#he really did just put his ship in orbit and went oh well the bitch is gone

[sundry-whovengerslocked]

Doctor Who "Rogue" memes

I've made memes. enjoy.

(contains slight spoilers)

firstly, ones that are more encompassing:

regarding the episode itself:

and finally, Captain Jack Harkness stages of grief:

[jangofctts]

Madness (Poe Dameron x Reader)

Rated: Explicit

Word Count: 5k

Warnings: Smut, handjobs, language, sex, creampies, Poe Dameron is a warning in its self, slight description of blood/injury 

A/N: sorry that this is a day late y’all. I'm v sick and high on nyquill yehaww brothers

This is not your fault.

Oh, Stars, but it is.

You bury your fingers, blackened with motor oil, into your hair and fold into yourself. You wish you could disappear. Wouldn't that be a fucking miracle and a half? You spare another glance at the destroyed droid and with a despaired wail, you bury your face into your knees again.

What the fuck were you thinking?

See, it started out fine, like most things do. But of course, like always, it turned out to be a real garbage fire. No, not even that. It was worse than a garbage fire. All you wanted to do was help out, and with the slowly dwindling amount of pilots available, you are pushed to the side. No pilots, no mechanics.

Droid maintenance is not your forte, but Kaydel Ko had specifically asked for your help and of course being the blubbering mess you are, you couldn't say no. All it took was a sweet, helpless smile and then boom! Here you are, stuck with a First Order droid with a processing chip all but fucking obliterated.

You thought it'd be easy to rewire the little BB unit, but the spunky little thing had its very own arsenal of weapons. Your legs and hands are a mess of electrical burns and tiny slashes that sting much worse than a papercut and steadily ooze blood. It would absolutely not stay still, so you resorted to a makeshift prison made out of duct tape and bungee chords until you could sort of pry into the droid's mainframe. You toyed with one wire at most and the droid spun its little head around, knocked the tweezers clean out of your hand, tore three more wires and with a disheartening woop; exploded in your face.

You aren't really thinking straight the moment you decide that hiding the blasted thing would be a grand idea. So, with your face covered in black soot and your hands bordering being numb, you scoop the destroyed droid up and sprint out of the base. You do have some luck, you figure. You run into nobody in the hallways leading outside; no one to see your absolute disaster that you plan on chucking into the dense forest.

You beeline towards the X-Wings and just as you think that you'd finally, finally be done with this whole mess, your worst nightmare appears.

Poe Dameron in all his neon orange jumpsuited glory steps out behind the body of his X-Wing. Right in your path of destruction. It's inevitable, really. The first syllable of watch out is barely out of your mouth before he even comprehends you're there and then you're crashing into him, faster than fucking lightspeed.

The resounding 'oof'  as you barrel into him will no doubt haunt your dreams, and you have just enough time to watch as the droid bounces on the ground, spraying sparks everywhere, then disappear into the underbrush, before Poe collapses on you. At least one of your problems is solved.

"What the hell?"

You would ask the same thing, but the entirety of Poe's weight focused on your back is doing a splendid job of crushing your lungs. Your hand shoots back and slaps at whatever it can. "P-poe! Can't breath!"

"Aw, shit. Sorry, kid."

You heave in precious air once he unravels himself out of the pickle you've put yourself in and before you know it, he hooks an arm underneath your armpit and hauls you up. He takes one good look at you, up and down, and has to bite his lip to keep his smile away. Not like it does much good.

"You—uh—ok, kid?" He coughs, trying real hard.

You throw your hands up. "Oh! Go ahead and laugh! That's all I'm good for anyway!"

What little pride you have left rapidly dwindles but as his shoulders shake in uncontrollable laughter that morphs into one of those laughs where you can't breathe, you can't help but smile yourself. Poe's glee is contagious (even if you are the butt of it) and you're glad you can give him some comedic relief. The days are getting darker, more friends are dying, and it's harder to put on a smile, even for Poe. It's a rare and special moment to provide some momentary happiness.

Eventually his chuckles taper off. He's folded over, clutching his stomach as tears shine at the corners of his eyes. "You—you!"

Another fit of giggles consume him after taking another peek at your face. "Wha—what ha-happened?"

You huff and cross you arms over your chest. Try as you might to appear irked, a lopsided grin still lines your face. "That is none of your business."

Poe wipes at his eyes and stands, his chest still heaving. "You're the one who tackled me. The least you could do is tell me."

"I did not tackle you," you scoff. "You were in the way!"

He's still smiling as he shakes his head. "Yeah, whatever. Kaydel Ko asked you to rewire that FO droid, right?"

You grimace. "No."

He raises a brow and ruffles your unruly hair. "Sure, kid."

Poe takes a glance at where the droid launched into the trees and points. "C'mon, I think it went over there."

To your horror he seizes your upper arm and drags you forward. Oh. nonononono. You dig your heels in but Poe is persistent and you're quickly coming to terms with your impeding doom and ridicule, so you let him take you.

It's easy to find. The droid is still smoking and sparking, looking oh so sad nestled between a tree and a large fern. Poe starts laughing again.

"The hell d'you do to the poor thing? Run it over with a pod-racer?"

"Something like that," you mumble.

Poe scoops it up and the damage looks even more devastating when he's holding it. You chew your lip and sigh as he hands it back. "Thanks, I guess."

With an amused 'mhm' he once again places a hand on your shoulder and wheels you out of the forest. You don't mean to tense up (a force of habit really) as his thumb whispers over your shoulder blade, but the damage is done and his hand drops. You want to wack yourself with a stick.

You pause by his X-Wing. "Hey, I'm sorry for, y'know tackling you. Also, th-thank you..."

He flashes you a smile and shrugs. "No biggie, Sparky."

You scowl. "Don't call me that."

That pulls out another laugh and then he's staring at you. Those big brown eyes, so warm and deep like the richness of the soil, capture yours as if they have their own gravitational pull. All grasp on words slip your mind and you're left to wrestle with your tongue into saying something. Why is he looking at you like that?

"I can help."

You blink. "What?"

"With the droid, I mean," he offers. You swear you can see the skin underneath his collar flush red. Poe Dameron blushing. Hm.

You have absolutely no clue why you agree, but his bright smile is enough to launch your heart against your ribcage.

"Great. I'll let Kaydel know we'll have it done by tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" You squeak. Fat chance.

Before you can argue, he ruffles your hair again and shoots off. "Meet you at 1900 in maintenance!"

You glance down at the droid. The hole in its head sparks. "Oh, Stars."

                                                   =-=-=-=

You're pacing by the time 1850 rolls around, your stomach a mess of knots and twists. You don't want Poe Dameron to help you. In fact, you don't want him here at all!

You're clean at least. The black soot covering your face was a bitch to scrub off and there's still some of it hiding in the lines of your skin, but it's the best you can do. Not that you care. Well, you shouldn't care what Poe thinks. You know each other—scratch that. You know him from the years spent in the Resistance, because, well, he's Poe Dameron. As for yourself, you're 99.9 percent positive the only reason he happens to know your name is because there's only fifteen of you still alive following the aftermath of Crait. Kinda hard not to know your fellow survivors.

