashamed to admit it, it was the best hug of my life. Comforting and warm. For a moment, I forgot about the greater good. My purpose in life. My father. It was like being suspended in a vat of Christmas and love.

He let go of me and I stepped back, noticing for the first time the two figures behind him.

“Calvin, these are my sisters: Clover and Amber.” Juniper said, beaming from me to them.

Juniper was the middle daughter of three. Clover, at 29, was the eldest and Amber, at 22, was the youngest. The only thing the sisters had in common was that they were three of the most gorgeous women I had even seen in my life. Clover had silky black hair, cut short at her chin. Her features were sharp, her thin grey eyes bordered by heavy eyelashes. She smiled coyly at me as she extended her hand.

“Nice to meet you, Calvin.” While Juniper’s voice was high and bubbly, Clover’s voice was low and throaty. Similar to her father’s but with a husky feminine quality that made it difficult to think of her as my girlfriend’s sister.

“And I’m Amber.” A soft voice said to my left. I tore my gaze away from Clover to the younger sister. Amber was much shorter than her siblings, with thick red hair and a circular face. She had a button nose and round green eyes. She looked like she had stepped out of an Irish folktale. Amber contrasted sharply with her sisters. Juniper was tall and had an athletic build. Tight but soft, firm and preppy like a cheerleader. Clover was tall and thin, angles and bite, the only one in the room who actually looked like a lawyer (but ironically was a painter).

And Amber…. Well… Let’s just say Amber’s curves swelled and ebbed in all the right places. A sailor could get lost exploring those rolling waves.

I smiled and took her hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Juniper didn’t talk about her family much and I knew well enough not to ask, but I made a mental note to discreetly broach the subject of whether her and her sisters all had the same parents. “Where’s Mrs. Mills?”

Matthias’ smile wavered. “Eh, she had to run an errand.” His eyes shifted to Clover, who's returning gaze narrowed slightly. His dark eyes shot back to mine and he smiled confidently again, the moment of weirdness over as suddenly as it had started. “She’ll be back later.”

“Come on, Juniper. Help us with dinner!” Amber said as she grabbed her sister’s hand and began to pull her down the hall.

Clover’s mouth turned downwards as her dark eyes lingered on me for a moment before following her sisters.

Something heavy hit my shoulder and I jumped. Matthias had clapped his huge hand onto my back. “Let me tell you, it’s nice to have a man to talk with! I’m always surrounded by women!” He laughed a low good hearted growl as he lead me into another room.

We entered a cavernous living room, the ceiling arching high above us. Several thick naked wooden beams held it up. A large red oriental rug stretched from wall to wall, complimenting the forest green walls well. Two large brown leather couches sat kitty corner to each other in the middle of the room.

The walls were lined with hunting trophies. The taxidermied heads of different animals stared out across at each other, their dead glassy eyes unseeing. Deer and bears snarled meaninglessly, their teeth barred without emotion. A bobcat perched on a rock in the corner of the room next to a fat pheasant. Against one wall was a large glass gun rack. Polished rifles gleamed in the warm overhead light. The centerpiece of the room, a massive moose head, rested above the marble fireplace in which a large fire roared, radiating heat and golden light around the room.

Catching me eyeing his collection, Matthias laughed. “Are you a hunter, Calvin?”

I thought for a second before carefully choosing my next words. “My father and I used to go hunting once a year together. I still practice the tradition.”

“Good.” His deep voice resonated with the warmth from the fireplace, creating an atmosphere of masculine comfort and safety. “I like a man who hunts.”

I smiled at him and nodded, unsure how to respond.

“Sit down, sit down!” He ordered as he fell into one of couches. I obliged, sitting on the other couch facing him as I prepared for the inevitable father-boyfriend interview.

“Calvin…” he rolled my name around his tongue experimentally as he eyed me. “That a protestant name, isn’t it?”

“Uh…” I stammered, taken off guard. “Yeah, I guess so.”

Matthias leaned forward, resting his forearm against his thigh. “Do you believe in God, Calvin?”

The line of questioning was going down a dark path I had not expected. In the four months I had been dating Juniper, she had never brought up religion.

“Of course...” My answer was slow and deliberate.

Matthias nodded, his eyes narrowing at me. “God is the most important thing to this family. The Mills clan walks close with Him. We are His servants, and we take that role very seriously.”

I nodded. “My family believed the same. We were very devote.”

“Were?” Matthias asked.

“My father died this past February. I never knew my mother, but my dad raised me to be fearful of God.”

“And what do you believe now?”

I hesitated. “I still practice.”

“You can be honest with me, Calvin.” Matthias sat back into the thick leather couch. “I won’t tell Juniper not to date you because of your religious beliefs. Or lack thereof.” He laughed, as if that last part was a joke.

I smiled at him, “I’ll admit, I do not follow the more embellished of the ceremonies my father taught me, but I still believe in his word and actions.”

He nodded. “I can respect that. I know my daughters only participate in some of the more, how did you put it… embellished of the ceremonies solely for my benefit. I understand the younger generation doesn’t care as much for the ritual of worship. But I think it’s important that you know how deep this family’s spirituality runs. God comes first in this house. When God asks us to do something,” he paused, looking towards the floor as he cleared his throat. He looked back up at me, his gaze fierce, freezing me in time and space. “We obey without question.”

“As it should be.” I said.

We stared at each other for several moments before the tension was broken by Matthias’ deep laughter.

“I like you, Calvin.” He stood. “I’m gonna go grab a beer, want one?”

“That’d be great, thanks.”

He left and I sat in the living room, surrounded by fire and death.

Dinner and drinks passed uneventfully. The food was delicious and Matthias’ wine cellar impressive. I didn’t even notice the absence of Mrs. Mills throughout the course of the dinner. Matthias kept filling my glass and I drank the rich red wine with relish.

I should’ve known better. Christmas eve had been me and my father’s night and so maybe my overindulgence was an attempt to deal with his absence. Maybe I wasn’t ready to go through that night’s rite without him just yet. But I knew at the back of my mind that I had to. That it was my duty. I owed it not just to my father, but to the world.

As Matthias poured another glass of wine, I looked down at my watch. 9:58. I needed to pace myself. To rest. I’d need my wits and strength for the witching hour. Luckily, I did not have to excuse myself early. As the clock struck ten, Matthias raised his glass in cheer.

“Let us bless our last sip of wine before we head to bed.” His eyes twinkled with drink. “Tonight’s a big night for us, and so let us toast to family” he held his glass towards me, “and new friends. To endings and new beginnings.” He winked, his smirk lopsided. “To the most sacred holiday, and to God. Let us give to Him all that He asks of us, and hope He favors us with the treasures of His bounty.”

He stretched his glass to mine. “To Saint Nicholas.” Our wine glasses clinked as the sister’s voices echoed their father. “To Saint Nicholas!”

I laughed and drowned the last of my wine, attributing each and every red flag to the quirkiness of a rich and spoiled family of lawyer lumberjacks.

I awoke later the night to hands running up my chest. I opened my eyes, my mind groggily trying to catch up to my body’s instant reaction. A warm naked body pressed into me and I rolled towards her, pulling her closer. My lips found her soft skin and I kissed her neck, tracing the gentle curve to her jaw. Something brushed lightly against the back of my neck, but my brain was too drenched in desire and sleep to register the sensation. She moaned and I ran my hand up her side. As I cupped her breast, the supple flesh gave under my fingertips and electricity shot through my body as I squeezed. Bringing my mouth to hers, I kissed her deeply

Arms wrapped around my back and I opened my eyes with instant focus, my vision suddenly filled with Clover’s cold grey gaze.

I recognized the sensation of breasts much larger than Juniper’s or Clover’s pressing against my back, firm and soft. Amber’s breath was hot on my ear. “Shhhh, don’t fight it.” Her tongue slid across the sensitive skin at the top of my neck and brought my earlobe between her lips. She sucked softly and my dick swelled.

I turned to face her, her lips finding mine as I pressed myself into her thighs. I moaned lightly as Clover’s hand snaked around my hip. As I kissed Amber, Clover moved to my cock, gently teasing it before wrapping her fingers around the shaft.

“Oh, fuck.” I gasped as she began to stroke. I rolled onto my back, my eyes closed as Amber and Clover explored my body, their heat radiating into my sides.

