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pickledpascal · 1 month ago

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Nobody's Soldier

Pairing: Oldman!Logan x Native American OC!Maya Imik

Warnings: CANONICAL DEATH, depressing, whump, blood.

A/N: like i said,,,, i watched logan (2017) so this came out of that. if you know what avatar the last airbender is, maya is basically a waterbender with bloodbending abilities

Word Count: 1.1k

Hugh Jackman Masterlist

Being with Logan was the best thing to have ever happened to Maya. He came into her life at just the right time and helped her to feel more and more human. She only hoped to do the same with him. To make him feel loved and cared for and all things human that he forgot about years ago.

She thought she had all the time in the world to give that to him. Enough time to devote her entire life to him, give him memories that would hurt but would twist his heart with that familiar feeling he had when she was around. Give him hope. Love was everywhere. It could come from anyone. She knew her time on Earth was limited, even with her advanced healing, it was nothing compared to Logan’s. He would be there, no matter what. No one might know him as Wolverine in the future, but he’d be there

The problem was that he was dying. He was aging. His time was limited, now. Not hers.

His hair started to grey entirely rather than just at his temples and his wrinkles deepened and… he couldn’t heal as well as he used to. He had scars now, callouses on his knuckles, and he bled every single time he used his claws. Fuck, he had a goddamn limp.

Maya was scared she’d outlive the one person she thought—she knew—would live forever. She knew he was trying to put on a brave face every time he went to bed with her, trying to ease her worries, but there wasn’t anything he could say or do to take her mind off the truth.

His time was coming soon.

The years they spent together didn’t feel like they were enough. They could never feel like it was enough. So Maya cherished every damn moment like it was the last. Every laugh, every smile, every crinkle of his eyes, every kiss, every touch, every ‘I love you’ he said; which slowly became sparser.

He was tired. It was plain to see. Tired of life and the poison in his body that was slowly killing him which Maya couldn’t heal. There was no healing adamantium poisoning. There was just the slow but imminent inching towards the light.

Which meant there was a hard conversation that needed to be had.

“Maya, honey?” Logan grabbed her attention away from the book she was reading. He sat next to her at the table, facing her. “I need you to do something when I–”

“Logan.” Maya put her book down and gave him a glare. It was full of a different kind of heat. Sadness. She looked away from him.

Logan grabbed her chin roughly, “No, look at me. Listen to me,” He pleaded. Reluctantly, Maya captured his gaze with unshed tears on her waterline. “I’m going to go. You know that. I know that. When I do… You gotta do it. You have to stop my heart,” Her lip trembled as she drew in a sharp breath. “I wanna feel it, wanna feel you one last time. Please.” He was desperate.

Desperate for his lover to be the one who gives him the final blow. Desperate to feel her hands squeezing the life out of his heart. What a heavenly way to die, huh? But he wasn’t going to Heaven. No, he was going to be returned to the cold, dark Earth like he was supposed to.

Maya was cold. He liked the cold.

“I can’t—” She tried to keep in her tears.

Logan cupped her face. “Yes, you can. You will. I need you to.” He whispered, pressing a kiss to her cheek as the tears finally slipped out of her. He could taste the saltiness of them and secretly savored it.

Maya sobbed, pulling him into a tight hug. She wrapped her arms around him like a vice and pushed her face into his shoulder. “I’ll miss you.”

He cupped the back of her head and gently petted her hair, trying to soothe her. “I know, I know.” He pressed a kiss to the side of her head. “I’ll miss you too, honey. More than anything.”

She knew what that meant and it only made her cry harder. There was never an ‘I’ll love you till the day that I die,’ no. I’ll love you even after I die. I love you so much that you’ll feel it in your ribs after I go. I love you so much that anytime you enjoy simply existing, you should know that I’m right there with you. I love you so much that you should know the hardest part will be leaving you.

When Laura came along, Maya was skeptical, as was Logan. However, Maya warmed up to the little girl a lot faster than he did.

She never thought of herself as becoming a mother. She couldn’t have kids, especially not with Logan and she didn’t have a deep want to ever have children of her own anyway. Laura brought it out of her. She just wanted to make sure she was alright and quite literally stepped in front of a few bullets for her.

The younger Wolverine didn’t need to feel all the pain her father did.

When this journey started, Maya hadn’t expected Logan to die, but maybe that was because of the naivety of the twelve-year-old girl still trapped inside her.

She breathed in shakily when she sunk to her knees next to Logan. Laura was on the other side of him. The wooden roots were protruding out of his chest. No, there was no healing from this. Not anymore.

Logan took both of their hands, gripping them as tightly as he could. He looked at Laura, eyes beginning to glaze over. “Take your friends… Go. They’ll just keep coming and coming.” He held Laura a little tighter. “Don’t be what they made you.” He whispered.

“Daddy…” Laura cried softly.

He turned his head to Maya. She knew what that meant. “Please, Maya…” He was struggling to breathe. “I’m so tired…” His voice broke.

Maya gripped Logan’s bloody hand tightly and sniffled as tears rolled down her cheeks, dripping onto his skin. She put her other hand over his heart and curled her fingers. She could feel his heartbeat slow.

“So this is what it feels like…” Logan stared up at the sky, a flicker of wonder in his eyes.

She could feel his heartbeat stop.

She cried silently, nuzzling her face into his neck as if it were any other night. Her body shook with each inhale and exhale she took. She hadn’t loved him for long, only five years, but she loved him with all her heart. It wasn’t nearly enough.

Laura set a hand over Maya’s. She leaned over Logan’s body and held onto her. She needed her mother. And Maya needed a reason to keep going.

All this time spent fighting in other people’s wars… He wasn’t anyone's soldier now.

#oc #native american oc #ocs #logan howlett x oc #logan howlett xmen #logan howlett x reader #logan wolverine #logan howlett #hugh jackman wolverine #wolverine #deadpool and wolverine #hugh jackman #logan 2017 #old man logan #laura kinney #transgender #canon bisexual logan #bisexual

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aftermathfanfic · 8 months ago

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Part 4, Chapter 1

Uncle Scrooge stood in front of him, one hand on his cane. His hat was resting on a nearby countertop, and he wore a strange, guilty expression.

“I’m sorry, Louie.” He told him quietly. “I should’ve been there.”

“Mm-hm.” Louie grunted noncommittedly.

~~~

Three Years Ago

Louie sat silently in the armchair, his gaze levelled at a cup of water he was clutching in his hands. The only sound in the room was the ticking of the wall-mounted clock and the scribbling of pen against paper, a few feet in front of him.

“…Can you tell me what triggered your panic attack?” Asked Dr. Lake, his voice calm and measured.

“…Yeah.” Louie murmured. He took his hands out of his pockets, laying them on his legs as he talked. “Um… so, I was at my uncle’s Money Bin. Apparently, some thieves had broken in, tried to steal stuff… the Beagle Boys, apparently. No idea how they got in. Me and my brothers went over when we heard about it… not that we needed to, it was all wrapped up by the time we got there. We saw the police were taking some of them away, and they were searching them… fishing gold out of their pockets and everything.

“I came over, saw this, like… gold ingot that had fallen on the floor. And I…” Louie swallowed, forcing himself to continue. “…I saw my reflection in it. Like I’d seen in the… in the dagger.” Louie took a moment, then finished, “And I just… same thing that happened with my golden khopesh. I just… froze up, couldn’t breathe right… it felt like I was back in that room, like…”

“Like you couldn’t escape?” Lake suggested.

“…Yeah.”

Louie fell silent. He heard the doctor scribble something else down.

“…And what did your family do, when you had your attack?” Dr. Lake asked.

Louie shrugged. “Took me home. Huey calmed me down, he’s, uh… really good at doing that. And I just watched TV for the rest of the day.”

Louie looked into the cup, his tired reflection staring back at him.

“…I used to really like gold.” He murmured.

“Did you like it because it was valuable, or for what it represented?”

“Both. Kinda. Having gold meant that you were rich.”

“And what does it mean to you now?”

Louie shrugged again. “I don’t know.” He mumbled.

The therapist was quiet for a moment. Louie looked up at the older drake, swaddled in an old grey turtleneck. He put his notepad down, then asked, “These panic attacks, they occur whenever something happens that reminds you of that… ‘adventure’, yes?”

“Yeah.” Louie nodded. “That’s why we don’t go on adventures anymore.”

“And the nightmares… do they occur in response to similar stimulus?”

Louie shook his head. “No, the nightmares just happen whenever. There’s no… rhyme or reason to them.”

“I see… and do you tell your family about the nightmares?”

“No… but they know.”

“And they take care of you when you have your panic attacks? You mentioned that your brother Huey is good at calming you down.”

“Yeah, yeah. They take care of me.”

Dr. Lake wrote down another note. “…Let’s go back to your last ‘adventure’, where this all started. Are you comfortable if we do that?”

“…Yeah.”

“In one of our previous sessions, you mentioned how the incident started off as a ‘routine adventure’.” The doctor recalled, flipping through his notes. “Could you remind me… what constitutes as a ‘routine’ adventure?”

“Uh… ancient ruins, deathtraps, treasure that’s either cursed or protected by another, scarier deathtrap…” Louie explained. “You know, like those Ford Windfall movies.”

“And you’ve always felt safe on those trips?”

“…Yeah? Like, it- it’s dangerous, but Uncle Scrooge always has our back.”

“You feel as if your uncle protects you?”

“…Why wouldn’t I?” Louie asked, confused.

“He doesn’t force you to go on these trips? You have the choice of staying behind?”

“Of course I- What do you mean? What is this?” Louie demanded.

“Calm down.” Lake said steadily. “I’m not trying to be accusatory. I’m just trying to get a better understanding of your… situation.”

“Really? ‘Cause it sounds like you’re saying that- that it’s my family’s fault that- that I’m like this!” Louie accused him.

Dr. Lake didn’t say anything, his face pensive. He leant forward in his chair, his hands clasped. “Louie… if I could speak frankly…” He said slowly. “Your family has a very unique lifestyle.”

“Yeah, we’re adventurers.” Louie retorted.

“I know that. But please, try to understand… there are very few children who live a lifestyle like yours. And those children are typically… quite troubled.”

Louie didn’t say anything.

“There are many people who would say that your circumstances aren’t healthy for a growing mind.” Lake continued. “And if your uncle didn’t have the reputation that he has… well, it’d be seen as a case of neglect, or abuse, even. I-”

“Abuse?” Louie spluttered. “You think my family’s- what the hell do you know about my family?”

“I’m saying this is how your circumstances can be perceived. These aren’t my views, and I don’t personally believe this to be a case of abuse. But I do think that your family might have had a role to play, however unwittingly, in your trauma. All I want is to get to…”

Louie stopped listening. He couldn’t hear him. He felt his breathing quickening, his heart racing, the doctor’s words flying back and forth in his head. The cup shook in his hands, there was a ringing in his ears, and-

~~~

He was in a doctor’s clinic.