You never minded it. You're used to being alone, pushed to the side where you could blend in like a shadow. Really, it's the only reason why you managed to escape the First Order. No one paid you half a mind when you slipped inside that ship and piloted away. Well...you were shot at shortly after, but that's not important.

You're not paying attention--lost inside your head again when the blast doors swoosh open. You don't even fucking see him until you collide head on for the second time today. With a strangled yelp, you both stumble and trip over a flailing limb here and a hidden wire there. The whole debacle ends up with you smacking the back of your head devastatingly hard on the duracrete floor and with Poe's entire weight once again crushing down on your chest cavity.

"Holy shit, Sparky," he groans. His head is nestled in the crook of your neck and if you weren't seeing stars spinning in your fucking orbit, you'd have the decency to be embarrassed. "You trying to kill me?"

"Un-Unsuc-successfully," you wheeze. "How-how m'I doing?"

He pulls away just a fraction, hovering so close that you feel his nose brush against yours. "A for effort. Though, I don't think you're really cut out to be an assassin. Might wanna reconsider that career path."

"Agreed."

Fuck. Your head is pounding. You don't even get to enjoy the way Poe feels pressed against you, or how good he smells. Maker, he smells good, something warm and woodsy, but fuck, you are in so much pain. Are you bleeding? You're pretty sure you're bleeding.

"Did you hit your head?" He asks, his plush lips twitching into a frown. He still hasn't moved from the current position of lying between your legs and it makes everything worse.

"I'm fine."

"You're not fine," he huffs. "I heard your head smack the ground, Sparky. Lemme see it."

Poe peels himself off of you and tugs you into a sitting position. You reel and squeeze your eyes shut as nausea punches through your gut and the edges of your vision go a bit fuzzy. Damn, you really did not plan on getting a concussion today, nor have Poe Dameron be the one to patch you up.

He sits behind you and as his calloused fingers sweep across the back of your neck, you tense up. Poe hesitates then, his fingertips ghost above the skin, barely there and you try to relax. Years spent in an organization where corporal punishment is encouraged will surely make one hesitant of touch and try as you might, it's a hard habit to curve.

"I'm just checking to see if you're bleeding," Poe says softly noting your tension. "Is that ok?"

You nod and wave his concerns away. "Yeah, s'fine."

He cradles the back of your neck in one calloused palm while the other gently cards through your hair. He sucks in an audible wince and icy panic floods your veins. He must sense your apprehension because his thumb unconsciously begins to rub tiny circles onto your skin.

"Don't freak out... But you have a teeny, tiny cut," he tells you. "Microscopic, really."

You're gonna die. Maker, you're gonna die because of that stupid fucking droid. You're going to smash that fucker into smithereens even if it's the last thing you do. You try and move, eyes locked on the piece of junk across the room, but Poe is hurriedly pushing you back down.

"Hey, whoa, whoa, whoa!" His hands are like metal clamps on your shoulders and you grunt in irritation. "Just sit. I'll go get a medkit. Nothing a little bacta won't fix."

He's right. You're overreacting, but that droid's beady little eye seems to sparkle with smug satisfaction at your demise. You glare and swear revenge.

Behind you, Poe runs to the wall where the kit hangs and hurries back with the spray on bacta canister. You barely feel it coat the back of your skull and then he's done. "See, I told you. It's already healing."

"Wow, thank the Maker that the joke of the Resistance is saved," you sigh. You reach up to touch the dully throbbing area but Poe smacks your hand away. "Ow!"

"Don't touch it." He chides.

You roll your eyes and turn your head to face him and jut a thumb over your shoulder, "How long do I have to wait until we get to fixing that piece of shit over there."

Poe blinks, glances at the droid then back to you. "I dunno, half an hour?"

"Half—Poe! Are you serious?" You hiss. "We're going to be here all night!"

The pilot has the audacity to shrug. You want to throttle him. "It's not like we have anywhere to be."

You open your mouth to protest, but once again he's right. You scowl and glare at the frayed laces of your boot. This is officially, the worst day you've ever had.

A prolonged silence, a bit awkward and filled with your obvious irritation, blankets the room. Poe has enough sense not to prod at your buttons and settles down to your right. Your head is starting to feel much better at least.

It continues like this. Neither of you speak for the better part of ten minutes and then, quietly, almost to too quiet, he says;

"You're not a joke, y'know."

Your brows furrow together and you pause. You look up and he's got that warm, familiar look again and it only brings a dull ache that eats away inside your chest. Part of you wants to agree, but that dark and nasty other part that lurks deep in your chest lashes it's claws out at the thought. He doesn't know you—doesn't know the pain you've been through. You don't want his pity.

You look away. "I...I don't think you know who I am, Poe."

Your teeth bite the inside of your cheek as you pick at the skin along your fingernails. You can feel his eyes crawl over your face and you do everything in your power not to catch his eye because tears are starting to prick at your eyes. Maker, why are you crying? This situation, in its entirety, is beyond stupid.

He says your name, your full name and the air in your lungs seizes. "I know you. You were a Lieutenant in the First Order before you came to us. I remember the day you arrived too."

You spare him a glance and he smiles.

"I remember 'cause that janky Xi-class you were piloting was blasted to hell and you somehow managed to park it without killing anyone. And then—this is my favorite part—you walk out, still in your uniform and you go 'I do hope I don't have to pay for parking'. And then you collapse face first onto the ground." Poe's chuckling as a blush flushes up to your ears. You recall. Vividly.

You snort and rub at your chin. "It wasn't all that amazing."

"Sparky, you stole a First Order ship and flew to a Rebel base. That's pretty ballsy."

You shrug.

"I also remember that time you tricked out Jess's rig with those mods. Me and Snap were jealous for weeks. And that time you spilled caf all over Leia's datapac. Remember that?" Poe says. His hand inches closer your knee. "And when you gave her that replacement one, all those ads about male enhancement pills and 'hot Twi'leks near YOU' kept popping up?"

"Arhg!" You cry, burying your face into your hands. You're pretty sure at this point you could fry an egg on your face from how hot your skin feels. "That was so fucking embarrassing. I-I can't—why would—ahg!"

"Kid, that was the funniest thing I've ever seen."

"That still makes me the butt of every joke! And I still can't even fix a droid properly!" You wail. "Or how about that time I dropped a crate of explosives? I might as well throw myself in a trash compactor."

Before you can even fucking blink, Poe's hands snatch up yours and hold them so firmly you have no choice but to look at him. "Sparky, listen to me."

You quite like the color of his eyes you come to find. A honeyed caramel, so rich that it'd take years to explore the countless layers. There's no malice, no hidden motives you can detect. Just pure, unrefined kindness and hope and—Stars, he's gorgeous.

His thumbs run across the slopes of your knuckles and it's electrifying. "You are one of the only people keeping the Resistance together."

"Bu-"

"Shut up. I'm not done."

You mouth zips shut

"You focus so much on the bad that you don't realize how much you contribute," he says with a gentle smile. "You maybe aren't the best with droids, but people? Sparky, so many of us look to you for hope. I know it's cheesy, but you really do brighten a room with your smile."