Clover kissed my cheek and whispered, “open your eyes.”

I obeyed.

Above me, standing at the foot of the bed, was a woman. I sat bolt upright, filled with sudden panic. Clover and Amber’s hands fell away as they watched my reaction with amused expressions on their faces.

The woman stood, looking at me. Her hair was long, longer than Juniper’s, and it was stark white. Not graying, but pure white. She stood completely naked, her pale body glowing in the silver light of the moon outside the window. Her eyes were wide, revealing pupils completely milky with cataracts. She looked ageless, color fading from her along with her youth, yet her fair skin was still smooth and firm.

“Calvin, mom. Mom, Calvin.” Clover cooed beside me, her voice a mix of sensuality and power.

Mrs. Mills stared at me with those unseeing eyes, and she smiled.

“It’s nice to meet you, Calvin.” She said quietly, her voice delicate.

I was breathing heavily, my panting shifting from arousal to fear in mere seconds. My fight or flight instinct was screaming at me to do something, but I was frozen. My eyes darted to the digital clock on the nightstand. 11:28. My alarm was set to go off in only a few minutes. I still had time to prepare for the ritual. I looked up at Mrs. Mills, who was still smiling at me, waiting for a response.

My voice came out strained, tight with fear, confusion, and some embarrassment at the sheer amount of nudity around me. “You too, Mrs. Mills.”

“Please, call me Holly.” Without waiting for a response, she turned to Clover. “He will do. Prepare him for sacrifice.”

I felt a pinch in my neck, then darkness.

I opened my eyes slowly. My head throbbed and my body was shaking uncontrollably, the air shockingly cold. I tried to take in the scene around me through blurry vision. I was sitting on the cold hard ground. Short walls of snow surrounded me in a circle, but the circle itself was bare except for dozens of thick white candles. My ass cheeks were numb against the frozen leaves that had only recently been covered. I was naked and I realized the Mills family was kneeling around me.

Juniper and her sisters swayed in the chill night air, the slowly falling snow soaking into the delicate fabric of their nightgowns. They chanted together, their voices joining in a chorus of a German sounding dialect I did not recognize.

Directly in front of me stood Matthias. His hands clasped in front of him as if in prayer. A black, crooked dagger jutted out from his grasp towards his face.

Jesus fuck, what time is it? I thought as I tried to stand, but my hands were tied behind my back.

A creature stepped out from the chilly darkness and into the circle. Looming above me was a reindeer, Holly straddling its back. She wore a long, flowing white gown. A crown of icicles was perched on her forehead and she looked down, her white eyes glowing in the candlelight.

Contrasting starkly to Holly’s disturbing beauty, the reindeer was twisted and distorted. It looked more like someone’s idea of a sick joke than a living animal. Instead of standing on hooves, the deer’s leg bones protruded from the ends of red oozing stumps. Bloody velvet hung loosely from white bones in fleshy stripes. It’s face was dirty and blackened with what looked like charcoal. A long, black tongue lolled out of its mouth between two rows of human teeth.

I squirmed in the rope that bound me, trying to pull its knot loose. Juniper and I had played with bondage in the bedroom and I knew her style. It wouldn’t take me long to undo anything she had done and my adrenaline silenced any doubt that it could have been any one of the other four family members.

The creature stepped forward towards me as it spoke, its exposed ankle bone pressing into the frozen earth with a dull crunch.

“I am the soul of Saint Nicholas.” It roared, its voice cracking through the air like thunder.

I paused my squirming. “I’m sorry, what?”

“You heard him, mortal!” Holly shrieked. Her voice had lost the fragile air from before. It was now dry and harsh, like paper crinkling into a ball. Or wood cracking as fire bites into it. It didn’t sound real. More like a demon's voice than a human’s. Like a succubus or siren. High pitched and flittering. The cackle of an evil witch.

My fight against the rope renewed with desperate determination. Fuck this shit and fuck this family.

The reindeer snickered quietly before beginning to speak again. “I am weak and old, but fresh blood will wash me anew.” His eyes glowed like burning coals.

“Oh Saint Nicholas, we worship thee!” The voices of the Mills family rose above the circle, their eyes closed with intense concentration.

Matthias continued, “we call upon the witching hour to bring our deity new life!”

“Let Saint Nicholas live again!” The daughters chanted.

The rope fell loosely from my wrists and I silently thanked my now ex-girlfriends crappy survival skills. I jumped up, naked and filled with a fury that easily squashed all self-doubt I had going into this cursed holiday. My father’s death was far from my mind, replaced with hatred.

Matthias’ eyes shot open. His daughters’ chanting faded as they looked from him to me to the god before us.

I looked at my watch. 11:58. I sighed with relief. Witching Hour wasn’t for another three hours. I had plenty of time to deal with the Mills’ shenanigans before it was too late to complete the ritual.

The reindeer, who stood almost a foot beneath me, smiled. “Oh, the foolish confidence of the son charged with the burden of the father.” He bellowed, his voice deep and impressive.

I looked down at him, our eyes locking. “What did you say?”

The deer began to paw the ground, shifting right and left. He looked like a child doing the pee-pee dance. “Oh, look at me.” He said in a mocking tone. “I’m Calvin and I’m an orphan. My daddy entrusted me with our family’s sacred duty but I’m scared.” The reindeer shook its head dramatically with each word, “if only daddy was here to help me kill these people.”

Holly’s anger faltered on her face. She was confused as well. This behavior, apparently, was not what the Mills family expected from their god.

“What the-” Matthias stood, his face twisted in confusion.

“Get the fuck off me, lady.” He bucked and Holly fell to the ground with a painful thud. Matthias reached out and quickly pulled her towards him. His daughters were now cowering at his sides. All malice and power gone from their faces, replaced with utter confusion.

How do you like it? Fucking assholes.

The reindeer continued, “luckily for little Calvin, the Mills are too dumb to know that the witching hour isn’t midnight. Little Calvin still has hours to kill all of them and burn their black little hearts in a fire born of coal and pine.”

He stopped his dance, his face becoming stern again. “You must’ve been thrilled when you were brought to the woods. No fake Christmas for Florida boy, oh no. No mail order pine needles and coal for daddy’s little boy. No, you thought coming up north was the right thing to do. Not like daddy made you live somewhere where it didn’t snow for a reason.”

I spat at the ground and look to the Mills. “This isn’t fucking Santa Claus you dim fucks.”

The reindeer took a steps towards me. “Do you believe in fate, Calvin?”

I looked down at him. “How did you find me? How… how are you even mortal?”

He leaned forward, his dead animal lips hovering by my face. “I followed you, Calvin. I could smell your hunter scent in the snow and I followed it.” He stepped back and looked up at me, smirking. “I found the same idiots I knew you would. A little early Christmas gift, just for you.” His long tongue stretched out towards me. I flinched as the dry leathery skin touched my face, caressing me. It smelt of dried fish and dirt.

“How were you able to become corporeal?” I asked, shooing his tongue away from me. It fell lifeless, hanging in front of him uselessly.

He turned his head to look at the Mills family, who stood behind him, mouths agape. Juniper’s mascara ran and she cried, confused at the scene in front of her. My mind shot back to Matthias’ gun rack. His hunting trophies on the wall.

“Oh god, he made this vessel for you? Fucking sick, man.”

The reindeer shrugged. Or at least, he lifted his shoulders in what could be interpreted as a shrug.

“So what now, are you going to kill me?”

“Not tonight, Calvin.” He winked.

I looked down at my watch. 1:15.

“I still have two hours to perform the ritual…” There was a hiss around me, like sand flowing. I looked up to see a pile of black where the Mills family had been seconds before.

The reindeer swung his face around, as if in astonishment. “Oh my! Where did those rascals get to!?!” He stomped around in mock confusion, the bare bones he stood on audibly snapping with the weight.

“Welp,” he looked back up at me, “good luck trying to find new sacrifices in the middle of bum fuck whatever state this is. I’m out.” He turned away from me and leapt into the snow. He bounded deeper into the woods, his legs spasming in front of him as if he didn’t have the right number of knees.

“See you next Christmas Eve, mother fucker!” He said over his shoulder as he disappeared from sight.