He was sitting on a bare white bed, a bloodied bandage wrapped around his midsection. His hands were in his lap, and he felt exhausted.

Uncle Scrooge stood in front of him, one hand on his cane. His hat was resting on a nearby countertop, and he wore a strange, guilty expression.

“I’m sorry, Louie.” He told him quietly. “I should’ve been there.”

“Mm-hm.” Louie grunted noncommittedly.

Both Louie and June had been whisked away to the village doctor’s clinic the moment the family had escaped from Castelo de Cristo. Both of their injuries were flesh wounds, though June had lost a lot more blood than Louie had. It took a while for her to wake up, and neither Donald, May nor Webby left her side until she did. When Louie saw her, she was sporting bandages around her head that held a thick gauze to her wound.

Louie’s complication was the poison – the bulezau’s barbed tail had delivered a potent venom into his system. It was a small dose, thankfully, but it was still enough to warrant an overnight stay at the clinic.

Scrooge was talking again. Louie wasn’t listening. He just nodded dumbly and said, ‘Okay’ whenever the talking stopped. Eventually, Scrooge left the room, leaving Dewey as the only other person in the room, sitting in a nearby chair. Louie didn’t look at him. He just looked at the ground, his hands in his lap, and the tortured expression of the murdered girl burned into his retinas. He remained in that state for the rest of the day. It still hurt to move, and he needed to lean on Dewey to walk, so all he could do was sit on the bed and wait.

They were back on the plane in what felt like no time at all, and the flight felt like it only took an hour. Louie kept his distance from the others, sitting up on the upper level buried in his hoodie. He didn’t speak for the whole trip, not even when they landed back at the mansion. Huey and Della immediately rushed to his side, helping him walk back into the house and worrying ceaselessly over him, and Louie saw the other adults rushing out of the house as well.

Louie didn’t think he’d ever seen Daisy so terrified. She ran up to June immediately, hugging her tightly and apologizing profusely over and over again. June didn’t look like she knew how to react at all. She just lent dumbly into her foster mother’s embrace, allowing herself to be led back into the house with Donald and May in tow.

Webby followed them with Mrs. Beakley beside her. Neither she nor Louie spared a glance at each other.

Louie was taken to his bedroom by his mom, with both his brothers in tow. He had to move slow, every step causing a dull pain in his stomach. He was sat down gently on his bed, Della kneeling before him. “Hey,” she said softly. “How are you feeling?”

Louie grunted weakly, holding his wound.

“Do you want a can of Pep?”

“…Yeah.”

“Coming right up.” She stood back up, looking at all three of them. “You don’t have to worry about going to school tomorrow. We’ve told them what’s… well, we’ve given them a sanitised version of the story. You’ve all been through enough without having to angst about tests and stuff.”

Dewey frowned. “What happened to Huey?”

“…Something happened while you were away.” Della replied evasively. “But we don’t have to get into it now. What’s important is that you all recover from this, so you’ll stay at home. We’ll set up some sessions with Dr. Lake, maybe a-”

“No.” Louie interrupted.

“…Louie, you can’t-”

“You guys can do whatever you want, but I’m not seeing him.” Louie declared stubbornly.

“…Alright.” Della sighed. “You need to physically recover first, anyway. Just rest up, don’t exert yourself… if you need anything, just call me or your brothers. Okay?”

“Yep.”

Della gave him a weak smile, then left the three of them in the room.

Once she was out of earshot, Louie looked up at Huey. “Tell us what happened while we were gone.” He told him bluntly.

Huey hesitated. “…Louie, I don’t think you need to be-”

“I need to distract myself, Huey. Anything to stop me from thinking about last adventure or the pain, okay?”

“Or the stuff you said to Webby.” Dewey added, giving him a look.

“…I was kinda hoping I’d dreamt that.” Louie muttered.

“Well, you didn’t, and I feel like she deserves an apology.”

“Later. Now’s too soon.”

“What did you say to Webby?” Huey asked slowly.

“Just- tell us what happened.” Louie all but begged him. “Whatever it was, I can guarantee that it wasn’t as fucked up as what happened to us.”

“Language.” Huey chastised him.

With both of his brothers looking at him now, he sighed, reluctantly explaining, “If you must know, I got accosted at school the other day by someone from the FBI.”

“The what?” Dewey exclaimed in disbelief.

“…The Federal Bureau of Invest-”

“I meant like ‘what the hell’, dude. I know what the FBI is.” Dewey replied, annoyed.

Louie leaned forward, wincing as he did. “…What did the FBI want with you? Did they confuse you for me or something?”

“No, they- wait, why would they want to talk to you?”

“I dunno, I’m just the more suspicious one.”

“…Right. Well, what he wanted…” Huey continued, sitting on Louie’s desk chair. “And this is where it gets weird – he wanted me to talk about the Other Bin. Where we keep the dangerous stuff.”

“The…” Dewey frowned. “Isn’t that, like, top secret? I mean, we didn’t even know about it for like, two years.”

“It is. But he knew about it somehow. Or at least, he knew about some of the items we keep down there.”

“How?”

“No idea. But I did some research, and the guy who spoke to me…” Huey pulled out his phone. “His name is Agent Nickel, and – this is where it gets even weirder – he’s behind this.”

He brought up a picture of a large, dark figure being shoved into a police car, showing it to both of them. Louie narrowed his eyes at what he saw, asking cautiously, “That’s… that’s that ‘Phantom Blot’ guy, isn’t it?”

“Yep. And this…” Huey swiped through his gallery. “…is Steelbeak, being brought in by the Arizona police. And this is Rockerduck,” He added, swiping to the next picture. “Also getting arrested. And this one- well, we didn’t fight him, but he was one of FOWL’s administrators. All of these senior-level FOWL agents, everyone who fled from the fight at Alexandria, almost all of them are in prison now – and this Agent Nickel guy was behind all of those arrests.”

“Holy crap…” Dewey murmured.

“Lang-”

“This guy brought down FOWL! I mean, we defeated them first, but he- wait, shouldn’t this mean that he’s on our side?” Dewey questioned confusedly. “He obviously knows FOWL were the bad guys, why’s he after us?”

“I don’t know.” Huey admitted, putting his phone away. “It doesn't make sense.”

“Maybe he’s covering his tracks?” Louie suggested. “Like…” He winced as he shifted his position, “…there’s no way that this guy just happened to know exactly where all of these FOWL guys were hiding out. That’s something you can only learn from the inside.”

“You mean Nickel’s ex-FOWL?” Huey frowned. “That explains the arrests, but what does he have to gain by going after Uncle Scrooge?”

Louie shrugged. “Dunno.”

He felt his phone ping in his hoodie pocket. He frowned, pulling it out and looking at it.

It was from Doofus Drake.

“So, what happens now?” Dewey asked. “Like, we can’t go on another adventure if we’re being watched by the government, right?”

“I don’t think we’d be going on another adventure regardless.” Huey replied flatly. “Not after what happened on this one.”

Louie put his phone away, trying not to betray the surge of panic he’d gotten. “Yeah, nah, dude. This adventure was a disaster.”

The door opened again, and Della stepped in with a cool glass of Pep in her hand. “Hey, dudes.” She handed the glass over to Louie. “Here you go.”

“Thanks, mom.” Louie murmured, taking the glass and taking a long sip of it. After a moment, he asked quietly, “Could I be, like, left alone for a bit?”

“You sure? You don’t want to talk about-”

“No.” Louie replied brusquely. Hesitating, he added less harshly, “Not… yet. I just… need to be alone.”

Della shared a concerned look with her other two sons, then replied, “…Alright. If you need anything, just shoot a text to me or your brothers, ‘kay?”

“Yeah.”

Della hesitated, then added, “…You don’t have to see the doctor if you don’t want to. But you should still talk to someone about stuff like this. Trust me, if you just let it stew…”

“Yeah, I know.”

Reluctantly, they left his room, leaving Louie alone. He waited a few moments after they left, listening to their footsteps disappear down the corridor, then he pulled his phone out again, checking Doofus’s message.

I see you’ve returned, it read. Bring my present to where we last met. Sooner rather than later.

“God… fuck.” Louie swore under his breath. He stood up, wincing at the pain, and trudged to his door. He opened it, looking down both directions of the corridor, just in case either of his brothers were secretly listening. Seeing nobody, he shut his door and hobbled back to his bed, dialling the number that the text had come from.

Only a few seconds later, there was an answer from the other end. “Llewellyn.” Doofus greeted him boredly.

“Hey, Doofus, buddy!” Louie replied, trying to sound confident. “Hey, look, I’m gonna just say it and save us both a car trip – I don’t have a treasure for you.”

“…Is that so?” Doofus replied disinterestedly.

“Yeah, I know. I know how it looks, but the thing is-” Louie bit back a hiss of pain as he sat down on the bed. “…my uncle had been duped. There wasn’t any treasure for me to grab, so- so you can’t exactly blame me for not-”

“I thought I was clear, Llewellyn.” Doofus interrupted him. “Bring me my trinkets, or your school finds something… unpleasant in your locker.”

“I know, but there- there were no trinkets to nab.” Louie chuckled nervously. “You gotta understand that!”

“I believe I mentioned, last we spoke, about perusing your uncle’s collection?”

“That’s not an alternative. He’ll know, man.”

“We both know that’s not my problem.”

“Look, just- be reasonable.” Louie groaned. Thinking quickly, he told him, “My family goes adventuring every weekend, right? Why can’t I just get you something on our next adventure?”

“And give you and Chanda time to ruin me?”