A tear trails down the curve of your cheek and he's quick to cradle your jaw and swipe it away with the pad of his thumb. "I don't know what we would—what I would do without you."

"Poe," his name comes out shaky and soft and you know he can feel your blush under his palm, "I—I...thank you."

His eyes flicker down to your parted mouth and then he brushes his thumb across the seam of your bottom lip. He leans in close enough that you can feel his lips just graze yours, warm breath fanning over your chin, and your eyes flutter shut.

"Can I kiss you?" He whispers against your lips. Fuck, he is so infuriatingly perfect, isn't he?

"Yes."  Maker, yes, yes, yes. That shouldn't even be a question.

The first kiss is fleeting. An innocent peck that flings open the gaping maw of your desire. Your hand shoots up, tangles in the thick curls atop his head and you drag him closer. He groans into your mouth, grabs at your neck and tilts your head, deepening the kiss. His tongue, hot and wet sweeps over your bottom lip and you readily open your mouth and let your tongue glide over his.

He's playful; breaking away to catch your bottom lip between his teeth, then releasing to hook the tip of his tongue into your top lip then swoop in for a lingering kiss. It's impossible to keep up—he dances to his own tune while you stumble along. There's no lack of enthusiasm on your part however and he isn't bothered in the slightest by the occasional bump of your nose or when the hard enamel of your teeth click together. Your whole juxtaposition changes, and you suddenly want to thank that dumb droid. You'd break a thousand of them if it meant you could continue forever on like this.

Poe eventually leans away, the hand tangled in your hair firm so that you're still only a hairsbreadth apart, carefully lowering himself down until you hover above him. His warm hand that leaves a burning trail down your waist, hooks around your thigh and helps tug your leg over his hips. You pull back to suck in air that's suddenly so difficult to inhale and Stars—he's a sight to see. Those lovely black curls are wild and untamed, his plush lips swollen and pouty because you won't give him another taste of your mouth. His chest heaves and your breath stutters as he plants his hands on the swell of your hips, thumb pressing lightly against the outcrop of bone there.

"Maker, you're gorgeous..." You murmur. You lean down and nestle your head in the crook of his neck, lips seeking out the soft skin above his collar. You trail your lips across the curve of his throat and as your teeth catch his earlobe then lick at the small divot behind his ear, a soft groan leaves his mouth.

"Are-aren't I the one—fuck," his hips twitch as you mouth beneath his stubbled jaw, "s'posed to say that?"

You grin and pull him into an opened mouth kiss. His tongue pulls yours into the wet heat of his mouth and sucks lightly. With a whine, your hips stutter forward as fiery heat trickles into your belly. You can feel the growing bulge in his pants, pressing against your inner thigh and shit—you need him.

Your hips rock forward on their own volition and Poe is quickly there to support as his hands grip you tighter and drag you down harder. He props his knees up and with a sharp moan and digs his clothed cock into the apex of your thighs. The fabric of your pants catches on your clit and it's good. Dry fucking Poe Dameron is a wish come fucking true, but it's not enough.

Poe's smirking as his fingers toy with the buckle of his belt. "You wanna take a ride, Sparky?"

You punch him in the arm.

"Ow!" he pouts. "What was that for?"

"Don't say that shit to me ever again."

His warm chuckle echoes through the room and sends a pleasant shiver down your spine. "What if I ask if you wanna ride my cock reeeal nice and slow? Feel how hot and tight your cunt is when you sink down onto me. You wan't me to say that?"

Paired with his voice, his strong hands grab your ass and roll his hips up into you and you're done for. You melt into his chest, whining out your affirmations and you don't care how he's already got you wrapped so tightly around his fucking finger.

"Take these off." He purrs, skimming his fingertips over the waistband of your trousers.

Somehow you manage to escape your boots and shuck your pants off through the haze of your arousal. When you return, he's got his pants halfway over his knees, pristine white shirt haphazardly torn open revealing the beautiful expanse of tan skin peppered with dark hair. You straddle his thighs, eyeing the tent in his boxers that leaves little to the imagination and the heat in the pit of your stomach swells.

Poe shoots you a coy grin and sweeps a hand down. He grips his cock, still hidden beneath the confines of his boxers, and gives it a teasing stroke. "You want me?"

"Poe," You whine. Stars, he's making this difficult.

He's smug as he slowly, to the point of teasing, tugs down his boxers with his other hand and eases out his cock. It's gorgeous like the rest of him, deliciously thick and curving towards his navel. Precum shines at the head that's flushed a deep maroon, darker than the rest of his sunkissed skin. You're mesmerized with the way he strokes himself; lazy and gentle, focusing on the head then dipping down to squeeze at the base.

His cock bounces as he lets go and snatches your hand that's lying limp over his hip. He guides it over the searing flesh and it feels like velvet covering reinforced durasteel. He swears as your thumb rubs over the head of his cock, wiping away the bead of liquid that pools there. You circle your fingers around his length and stroke down to cup his balls and he juts his hips into your hand.

Fuck. You want to suck him off. Feel him shake and twitch under your tongue and cum down your throat. Yet, as his fingers trail up your inner thigh and pass through the slick folds of your cunt, you are vividly reminded where else you want him.

"Shit," he breaths, circling your clit with the tip of his forefinger. "You're dripping."

Poe probes further, curling his fingers into your cunt, juuust pushing into your entrance until his fingers are shiny and slick with your arousal. He pulls back and you groan at the loss.

He sucks his fingers into his mouth and moans. Fuck, why is that so hot? It shouldn't be. "Can I eat you out, Sparky?"

He's digging his fingers into the flesh of your ass, tempting you closer and Maker it sounds good, but—"Later. Fuck me instead."

Poe's lips curl into a wicked smile. "Are you sure?"

His fingers return to your the soaking flesh between your legs and thumb at your swollen clit. You shudder, quickly catching his wrist. "Please."

"Fine," he grumbles. "Later."

Finally, you think as you hold his cock loosely and grind your slick folds against it. He makes a punched out sound when you raise your hips and move the blunt tip to your entrance. You slowly let him sink in, a long stuttered groan falling past his lips at the feel of your hot, tight walls stretching around his cock. Your own breath catches in your chest and you dig your nails into chest, leaving behind tiny crescent shaped dents.

—oh—shit—holy fucking shit.

His cock is catching every ridge and curve until the back of your thighs are seated on his. His eyes are squeezed shut and little gasps, as if he were in pain, are tumbling out every time you twitch around him. He's thick—deliciously so, and when you raise your hips and slide back down, his cock drags against your walls and presses in deep. You grind your hips down, catching your clit on his pubic bone and wildfire spreads throughout your whole frame.

"Ah, fuck," he moans. He gives your hips a squeeze and pulls you against him harder, guiding you into a slow, steady pace. "You fe-feel good. Knew-knew you would."

At this point you're hardly doing any work despite being on top; he has his knees propped up behind you and thrusts up into you then drags you back down by your hips. You're loosing your fucking mind like this. One of his hands drifts down and reaches for your clit, his middle finger stroking against the slick bundle of nerves and the fire in your belly quickly spreads down all the way to your toes. You're shaking, panting sharply, and Poe continues to toy with your clit paired with the even rolling of his hips.