And now, because of the idiocy of one family, my legacy has died. For the first time in 200 years, my bloodline has failed in our sacred duty.

And for that, I apologize. I have failed you. There were so many signs, so many red flags. I should’ve known.

So here’s a warning, the last thing I can offer you in my father’s name. This Christmas Eve, make sure to lock your doors and windows. Leave your shoes outside and stay bundled in your bed. Because this year, Krampus is back.

[imjustthemechanic]

The French Mistake

Part 1/? - A Visitor Part 2/? - The Kulturhistorisk Museum Heist Part 3/? - Cutscene Part 4/? - The Marvel Cinematic Universe Part 5/? - Breathless Part 6/? - Escape at Last Part 7/? - Fox in Socks Part 8/? - Things Go Wrong Part 9/? - Downey and Out Part 10/? - Road Trip Part 11/? - Temptation Part 12/? - An Awful Reunion Part 13/? - Unreality Intrudes Part 14/? - A Call for Help Part 15/? - Loki’s Guests Part 16/? - Stan Lee Cameo Part 17/? - Reassessment Part 18/? - Midnight Invasion Part 19/? - Elevator Fight Part 20/? - Courage Part 21/? - Unwelcome Back Part 22/? - Darkest Hour Part 23/? - They Are Here Part 24/? - The Jet Propulsion Laboratory Part 25/? - Word of God Part 26/? - Avengers Assembled Part 27/? - The Houston Underground Part 28/? - Houston has a Problem Part 29/? - Onward and Upward Part 30/? - The Chi’Tauri Queen Part 31/? - Through the Wormhole Part 32/? - Prisoners

They’re not out of the frying pan yet...

If the Chi’Tauri had wanted to kill them, that would have been the time – but it seemed like they didn’t.  Instead, they confiscated their weapons, and then one of the soldiers scooped Steve up as if to carry him over the threshold, and slid back down the tunnel out of the cockpit.  They weren’t being killed.  They were being captured.

Thanos wanted Loki.  Maybe he’d decided he wanted the others, too, or maybe it was the giant queen, wanting revenge for the murder of her smaller sister.  Either way, it meant they weren’t going to die quite yet, and that was an opportunity.  All they needed was a plan.

Steve tried to come up with one, but his body and brain were both on the verge of giving out.  All he really wanted to do was go to sleep.  That was the most frustrating thing of all, was that he had the will to fight, but not the means… Steve had spent his entire childhood wanting to fight for something and not being able to.  After finally gaining the ability to make himself heard, the last thing he wanted was something keeping him down again.

That was a perfectly normal thought process for Steve Rogers, but at this particular moment, something about it was a revelation. Was that really all there was to it? Somebody had once said that people had two reasons for doing things, a good reason and a real reason.  There were all kinds of good reasons why Steve didn’t like the idea of the Sokovia Accords, but could that be the root of it all?  That Steve felt now that he could fight, he had to?  To do otherwise would have been a betrayal of that skinny kid from Brooklyn who didn’t know how to back down from bullies twice his size.

If Steve had known any psychologists, that probably would have been something to discuss with them.  Right now, however, was hardly the time for self-examination. They still needed that plan… but what kind of plan?  When Stark had flown through a wormhole towards a Chi’Tauri armada, he’d been carrying a nuke on his shoulders.  All Steve had was a body that wasn’t even technically his.

What would Stark do if he’d found himself in this situation without a nuke?  He probably had some way to detonate his suit… but that didn’t help Steve, either.

They left the Leviathan, as Steve had expected, through its open mouth, into a broad hallway that stretched out in both directions as far as the eye could see.  There had to be a hundred craft docked up and down the space-facing side of it, their toothy jaws gaping open as if they were crocodiles just waiting for some unwary fish to swim inside.  On the wall next to each was a tall, narrow panel lit up with symbols and images that perhaps represented some kind of status report.  Most were pink, but Steve noticed that the one for the Leviathan they’d come in on was blue.  Did that indicate damage to the ship, or the fact that it had the wormhole on board, or something else entirely?

The soldiers carried their prisoners a few hundred yards up the hallway, then got in an elevator.  Steve was starting to hate elevators.

“If we are to be your prisoners,” Thor said, “might we know where you are taking us?”

There was no reply.

The elevator rose past rings of sickly pale purple lights.  Steve counted nine of these, before one of the soldiers reached out and pulled a handle, bringing them to a halt.  The doors opened in layers, like a beetle unfurling its wings, and their captors carried them out into a wide, low room with rows of glass tubes set into the walls down either side.  All of these were filled with thin gray fog, and some had a Chi’Tauri – or another, distressingly less-humanoid – shape visible inside them.  This was the brig.

The soldier carrying Loki was just ahead of the one carrying Steve, and rather than holding him bridal-style it had slung the demigod over its shoulder like a sack of potatoes.  Loki raised his head a bit and caught Steve’s eye, and Steve saw him wink.

“Fools!” a voice boomed out.  “Did you really think your primitive prison could hold Loki of Asgard?”

The Chi’Tauri soldiers stopped and turned towards the sound – and there, impossibly, was Loki.  He was dressed in full Asgardian regalia, gleaming with gold from the tips of his boots to the top of his horned helmet, striding confidently towards them with his sceptre in his hand.  Behind him, one of the tubes was standing open, the mist spilling out of it across the floor like dry ice fog.

“You forget!” this apparition declared.  “In this universe I wield power over the elements!  I will teach you not to forget my power again!”

That was right – they were back in their own world now!  Had Loki already switched back, or was this just Tom Hiddleston putting on a show? Steve looked at the other Loki for an answer, but his head was hanging down now.

One of the Chi’Tauri raised its plasma rifle and fired at the new Loki, but the figure vanished.  A moment later, two of them reappeared on the other side of the group, and laughed.

“Thanos only wishes he were a god!” the two said, in perfect unison.  Their voices echoed around the giant room, doubling up over and over until they were difficult to understand.  “Now he shall see a true god at work!”

Again, one tried shooting.  Again, the image of Loki vanished, and two more appeared elsewhere. The Chi’Tauri clustered together, worried now.

More fog welled up out of the open tube, and began to fill the room, coming up as high as the aliens’ knees.  The Lokis held up their arms.

“To me, my Avengers!” they said.

Three shapes emerge from the fog.  One was Thor, in armor and cape, Mjolnir in his hand, his long blond hair flowing behind him in an unseen breeze.  One was Natasha in her Black Widow suit, her batons at the ready with electricity crackling on their tips.  The third was Steve himself, clean-shaved and dressed as Captain America with his shield on his arm.  All three of them had their eyes glowing blue, the same colour as the gem in Loki’s sceptre, the same way Barton’s eyes had glowed while under the god’s power.

That was when Steve realized – it was all an illusion.  The only magic Loki was doing was manipulating light into shapes that weren’t there.

It was enough to fool the Chi’Tauri, though. The images of Loki raised their sceptres and brought them down on the floor with a reverberating thud that was all out of proportion to the actual size of the weapon, and the phantom Avengers vanished, to re-appear in among the Chi’Tauri.  The Natasha spun her batons in a gesture the real one would have considered needlessly showy.  The Thor raised his hammer, and lightning fizzled over his skin.  The Steve prepared to throw his shield.

The aliens put down their prisoners, all four of whom sensibly flattened themselves against the floor and covered their heads, and the firefight began.  Bolts of plasma and even a few projectiles flew as the phantom Avengers vanished and reappeared, delivered a blow and then flickered away, over and over.  Not a single shot hit its intended target. Instead, the Chi’Tauri realized too late that they were shooting at illusions, and illusions placed to make them fire on each other.  As Lokis multiplied and the other images flashed in and out, the aliens fell one by one until Steve and the others were surrounded by the wounded and dead.

Loki’s maniacal laughter echoed as the phantoms winked out, until only a single figure remained – and then it, too, dissolved into silence.

The first to speak was Thor.  “Fine work, Brother,” he said, as he got to his feet. “Fine work!”

Loki – the real Loki, still in Tom Hiddleston’s body – was lying on his back, his chest heaving as if he could barely breathe.  “You can give me my well-earned thanks later,” he panted.  “Now, free our alternates!”