Louie froze. He heard Doofus chuckle and remark, “Yes… I know you two are plotting against me. Really, Llewellyn? Trying to wriggle out the moment you’re out of earshot?”

Louie took a few moments to compose his answer, replying carefully, “…Guys like us don’t like being blackmailed, Doof. I feel like you’d do something similar in my position.”

“Hm.” Doofus sounded amused.

Louie sighed, continuing, “Look, your blackmail isn’t going to work anyway. I don’t know if you caught on from how awful my voice sounds right now, but I’m not going into school this week. And if a bag of weed just magically shows up in my locker when I’m not even there, I can refute that easily, can’t I?”

When Doofus didn’t respond, Louie insisted, “You have to give me a week.”

“…Hm.” Doofus didn’t sound so amused this time.

After a moment, he said coldly, “Next Sunday. I want something by then.”

“I can get you something by Sunday.” Louie lied.

“And I expect it to be gift-wrapped.” Doofus added before hanging up.

“Of course, yeah.” Louie chuckled to himself in the brief moments before his smile vanished. “Fuck you. Fuck you all the way to Hell.”

He slowly laid down on his bed, throwing his phone to the side and staring hopelessly up at the ceiling. He already knew he was going to have a bad week.

~~~

Bentina handed Webby a glass of water. “Here. This will help.”

“…Thanks.” Webby mumbled, taking the glass and taking a sip.

They were in Webby’s room, on the library floor. Webby was sitting on the stairs leading up to her proper bedroom, with Bentina kneeling before her. She had a hand on her granddaughter’s shoulder, looking sympathetically into her eyes.

“…Do you need anything else?” Bentina asked.

Webby shook her head, taking another sip of water. “No.”

Bentina was quiet for a moment, before saying softly, “Those men… they were trying to kill you.”

“I know.”

“If it hadn’t been for whoever saved you, you would be in a much worse place. You know that?”

Webby frowned, looking up at her. “Are… you trying to make me feel better about it?”

“I’m trying to make you understand that it couldn’t have gone any other way.” Bentina told her. When Webby didn’t respond, Bentina insisted, “It had to be done.”

“…I don’t like that idea.” Webby murmured.

That’s because you’re young, Bentina thought to herself. But she said nothing, only looked at her granddaughter sadly.

“…I’ll get you something sweeter.” She decided, standing up. “Apple juice?”

“…Yes, please.”

Bentina left the room, leaving the door open behind her. She made her way to the kitchen, where she found Donald, Daisy, and Scrooge having a hushed conversation. They stopped as she entered, though it didn’t escape Bentina’s notice that their words had a somewhat heated edge.

“…How’s Webby?” Daisy asked anxiously.

“It’ll take a while. But she’ll be fine.” Bentina replied. “May and June?”

“…May’s alright.” Daisy answered her, worry painted across her face. “But June… she’s barely said a word since she got back. It’s like she’s catatonic.”

“She’s had a head wound. She’ll recover in time.”

She walked over to the fridge, opening it and pulling out a bottle of juice.

“You can stop blaming yourselves, by the way.” Bentina added over her shoulder.

“It was our adventure.” Donald lamented, shaking his head.

“We sent them there, Bentina.” Daisy insisted. “June and Louie got hurt – seriously hurt – because we didn’t see this coming.”

“How would you have seen this coming?” Bentina questioned simply, walking over and putting the bottle on the table. “Our research gave no indication that anyone had lived in those ruins for centuries. And the only hint we would have had of them was a single missing person report. There was no way you could have known.”

“Goldie did.” Scrooge spoke up miserably. “She up and told me to my face. I didn’t listen.”

Bentina frowned. She opened up one of the cupboards, replying, “Well, you’ve made worse lapses in judgement.”

Scrooge gave her an angry glare. “A lass died, Bentina. Barely older than the kids.”

“And sitting here, feeling sorry for ourselves, will not bring her back or make the children feel any better.” Bentina said dryly. She put down the glass for Webby, inquiring, “You contacted the Portuguese authorities, yes? You told them what happened?”

“…I gave them a truncated version of it, aye.”

“And her family has her body?”

“Aye.”

“Then that is all that we can do.” Bentina told them simply, pouring the glass.

The kitchen door opened again. Della walked in, looking just as tired as the rest of them. “Hey.” She murmured. The others greeted her back.

“How are the boys?” Donald quacked concernedly.

“…Dewey’s handling it pretty well.” Della sighed, heading over to the fridge and reaching towards the top. “That boy’s unshakeable. But Louie…”

She took down a bottle of Irish whisky, admitting, “…He’s not gonna be okay for a while. He’s been doing so well, opening up to us and everything, but after this… I wouldn’t be surprised if he starts pushing us away again.” She laid out a number of glasses on the table, asking, “Anyone want some?”

They all nodded, save Bentina. Della poured the four drinkers a shot each, then promptly drank hers in one gulp. Everyone else took a sip of their glass.

“God, those poor fuckin’ parents.” Della muttered, pouring herself another shot. “Can’t imagine what they’re going through right now.”

“If it hadn’t been for that gunman, we’d be going through it too.” Donald mumbled.

“God… the idea of losing one of them makes me wanna puke.” Della winced. Holding up her glass, she asked frustratedly. “And we have no idea who that guy was? Not even a hint?”

“Nope.”

“Great.” Della muttered, downing her drink. “One more mystery to deal with.”

Donald nodded. Then, he frowned, looking up at her. “…One more?”

“Huey got accosted by someone at school.” Daisy muttered, her drink untouched. “From the FBI, apparently, talking about-”

Scrooge suddenly bent over in a coughing fit, slamming his half-finished drink on the table. He waved them away as they came to try and support him, thumping his chest as he cleared out his throat. When it was over, he looked back up at his family in shock and anger.

“…What?” He hissed.

#ducktales aftermath #ducktales #ducktales 2017 #fanfiction #scrooge mcduck #louie duck #dewey duck #huey duck #webby vanderquack #donald duck #daisy duck #della duck #bentina beakley

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foxes-that-run · 1 year ago

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2021 Haylor Timeline

Timeline Tag, or years 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024.

2 January - Harry at Jeffs wedding with OW. Holding hands at wedding photos - the Paparazzi Clint and his partner follow Olivia to a hotel in Santa Barbara. He later does an hour long podcast on following them and explains he then realised Harry was there and takes photos. After a few phone calls, the two photographers discover rumors of a romantic relationship between Harry and Olivia. 10 minutes later, photographed them together. in Nanny tell all Nanny said Olivia was still texting Jason to say she loved him, that Olivia was pretending to not have service. Nanny found out she was at the wedding online.

3 January - walking with OW in Santa Barbara

4 January - Harry hike in LA

15 January - Ted Lasso Season 2 starts filming London, in Nanny Tell all nanny said that Ted confronted her on the plane there about her telling Olivia that Jason had been crying and not coping. Jason then offered the Nanny a life coach to get info out of her and they were attending therapy with the Nanny.

18 January - Coney Island released as a single.

14 February Olivia at Harry’s LA house with luggage. Don't worry Darling filming wraps. On the 21st Taylor Lover tour cancelled.

16 February - E News Harry and OW fly to London together. DWD wraps, Harry OW cast photo

20 February - OW near Jason Sudeikis /her kids London house

6 March - Oliva posts photo of Branston Beans from Harry's Kitchen, the curtains can be seen. Lockdown laws mean she should not have been able to travel there and was bragging about it and posting inside his house.

10 March Instead of congratulating Harry on the nomination Zayn posted “F the Grammys”

youtube

15 March -Talk at the Grammys, Taylor and Harry part of small group of attendees. Harry goes over to Taylor and they are polite, Harry seems a little awkward and says “well it was nice to see you”. He keeps looking at her during his acceptance speech for record of the year.

Taylor wrote High Infidelity and WCS with Aaron Dessner while in LA for the Grammy's, when she saw Harry & J Mayer.

Niall and Liam congratulate Harry on his Grammy win, Zayn and Louis do not.

31 March - architect of Harry’s Erskine House renovations posts photos of the interior to their website. It has a black, wood pale grey palette with pink stairs

13, -25 April - OW with Harry london

April 27 - Joe leaves UK to Belfast to film.

May 11 - HS & TS both at Brit awards (the 26th was a blood moon)

May - Harry’s bassist since HS1, Adam Pendergast, leaves love band (date from his LinkedIn)

20 May - Harry and Olivia dinner at Refuel Bar & Restaurant at The Soho Hotel. ET Rumours Joe and Taylor engaged.

15 June - Harry seen with fans wearing Apollo eleven tshirt

21 June - Harry wrapped My Policeman in Italy, started in Feb. Released 1 September 2022. Holiday in Italy

2 July - renegade released

3 July - Harry at England v Ukraine game Italy

8 July - Harry and Olivia on yacht and in Italy

26 July - Charlotte Clarke (Harry’s backup singer) said she was let go and doesn’t understand why. won’t be on HSLOT

28 July - Taylor posts for folklore' anniversary, "It’s been one year since we escaped the real world together and imagined ourselves someplace simpler." with a photo from Donegal Ireland. Heavily TTPD coded with Victorian gown, like the Betty speech’s on eras tour and lakes (poets), two coffee cups too, was it already a double album?! Coffee also as in the end of the Karma MV. Joe posted photos from the same trip on July 22nd

9 August - 26 August Harry in studio maybe mixing Harry's House in the behind scenes photos here you can see outfits he wore in LA on these dates.

4 September – 22 July 2023 - Love on Tour, Harry has a new bassist Elin Sandberg

7 September - Taylor in Belfast visiting Joe. Red TV entirely recorded at Kitty Committee Belfast UK (her home)

9 September - Taylor at Toronto Film Festival and to premiere all too well

11 September - Harry at Toronto Film Festival to premiere My policeman, talks about wasted time being the worst thing in presser

17 September - wildest dreams TV released, TikTok about recording Red TV and a glitch. Harry and Olivia in Phili with Xander, max and family

May 11 - HS & TS both at Brit awards (the 26th was a blood moon)

May - Harry’s bassist since HS1, Adam Pendergast, leaves love band (date from his LinkedIn)

May 24 - Joe and Taylor together in Paris

3 June - Harry OW her parents London

21 June - Harry wrapped My Policeman in Italy, started in Feb. Released 1 September 2022.

30 June - H Holiday in Italy

2 July - renegade released

8 July - Harry and Olivia on yacht and in Italy

13 July - Jason sudokis GQ that he still doesn’t know why they broke up and it ended in November 2020. Harry mentioned.

14 July - HSLOT announced for September

26 July - Charlotte Clarke (Harry’s backup singer) said she was let go and doesn’t understand why. won’t be on HSLOT

7 August - OW and Harry had guests at house, Harry has moustache and greets someone.