"You gonna cum on my cock, Sparky?" Poe huffs out, grabbing a handful of your asscheek. "Yeah, just...just like that. Cum for me."

Your back arches and everything seizes up tighter than a fucking clamp, and with another pass along your aching clit, you burst hot and wet around his cock. With a hoarse cry, your core clenches and spasms through each one of his thrusts, stretching out your pleasure.

In one smooth, fluid move, Poe sits up and pushes you forward until your back hits the ground and he's towering over you. His hand is buried in your hair, cradling the sensitive area but you're still riding your high to notice the pain. With his free hand he hooks the back of your knee and folds it over his shoulder. Stars, you didn't even know your leg went up this far and when he roughly thrusts into you, the air in your lungs is sucked out and replaced with a strangled wheeze.

"You like that?"

You claw at his bicep as he kneels up and pounds down into you, hitting that heavenly spot within you. Your eyes roll back and Poe curls over you to nuzzle into your damp skin, teeth digging into the exposed skin above the collar of your shirt you never bothered taking off. His thrusts are slowly reaching the pace you need him to go and you bury your fingers in his hair and pull. His moan vibrates over your skin.

"Harder." You order. "P-Poe. I-I n-need—"

Poe digs his teeth in between the junction of your shoulder, slips his cock nearly all the way out of your cunt, then slams it back in deep. It's fast and brutal, and you can hear your flesh slap together, hear the obscene squelching noice your cunt makes from how wet you are. Your face burns in embarrassment, but he's hitting something so devastatingly wonderful that you don't really give a shit.

He's grunting in your ear, whispering praise—how wet you are and how perfect you whine and beg for him. He's plowing into you and you're close. So close to the edge again.

"Fuck," he growls, "m'gonna cum. Where—where do—"

"Anywhere," you gasp, arching into him. "In-in me. Cum inside."

Poe's hips stutter. The fist in your hair tightens and he rocks his hips into three—maybe four times before the muscles in your back stiffen and everything blurs and goes out of focus. White hot pleasure rips you apart, floods each cell with razor sharp heat as your body convulses in ecstasy.

He's hissing out swears between his clenched teeth, as his hips jolt and grinds himself balls deep inside you. Poe captures your lips and feel him pulse and throb, chest heaving, as his load, thick and hot, spurts into you and coats your walls.

Poe keeps you pinned there as his hips shallowly rock into you, savoring the last dregs of his orgasm as you catch your breath. He stills and you two lay there, filling the room with your gentle pants. Your knee slips off his shoulder and he moves to plant a lazy kiss on the corner of your mouth and pulls out. His cum trickles out after and drips down your slit but you're too spent to care right now.

He lifts his head that's resting on your sternum. "How's your head, Sparky?"

"Wha—oh." Truth is you hardly feel it now. The bacta truly does work wonders. "S'fine. Never better."

He shoots you a dashing smile, the gap in his teeth and his boyish air makes your head spin. "Wanna take me out for another spin, then?"

"Poe!"

And the droid never did get fixed...Oh well...

[schrijverr]

Authentic

While writing HNOC, Jonny suddenly puts on an accent, when it isn’t well recieved at first, he gets weird. He is withdrawn and agreeble, concerned the others corner him and find out it is his original accent. He storms off and is comforted by Brian.

On AO3.