Thor looked across the room at the open tube – it was closed now, with fog and a visible figure inside it.  “Of course,” Thor said, and grabbed one of the staff weapons dropped by the dying Chi’Tauri.  He dragged this over to the tube, and shop out the control panel beside it.

Natasha went to join him, but Steve was no longer sure he had the strength to walk, so instead he went to check on Loki. Whatever the god had just done, it had left him on the brink of exhaustion.  He was not only panting but soaked in sweat, with his face so pale it was almost gray.  Between that and his staring, bloodshot eyes, if he hadn’t been visibly breathing Steve wouldn’t have been sure he was even alive.

“Loki?” he asked.

“This body…” Loki panted.  “Not accustomed… too much energy…”

“We’ll get you out of here,” Steve promised.  He had no idea how they were going to do that now that they had two people who couldn’t walk, never mind that they would have to take the actors with them and heaven knew what condition they were in.  Steve was going to do it, though.  Loki had now saved all their lives once, and Steve’s personally a second time.  For the moment at least, Steve could forgive him for trying to take over the world.

“You better,” said Loki.

Something hissed and gave off an electrical smell, and Steve looked up to see that Thor had gotten one of the tubes open.  Out spilled a man in a long black coat, with dark hair sticking to his face and neck – it was Loki as they’d last seen him in their own world, standing in front of the rune stone disguised in Midgardian clothes.  He fell on the floor in a boneless heap, and Thor rolled him over and gave him a shake.

“Wake up, Tom Hiddleston!” he ordered.

The big room had excellent acoustics, probably on purpose – a prison was not a place where you wanted people keeping secrets – so Steve could hear quite clearly when a weak voice asked, “Chris?”

“Nay, I am Thor!” was the pleased reply.  “My brother and I have come to help you!”  He propped Hiddleston up against the base of the prison tube.  “I shall free the others, and come back for you,” he promised.

Only seconds later, Natasha got a second tube over, and freed Scarlett Johansson.  Whatever kind of stasis the Chi’Tauri kept their prisoners in, it couldn’t be a nice experience, because she too immediately slumped to the floor, coughing and gasping.  Nat patted her back a couple of times and took her pulse at the wrist, then went on to the next tube.

Thor next freed Chris Hemsworth, who staggered out sputtering and gasping but apparently in better shape than the others. He was wearing the sweatshirt and jeans they’d last seen Thor in, although somehow he managed to look much more like a normal person in them than Thor possibly could.  He didn’t fall over, but he did have to lean on his own knees a minute catching his breath, before he looked up at his rescuer.  There was a moment of silence and then Hemsworth said, in a distinctly Australian accent, “oh shit.”

“No need for obscenity, Hemsworth,” Thor assured him.  “You are safe.”

Hemsworth pointed at him.  “Are you…?”

“Indeed!” said Thor.  “And delighted to meet he who was thought worthy to represent me on film!”

Then Natasha opened the last of the four tubes. Out stumbled a tall man with a short beard and his hair dyed brown, dressed in a Brooklyn Dodgers t-shirt and a pair of jeans with a hole in one knee.  Nat grabbed his arm, and Thor helped her guide him over to the others.

“We must hurry,” Thor said.  “Collect yourselves, for the Chi’Tauri will be upon us at any moment.”

“Oh, my god, I wasn’t dreaming,” said Scarlett. She was sitting up now, looking around like a caged animal.  Then her eyes found Natasha, and she stared.

“You’re still not dreaming,” Nat told her calmly. “We’ll explain when we’re not in mortal peril.

“I think I can figure it out,” Scarlett said warily.  “I’m just not sure I believe it.”

Although they’d come out of stasis in a bad way, the four actors seemed to recover quickly – but then, they were in bodies with physical enhancements and powers that Steve, Thor, Nat, and Loki currently lacked.  Soon all of them were on their feet – except for Hiddleston, who was curled up and shivering as if feverish.  Hemsworth and Evans got him to his feet, but he just hung limply between them.

“Loki,” said Steve, touching the god’s shoulder. “Wake up.  We need you to do some more magic, get us back to the Leviathan.” That was all he could think of for how to get out of here again.  There were many reasons why it was not a good plan, but it was all they had.

There was no response.  Using Asgardian magic had simply been too much for Hiddleston’s body – Loki was out cold.

[burlybanner]

How would Tony and Steve react to seeing Chubby Bruce in Asgardian clothes for the first time?

I think they would be ecstatic. Absolutely over the moon…

**

Asgard isn’t like Earth, Bruce reminded his alter as they began to change. A line of a hundred, frothing-at-the-mouth lizards the size of Godzilla, and warriors the size of ten human men, roared at the pitiful cadre opposing them. But the enemy didn’t didn’t know what Bruce knew. That even with as few as ten Asgardian warriors, and Cap - and Iron Man - they’d find out how quickly tables could turn with the addition of a Hulk.

You don’t have to hold back. Go all out, it’s okay.

Bruce could feel the Hulk roar in anticipation for the battle and for once, he wasn’t afraid. As he began losing consciousness he felt the Hulk’s joy -and fury consume him…and it was glorious.

**

“Bruuuuce–oh, Brucie-bear. Olly-olly oxen-free.”

Thor raised a brow in Tony’s direction, clearly unfamiliar with the phrase, but said nothing even as Steve smirked at the engineer.

“They still say that, huh?”

“Yep. Some things never change.”

Both Steve and Tony exchanged a look, but Thor simply shook his head and hid his own smile. “Midgardlans,” he rumbled, mostly to himself. Still, he knew both companions must have heard him, by the way they chuckled.  "Although we may not have needed it, thank you for your aid. With many our warriors currently battling in Niflheim, we were low on our numbers. What could have taken a day simply took hours, with our combined strengths.” Thor was surprised at his own candor and humility; he’d learned much from his fellow Midgardians. In days of old, he would have bragged about how much he didn’t need anyone’s aid. But now? It was good to have the continued bonds of friendship at his beckon.

“No problem,” Steve said. He was only limping a little, Thor noted, but their healers had made sure his system had been strengthened by their herbs. “Of course we were happy to help.”

“Aye.” Thor gestured with his chin. “It shouldn’t be much farther. There’s a grove a few paces ahead, where Banner most likely collapsed. It’s quite a peaceful place, mostly free from visitors, apart from the hallowed animal or three.”

Tony nodded. They’d traveled pretty far from the castle, or whatever Thor called home. After the battle Hulk had loped off, and even their combined yelling hadn’t stopped him. A Hulk going full clip down a mountainside and into parts unknown meant another hour out of their schedule locating him. “It’s not like he’s been hard to find,” Tony said, pulling back a broken branch. “Hulk’s signature is all over the damn place, which makes him easy to follow. He’s not exactly subtle.“

“I’m still surprised Bruce went this far without changing back,” Steve sighed. “He’s usually himself sooner than this.” He shielded his hand over his eyes, briefly checking the sky and landscape. 

“Unless something was chasing him.”

Thor shook his head and his golden locks shifted in the gentle breezes.  “Doubtful. If a challenger awaited him, we would have heard the roar of battle. In earnest, I would ponder his alter’s enjoyment of this land instead. Here he is treated equally, regardless of his form. And the knowledge that he need not worry of harming anything about him surely lightens his heart, and provides a comfort, of sorts.”

“Huh.” Tony rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Makes sense. Even the Big Guy’s gotta have some ‘me’ time.”

“I just wish he hadn’t run so damn far. I mean, I know he’s not in any danger, but still.”

“You gettin’ tired, Cap?”

Steve shook his head. “No. I just wonder how hard it’ll be to get Bruce back, if Hulk’s enjoying himself this much.”

The two men’s brows furrowed, Thor noticed, and their brief jovial mood appeared to taper. But Thor understood their concern; if Banner chose his alter’s life instead, it may make life difficult between the three.

They trudged in companionable silence for a short time, before Thor nodded to a thicket of downed tree limbs. “Ah, I see,” Thor said with a smile. “He’s hidden himself away. Drawn himself in, for protection.” Thor traded gazes with Tony and Steve. “As an animal might, before sleep takes hold.”

“So you’re saying he’s out cold.”

“Mayhap.” Thor grinned broadly. “Shall we wake him?”