9 August - 26 August Harry LA in studio maybe mixing Harry's House in the behind scenes photos here you can see outfits he wore in LA on these dates. Walking with Olivia 19 August

31 August - Taylor and Joe hiking Franklin Canyon

4 September – 22 July 2023 - Love on Tour, Harry has a new bassist Elin Sandberg. OW at first show.

7 September - Taylor in Belfast visiting Joe. Red TV entirely recorded at Kitty Committee Belfast UK (her home)

9 September - Taylor at Toronto Film Festival and to premiere all too well

10 September - Harry golfing in Dallas

11 September - Harry at Toronto Film Festival to premiere My policeman, talks about wasted time being the worst thing in presser

17 September - wildest dreams TV released, TikTok about recording Red TV and a glitch. Harry and Olivia in Phili with Xander, max and family

18 September - Harry seen with Olivia near her parents in DC before show there

22 September - first heart kiss since 2018! St Paul - Falling, with Two Ghosts intro (4:31). Then again weekly till the end of the year

25 September - Taylor London Lena's wedding.

youtube

29 September - & 1 Oct Harry played Nashville and wore a white satin outfit, he played with his rings while performing Beautiful. Harry plays To Be so Lonely for 9 shows then never again, including Nashville N2 and NY. In Nashville looks up. OW at shows

3 October - OW parents at HSLOT but she is in LA.

9 October - Harry in Florida dinner

13 October - fan sends to DM that they saw Harry, no OW at Pittsburgh cathedral of learning with “more police and security than I knew existed” wouldn’t have recognised him if it wasn’t for them.

16 October - Harry wore “all things must pass” hoodie NYC OW walked awkwardly holding him. One security person.

22 October - one more photo of Taylor and joe in the bathroom leaked (the proper selfie), photos from 2016 leaked in 2020

25 October - Harry seems to be in a bad mood when he first goes on stage in Boston, also wearing no rings. Heart kiss in Falling, OW there and not seen with him until harryween in a week.

26 October - Taylor posts TikTok "Autumn Lovers RISE" as a reenactment of a 27 September 2017 Tumblr post. She writes lyrics to ATW "just between us did the love affair maim you" "and Plaid stuff and ankle boots" she's wearing a skirt but says 'stuff' plaid shirts and ankle Chelsea boots is Harry in 2011-2013. And "Maroon/Hunter Green" The ATW move included a book coming out 13 years later about the love affair.

30 October - Harry dressed as Dorothy at harryween MSG NY, Olivia as Dolly Parton posted photos with exercise bike and boobs. Olivia left for LA.

31 October - Moon Harryween Harry played MEDICINE!! For the first time since 2018

1 November - rumors Harry and OW fighting

10 November - heart kiss in falling. Tumblr anon said about OW “I was working at the venue in Sacramento when he played during LOT. Her backstage privileges were revoked after the show prior to that...which was..I think...Portland. Our backstage security was instructed to not allow her backstage under any circumstances. She didn't even arrive to the venue with him. From what I understood from Sacramento through the end of that tour her security access was no more than say..contest winners..radio personalities etc. I was shocked at the time that they lasted another year since there was clearly trouble in paradise.”

11 November - Harry has a bruise on his back I. Love on tour backstage photo

12 November - Red TV released Harry wears red in his show on the 11th. All Too Well Short Film premiere Dylan O'Brien (who is in ATW film) is included in this footage of Austin and Dylan cheering when Jack plays Question..? in the Studio. Appears on Fallon and says she easter eggs 3 years in advance in reference to ATW.

16 November - Pleasing launch with Harry on bike photo on cover of Dazed

17 November – Taylor leaves NYC for Panama to go see Joe. Taylor posts a drunk TikTok from Panama. On the 20th she went to the national theater and leaves on the 22nd. Joe stays and films. Midnights written while gone

21 November - Last time Taylor is photographed in public for 3 months is the SNL performance for All too Well

25 November Rolling Stone noted the Haylor call and response “the long-running songwriting badminton between her and Harry Allegedly is pop call-and-response the way it ought to be”

28 November- 13 December Harry MIA. after his shows. OW seen alone in LA

1 December Taylor wore Gucci lion ring to Zoe’s kravitz birthday throwback photo shared day after YLM date identified by Jack.

5 December - You're losing me written. Love on Tour in Buenos Aires

28 December - Harry and OW Italy. Fans post they saw them Hampstead NYE, no photos.

Continue to 2022

#haylor #Youtube #haylor timeline #2021

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lunaryrs · 3 months ago

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hey i need to know what cars austin hanna's children canonically drive. thank's.

yayyyyy i love assigning cars to muses ^_^ i'm not as good at these sort of lists as u but i'm gonna try hard and really believe in myself and you're gonna smile and nod at all of it because what;s the alternative? to challenge me and look like a total bitch? exactly.

cora i want to say drives something like a 2017 kia forte, in the dark reddish maroon color. she bought it second hand after crashing her former and first car, an older pontiac sunfire. it was also secondhand and shitty, but she insisted on saving and spending all on her own. she could've had something better, but unfortunately has a brain disease that makes her repel her loving and helpful parents.

ezra strikes me as a station wagon guy. i think he could have wanted to make it happen on his own, in which case i see him in something like a 2000s subaru outback in the green color. austin clapped him on the shoulder for that one. if you see him in something more modern, i'm thinking a white 2019 tiguan.

zoe is a jeep renegade girlie, in graphite grey (i think? i toyed with black and white and the blue color). i'm thinking something more generic like the grey because she's for sure leasing it on her teacher's salary. maybe leasing to buy, but definitely leasing. she's the sort of girl that has decorative coasters in her cup holders and some macrame something orother hanging from her rearview. she's got a sparkly bath and body works fragrance holder on her driver's side visor and she's always got a fresh warm vanilla sugar insert on deck

maisyn drives a 2009 ford focus, in the blue/grey sort of color. there's a taco bell 5-layer burrito stain on the upholstery, right where she dropped in between her legs eating one-handed on the road. she's got a fat stack of CDs that are always spilling out of her center console, the cases of many having cracks in the plastic for being stepped on in her passenger seat. when people get in her car, she has to get out and remove the canvas totes and birkenstocks tossed into and never removed from her back seat along with the week-old dunkin' bag she was using to collect trash like napkins and straw rappers. she does this outside of people's houses, btw. doesn't prepare in advance.

ayla drives a mercedes gle coupe, in maybe a white or a red depending on how bougie we see her. this is all based off of you saying she appreciates the name brand and sensuality of a dove bar. we've never discussed her but i love your characterization. she's the kim kardashian of this family; she's hot and she's got main character syndrome. you know she feels hot as hell driving around in her little black slit sunglasses. she's got an off-white flower hair clip clapsed to her passenger side mirror, whole car smells like expensive perfume and her marc jacobs tote bag is perpetually riding shotgun. she uses apple carplay to stream music and be alerted to new text messages, which she replies to by manually texting and driving. fortunately, she's got decently quick reflexes (years of practice?) so she hasn't yet rear-ended anyone doing so, but she's definitely had a few close calls.

rylan oh you know he drives a hybrid of some sort (again based on waht you said about him and ice cream) and won't let anyone forget it. maybe a 2017-ish toyota prius prime. austin went with him to help pick it out; talked a big game about helping him navigate the dealership, but ultimately ended up folding to an outrageous offer too soon. fortunately, rylan walked in there with a plan and was able to negotiate for himself. austin was so proud, and when he recounted the story to camryn later, he claimed it was his plan all along to see how the kid did for himself.

orla is a only a baby, so jot that down. maybe she's a late bloomer or maybe she's failing to launch, but i do think she's indulged by camryn and austin a little. they're adamant they're not enabling her, because she has had stuff going on and benefits from the healthy, cozy environment in the hanna home. she doesn't have a car of her own, but borrows her parents' when she needs to get around. she's scratched up the honda pilot in the past, so her privileges have officially been revoked per austin. i think they're a two-car household and i could see camryn with something cute and sleek like maybe a black mazda 3, especially as the kids are older and she needs to transport less. that one is much easier for orla to navigate in.

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sociopath-analysis · 2 years ago

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Sociopath Profile: the High Priestess

From the 2017 fifth season of Samurai Jack Voiced by Grey Delisle

You all are looking at one of the darkest characters in the entire show. Even Aku, a being made of evil, isn’t as terrifying as her. And even he’s surprised at the lengths she’s willing to go. The High Priestess is one of the main villains of season five and she is largely responsible for the dark tone shift in the show. And even worse, she’s only human. (Well, possibly.)

[SPOILERS BELOW]

Let’s just start with the fact that she’s the leader of a cult that worships a literal embodiment of evil. She is willing to do anything for Aku and will openly advocate for the destruction of anything good in the world. The members of her cult, her own daughters, are put through nightmarish training that could end up getting them killed and treats it like the most normal thing in the world. She shows no concern for her daughters and abuses them both physically and mentally in order to make them take out Jack.

And she’s not exactly cruel so much as cold and emotionless. Her voice never really has much noticeable emotion when she does terrible things. And she doesn’t abuse her daughters to be sadistic. Not that it makes it any better. All the cruelty she gave them during their training had a purpose. Not a good purpose, but it wasn’t for entertainment. And the most she feels towards the daughters that get left behind to die is a sense of disappointment since they were not strong enough to be worthy fighters for Aku.

This helps the Priestess come off as more refined and cultured even when abusing her daughters. Superficial charm is something that she would need in order to properly brainwash her daughters. She can talk gently to one of them before doing something awful. A good example is when she catches Ashi looking out the window and tells her many motherly things about protecting her from Jack and the “dangers” he will bring. Immediately after, she grabs her by the throat and throws her across the room. She then beats her and berates her for losing focus. Ragyo Kiryuin may be the worst mother in anime, but the Priestess is an even worse mother than her.