Ships: none

Warnings: none really, but tell me if I missed one or if you want me to tag something!

~~~~~~~~~~

Brian had not been pleased when he had finally been freed from the core of the sun around which Fort Galfridean had orbited, but he’d cheered up a bit after the Mechs had agreed this tale was good enough to be told.

They’d started writing it. First getting a feel for the songs to see, which voice fitted where, shots had been fired, First Mates had died, nothing important. An outline had been made as well, giving a broad idea of the spoken parts and the songs.

Now they were sitting in a circle with their instruments, ready to try some melodies and tweak the lyrics. They had agreed on the beginning, mostly, the first part was written down and Ashes said: “I think we should have Lavinia Stone explain why they’re going to shoot.”

“You mean when she told them they could run the town if they killed her and took her sheriff star?” Brian asked.

“Yeah, that.” Ashes replied, “You know what she told them exactly?”

Brian thought for a second, then unsure said: “I think she used son of a bitch? Maybe tin star and rightwise sheriff of the town or something in that direction? Does that help?”

“Yeah, that might work.” Jonny agreed, “Uhm, what about something like this: Any sonnabitch can pull this tin star from me, makes ‘em rightwise sheriff o’ this town.”

He scratched his nose and shook his head as he whispered to himself: “No, needs a few more words.”

Clicking his tongue he thought for a second, then his face lit up and he proudly said: “Any sumbitch can pull this tin star from my stone cold hands, makes ‘em rightwise sheriff o’ this here town. ‘Cause she’s Lavinia STONE.”

The smirk turned into a frown when he looked at the others. All had a confused expression on their face, eyes filled with question marks. Jonny had no clue what that was about and muttered: “We don’t have to use that part, geez. Just tell me if it sucks.”

That snapped most out of it and Tim said: “No, it’s not that, just wow, that was weird.”

“What?” now it was Jonnys turn to be confused.

“Did you not hear what you just did?” Ashes asked.

“I suggested something for the song and you all got weird about it.” Jonny frowned, not comprehending what they were getting at.

Ashes facepalmed and Tim exclaimed: “The fucking accent, Jonny, where the fuck did that come from?”

Understanding appeared on Jonnys face and lightly embarrassed he shrugged: “Thought it might be fun. Brian said some of them talked funny and from his horrible impersonation, I gathered it sounded something like this. Besides, it adds a bit to the atmosphere, right?”

The others found that explanation enough and agreed that it did sound fun, before they moved on to the next part, squabbling like normal until Brian came in and Galahad was introduced.

Lyrics was as easy as it had ever been, which is to say not that easy but with years of practice they managed, and it was only when they did a quick test run that it went wrong. Jonny was in the middle of his part when Tim interrupted: “Do you have to give him the accent too?”

Jonny stopped mid sentence and indignantly asked: “What’s wrong with the accent?”

“It’s inconsistent.” Tim told him.

“What! My accent is not inconsistent, what are you on about?” Jonny exclaimed, getting offended and a bit of fear, that no one could place, creeping into his voice.

Brian tried to keep the peace and said: “I think what Tim means is that none of us are using an accent, so although it is accurate it might be weird that only some of the characters have it, you know?”

“Well, why don’t y’all do the accent too then?” Jonny pouted.

“Oh, really, letting it bleed over now are you. What are you trying to prove?” Tim snapped.

If anyone had been paying close attention they would have seen that Jonny flinched back slightly at that, but no one did.

“I think none of us can keep that up, Jonny.” Brian tried to placate him, “You already said I did a horrible job at it.”

Jonny sighed and moped: “Okay, fine, but I personally think it sounds better with the accent.”

“Sure, lets just start from the top again.” Ashes said.

They all got in position again and started again. This time when they got to Galahads part, Jonny played up his normal British accent as much as possible. He was stopped again, this time by Marius: “Really, Jonny? Just because you don’t like it, doesn’t mean you don’t get to take it seriously.”

“I am taking it seriously, I did exactly what you wanted. Nothing is good enough around here.” Jonny pouted earnestly.

“Why are you so insistent on using the accent?” Marius asked him.

Jonny opened his mouth, but closed it before a sound could come out and bit his lip. He swallowed and shrugged: “I’m not, just sang like normal. But also it’s accurate? And it sounds better?”

He grabbed some notes for the next part and explained: “I mean what sounds better out of the two of these: ‘Don’t recall asking for your opinion, son.’ or ‘I don’t think I asked for you input, my friend’?”

“If you exaggerate it like that, of course it will sound dumb, but the accent you’re doing is even dumber.” Tim said, not willing to abandon his side and say Jonny was right.

Some of the others agreed and something shut behind Jonnys eyes as he relented.

The others were glad this wouldn’t end as a big fight, which would be a mess to clean up, but Jonny wasn’t the same afterwards. He kept his mouth shut most of the time, no banter and no unnecessary commentary.

They tried to go on, but with Jonnys mood it was almost impossible, so they decided to leave finishing and cultivating the first draft for later and take a break.

The moment it was decided Jonny was out of the room, yelling something over his shoulder about a smoke, despite the fact that smoking was allowed everywhere on the Aurora. No one stopped him, however, just watching him go. Tim commented: “The asshole.”

Ashes smirked and Marius rolled his eyes, but Brian was a bit concerned about their First Mates reaction. Still, he knew following him and asking if he was alright, wouldn't be appreciated, so he left him to himself, but he resolved to keep an eye on him.

It seemed to be over the next day, Jonny had shut up about the accent and everything went on as normal, he did sound more British than normal, though, but not enough to be truly notable.

There did seem to be less fighting, though. Every time it seemed a fight would’ve normally broken out between Jonny and someone else (Jonny was usually the one fighting the most), Jonny would relent and let the other do their thing.

At first, no one was questioning this sudden change of character since it made the process go a whole lot smoother. Brian had frowned at the start, but Jonny didn’t seem to mind still just grinning like normal, so he hadn’t said anything about it.

Then that changed.

They’d finished the first draft and although no one member was more important than the other, it was the collective group that made it the best. And while Jonny wasn’t always prominent in the writing of the notes you could see him reflected in the lyrics, but his presence was now obviously missing.

This became even more apparent when they played it for the first time, stopping from time to time to make notes and suggestions.

Everyone had picked up on it, everyone except Jonny apparently. He was either playing oblivious or really hadn’t noticed the others silences that he hadn’t filled when they were taking suggestions on parts he hadn’t had a say in yet.

They were a bit sick of it. Was he still mad at them for yesterday? He seemed fine, but they all had masks. Was he deliberately being an asshole in the hope they would apologize or something? No, he wouldn’t do that, well he would be a deliberate asshole, but not over this. Unless this wasn’t like normal?

“What do you think, Jonny?” Brian asked.

“Hm?” Jonny looked up, “Oh, uhm, seems fine.”

He smiled at them, but they weren’t really sure he knew what it was about with the way his eyes were a bit distant.

“What were we talking about?” Tim asked, getting a bit frustrated.

Jonny blinked and uncertainly said: “The lyrics for the song about Mordred returning to the Saxons?”

“No,” Tim sighed, “about the love song between the three Pendragons. Are you even paying attention?”

He winced and replied: “Yes, just got a tad distracted. What was the original question?”

Tim was about to get angry, so Brian intervened: “I was wondering what you thought. This part here doesn’t flow so well.”

Brain pointed at the sheet in Jonnys hand and Jonny read it out loud to himself: “Guinevere you’re my stars, Arthur you’re my night. I know we have to ride at the dawns first light. And I’m not saying that this crusade isn’t right. But first we fuel a few more sins with whiskey.”

Jonny was quiet as he thought. He seemed to come up with something, because his eyes did the light up thing they always got when he had an idea, but then they dulled and he didn’t say a thing.

After a while he shrugged and said: “I don’t know.”

Now everyone was getting worried. If there was one thing Jonny loved, it was stealing the show by coming up with something and fixing a problem. It could be annoying if it wasn’t helpful.