***

Bruce moaned. He felt warm, safe, and comfortable, and the sun’s rays on his face and the lingering scents of honeysuckle, rose and lavender made him want to continue sleeping for a while yet. Part of him heard low voices, but it was the first time in a long time he’d felt so at peace, so he kept his eyes shut, hoping for more time.

“Brucie, hon’.I know you’re exhausted–”

“Mmm. Fi’ more minutes–”

“–but you’re butt naked in an Asgardian meadow. Not that I care, or Steve, but you might care that Thor’s here and gettin’ an eyeful. Just sayin’.”

Bruce made another noise, because his mind took awhile to catch up. And then–

“Oh, God–”

“There’s our little exhibitionist.”

Bruce tried to awkwardly cover himself from Tony’s lecherous smirk, but there was a lot more to him these days and two hands weren’t cutting it.

A chuckling Thor began approaching Bruce with what appeared to be clothing, but for some reason Steve subtly stood between them. “I’ll give those to Bruce, Thor.  Thanks.”

Bruce looked questioningly between Thor and Steve as Steve took the Asgardian garments and handed them to Bruce, but he mostly ignored the pair in favor of figuring out how the clothes worked.

Bruce waved the soft tunic in front of him and turned it around a few times. Hmm, is this the front or the back-? Without tags it’s almost impossible to tell…

Thor picked up on the truth faster, but Bruce was too busy gauging his clothes and dealing with a Hulk-sized tiredness to pay them any mind.  

“There’s no cause for alarm, friend Steve,” Thor said gently. “I know the bond you three share - I meant no disrespect.”

Bruce glanced up, then, watching as Steve’s cheeks flushed as he stared in the opposite direction. The sun caught Steve just right, though, and Bruce’s gaze lingered as he pulled on his soft boots.  

“I just think Bruce deserved some modicum of decency, is all.”

“I’ve been naked before, in stranger places,” Bruce snorted under his breath, but Tony’s laugh interrupted him.

“Steve. You’re positively adorable when you’re jealous.”

Bruce made a face. “Wait, what?” 

“I admit, Banner’s current stoutness is an added boon to his beauty–” Bruce’s eyebrows definitely shot up, and he couldn’t help his Thor-directed double-take  “–but I would not deign it proper to presume.”

“In other words,” Tony translated, “Thor’s not interested, Steve. Unless you want him to be.”

The tips of Steve’s ears burned bright. “Right. Sorry. I guess I’m a little on edge because I’ve noticed more than a few people with a passing interest in Bruce.”

Bruce squeaked. “Are you serious?” He grumbled a litle, trying to figure out how his belt and over-tunic (or whatever it was called) worked. He wrestled with the material while grumbling at Steve. “They admire the Hulk’s strength, surely.”

Steve chuckled softly. “No, Porkpie. It was you.” He gently went over and kissed Bruce’s cheek. 

“You’re the newest dish on the Asgardian menu, Bruce.” Tony sighed and shook his head as an unusual bird squawked nearby. A peacock, maybe.  “You should show off your curves, m’man. Strut your stuff and preen a little. And then don’t let ‘em forget that you’re ours, because hands off.”

Bruce chuckled. He didn’t understand why anyone even thought such a thing who wasn’t into very larger men, but whatever. Different strokes, and all. Even on Asgard.

“God…dammit,” Bruce grunted. He knew something wasn’t right with what he was wearing, but he couldn’t figure out how it all fit around him. With his fatter body, he couldn’t discern any patterns to the threads–

Thor exchanged a look with Steve and Tony. “May I?”

Steve paused and sheepishly nodded. “It’s okay. I won’t bark at you any more.”

Smiling softly, Thor went over to Bruce and helped him stand. “The sporran should be reversed,” he said, and he gripped the sides of the belt and twisted it forward. “And the pouch should be strapped as so. And the cloak is meant to be fastened here and here - if you choose it.” Thor’s smiled widened, but hid Bruce’s completed look from Tony and Steve’s view.

“I think the look most fitting, with the hooded cloak.”

“Hm.” Bruce tugged at the fabric bunched at the waist - but the clothing flowed in the right places, just maybe not in the way he expected it to. The medium-blue (Ocean color?) of the tunic was offset by the royal blue cloak with gold brocade trimming, but he suppose it suited Asgard. The clothing was a little ostentatious for his tastes but it was also surprisingly lightweight, considering how much he wore of it.

“Well, I guess I’m ready to head back, then. Although I’m still a little tired,  so I wouldn’t mind if we…”

He stopped, suddenly noticing how still Tony and Steve had become. Thor had stepped aside and bowed, presenting Bruce to them in a weird way. He figured the bow was some sort of strange Asgardian custom to which he had little knowledge. 

“What?”  Bruce nervously adjusted his clothes, but there wasn’t a lot of give. Despite the lightweight fabrics and the comfort of the clothes he still felt like a stuffed sausage, to be honest. “Something on backwards?”

“N-no,” Tony said, his tongue uncharacteristically tied. “You look…I mean–”

“Gorgeous,” Steve breathed, and Tony slowly nodded.

“Yeah, uh. It ah. It suits you, big guy.”

Bruce smirked. “As chunky as I am?”

“Especially so. Shit. I can’t believe I didn’t see it. Blue is definitely one of your colors. Brings out your eyes. Your cheeks. Your…” he gestured lamely and sighed like a lovestruck teen. “Everything.”

Steve seemed a little unsteady as he approached, and took a surprised Bruce’s arm. “I feel underdressed.” He pointed to his uniform. “Really, really underdressed.”

“Well, it’s not like we had anything but our own uniforms to fight in and whatever we had on underneath,” Tony mused. He hooked his arm into the crook of Bruce’s opposite side and glanced at his t-shirt and ratty jeans - his standard Iron Man out-of-costume costume. “You’re the highlight of the show this time, Banner. I think I’ll be the jealous one, if anyone’s tongue hangs out of their mouth.”

Thor indulged them with a small smile of satisfaction. “Our weavers are quite skilled, and know their crafts well. When they realized Banner would need a change of clothes after his bout with our monsters, they immediately went to work, and created suitable wear. You may understand it not, but our weavers find clothing that, in your vernacular, would match the ‘soul’ of an individual. Not just their outward appearance. And they take their craft very seriously.”

“So I see,” Steve whispered. He shyly caught Thor’s eye. “Tony and I may need clothes of our own. Originally I wanted to leave as soon as Bruce woke, but with this added benefit…” he nibbled his lip. “Maybe we should stay for dinner this time.” 

Tony nodded, agreeing 100% with Steve.

“We shall have a banquet in your honor,” Thor said proudly. “I had hoped you’d stay, to be very honest. Suitable wear has already been set out for you, Steven. And you, Anthony. I think you’ll find those clothes very much to your liking as well.”

And Thor was true to his word. The trio spent the entire evening ogling each other’s Asgardian wear, noting how very much it brought out their separate personalities and their particular traits. They danced, dined, and toasted to the success of Asgard for the rest of the day, and into most of the night. Tony thought they’d get into a fight or two the way Steve stared down a few ladies (and men) who made passes Bruce’s way, but Thor had given the subtle, “hands off” gestures, and instead their conversations with the Asgardians were as hale and hearty as their food and drink. 

Although to be fair, after the banquet they found space to be alone and their new clothes didn’t stay on for long. Not that they minded that, either.

(A/N: Depictions of Bruce’s tunic in my mind are a combination of these two pictures: Here and here.)