Her backward philosophy of thinking that Aku of all beings is a benevolent god and that Jack is the one ruining their land borders on delusional. It seems that she thinks that chaos and evil are good things while the idea of peace is a bad thing. Not surprising considering who she worships. And it drives her to very scary extremes such as the abuse of her children and drinking a cup of Aku’s essence! Even he’s surprised by it. And her view of life is explicitly shown when she crushes a ladybug in front of her daughters. It shows how little even their lives mean to her.

She also has an over-inflated ego as well. It may not seem like this at first since she is devoutly loyal to Aku. However, she believes herself to be the most worthy and important of Aku’s followers, especially since she gave birth to his children. Aku barely remembers her. Though the fact that she’s able to drink his essence and somehow not be driven mad may justify some of that since Jack only had a drop and it drove him insane. (I guess you can’t be driven to a place when you’re already there.)

Female Sociopath List

#High Priestess #Samurai Jack #Samurai Jack Season 5 #character analysis #profile #High Priestess Samurai Jack

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nostradamus0 · 2 years ago

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little daughter, jabbing your finger at the moon

read on ao3

Ray meets his daughter somewhere between East Berlin, 1962, and Memphis in 1954. He’s never been to Memphis yet. He’ll meet Elvis there in a few days. First, he meets Ruth. And just as quickly, he forgets her.

Wait, back up. Everything’s out of order. (Time travel is confusing.)

Blackbeard, 1700s, Bahamas, Earth totem. Pirates. Kidnapped. Nora. East Berlin in the 60s. Time stones are not bulletproof. Cold fusion, torture is not the answer, torture is not the answer—the hammer hits the table. (Why does Nora keep smacking him?) I was supposed to have you home by now. Damien Darhk lets his daughter fall: his life over hers. The totem turns. There’s a hole in the Berlin wall. (Oops.)

He’s back on the Waverider. Things are not quite as he left them, but there are dishes to do, so everything else can wait. (Except Ruth, but he hasn’t quite met her yet. We’re almost there.) Now that we're up to speed and in the right order:

She appears in a swirling cloud of purple smoke. He’s in the kitchen, stirring that cup of coffee with grass-fed butter, dishes eagerly awaiting him in the sink, and a few of his teammates are scattered around the room in the aftermath of lunch. Ava’s at the table, attempting to fill out a mission report with Sara and Nate on either side of her, tossing almonds at each other to catch in their mouths. Sara hasn’t missed a single one; Nate hasn’t caught any. Zari’s lounged sideways in an armchair, knees hooked over the armrest, still in her pajamas despite the early-afternoon hour. Mick is drinking beer in the corner, as is his way.

She appears in the dead center of the room, little shimmers of violet lingering in her dark hair. The last of them fade and left behind is a small girl blinking owlishly, standing strangely still for a child so young. There are barrettes with little stars holding her hair away from her eyes. Light-up sneakers and a windbreaker zipped to her chin. Ray’s first thought is that she looks so very familiar; he must have met her before. Those eyes, he knows those eyes. His second thought is of 2017, of an insane asylum and a frightened girl, of a coffee shop and a demon, and that this kid looks just like that girl, just like—

“Nora?”

Her head tilts. No, this isn’t Nora; there’s something slightly different about the shape of her nose, the curve of her forehead, the way her eyebrows furrow together as she breaks free of whatever confusion or surprise was holding her so still and reaches out, stumbling over herself as she barrels into him. “Daddy!”

It’s solely instinct that has him extending his arms out to catch her as she crashes against his legs, not even tall enough to reach his waist. She can’t possibly be any older than five. He is certain he does not have a daughter. Nevertheless, there’s one here who says he does, and she’s got her chin tilted all the way back to look at him as she holds up her arms, making grabby hands, and he realizes she wants to be picked up. Awkwardly, he bends down, lifts her up, and she settles on his hip like she’s been doing so her whole life. (Perhaps she has, he thinks. Perhaps time is acting out of order again. It’s been doing that a lot lately.)

She’s staring at him, wide blinking eyes—still Nora’s eyes. Ray tries, and tries a little harder, to just see grey. Some random grey, one he didn’t just spend a few days getting to know, gazing into more than he should’ve with the enemy. (An enemy who, for a little while, didn’t feel like one. She grabbed his hand and clutched the time stone and suddenly they were in a bathtub in East Berlin and he was tripping over the shower curtain, hitting his head on the bar, and they bickered but it was different. She was different. Maybe he was different, too.

But then her father found them, and they were enemies again.)

“Daddy?”

He’s pulled back into the world, back into the present—a loaded word for a time traveler to use, when he thinks about it—and tells himself that the world is full of grey-eyed people. And then he realizes: he doesn’t care. Something inside him just knows: this is his daughter, looking at him like it doesn’t even scare her that she’s appeared in a strange place in a cloud of smoke because he’s here and holding on, and it really doesn’t matter where she came from.

Well, of course it matters, but not right now. Not in a way that changes how his chest expands when she smiles, teeth a little crooked, tag sticking up out of her jacket, bent back against the hood. Ruth Palmer, in handwriting he doesn’t recognize. His daughter’s name is Ruth. (His grandmother’s name was Ruth.)

What does a person say when confronted with their child from the future? His stomach flips.

“Hi,” he says, suddenly feeling more awkward than he has ever before. But she just giggles, echoing him: “Hi,” and wiggling like she’s changed her mind and wants to be put down. It’s only once she’s back on the ground and he looks up that he realizes he’s got four people staring at him. (Mick still has his head back and his eyes closed, completely uninterested [or possibly asleep]—an emotion Ray is incapable of fathoming, considering that his world has just flipped on its head, but we must digress.)

He clears his throat in an attempt to also clear his head. His eyes follow Ruth as she bounces over to Zari and clambers up onto her lap, onto the poor chair barely big enough for one, given the way Zari’s sprawled across it. He watches, rather frozen in place, as Zari attempts to haul herself into a more sitting position before the child lands on top of her with a quiet oof.

“Careful, Ruth,” he says weakly, and she shoots him a dazzling, unchastised smile. Sara catches his eye and mouths Ruth? so he reaches back to pull the tag of his sweater up from the collar and gestures to it. She nods like she understands, even though he’s never been more confused in his entire life.

“Um, hey,” Zari says, having rather unexpectedly found herself in a staring contest with a small child. “Ruth, was it?”

She looks affronted. Looks down at Zari like nobody has ever said anything more ridiculous, and says: “No, Aunt Zee-Zee.”

Aunt Zee-Zee? Ray thinks. Next to him, Sara snorts, and Nate, fist still full of almonds, says quietly: “That is so cute, oh my god.” (Zari glares at them both, but her expression softens when she looks back at Ruth and he figures she doesn’t actually hate the nickname.

It is pretty cute, after all.)

His daughter (his daughter!) taps Zari on the chest twice and says: “Aunt Zee-Zee,” and then taps her own chest and says: “Roo.”

“I thought her name was Ruth?” Ava says, still holding her pen, but her hand is limp and there’s a streak of black ink across the paper. The girl looks at her, tilts her head, and says: “Only when I’m bad.”

“Right. And the rest of the time, you’re . . . Roo?”

“Like from Winnie the Pooh!” Ruth agrees cheerfully.

“You’re the baby kangaroo?” Nate asks, (only sort of rhetorically), to no answer.

Ray looks back at the armchair, at Zari awkwardly holding herself up on her elbows, braced on one arm of the chair, and Ruth plopped happily on her stomach. She’s got her hands cupped together like she’s hiding something inside, holding them out to Zari as if to show her what.

“I gotta show you my trick,” she says, waving her hands dangerously close to Zari’s nose. “I’ve been pra’ticing.”

To her credit, Zari does an excellent job rolling with the punches. “Alright, show me whatcha got,” she says. Ruth’s nod is one of intense determination. Her nose scrunches up and her eyebrows furrow, and her shoulders rise and fall with a deep breath.

Then, her hands glow. It’s a soft, shimmery purple, just like the cloud she appeared in, and when her hands fall open, Ray watches something appear in her palms, piece by piece, like atoms are being pulled out of thin air to build it together. When the glow fades, there’s a donut sitting in her hands, held out to Zari like she’s presenting her with something priceless. Magic. His daughter has magic.

Ruth giggles at Zari’s expression: wide-eyed and slack-jawed, gaze darting between the donut and Ruth’s face like she’s not sure which should take precedence: her love for donuts or the display of magic. The donut wins, but as she reaches for it, Sara snips: “Zari, no,” in the tone one would use to scold a misbehaving cat, and she retracts her hand with a disgruntled huff.

“Ray,” Sara starts, her voice uneasy, and he interrupts because he doesn’t want to hear her say it: “I know.”

They’ve been fighting magic for months. Magic has nearly killed them all a dozen times over; magic held him up by the throat yesterday. It makes sense this would alarm her. But Ruth is just a little girl—his little girl—and none of what they’ve been suffering is her fault.

“She might not be real.” Ava’s words are slow and careful, like she’s trying to keep her voice steady. “She could be a trick, some type of trap.”

“Seems pretty real to me,” Zari says, but her eyes are still jumping between Ruth and the donut, and Ray wonders briefly which she’s talking about. When Ruth moves to scramble off her lap, the donut falls and she frantically reaches out to catch it. (And Sara is no longer looking at her, so she shrinks low in her chair and takes a huge, quiet bite.)

Suddenly Ruth is back in front of him, holding up her arms, and he knows what to do this time. He heaves her into the air and she settles on his hip, burying her fingers in the soft wool of his sweater. She is real. She must be real. Her breath is warm on the side of his face as she whispers loudly against his ear: “Why does Aunt Ava think I’m tricky?”

It’s quite possibly the biggest failure of a whisper he’s ever heard, and everyone else definitely hears it as well. (Somewhere off to the right, Aunt Ava sputters at the way Ruth has named her.) Sara pushes back her chair and stands, her fingers grazing Ava’s shoulder as she moves gracefully around the table to come stand in front of them, clasping her hands together.

“Aunt Ava’s just being silly,” she says, offering Ruth a bright—and fairly forced—smile. Glancing up at the ceiling, she prompts: “Gideon?”