He did not stay silent.

“Are you sure?” Brian asked, “It seemed like you thought of something.”

Jonny bit his lip, before carefully saying: “I thought- uhm, maybe? I think I could fix it, but I don’t know if you’ll like it.”

“Why do you think that? We won’t know unless we’ve heard it, so just tell us and we’ll decide ourselves.” Brian encouraged him.

Nodding slightly, Jonny started to sing: “Guinevere you’re my stars, Arthur you’re my night. I know we’ve got to ride at the dawns first light. And I ain’t saying this preacher man’s crusade ain’t right. But first we fuel a few more sins with whiskey.”

Jonny tried to gauge their reactions and quickly said: “I know y’all don’t like the accent and think it’s dumb, but the words make it fit better. Of course, we don’t have to do it. It was just a suggestion, you know.”

“No, no, that fits.” Ashes told him.

His shoulder sagged a bit with relief and he smiled at them before he wrote the new lyrics down. He did not notice he was the only one changing the lyrics.

While he was doing that, Brain and Marius shared a concerned look that the others caught on to and made them look at Jonny again and think. Then Marius said: “Hey, Jonny?”

“Yes?” Jonny asked looking up.

“Why do you know so much about this one accent and use of language?” Marius replied, immediately adding: “Not that that’s a bad thing of course, just curious.”

“I don’t know that much about it.” Jonny dodged the question.

“Yes, you do.” Tim inserted himself into the conversation as well.

Jonny huffed and crossed his arms as he said: “It doesn’t matter, why do you care so much anyway. I thought you found it dumb.”

“Because you’re suddenly acting weird after we brought it up.” Tim exclaimed.

That startled Jonny a bit, but he yelled back: “I do not.”

“Yes, you are.” Tim frowned angrily and began to list, “You’re not making useless comments, no banter, exaggerating your British accent, you’re not giving your own opinions, you’re fucking agreeable, Jonny. You’re never agreeable, so excuse us for wanting to know what the fuck is going on with you.”

“There’s nothing going on with me, I tried something and it failed, so I shut up.” Jonny spat, “I’m fine.”

“What did you try? What on earth did you try to make you act like this when it failed.” Tim had stood up now to continue their fighting match, properly.

Brian, however, wasn’t having it and pushed him back down in his seat as he shouted: “Lets all just calm down for one second, okay.”

Both took a deep breath and just glared at each other.

Gently Marius broke the silence: “Jonny, you try a lot of things that don’t succeed, why does this one bother you so much. I know Tim wasn’t the best at telling you this, but we’re just worried about you.”

Jonny swallowed heavily and blinked heavily a few times. He tried to start a few times, but then just stopped, choosing to dismiss it: “It’s not that big of a deal.”

“The more you dodge it, the more it seems like a big deal and we’re not continuing until you tell us.” Ashes told him. From where they were resting on the couch, all sprawled out, they looked like how they’d been when they were Hades. The royal feeling rolled off of them and Jonny couldn’t help, but listen.

“It’s, uhm, I’m from New Texas.” he finally settled on saying.

When that didn’t clear anything up he explained: “It’s not the same system as orbited around Avalon, but it’s close.”

The realization dawned on everyone that the accent they’d thought he’d been putting on was his original accent and the way he spoke now could be considered him putting on an accent. They’d never realized that he could have a different accent since the rest of them, except for Nastya, had the same one.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, Jonny. We hadn’t realized.” Brian said.

Jonny squirmed in his place uncomfortably and shrugged: “It’s no big deal.”

“Seems like it is though, I know you don’t like me psychoanalyzing you, but this made you more upset than anything else I’ve seen.” Marius told him.

That earned him a scowl from Jonny, who replied: “Stay away from my brain, Marius. It’s none of your business.”

Meanwhile, Tim was still thinking about Jonnys change of accent without really paying attention to what the others were saying, so he blurted out: “So where did your accent go then? Nastya still had hers, despite being on this ship for quite a long time.”

The scowl deepened and Jonny said: “That’s also none of your fucking business.”

“Does it have anything to do with why you’re so upset?” Marius asked.

Completely fed up, Jonny roared: “Yes.” and stomped off.

As they watched him go, Ashes commented: “That could’ve gone a lot smoother.”

Beside them Brian pinched his nose and sighed: “Yes. Yes, it could have.”

“Should we go check on him?” Tim asked,a bit taken aback by the reaction and feeling guilty a bit too.

“No, I think we’ve done enough for today. I’ll check up on him in a few hours.” Brian told him.

The rest of the day came and went and soon it was time for Brian to see how their First Mate was fairing. He hesitated outside his room for a second, then he knocked.

It was quiet for a beat, then he hear Jonnys voice: “What do you want?”

“It’s me, Brian. I came to check up on you. I know you don’t want me to, but just open the door so I  can see you’re at least a bit okay and I’ll leave you alone.” Brian answered.

He heard grumbling, but also movement, so he smiled at his little victory.

The door slid open and Jonny looked at the ground and said: “See, I’m fine. Now go away.”

Brian raised a brow and rolled his eyes, before he squatted down a bit and gently put a finger under Jonnys chin to raise his face to make eye contact. Jonnys eyes were shining with the wetness of tears not yet fallen, but his makeup hadn’t been smudged, which Brian counted as a win.

What he didn’t count as a win, however, was that Jonny wasn’t even fighting him about this treatment. He just stood there silently and stared at Brian, all fight drained out of his body with the opening of his door.

Brian broke the silence softly: “If you want I can leave now, but I’m happy to stay. You don’t have to talk, just company.”

Jonny worried his lip between his teeth as a mental battle waged behind his eyes. Then he quietly said: “Don’t tell the others?”

“Of course not.” Brian replied with a kind smile, closing the door behind him as he lead Jonny to his bed.

Brian leaned against the wall and allowed Jonny to crawl up beside him, before pulling the blanket over the two of them. He gently rubbed Jonnys back and sat quietly with his eyes closed and his mind calm.

He knew Jonny was more tactile than he’d have you believe. All the crew was familiar with the ways he would brush up against people, accidentally bump into them or started a fistfights when he was feeling lonely.

No one ever said anything about it, but they tried their best to pander to it. Everyone had something after all.

After nearly thirty minutes of comfortable silence Jonny said: “I know it’s stupid to be upset about. I just- never mind.”

“It isn’t stupid at all.” Brian told him.

“Yes, it is.” Jonny moped, “Just because she beat it out of me doesn’t mean that it isn’t just an accent.”

He didn’t even seem to realize what he had just confessed, instead angrily staring at Brians thigh and plucking on a lose thread of Brians pants, Brian knew he would probably offer to fix it later as a thank you or apology, unable to voice it.

Brian carded a hand through Jonnys hair and said: “You know, I don’t even speak this language.”

“What?” Jonny asked, not looking up, but leaning into the touch.

“I borrowed a book from Ivy about my own planet, it talked about the language and how it’s one of the few places that hasn’t switched to Basic yet. There was a passage in the language, but I couldn't understand a word, not programmed for it, I guess.” Brian explained.

“Oh, I’m- I’m sorry, that sucks.” Jonny mumbled.

Brian shrugged and said: “Yeah, kind of. I know I’m not that Brain, never really was, but it still hurt. I locked myself at the helm for two months to process. Isn’t that stupid?”

“No. No, it’s not.” Jonny frowned, plucking harder, “That’s upsetting to learn, you just reacted like anyone else would.”

“You’re right.” Brian agreed, for a moment Jonny was confused, but then Brian cleared it up: “So, why is it stupid when you’re upset?”

“I don’t know.” Jonny pouted.

“You don’t have to know. Sometimes a brain is just stupid, but that has nothing to do with you. You’re allowed to just be upset.” Brian told him.

Jonny huffed: “You sound like Marius.”

“Marius isn’t always wrong, even when he is an idiot from time to time.” Brian said.

They fell into a comfortable silence again after that. The rhythmic motion of Brian petting Jonnys hair soothing them both.

Then after a while, Brian said: “For the record, I liked the accent you gave Galahad, you really sounded like him. Tim probably did too, he just wanted a fight I think.”

“Really?” Jonny asked after a beat of silence.

Brian smiled: “Yeah, really. I think that if you bring it up again, the others are probably a lot more receptive. You know how they love dramatics and what is more dramatic then an album with authentic vocabulary and accents just for accuracy?”