[networkingdefinition]

Bikers Quotes

Official Website: Bikers Quotes

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• A cousin of mine who was a casualty surgeon in Manhattan tells me that he and his colleagues had a one-word nickname for bikers: Donors. Rather chilling. – Stephen Fry

• And what makes me happy now has changed as well… Its one thing to play in a bar or at a biker festival, and hear a guy who’s been drinking beer all day come up and tell you how good you are. For a long time in your life that will make you happy. – Rick Derringer

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Biker', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_biker').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_biker img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Biker chicks want the bad boy. – Theo Rossi • Bikers, in general, have just been so attractive to people. Photographers would follow them because there’s this weird warrior gravitas that comes with it. The bikes are loud, they have tattoos, they have artwork that they all wear on their jackets. – Ryan Hurst • Canada is like a nice family living over a biker bar . . . They keep telling the downstairs neighbors to keep down the noise, people are trying to sleep. – Dustin Hoffman • First you buy me a mocha. Then you let me help you hide a body. Now you take me to a biker clubhouse. Best. Day. Ever. – Kelley Armstrong • For about three years I was performing at one bar in East Los Angeles that was like a mean dive bar. You’re in there performing for drunks or bikers, not the most flattering people. I think it helped build my confidence, because you have to get their attention, then make them laugh. – Gabriel Iglesias • Grandma Mazur stood two feet back from my mother. “I gotta get me a pair if those,” she said, eyeballing my shorts. “I’ve still got pretty good legs, you know.” She raised her skirt and looked down at her knees. “What do you think? You think I’d look good in them biker things?” Grandma Mazur had knees like doorknobs. – Janet Evanovich • Guys are so predictable. They can’t seem to separate fantasy from reality, so I get a lot of bikers and race car drivers hitting on me. They’re all just playboys, so they don’t interest me. – Michelle Rodriguez • I don’t believe any sort of traveler does a better job than any other sort of traveler at obeying traffic safety laws. It’s difficult to foresee a camera program that can be used with bikers and walkers. – Robert James Thomson • I have a lot of respect for the bikers, which I’ve always had. – Emilio Rivera • I like raunchiness, not like in a biker-chick sort of a way, but like the girl can’t help it. Little bruises, a few hairs out of place, a little stain here and there. – Anton Szandor LaVey • I never went to camp as a kid. I couldn’t get into an Ivy League school. I wouldn’t join a biker club. – Bob Saget • I think it’s particularly a distinctively American concept that resonates with American culture through biker culture. A motorcycle is an independent thing. You’re like, ‘I don’t want to ride in a car with this person. I want to be independent and ride by myself. But, let’s ride in a group. Let’s be independent, together.’ – Ryan Hurst • I’d love to be on ‘Glee.’ I’d love to play a rebel. Be a real biker chick in leather and covered in tattoos. – Leona Lewis • If you see a biker chick hanging out with a group of bikers and associated with them, stay away. You’ll know right away if a biker chick is free; if she’s with someone, she’s right by his side. Getting with somebody’s old lady is a big no-no. That’s more serious than anything in that world. – Theo Rossi • I’m a menace to society, But girls in biker shorts are so fly to me. After the date, I’mma want to do the wild thing… You’re talkin’ lobster? I’m thinkin’ Burger King. – Ice Cube • I’m continuing to do research into biker culture. – Ron Perlman • I’m definitely never going to be a biker. I’m scared of cars so the idea of riding a motorcycle is just never going to be something that I’m into. – Kristen Stewart • I’m not keen on cars and motorbikes. I tried to be a biker, but it wasn’t me – I bought a Harley-Davidson and dumped it. – Colin Farrell • In ‘Hell Ride,’ I play a biker – it’s about the bikers. It’s with Dennis Hopper and Michael Madsen, Larry Bishop and myself. We’re bikers, and I play Billy Wings; I’ve got all sorts of wings, and you have to watch the movie to find out what the wings are about. – Vinnie Jones • It’s not impressive to get in a fight, but if one does happen, you’ve gotta be ready to handle it. Every girl, not just biker chicks, knows what kind of guy can. – Theo Rossi • I’ve been a biker, I’ve been a convict, I’ve been a husband, father, and son. – Duane Chapman • Messengers and mountain bikers share a common chromosome. – James Bethea • Nick was dressed in jeans, a dark green sweater, and bomber jacket–the perfect image of a rich college student. Talon looked like a biker who had just left Sanctuary, New Orleans’s premier biker bar. Acheron looked like a refugee from the Dungeon–the local underground goth hangout. Valerius was the professional contingent, and Zarek…Zarek just looked like he was ready to kill something.’ (Talon) – Sherrilyn Kenyon • One of the important things is that a lot of people forget that a biker club is a secret society. – Ryan Hurst • Only a biker knows why a dog sticks his head out of a car window. – Ralph Waldo Emerson • Really good mountain bikers are lousy judges of trail difficulty. We haven’t a clue, we just ride. – John Olsen • Sure, my childhood was unusual. All these eccentric, wild people frequented our home: rock stars, drag queens, models, bikers, freaks. But I was not this little rich girl. My mom and I lived in an apartment. – Liv Tyler • Tattoo. What a loaded word it is, rife with associations to goons, goofs, bikers, tribal warriors, carnival artists, drunken sailors and floozies. – Jon Anderson • The White Horse video which was directed by Marco Ovando started off with a biker theme. Once Ava Sanjurjo came in as stylist along with Marco & I it really took it’s own shape. It was all very improvised but wound up paying homage to NY and night life. People say it reminds them of a Guess ad which I love! – Nomi Ruiz • There was this kind of mildly annoying mythology about conductor Like biker should riding a Harley-Davidson on an LP cover, and wearing a sort of a leather suit. – Esa-Pekka Salonen • Um, Dr. Alexander, there’s a couple out here who say they’re related to you. They…um…they’re biker people. (Nurse) Hey, Julian. Tell Attila the Hun here that we’re okay so we can come and ooh and aah over the babies. (Eros) – Sherrilyn Kenyon • We get crazy when we can’t make things be like the world tells us they are”. She looked back out the window. “It was that way for me and your brother, I think. I mean, how could I have loved him that last year? I didn’t even know who he was. He was way more attracted to drugs and bikers and that whole lifestyle than he was to me. But somebody told me that if you really loved somebody,you stayed with him no matter what. You had to fight for him.” She laughe. “Hell, I was convinced. – Chris Crutcher • When I ran for governor, I told all the bikers, “You don’t need to worry about me bringing in a helmet law. It’s your option because you as a motorcycle rider that’s your option. It doesn’t come with the bike.” – Jesse Ventura • Why did I adopt kids? I dunno. Let me look at my family: religious weirdo, gun nut, biker, boozer, dead tooth, too many cats, the guy who talks to his truck. Hmm. Maybe I adopted because genetically my balls are full of poison. – Dana Gould • With a face like this, there aren’t a lot of lawyers or priest roles coming my way. I’ve gotta face that was meant for a mug shot and that’s what I’ve been doing for the past thirty years. If I play a cop, it’s always a racist cop, or a trigger-happy cop or a crooked cop – but by and large I play cowboys, bikers, and convicts. – M. C. Gainey • Yeah? Can you draw a skeleton riding a motorcycle with flames coming out of it? And I want a pirate hat on the skeleton. And a parrot on his shoulder. A skeleton parrot. Or maybe a ninja skeleton parrot? No, that would be overkill. But it’d be cool if the biker skeleton could be shooting some ninja throwing stars. That are on fire. – Richelle Mead • You could say that the Hell’s Angels have a bad reputation, then you talk to a biker, and he’s trying to join it. It just depends upon who you’re talking to about reputation. – Anton Newcombe • You ready? I have gold teeth, I have braids, I’m wearing Rick Owens moon boots, I have rips in my denim, a biker vest, I love artsy girls, my favourite artists are Jimi Hendrix and John Lennon. I’m obsessed with being different. – ASAP Rocky • You wouldn’t believe that I still have the bikers with the caps to the side at my door, ringing the doorbell. – Tina Turner [clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

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[equitiesstocks]

Bikers Quotes

Official Website: Bikers Quotes

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• A cousin of mine who was a casualty surgeon in Manhattan tells me that he and his colleagues had a one-word nickname for bikers: Donors. Rather chilling. – Stephen Fry

• And what makes me happy now has changed as well… Its one thing to play in a bar or at a biker festival, and hear a guy who’s been drinking beer all day come up and tell you how good you are. For a long time in your life that will make you happy. – Rick Derringer