“On it, Captain,” Gideon says, her smooth, monotonous voice filling the room. After a brief silence in which Ruth begins to rub her thumb up and down his cheek through his stubble like his face is one of those double-sided sequin pillows, reminding him that he really needs to shave, Gideon returns. “Ruth Palmer is no trick, Captain Lance. She is very real—born in late 2021 in Ivy Town, where she lives with Dr. Palmer and her mother, along with a cat and a younger brother.”

Ray’s heart skips in his chest. This is real; Ruth is real. In less than four years, he’s going to be a father. Living in the town that raised him, creating a family of his own.

“Fucking hell,” Sara mutters, swiping her hand over her face. Ruth leans dangerously forward with a cupped palm outstretched: “Swear quarter, Aunt Sara.”

The fearless Captain of the Waverider stops in her tracks and Ray watches her brain reboot itself, completely confused at the notion of a small child asking her for a quarter like there’s a swear jar on their ship. She blinks. Her hands hover awkwardly in the air as if she intended to pat down her pockets to see if she might have a stray quarter, but thought better of it.

“I’ve gotcha covered, don’t worry,” Nate says, leaning back in his chair to rummage deep into the pockets of his jeans before triumphantly pulling out a coin and tossing it to Sara, who, upon catching it, makes a weird face and mutters: “Is there melted chocolate on this?”

Nate shrugs, and she just sighs and hands it over to Ruth, who turns the quarter over in her palm happily and clutches it against her chest.

“Spend it wisely,” Nate says, and she nods sagely, tells him: “Gumball machine.” Her voice is so solemn, so serious, that Ray almost chokes on the laugh that bubbles up in his throat. There’s so much warmth in his chest that he worries he might explode from the pressure of it all against his ribcage, straining against the confines of his heart like he can’t fit all the love inside. His daughter smiles down at her quarter before pushing it into the pocket of her jacket and tapping his shoulder.

“Daddy, where’d Mommy go?”

“Oh, yeah, great question,” Zari says, tipping sideways as she hauls herself up from her chair and nearly falling on the floor. “Who’s her mom? I bet that’s where she gets her magic.”

Sara snaps a finger and points at Zari: “Yes. Hey, Gideon—”

“I’m sorry, Captain, but I’m afraid it goes against my protocol to reveal too much information about the futures of the Waverider’s crew.”

“We’ll have to forget this anyway,” Ava bargains. “I have a memory flasher—every agent does.”

Silence. Ruth goes limp against his side, head drooping against his shoulder, and he runs a hand up and down her back as she sighs: “Daddy, I’m hungry. Goldfishes?”

“I’ve got a jumbo-size box of the rainbow ones,” he tells her, carrying her over to the cupboards and sitting her down on the counter. For a moment, the room is weirdly quiet as he digs into the back of the tallest cupboard, the one no one else can reach, for his giant box of goldfish. (His one unhealthy indulgence.)

“So, Roo,” Zari says, leaning against the fridge as he fills a snack bowl and passes it to his (future) daughter. “Cool magic trick. Excellent donut.”

Ruth sits up straight, preening, but the gesture is slightly undermined by her cheeks puffed out with goldfish. It’s utterly adorable, and Ray swears he can feel his heart exploding like little fireworks in his chest.

“Where’d you learn how to do that?”

It’s like sliding one of those fancy dimmer light switches to full blast. Ruth beams, her smile a bit goldfish-y, and wiggles in place, kicking her legs back and forth. She holds out the bowl to Zari, offering her some of her snack. Surprised, Zari glances at the crackers, makes an eh, why not face, and grabs a few, shoveling them into her mouth.

“Mommy’s teaching me,” Ruth says cheerfully. “It’s hard ‘cause her magic’s different now and she can’t jus’ show me, but she’s really patient even though I’m not good yet. Seamus would be way better than me ‘cause he learns fast except he’s not interested in magic, but it’s okay ‘cause he knows a lot about dinosaurs.”

Ray blinks. Gideon had said Ruth had a brother. He has a son. (Not yet, he reminds himself. In a few years. Not yet.)

“Seamus is your brother?” Sara asks. As she approaches the counter to snag his goldfish box, one of Nate’s missed almonds crunches under her shoe. Ruth nods—“we’re going to the dinosaur museum for his birthday!”

One of her barrettes is falling loose. Shoving his nerves back as far as they’ll go, Ray reaches out to undo it, and she goes still to let him brush her hair back from her face and push the clip back into place. The little star on top glitters at him.

“What do you mean, her magic is different?” Ava’s voice drips with hesitance and wariness, but Ruth seems unconcerned. She just shrugs. “She’s a fairy godmother, now. Her magic’s only for wishes.”

“I’m sorry—fairy godmother?”

Through a mouthful of goldfish, Ruth says: “She doesn’t get wings, though.”

“Sure,” Sara says, like everything is totally and completely normal. She glances over at Ray. “You don’t happen to know any fairies, do you?”

“Mommy’s not actually a fairy, Aunt Sara.” Ruth’s expression twists like it’s totally ludicrous to suggest such a thing. “She just has a pretty fairytale dress and a wand and took the curse so she could save Aunt Mona. Can I have more goldfish, please?”

Hands working separately from his—deeply overwhelmed—brain, Ray takes the box back from Sara to refill her bowl. (And, for his sanity, ignores Nate as he quips: “She wears a fairytale dress as a part of her job. I’m sorry but that is so on-brand for you, Ray.”)

“Thank you, Daddy.”

“So,” Zari says, clearing her throat. “What’s your mom’s name?”

After rolling with their ignorance for so long, Ruth finally pauses, looking confused. She lowers her bowl, held between both hands, to her lap. “Are we playing a pretending game?” She asks. “I don’t know the rules.”

There it is, Ray thinks. Finally, she’s realized something is wrong and doesn’t know what to make of it. He wishes he could pull a page from the book of his future self, who knows how to be this girl’s father and would know what to say. He’d have an explanation for why everybody’s asking questions they should know the answers to.

“No, sweetheart,” he says, trying to keep the shakiness of his heartbeat out of his voice. She’s started tugging on the zipper of her jacket, so he reaches out to help her pull it off. (Her t-shirt underneath is covered with stylized ocean creatures: little whales swimming across the cotton, jellyfish shooting down her sleeves, an octopus on her shoulder, tentacles curling by her collar. Clearly, she’s a marine biologist in the making.) “There’s no game.”

Ray pauses, cupping the side of her face and brushing loose flyaways off her forehead as a way to bide himself a few seconds to come up with something to say. She blinks up at him, all big grey eyes, wide and wondering, as he just looks at her. This little girl, this marvelous and shining glimpse of a life waiting for him, meets his gaze and he can hardly believe that in only a few years, he’ll get to be her father. The thought of admitting to her that he doesn’t know her yet makes him feel ill. Still, he has to say something.

“Have you ever heard of time travel, Roo?” He tries, and she nods, shooting him a look that screams ‘duh.’ (Deep breath, Ray, he thinks. You can do this.) “Well, it seems you’ve had a bit of a run-in with it. And here, in my time, you haven’t been born yet. We’re very happy to see you, but there are some things about your life that we don’t know because they haven’t happened yet.”

“Oh,” Ruth says, staring down at a single green goldfish clutched between her thumb and forefinger. She scratches at it with her nail and it cracks under the pressure, crumbling into her palm. (That moment of silence, he thinks, is one of the most stressful moments he has lived thus far.) “Has Mommy not been born yet, too? Is that why Aunt Zee-Zee keeps asking about her?”

“That’s . . . a really complicated thing to ask a time traveler, kid,” Sara says, her voice the slightest bit strangled, like she’s trying not to laugh. Zari, who has, in fact, not been born yet in his time, pushes herself away from the fridge with her elbow and suddenly her gaze on Ruth is incredibly heavy, and Ray’s stomach climbs up into his throat. Somehow, he already knows what question she’s going to ask, and she looks like she already knows what the answer will be. He studies her face and something sharp and anxious spins in his stomach. (He refuses to call it hope.)

Ray remembers his first thought when Ruth appeared: She looks like Nora. Shiny dark hair, clear grey eyes, the subtle arch of her brow. The same small dimple in her chin; the same straight curve of her jaw.

She looks like Nora, he’d thought. She still does. He’s been trying not to think about it. (He’s been failing at not thinking about it.)

Zari opens her mouth and he knows what she’s going to say. After all, they were the ones who sat with Nora at that coffee shop in 2017, played Heads Up and saw her smile. A smile that, however brief, was so much like Ruth’s is. He catches her gaze and knows he isn’t the only one who thought Nora when she first arrived.

“About your mom, Roo,” Zari starts, cautious but gentle, “is her name Nora—do people call her Nora?”

The room goes silent. Ava stops tapping her pen anxiously against the table; Sara’s breath hitches; Nate’s chair falls back onto four legs from where he’d been tipping it back on two. Shifting her weight on the counter, Ruth looks up at him, and he knows. Without a doubt, he knows that she is his daughter, and that she’s Nora’s, too. He doesn’t mind. (Perhaps he’s even a bit pleased, though he’s definitely not going to say so out loud.)

The familiar whoosh of a time courier portal sounds across the room, right where Ruth had first appeared. He turns just in time to see it finish opening, to see a blur of soft blue and shiny, dark hair fly through.

“Mommy!”

Goldfish slosh sideways in the bowl, close to spilling over the edge, and he just barely catches it as it tips out of her hands. Ruth is stretching out her arms, dangerously close to tipping off the counter, and Ray awkwardly hovers, ready to catch her should she fall. Everyone had been loitering around the counter before, but now, as the blur heads straight for them, they scatter like waving a hand through smoke.

It’s Nora. He recognizes her almost in slow motion. She comes into focus as she slows down, nearing the counter, and suddenly she’s less than a foot away from him, scooping Ruth off the counter into her arms and he sees her standing before him like he’s seeing her for the first time. By and large, she looks the same as she did yesterday. Or several years ago. (Everything’s in the wrong order, again.)

But there are differences, small things like the faint wrinkles around her eyes and the length of her hair, cut just below her shoulders in waves that seem to glitter in the light, that he suddenly has to fight the urge to reach out and touch. She seems softer in baby blue.

He remembers only a few days ago, how she stood in front of him in that warehouse, frustrated and hurt that her father didn’t trust her, and he’d realized that she wasn’t actually all that scary. Suddenly, those dark clothes had just seemed like playing pretend. (Dressing in black is basically a Bad Guy requirement, and being just barely over five feet tall with a glare that said ‘disgruntled and occasionally hostile house cat’ more than it did ‘vessel to an ancient time demon,’ she needed all the help she could get.)