Jonny grinned: “Not much.”

“Exactly.” Brian nodded, then he stayed silent until Jonny had fallen asleep.

The next morning the two of them made their way to breakfast. Jonny was his chipper self again and bounced around Brian as he excitedly told him about the dream he had in which it had been him against an entire army, pretty violent over all, but Jonny had won and found himself quite the badass, despite the fact that it was a dream and he had not actually done that.

He didn’t even notice how the others lost their tenseness when he’d come in. All had been afraid that he would still be upset, but it seemed Brian had been a good influence.

They all ate, before going back to the practice room. The plan was to start going over everything again, just the next draft until everything was perfect, but before they could start Jonny nervously asked: “Hey, uhm, I was just wondering if y’all’d be okay if I tried the accent again with Galahad. I think it would enrich the album and if all y’all don’t like it, we can scrap it again.”

“I think that would be a great idea, Jonny.” Marius smiled at him.

Relief washed over Jonnys face and he smiled back.

In the end they kept the accent in there and watching Jonny go apeshit every single time he got to perform Hellfire was completely worth it.

[ren-c-leyn]

The Last Job

Another fusion story, this one is a little different, though, as it’s a sci-fi instead of my usual fantasy ones. It’s made up of this prompt by @oopsprompts, this prompt by @coffin-prompts, this prompt by @thependragonwritersguild, these 1,2 prompts by @thewholekitandkabobble, this prompt by @scandy-inspo, these 1,2,3,4,5,6 prompts by @humdrummoloch, and these 1,2,3,4,5,6 by @givethispromptatry.

 This one is a tale of crime and betrayal. There’s some fight scenes and swearing, but nothing gory. 

 I wish we got warnings for the important things. We only seem to have them for what’s absolutely meaningless. And of all of the warning labels I should have gotten in my life, Jean’s should have been the brightest, most eye-burning, shades of red and yellow.

 Sure, I knew things didn’t always turn out how you wanted them to. Sometimes life didn’t work out like you planned. Sometimes life really didn’t work out like you planned. Sometimes life looks at your plan, scoffs, and makes an illegal u-turn into on coming traffic. But when she was around, it was ten times more likely that that u-turn would lead to a head-first collision with an explosion of chemicals and gunfire.

 But here I was, standing in the shadows of a ship with her, going over an insane plan we’d never follow for the last time.

 “I really don’t like this.”

 “Come on. This is tame compared to some of the things I’ve asked you to do in the past,” she replied, rotating the holographic projection of the blueprints.

 “Which is why I know it will go horribly wrong.”

 “You worry too much,” she said as she clicked the projection off. “It’ll be fine.”

 “Is this legal?”

 “A little late to be asking that, isn’t it?”

 I frowned.

 “So it’s not.”

 She snorted, a prideful smirk pulling onto her lips.

 “Half the things we do aren’t, but that’s never stopped us before. Now come on, we’ve got money to make.”

 With that, she tuned the com channel to her favorite music playlist, the thrum of Plutoian club music ringing in my ears, and then she clicked on her hover boots to begin entry plan. I grumbled but sighed, following after.

 We followed the schematics she had gotten a hold of, easily slipping past the initial defenses before stopping at a terminal.

 “Okay, now shut it down.”

 I took a seat and swiped the card, getting a deeper and deeper sinking feeling with each line of code I bypassed. This seemed... heavier than what we normal dealt with. Advanced well beyond what I would expect.

 “Jean, what’s the target?”

 She grinned at me.

 “Enough to set us up for life.”

 That didn’t make me feel any better, but I finished turning off the cameras and sensors. But I didn’t see that one string of code until it was too late.

 “Shit.”

 “What?”

 “I accidentally activated the drones.”

 “Then turn them off!”

 “I can’t, it’s locked me out of the system.”

 “Fuck, new plan then, let’s get our asses moving.”

 We sprinted down the halls, only for her to come to a skidding halt, swearing under her breath.

 “What now?”

 “Warrick.”

 “Whose Warrick?”

 “Oh... just someone I screwed over and probably wants me dead.”

 I gave her a blank stare.

“Is there anyone who doesn’t want you dead?”

 She started moving her fingers, like she was counting on them, before giving up and shrugging.

 “Probably not. But we have bigger fish to fry, so prepare yourself for plan X.”

 “Not again....”

 “Quit bitching and get ready.”

 With that, she drew her laser pistol and stepped out of the shadows. A well placed shot took out the drone, but there seemed to be more guards than just Warrick. The biggest of the group pulled some sort of bladed weapons from his belt.

 “Surrender now, before my-!”

 “Ok!” She sat with crossed legs and placed her hands on the top of her head.

 “I- really?”

 “Dude, you look like if you shrugged the world would shift in orbit. I know when to not tempt death.”

 The thin man, whom I assumed was Warrick, frowned at that reply, but held his tongue.

 “Right then... Warrick, deal with her.”

 Warrick stepped up and put her into some sort of restraining hold. I waited for the signal, the high-pitched hum of the music grating on my already fraying nerves.

 “If you don’t think I’m going to bite you to get out of this hold you are going to have to think twice,” she teased, flashing her modified canines at him.

 He scoffed.

 “As if you could reach.”

 She grinned, and then jerked into motion. Her skull came up against his chin as she pitched her weight to knock them both off balance. Warrick recovered partly, but left himself open to those stupidly long fangs. She flipped the music to a deep, foreboding beat. My signal.

 I set my pistol to stun and dropped the big guy first. The smallest member of the party caught on and tried to run from the madness, but I shot them in the back. Then, with measured steps, I went to Jean and Warrick, dragging her off of the poor guy before stunning him too.

 “Awwww... but I was having fun.’

 I rounded on her.

 “The rules! You swore you’d....”

 “Never kill, never smuggle weapons or drugs, and never target good people. Yes, yes, I remember.”

 I pointed down at the bloodied man at my feet.

 “That doesn’t fucking look like you remember.”

 “He won’t die.”

 I frowned at her before snarling.

 “I hate you.”

 “I know.”

 “If we get out of the alive I’m quitting.”

 “That’s fair, but first we have to get out alive, and I do believe there’s more of their pet robots running around.”

 I sighed as she pushed passed me before following. A drone popped up in front of us, and she hauled off and punched it out of reflex. I tried not to laugh as she swore and shot it a couple of times.

 “What’s so damn funny back there?”

 “It’s just.... What kind of idiot punches a robot in the face?”

 “The same kind of idiot that works with people like you, now move.”

 We finally made it to a round room with a large computer terminal.

 “I’ll get...”

 She held up her hand.

 “No, I’ve got this. It’s done in Jupiter code.”

 “Oh, yeah, in that case I’ll keep an eye out for drones.”

 She smiled and sat down, running her fingers over the keys. Then, the door we entered through fell and locked. I blinked as I heard her swear.

 “Shiiiiiiiit.”

 “I’m gonna assume that’s not supposed to happen?”

 “Would I be saying ‘shit’ if it was!?”

 “Guess not.”

 She sighed.

 “Okay, can you go see if you can get it open with the keypad while I try to fix this?”

 “Sure.” I turned to go back to the door, but couldn’t help but feel a little uneasy about this situation.

 We didn’t have the time to fight with doors when there were security drones and guards who could come for us at any second. Yet, Jean’s typing was unhurried, casual, calm. 

“Can I be real with you for a second?”

 “Sure,” I said, though I was a bit distracted with trying to power up the keypad.

 “I’m starting to doubt if this is worth it.”

 It took me a moment to process those words.

 “After all of this time, Jean?” I asked as I popped a small panel out of the wall so I could get at the wiring. “What’s changed your mind?”

 “I just realized... that I have different goals now, you know? This has been fun and all, but I’m craving... a different kind of thrill. Something more.”

 I hummed as I attempted to rewrite the door to bypass whatever she did.

 “And I’ve realized something.”

 I paused, noticing that her voice sounded a closer, and that the typing had stopped.

“You’ve done nothing but hold us back. You and your silly little ideals. Keeping us from the big money, keeping us too far below the radar for the good jobs, keeping us just far enough on the light side to make contacts wary of us. It’s so stupid, and, well, in conclusion: you are an idiot. I know you meant well, but a well-intentioned idiot is still an idiot. And you know I don’t work with idiots.”