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Biker', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_biker').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_biker img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Biker chicks want the bad boy. – Theo Rossi • Bikers, in general, have just been so attractive to people. Photographers would follow them because there’s this weird warrior gravitas that comes with it. The bikes are loud, they have tattoos, they have artwork that they all wear on their jackets. – Ryan Hurst • Canada is like a nice family living over a biker bar . . . They keep telling the downstairs neighbors to keep down the noise, people are trying to sleep. – Dustin Hoffman • First you buy me a mocha. Then you let me help you hide a body. Now you take me to a biker clubhouse. Best. Day. Ever. – Kelley Armstrong • For about three years I was performing at one bar in East Los Angeles that was like a mean dive bar. You’re in there performing for drunks or bikers, not the most flattering people. I think it helped build my confidence, because you have to get their attention, then make them laugh. – Gabriel Iglesias • Grandma Mazur stood two feet back from my mother. “I gotta get me a pair if those,” she said, eyeballing my shorts. “I’ve still got pretty good legs, you know.” She raised her skirt and looked down at her knees. “What do you think? You think I’d look good in them biker things?” Grandma Mazur had knees like doorknobs. – Janet Evanovich • Guys are so predictable. They can’t seem to separate fantasy from reality, so I get a lot of bikers and race car drivers hitting on me. They’re all just playboys, so they don’t interest me. – Michelle Rodriguez • I don’t believe any sort of traveler does a better job than any other sort of traveler at obeying traffic safety laws. It’s difficult to foresee a camera program that can be used with bikers and walkers. – Robert James Thomson • I have a lot of respect for the bikers, which I’ve always had. – Emilio Rivera • I like raunchiness, not like in a biker-chick sort of a way, but like the girl can’t help it. Little bruises, a few hairs out of place, a little stain here and there. – Anton Szandor LaVey • I never went to camp as a kid. I couldn’t get into an Ivy League school. I wouldn’t join a biker club. – Bob Saget • I think it’s particularly a distinctively American concept that resonates with American culture through biker culture. A motorcycle is an independent thing. You’re like, ‘I don’t want to ride in a car with this person. I want to be independent and ride by myself. But, let’s ride in a group. Let’s be independent, together.’ – Ryan Hurst • I’d love to be on ‘Glee.’ I’d love to play a rebel. Be a real biker chick in leather and covered in tattoos. – Leona Lewis • If you see a biker chick hanging out with a group of bikers and associated with them, stay away. You’ll know right away if a biker chick is free; if she’s with someone, she’s right by his side. Getting with somebody’s old lady is a big no-no. That’s more serious than anything in that world. – Theo Rossi • I’m a menace to society, But girls in biker shorts are so fly to me. After the date, I’mma want to do the wild thing… You’re talkin’ lobster? I’m thinkin’ Burger King. – Ice Cube • I’m continuing to do research into biker culture. – Ron Perlman • I’m definitely never going to be a biker. I’m scared of cars so the idea of riding a motorcycle is just never going to be something that I’m into. – Kristen Stewart • I’m not keen on cars and motorbikes. I tried to be a biker, but it wasn’t me – I bought a Harley-Davidson and dumped it. – Colin Farrell • In ‘Hell Ride,’ I play a biker – it’s about the bikers. It’s with Dennis Hopper and Michael Madsen, Larry Bishop and myself. We’re bikers, and I play Billy Wings; I’ve got all sorts of wings, and you have to watch the movie to find out what the wings are about. – Vinnie Jones • It’s not impressive to get in a fight, but if one does happen, you’ve gotta be ready to handle it. Every girl, not just biker chicks, knows what kind of guy can. – Theo Rossi • I’ve been a biker, I’ve been a convict, I’ve been a husband, father, and son. – Duane Chapman • Messengers and mountain bikers share a common chromosome. – James Bethea • Nick was dressed in jeans, a dark green sweater, and bomber jacket–the perfect image of a rich college student. Talon looked like a biker who had just left Sanctuary, New Orleans’s premier biker bar. Acheron looked like a refugee from the Dungeon–the local underground goth hangout. Valerius was the professional contingent, and Zarek…Zarek just looked like he was ready to kill something.’ (Talon) – Sherrilyn Kenyon • One of the important things is that a lot of people forget that a biker club is a secret society. – Ryan Hurst • Only a biker knows why a dog sticks his head out of a car window. – Ralph Waldo Emerson • Really good mountain bikers are lousy judges of trail difficulty. We haven’t a clue, we just ride. – John Olsen • Sure, my childhood was unusual. All these eccentric, wild people frequented our home: rock stars, drag queens, models, bikers, freaks. But I was not this little rich girl. My mom and I lived in an apartment. – Liv Tyler • Tattoo. What a loaded word it is, rife with associations to goons, goofs, bikers, tribal warriors, carnival artists, drunken sailors and floozies. – Jon Anderson • The White Horse video which was directed by Marco Ovando started off with a biker theme. Once Ava Sanjurjo came in as stylist along with Marco & I it really took it’s own shape. It was all very improvised but wound up paying homage to NY and night life. People say it reminds them of a Guess ad which I love! – Nomi Ruiz • There was this kind of mildly annoying mythology about conductor Like biker should riding a Harley-Davidson on an LP cover, and wearing a sort of a leather suit. – Esa-Pekka Salonen • Um, Dr. Alexander, there’s a couple out here who say they’re related to you. They…um…they’re biker people. (Nurse) Hey, Julian. Tell Attila the Hun here that we’re okay so we can come and ooh and aah over the babies. (Eros) – Sherrilyn Kenyon • We get crazy when we can’t make things be like the world tells us they are”. She looked back out the window. “It was that way for me and your brother, I think. I mean, how could I have loved him that last year? I didn’t even know who he was. He was way more attracted to drugs and bikers and that whole lifestyle than he was to me. But somebody told me that if you really loved somebody,you stayed with him no matter what. You had to fight for him.” She laughe. “Hell, I was convinced. – Chris Crutcher • When I ran for governor, I told all the bikers, “You don’t need to worry about me bringing in a helmet law. It’s your option because you as a motorcycle rider that’s your option. It doesn’t come with the bike.” – Jesse Ventura • Why did I adopt kids? I dunno. Let me look at my family: religious weirdo, gun nut, biker, boozer, dead tooth, too many cats, the guy who talks to his truck. Hmm. Maybe I adopted because genetically my balls are full of poison. – Dana Gould • With a face like this, there aren’t a lot of lawyers or priest roles coming my way. I’ve gotta face that was meant for a mug shot and that’s what I’ve been doing for the past thirty years. If I play a cop, it’s always a racist cop, or a trigger-happy cop or a crooked cop – but by and large I play cowboys, bikers, and convicts. – M. C. Gainey • Yeah? Can you draw a skeleton riding a motorcycle with flames coming out of it? And I want a pirate hat on the skeleton. And a parrot on his shoulder. A skeleton parrot. Or maybe a ninja skeleton parrot? No, that would be overkill. But it’d be cool if the biker skeleton could be shooting some ninja throwing stars. That are on fire. – Richelle Mead • You could say that the Hell’s Angels have a bad reputation, then you talk to a biker, and he’s trying to join it. It just depends upon who you’re talking to about reputation. – Anton Newcombe • You ready? I have gold teeth, I have braids, I’m wearing Rick Owens moon boots, I have rips in my denim, a biker vest, I love artsy girls, my favourite artists are Jimi Hendrix and John Lennon. I’m obsessed with being different. – ASAP Rocky • You wouldn’t believe that I still have the bikers with the caps to the side at my door, ringing the doorbell. – Tina Turner [clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

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[blackmanorcastleinthesky]

Witch was grateful for the sun on her face as she slipped from the castle. The sky overhead was clear and bright, making it a warm day, but the gentle breeze made it bearable. She smiled at the guards she passed on her way out, her destination the exercise yard ahead.

Morning drills were held there for the guards who would be on-duty that day. Evening drills for the ones on-duty during the night. In the middle of the day, there were only scattered groups. Prince and her daughter stood in the center of the sandy hard-packed circle, Prince confident and light on his feet, Cora mirroring her father to the best of her ability.

She was good. Only nine years old, and she already looked effortless with a sword in her hand. Witch let a smile curve her lips, the warmth in her chest pushing away a chill that lingered.

They’d finally broken their prisoner. It had ended in his death, to her dismay. She hadn’t meant to kill the man, but she needed to know what secrets he’d kept in his brain. And the final push to destroy the unnatural barriers had snuffed him out, from one second to the next.