This Nora seems warmer, less weighed down by the gravity of her own existence. (He imagines the knowledge that you are being raised for sacrifice would not be so easy to bear.)

Her palm cradles the back of Ruth’s head, fingers curling into her dark hair, and there, glinting off the kitchen light from her third finger—wedding rings. Two thin, silver bands slotting perfectly together; a glittering diamond. His heart sputters in his chest and sure, his present is her past and it’s kind of a battlefield at the moment, but she’s also his future. And it looks wonderful.

Ruth is like magic. (No pun intended. Well. Pun mildly intended.) She’s bright and happy and she likes goldfish and her hair clips have stars on them. She smiles and it’s like nothing bad can happen. She has a little brother who loves dinosaurs. She’s his.

His and Nora’s. He’s going to marry Nora.

“Ray? You okay?”

He blinks. She’s standing in front of him, head just slightly tilted toward Ruth, who’s perched on her hip and slumped, boneless, against her side like she’d done to him earlier. Her face is buried against Nora’s collarbone, fingers curled into the billowy fabric of her blouse.

Worry shines in Nora’s eyes—concern laced into the clear grey of her irises. For the first time, he allows himself to think: Wow, she’s really pretty.

“I’m okay,” he says, voice airy like he’s not completely there inside his own words. “You’re really pretty.”

Ah, rats. He did not mean to say that. (Somewhere nearby, Ava makes a strangled noise and Zari chokes on a laugh—very rude of her to find amusement in his suffering.)

Smooth, Ray, he thinks.

But Nora just laughs, bright and shiny like fairy bells or the stars, sparkling off the water from a new-moon sky. She is beautiful and suddenly it is incredibly easy to imagine falling in love with her. (It probably wouldn’t take very long.)

Still, he feels his cheeks flush, and when her laughter fades, she presses her lips together in an upside-down smile that says she’s trying not to start laughing again. His heart expands so far that his chest aches with the effort of containing it.

“So,” Sara starts, shifting into her ‘I’m the Captain and I Mean Business’ pose: arms crossed, stance wide. “Your kid time traveled into our kitchen. Why?”

It’s a question, but only grammatically. Really, it’s a demand for information.

“My best guess? She wasn’t doing so hot in hide-and-seek, and tried to use magic.” Nora looks down at her daughter, traces of mild amusement flickering across her expression. “Am I close?”

Unintelligibly, Ruth mumbles into her shirt.

“I can’t hear you, kangaroo,” Nora says.

(“Kangaroo,” Nate whispers, terribly unquietly, stressing the word so hard his voice sounds strangled. “Because of Roo. That is so cute.”

“No, it isn’t.” Ava whacks his shoulder and he whines pathetically, considering he’s literally made of steel.

“Sorry, babe, but it definitely is,” Sara says. Ray ignores them all, far too hypnotized by his future wife and daughter.)

Ruth’s face slowly emerges from Nora’s collarbone, and the hair on the side of her head is all tousled from being pressed against her shoulder. With a gentle, light touch, Nora brushes it out and tucks it behind her ear.

“I couldn’t find Daddy,” Ruth grumbles, her bottom lip jutting out in a dramatically grumpy pout. “I only tried to use magic a little bit.”

“Well, you’ll be happy to hear that I found him behind the couch, and now he’s having a hard time finding your brother.”

Ruth perks up, squirming a little in her mother’s arms. “I can help! Seamus always goes in the hamper.” Nora’s lips quirk up before she straightens her face.

“I’m sure he’d appreciate your help. But no magic, okay? You could get hurt.” Her hand moves up to brush against Ruth’s cheek, her thumb stroking at the skin over her temple. After trailing the tips of her fingers down her hairline, Nora tips her head forward to bump her forehead against Ruth’s. She murmurs: “I’m so glad you’re okay.”

“I’m sorry, Mommy,” Ruth says, sweet and sincere.

“It’s alright, baby. We’ll just be more careful from now on, yeah?”

Nodding seriously, Ruth says: “I promise,” before reaching out to press her thumbs to the corners of Nora’s mouth and pushes up, trying to make a smile. “No worries, Mommy. I found Daddy and I got goldfish and a swear quarter ‘cause Aunt Sara said ‘fucking hell.’”

From just behind Ray’s shoulder, Zari barks a laugh. Sara makes a choked sound of distress, and Nora just blinks, eyes wide and startled.

“I love this kid,” Zari says, and when Ray turns to glance at her, she’s grinning.

“I love you too, Aunt Zee-Zee,” Ruth beams. After a brief pause, she starts to wriggle. “Down now, please. Gotta find Seamus.”

Nora bends to set Ruth down, and after pressing a messy kiss to her mother’s cheek, the girl darts off toward the still-open portal, her light-up sneakers shining off the floor. With a sigh, Nora calls after her: “Don’t check the hamper first! Let your father keep some of his dignity.”

Turning back to them as Ruth disappears through the portal, she reaches for a flasher sticking out of her pocket that he hadn’t noticed before. She takes a deep breath, like she’s not particularly enthused about this part, and says: “Who wants to go first?”

“Not it,” Nate says immediately, raising his hands in a ‘no, thank you’ gesture and stepping back. Sara steps forward; “I’ll go.”

She reaches for Nora’s wrist and drags it up until the flasher is level with her face, and moves closer until it touches her forehead. She presses the button herself, and the flash of light can barely be seen with it pressed against her skin. Stumbling back a step, hand falling away from Nora’s wrist, Sara blinks a few times and her brow furrows in confusion. Ava reaches out to her, gently taking her by the shoulders and leading her to sit down at the table in the chair she’d been in earlier, before everything.

“What happened?” Sara asks, dropping into the seat, letting Ava move her.

“Nothing special. Don’t worry about it,” Ava says. “Look, almonds—why don’t you throw some at Nate? I bet he can’t catch them.”

Sara’s eyes widen and she pulls the half-empty bowl toward her on the table. With Sara still a bit dazed but occupied, Ava crosses the dining area toward Nora. Smoothing out the nonexistent wrinkles on her pantsuit slacks, she says: “Okay, wipe my memory.”

The overhead glow of the kitchen light catches and glitters on Nora’s hair as she nods. The silky fabric of her blouse flows like rippling water, moving with her body as she reaches out, aiming the flasher at Ava.

Ava blinks, the past few minutes gone. Zari. Nate. Mick is left alone, as he is, in fact, asleep. (But Ray does delicately extract the beer bottle from his hand lest it slip and smash on the floor. Mick snorts and his head lolls to the side, but he doesn’t wake.)

“And then there were two.”

Nora’s voice is soft and warm. Ray turns back and she’s standing near the portal with the flasher in one hand, the other tucked into a deep pants pocket. The same soft shade of blue as her blouse and the same lightweight linen, he’d first thought she was wearing a dress. She’s just as pretty as he remembered her being, but she’s alive in a way that his Nora isn’t. (Not his Nora, obviously. The version of Nora from his time, that’s all. Present-day Nora. Whatever. Shut up.)

Holding up the flasher, she asks, in a kind voice that suggests she knows he isn’t ready: “You ready?”

He nods. “Yeah. Yes. Not really, actually. But yes. Wipe my memory.”

She approaches him silently and slowly—like one might approach a skittish animal in flight-mode. He’s expecting her to hold up the flasher and be done with it, but she doesn’t, and he thinks he should’ve known better than to think she would. Instead, she slips her hand into his and squeezes and he feels a spark—

(“When I gave her the time stone, our hands touched and I felt a spark,” he will tell Zari soon, and she’ll make a depressing metaphor about Nora being a unicorn who will eat him alive, but that’s not for a while yet. First, he has to forget his future and then, in the semblance of peace in the aftermath of the war, he will feel that spark again and think it’s the first time, but it’ll feel familiar, and he won’t remember why.

But that’s all out of order. None of it’s happened yet and there are a few more months to wait through. Then, a few more years until Ruth. For now, though—)

Her skin is soft and warm against his. She smiles and the corners of her eyes crinkle.

“How long do I have to wait?” He asks.

“Not long. And you’ll keep busy.”

All he can do is nod. He’s not ready to forget—he’s always been so unlucky in love, and the knowledge of what’s waiting for him is like a beacon in the dark. But he focuses his attention on the warmth of her hand and the soft grey of her eyes, so bright and clear with love, and swallows the nerves that sit like a stone in his throat.

As though she can sense the feeling of unreadiness in his chest, Nora tilts her head, gesturing toward the portal, and says: “Right through there, my husband is playing hide-and-seek with our children, and he is you. This isn’t goodbye. You’ll see me soon.”

There’s nothing he can think of to say, so he just nods again and glances down at their clasped hands, squeezing gently before letting go.

Nora’s arm wavers as she holds the flasher up to his forehead, and Ray’s last thought before the past hour fades away is that he can’t wait to fall in love with her.

#legends of tomorrow #darhkatom #nora darhk #ray palmer #legends of tomorrow fanfic #fanfiction #also featuring!#sara lance #ava sharpe #zari tomaz #nate heywood

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ferncrayon · 2 years ago

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The Worst Meet-Cute Author: ferncrayon Chapter: Four (note: Chapter Three is also up but it's been up for two months and I forgot to post about it) Rating: Teen and Up Audiences TWs for this chapter (and this snippet): references to self-injury, homophobia, abusive situations, boatloads of angst Summary: Pippa reads Joy's tarot cards. Some history comes up. "The next morning Joy wakes up and she knows it’s a bad day. It’s there inside her head, the badness; thinking feels like trying to move around in a room crowded full of sharp objects, where the slightest mental shift or twitch ends in pain. These are the days when she lives every moment on the knife-edge of panic attacks, when she resorts to using real-life blades to outduel the ones inside her head. Days when there's a dirty scrim of gray over the world, gritty particles of it drifting through the air, working their way into her skin and her lungs. At home she'd curl up in bed, under the thick duvet, headphones in, playing the most soothing music she knows. She'd pass up food but drink cup after cup of Twinings Lady Grey tea, maybe take an extra Ativan or two. And when all that didn't work, at home, she'd cut.

Here she has wireless headphones, but nothing to connect them to. She has a bed, but no cozy duvet, and no way to hide from staff checks every 10 minutes. The tea is stale Lipton Yellow Label and the Ativan is rationed. That leaves the plasticware in the kitchen.

But Pippa has other plans."

#the worst witch #the worst witch 2017 #hicsqueak #joy hecate hardbroom #pippa pentangle #teen au #psych ward au

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notwiselybuttoowell · 2 years ago