Witch knew what it was to use teeth and claws. Sometimes, it was necessary. But if she could avoid needless murder, she preferred it. Her magic wasn’t for that. She didn’t like the idea of being known for her ability to destroy. It was easy. Creation was much more difficult. The harder path. It was one of the many reasons why she’d created this place, where people of any gift or curse or history or ancestry were welcome. Where they honored one another for the things that made them different, and still stood together.

Prince saw her, and lifted a hand in greeting. It gave Cora a sudden opening, and Witch’s clever little girl took it, nailing her father in the gut with the handle of her sword.

Witch clapped a hand over her mouth to smother the laugh she gave at Prince’s expense. But her husband stifled a curse, half-laughing as he bent over, clutching his stomach. When he straightened, the grin he gave Cora was full of paternal pride. Cora was beaming.

Witch settled herself back against the fence that surrounded the exercise ring. For several long moments, she let the sunshine warm her, quieted the worry in her heart as she watched her most beloved spar, intense and playful.

She felt his presence before she heard him or saw him. Witch looked at the man who came to lean back against the fence beside her. “Carver.”

“Witch.” Carver’s smile was nearly as bright as the sun. His skin, already brown, looked bronze in the sunlight. The hair that curled around his ears was dark chestnut shot through with gold here and there. She could draw every detail of his face from memory. She knew his heart just as well. He was the best of men. The best of anyone she’d ever known. Carver would never hurt anyone.

It did not explain the lump in her throat as he tossed an arm around her shoulders. She didn’t pull away, but Carver sensed the tension in her and eased back, lowering his voice.

“Have I done something?” he asked. His tone was concerned, unhappy. Not defensive. Not confrontational.

Witch pursed her lips and shook her head after a moment. “I… killed someone today. By accident. A man that Charlie caught sneaking around the castle. He had barriers up in his mind, neither of us could get in at first. Today, I succeeded. It killed him.”

Carver frowned. “I’m sorry, love. I know it bothers you to hurt anyone.”

She considered that for a moment. “That’s not entirely true, but.” She smiled wryly. “I understand and appreciate the sentiment.” Ordinarily, she would have wanted his arm around her, comforting her. But what she’d seen inside the prisoner’s mind had been so unsettling…

Carver’s dark eyes were on her, waiting. Not pushing, never pressing.

Inwardly, Witch gave herself a shake and stepped forward into his arms. What was wrong with her? There was another explanation for what she’d seen. Had to be. She knew this man who was her father, who’d created her and given her life. Who had been there to support her and encourage her, even when it was hard. Even when she’d wanted to give up.

Carver hugged her close, his arms gentle around her shoulders. She felt his fingers stroke her hair and ducked her head to press her face into the crook of his neck. “Is there anything that I can do for you, little witchling?”

Witch felt her eyes burn. How could she suspect him of anything? How dare she? “No, Papa. I’m just shaken. This is enough.” The world was always less scary when Carver held her.

Was this how Cora felt when she crawled into bed with them?

“If you change your mind,” Carver murmured. “Let me know.”

She nodded and held tight to him. They stood like that for a few minutes. When Witch pulled away, she brushed a kiss against his cheek.

“Thank you,” she said.

Carver’s eyes sparkled. “It’s nothing, love. You know that.”

“Grandpa!”

Witch laughed and stepped back. “Uh oh.”

Carver grinned, quick and infectious, as Cora barreled into him. Witch saw where she’d simply dropped her sword, and she stifled a laugh as she watched Prince pick it up, shaking his head and looking after his daughter fondly.

“Hello, my heart,” Carver said, picking Cora up straight away. “You look stronger than the last time I saw you.”

Cora immediately lifted both arms, flexing. “I’ve been practicing with Dad.”

“I see that,” Carver said. “Have you put him in the dirt yet?”

Cora’s eyes widened. “Oh, no. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to do that.”

Prince joined them, his sword and Cora’s held carefully in his hands. “One day, precious. I’m certain it’ll happen.”

She wrinkled her nose and looked at Witch. “You think so, Mom?”

Witch smiled at her. “Whatever you believe you can do, you can. I’ve put him in the dirt before.”

“You cheat,” Prince said. But he was smiling.

“I do not,” Witch replied. “How do I cheat?”

He wiggled his fingers at her, teasing. “You and your magic, love. All your little sneaky witch tricks.”

Witch snorted. “Your skill with a blade, my magic. We all use the gifts we’re given. You’re just mad that I’ve put you on your back a half dozen times.”

Now Prince’s eyes were glittering, his mouth quirked mischievously, the scars that pulled at the right corner making him look even more impish. He grabbed for her, which she allowed, and pressed a kiss to the bridge of her nose.

“I’ve never been mad at you for that,” he teased.

Cora looked between them, brows furrowed. Then she shook her head and looked at Carver. “I don’t know what they’re talking about anymore, but I think it’s gross.”

“They’re pretty gross, aren’t they?” Carver agreed.

“Let me show you what I learned today,” Cora said, wiggling out of his arms. She fetched her sword from Prince’s grasp and grabbed Carver’s hand to drag him out into the ring.

Prince pulled Witch a little closer, against the curve of his body, where she fit perfectly. “She’s getting so good. And so big. What happened to our baby?”

“Babies grow up,” Witch said. “I love her so much.”

“Me too.” Prince smiled. He pressed another kiss to the bridge of her nose, one to the tip, and then a softer, warmer one on her mouth. “And I love you. You look tired. Are you okay?”

“Yes,” Witch said. “I am tired. That man that Charlie found is dead.”

“Oh.” Prince frowned. “What happened?”

“I’m not sure,” she said. “Finally broke his barriers down, and he died.”

“Did you find anything out? Why he was here, where he came from?”

“Some flashes, but nothing really solid.” Witch shook her head. “What a waste.”

Prince hugged her tightly. “Ah, love. I’m sorry. We’ll just have to be more vigilant.” He huffed. “If anything happened to you or Cora...”

“I know,” said Witch. “Or you.”

He smiled at her. “Or me.”

Witch cupped his face and went onto the tips of her toes to kiss him. Chastely, but she let her lips linger against his. It only took a few seconds before there was a smattering of applause and wolf whistles from the others in the ring.

Prince looked past her at the heckling group. They were all grinning, despite the little growl he let out. It was all for show, anyway. All bark and no bite, her Prince.

“Hang on, my Lady,” he said, putting her at arm’s length and picking his sword back up from where he’d leaned it against the fence. “I have some punishments to dole out.”

One of the heckling guards made a sound of protest. “We’re off duty. Sir.”

Prince gave a laugh that made them all groan. Witch chuckled, appreciating the look of his bare back as he walked away from her. She watched him put his guards through their paces, playfully, until it dissolved into a wrestling match with all of them laughing too hard to continue.

A shadow fell over her face and Witch looked up to see Leon had joined her at the fence. He was wearing his pressed slacks and shiny boots, which meant he wasn’t here to work out.

“You need something, love?” she asked.

Leon gave her his dimpled smile and tossed an arm around her. “You left in a hurry. Seemed shaken. I just wanted to check on you.”

Witch rolled her eyes. “Leon, what have I told you about trying to be everyone’s knight in shining armor?”

“That I would look like a ridiculous giant in a metal suit?”

She lifted a hand to pinch his cheek. “There’s a boy. But… I’m fine, love. Just shaken, as you said. You know I don’t like the way things ended.”

“I know.” He nodded. “Charlie seemed to think it ended up for the best.”

“Of course he did.” Witch sighed. “What am I going to do with him?”

“Hopefully keep him around,” Leon said brightly. “I’m rather fond.”

“Me too.” They shared a smile.

“But,” Leon added, looking a touch sheepish, “with all due respect, my Lady? I don’t believe you. You were pale before you even realized he was dead.” When she lapsed into silence and only looked away, Leon squeezed his arm around her shoulders. “What did you see, Witch?”

Witch felt that chill creeping back into her chest, despite the sun overhead and Leon’s warmth next to her. “Carver’s face.”

Leon froze. “What?” He glanced out into the ring, watching Cora dance circles around Carver with her newly-learned footwork. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“No, it doesn’t. It’s just not possible.” Witch swallowed. “So the question really is, why would that man have had Carver’s face in his mind?”

“They could have met one another,” Leon offered. “In some other, casual, not-plotting-against-you way?”

“Yeah,” Witch agreed. “Probably.”