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It's called Fleather, and it's a new material being developed as a sustainable alternative to animal leather. It is delicate and smooth to touch, like soft lamb skin leather, and its journey begins in an unexpected place – flowers.

Fleather, made by a Kanpur-based startup called Phool, is part of an emerging trend of companies producing plant- and fungi-based leather alternatives which aim to disrupt the traditional leather industry and capitalise on growing interest in "vegan" fashion.

Producing leather from animals poses several environmental hazards. It is energy- and water-intensive and the process of tanning and treating animal skin with chemicals to make leather releases toxic heavy metals that can poison water bodies. Cattle rearing to source animal skin, meanwhile, produces greenhouse gases and contributes to deforestation. Animal rights activists also condemn leather, citing inhumane conditions in slaughter houses.

Fleather, on the other hand, is made by repurposing floral waste generated in temples across India, and it is Phool's moonshot.

The startup's journey began on a cold winter morning in 2015, when Ankit Agarwal and his friend made their way to the bustling bank of the Ganges in Agarwal's hometown Kanpur for some sightseeing.

The Ganges is believed by Hindus to be the most sacred of all rivers. But the sight that greeted the duo belied this faith. Rubbish was floating on the grey, visibly-polluted water. Among the muck were tonnes of flowers – marigolds, roses and chrysanthemums – discarded by temples and worshippers. These flowers are used in Hindu rituals and are considered sacred, meaning they can't be disposed of along with other waste.

But depositing them in a river is sometimes part of the ritual and as a result flowers are dumped in water bodies daily where they leach out harmful chemicals from pesticides, and eventually decay into mulch that contaminates the water. Undeterred by the obvious pollution, devotees take ceremonial dips in the Ganges and cup their palms to take holy sips.

The sight disturbed Agarwal, and set him on a quest to find a solution to the uniquely Indian problem of temple flower waste, which he calls "the lowest hanging fruit" among pollutants. In 2017, he zeroed in on an idea to upcycle the flowers into incense sticks, and founded Phool ("flower" in Hindi).

The company is backed by the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology in Kanpur and counts Bollywood star Alia Bhatt among its investors. Every morning Phool trucks travelled around Kanpur's temples collecting the flower waste before it was dumped into the river. At the Phool factory, workers plucked the petals and set them to dry. The dried petals were then powdered and made into a dough with essential oils which female workers then rolled into incense sticks.

But it turned out that there was a far more impactful and surprising use for the flowers, as the company was soon to discover.

#India #sustainability #flowers #waste reduction #leather #hinduism

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bree4 · 6 months ago

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I know Who Killed me Chapter 4

"Charlie!" shouts my mother i have been in bed all morning it's summer vacation i can't believe my first year at Anoka Middle has gone by this quickly. this fall i will officially be a eighth grader, holy shit. i go downstairs where my mom and sisters are waiting in the kitchen.

"Happy Birthday!" all three shout at once. today i turn fourteen.

they have a breakfast spread all over the dinner table and i am suddenly feeling i'll, not on a empty stomach but because i want to maintain my empty feeling. they sit me down and i put a fake smile on. i'll eat it, i just need to puke it up later than i will go for a long walk. maybe i can even start running?

i take a bite and i make sure to really chew each bite.

to others this would be heaven but for me it's awful, i can feel the fat latching onto my body i need to get rid of it now.

i go upstairs put on a grey oversized sweater and gym shorts grab my Nike runners and leave the house. it's the morning but the heat of summer is very much present on this walk, maybe i should have worn a t-shirt? i do a few laps around our neighbourhood and make my way to downtown i look at the shops and decide i want a coffee, which seems to be the only thing i find safe to eat. sparky's cafe is my go to spot, i like to get a iced coffee or a pumpkin spice latte in the fall. i would kill for a Pumpkin Spice Latte right now. it's also closes to the river side park, the walk i like to take when i clear my head.

the walk home is peaceful i feel better, i just need to get back to 110 i'm at 120 and once i'm back i'll be okay. i turn the corner at 2nd ave to walk the path at Akin river side park, i will walk up towards river ave it's a far walk but i need it right now.

Saturday June 30, 2018

today would have been Charlie's 15th birthday i can see it now, we would have had a nightmare before Christmas or a twilight theme but specially the first movie for the 'cold vibes' and he would have dressed up like Edward Cullen or even Bella Swan. the Cake would be chocolate with chocolate icing because he loved chocolate. i know him so well, i think i knew him better than his family did.

i walk down to the Akin river path because it's where Charlie spent most his time, he loved to walk the path. sometimes he would be here for hours, if his mom couldn't find him i knew he was always here. i spent that first week after he went missing down here, hoping it was all some joke or misunderstanding and that he would be by the docs or resting in the trees. i would be able to find my boy, but that day never came. i didn't leave my bedroom for weeks, my parents were scared that i might flunk out of the seventh grade.

god i wish he were just missing. how can you be dead Charlie? and why can't i remember that night, i've tried so hard to remember details, were we followed? did you get chased by some high school kids and a prank go too far, did one of us do something? and why can't this fucking town find who killed you?

Friday June 30, 2017

by the time i get home it's almost noon, my mom is sitting at the dining room table with a coffee i pour myself a cup and sit with her. she's reading her wellness book and i look at the title it's a diet book, she doesn't need that i do. i look at the book with interest, she catches me so i look away.

"you're so lucky" she tells although i have no idea what i'm 'lucky' for.

"for what?" i ask because i must know now.

"you're so skinny and you don't need to try..."but i do have to try, what does she mean skinny? i'm huge. there's a small bump in my lower belly that was never there before, and i can't see the ribcage anymore. i'm anything but 'skinny', i need to work out more shes clearly making fun of me.

i don't talk anymore i just sit, i don't wanna make a scene or cry or something. she slips a small wrapped gift to me.

"happy birthday "

"what is it?" i ask.

"open it." i start to unwrap the paper and i see a small iPhone box. i look up and smile, all that anger i just had slipping away, i'm now excited it's my first iPhone. my older sisters got one when they turned fourteen so i was hoping i'd get mine this year.

"i know it's not the newest model, but your cousin Riley didn't use it anymore a-"

"it's perfect!" i scream.

i rush to my room and get it set up, i used to use a iPod touch but this is the real deal i cannot believe it. after setting it up i DM my friends that i got a phone and to send me their numbers. the party is tonight and i told everyone it's going to be a villain from a horror movie. the party starts at seven so i need to get to setting up.

Saturday June 30, 2018

the walk to the train is freezing it's pouring rain today. i'm cold and i can just use a warm coffee, i'll go uptown near Anoka station i know sparky's is a few blocks down i'll catch the bus to main street and walk the rest of the way. i realize now i just made an entire circle around the city and somehow ended up back near the riverside path.

Friday June 30, 2017

the party starts and the three are showing up, they dressed up as their favourite horror movie villains: Ethan is Freddy from Nightmare on Elm St, Liam went as Jason from Friday the 13, Olivia decided on Annabelle from the conjuring, i went as the best villain in my opinion: GhostFace from the Scream Franchise, the best horror franchise in my humble opinion.

the lights are blinking orange and green the kitchen has neon purple light bulbs and all the snacks are in the dining room including the cake. i invited a few others from our grade but i never got a RSVP so as usual it's the core four, mom and my older sisters, they dressed up as the twins from the shinning and my mom decided on Winifred from Hocus Pocus. we play uno which always starts an argument between everyone and people get accused of Cheating ( not sure how they can cheat.)

"Uno!" Olivia shouts, but from the mischievous look Liam has i guarantee he's going to make her pick up four cards, he also has one card left.

he slams the 4+ card down in front of Olivia.

"Nope, now you gotta pick up four cards Liv." he is so proud of himself.

"ugh, Liam!" she's mad now.

"Not fair!" she whines.

"You're just not fast enough, nice try though."

the next round is almost done and Liam only has his single card, i'm waiting for him to put it down. "do it, i dare you" i say in my mind.

he puts it down and i shout "UNO!"

he glares at me and i keep his stare, i smirk and he gives me one right back. this game is getting heated.

"will you two stop flirting?" Ethan tells us breaking the silence.

"shut up Ethan." Liam says. okay we are clearly done with Uno, i need to switch the Activity soon or all three will literally murder each other.

"cake?" i ask. Ethan is already rushing to the dinner table where all the snacks and my birthday cake is.

"Mrs.Summers Charlie wants to do the cake!" Ethan screams.

"it's Carol weirdo." my mom says coming out of the kitchen with a fresh cup of coffee. we laugh because it's true my mom hates being called mrs.summers or ms summers or miss summers, just call her Carol. she says calling her by her last name makes her feel old.

"Sorry..." Ethan says but he's only teasing.

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR CHARLIE, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU" everyone is singing.

as i watch them all sing i wish we can sit here for a few moments longer, because little do they know, i will be murdered on Halloween night. i blow out my candles. everyone claps in celebration here's to Fourteen, and the last five months i have to live.....

Wednesday October 31,2018

the sheriff is in the principals office and everyone is in the hallway watching with confusion. why are they here?

"Can the Following Students report to the principals office immediately: Liam Green and Olivia Bennington, thank you." i'm frozen again, it's just like last year. i am met with everyone staring at me i look down the hall at Olivia who's already look back at me, she's just as confused.

the office feels cold when we walk in, the sheriff is already in the office with the principal. we walk in together.

"Hi?" Olivia says.

the sherif turns around and looks at us both, i don't say anything but i'm very cautious.

"Ethan Lowry is missing." he flatly says.

i look over at Olivia and back at the sheriff.

Fuck.

#halloween #story #lgbtq community #lgbt pride #small town aesthetic

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