 I looked over at her, my blood went cold as my hands shook slightly. Her pistol was pointed at me, glowing with red light. And on her face was that expression I had grown to know and hate. It was a look of mockery.

 “I’ll give you three seconds to run.”

 I froze for second one as my mind tried to catch up to what was happening, but on second two my instincts took over. The screaming laughter of Plutoian club music beat in my ears as the blood and adrenaline rushed through my veins. The pistol was in my hands and pointed back at her. On second three, we both fired.

 I was on the ground, bleeding out as the howling lyrics ran through my ears. I heard her laughter only distantly as she stepped in time with the music. She stood over me with a smirk, pointing the gun down at my face.

 “Any last words, dear partner?”

 I somehow found the nerve to smirk back at her.

 “What about the rules? You promised....”

 “Rules and promises are only good for making people dead, like you.”

 She began to squeeze the trigger.

 “So it’s my fault for believing you....” I sighed as I let my head drop onto the floor in defeat. “I always knew I’d die to this song. Kill me at the chorus, yeah?”

 “Fine,” she replied with a smile.

 We both listened to the garbled remix of a song about regrets for a moment, counting down the beats to my demise. Just before the fated moment came, the door exploded open, and everything went black.

 When I woke up, I was wrapped up in some light fabric. There was the whooshing noise of waves, and a shrill cry of some sort of birds. Slowly, very slowly, I forced myself to sit up before looking around.

 It was so beautiful, the light of dawn cresting the waves. The air smelled wonderful and felt even better. Had it not been for the pain and bloodstains, I would have thought I had died and somehow reached heaven.

 I didn’t know how I came to be in that beautiful place, and I honestly didn’t care. I  just stared out at the waves rising as they moved closer to the shore. The thrum of betrayal still ached through my veins. The empty space beside me seemed to howl and scream, refusing to let me think of anything else.

[whiskeyworen]

That was a hell of an Adventure!

More Sea of Thieves adventures here! So last night, me and my friend decided to bite the bullet and try for the first Tall Tale mission series; Shores of Gold. It was pretty neat that every character we interacted with actually had dialogue and animation beyond the usual idles, and that even the skeletons talked, at least to each other (on islands where we had the mission stuff. Normal skeletons just babbled that grating rasp they usually do). It should have been an easy run but... as usual, the Seas were against us.

Right from the get-go, we ran into issue; upon leaving port, we discovered there were at least THREE active Player Galleons in the area, and most of them were... let’s just say they were either orbitting or at station-keeping near the islands we absolutely NEEDED to go onto. A few of them we waited out until they decided to do other stuff, but at least twice, a Galleon would suddenly turn around and start moving to get into a firing position, and we were forced to flee. One of the times, the other ship (while firing at us from long range) had caught some fantastic wind and had managed to cut across our course. I saw them coming, and had planned to swoop right by under their bow and kind of do a quick 90 turn and head on a new tack while they struggled to turn their pig of a ship (I’ve done this before with great success), but I misestimated just how good that wind of theirs was. So instead of cutting across their bow... I plowed our sloop almost perpendicular to them, catching them just off the starboard bow. Tremendous impact. My friend was already below decks filling holes, so before impact I was letting him know what was coming and to be FAST on those repairs. BLAM! Smashed into ship. My friend ran up to the deck, unloaded a surprising FIVE cannon shot directly into their starboard lower hull, before rushing back down to patch the holes my blunder had knocked in us. I turned us 90 to starboard to cut us away from the ship, and put us at full, perfect wind away from them. Our aft was exposed to them while we ran, but given the fact we’d just punched a LOT of holes in their hull, and galleons are bitch to fix even with full crew, we managed to gain a lot of ground. That must have been enough for that crew, because instead of chasing us, they turned and either headed back to port, or headed out on whatever their mission actually was. I’d like to think my kamikaze run on them scared the crap out of them. Or that they were so low on repair tools they needed to find landfall fast to keep the boat floating. LoL A few other galleons later, and a few Megalodon attacks later, we managed to get to a few of the islands we needed. Uneventful stuff, honestly. Well, except for that time another team had come swooping in, and we had to book it. As a matter of security, only one of us was ever off the ship at a time, so the other could escape getaway with our ship. This saved our hides no less than FIVE times. At one point, during a ‘Hunt the Skeleton Lord’ mission, my friend was left on shore while I had to run for open water. I didn’t go far though; a little ways away there was a cluster of jagged, giant rocks in rough water. I carefully moved directly between them, to a place no ship would want to chase me without CAREFUL moves, and killed my acceleration. Not anchored; I wanted a bit of drift. I sat there, relaying what I was doing while my friend relayed his encounters on the island. Apparently he ambushed a team of FOUR and beat the tar out of them, and then used the island’s guns to punch about ten holes in the hull of their parked ship. He told me later that they seemed really unskilled in combat, and we found out much later that they had left a bunch of chests either half-dug or undug all over the place. My friend felt bad because it’s very possible he’d encountered a squad of true new people, under the guidance of one medium player, and he’d absolutely destroyed their treasure hunting fun. I felt bad too..for a moment. Then I pointed out that this crew might have been the ones chasing and firing on us earlier. In which case, they’re not all THAT nice...just unskilled.  Once they get skilled, they’re a threat. Fastforward a while, and we finally get back to port to finish the Shroudbreaker mission (part 1 anyway), and I’m scouring the island for supplies. Then...this happens. Me: *turns a corner and finds a badly beaten Sloop parked off shore, completely opposite of where ours was supposed to be parked* “Oh shit! There’s a sloop here! Get the ship and get the hell out of here!” Friend: “Uh, yeah I know. There’s someone on OUR ship right now.” Me: “What?! What are they doing? Can you fight them off?!” Friend: “They’re.. They’re repairing our hull?” Me: “Repairing our... what? They’re actually fixing the ship??” At this point the other Sloop comes apart as the player scuttles her. Friend: “Yeah. They fixed one of the holes I missed I guess. And now they’re cooking food.” Me: “I’m totally confused now. You mean they’re not trying to raid us?” Friend: “Doesn’t look like it. I’m checking our stuff, but I don’t see anything missing. They’re just...cooking food below decks right now. You gotta come see this.” So I did. Sure enough, waiting for me on the upper deck with a freshly cooked splashtail was a female avvie player by the name of BlackByrd something. Had a bunch of numbers. They offered me the fish, which I took, gave my thanks, and then... they went to a part of the ship and started fishing. I didn’t know what to make of this. We had a mission to do that might take us into Red Water territory (with the mission making the area safe for us), but if this person hung onto our ship, they’d die when we hit red water. They hadn’t done anything hostile, and in fact, were just... they were just fishing. So we took a break. All three of us just fished for like, an hour, cooking food and stuff. It was surreal. Finally we decided to head out. Seems that BlackByrd didn’t have a mic, and was playing the PC version of the game, because they had access to the chat window. So we headed for a few of the closer island to get stuff we needed, while they kept fishing off the bow of the ship. Sadly, our surreal little experience with our hitchhiker finally came to an end. Not a bad end, but a sad one. As we started to head into the Wilds, Blackbyrd stopped fishing and came up to the wheeldeck and waved at me. So I waved back. They turned to my friend and waved to him, and he too, returned the wave. Then they jumped overboard. I guess it was time for them to go, or they didn’t want to go on OUR adventure, preferring to fish instead. I wish them the best. They reminded me that not ALL players want to massacre each other. There were a few other encounters, but the last one that stood out was a Skeleton ship that had somehow managed to not only jam its bow into the docks of Plunder Outpost, but had physically bottomed out her hull on the shoreline beneath, stopping her dead. We didn’t think Skeleton ships could even get NEAR outposts, but this one looked legitimately docked (which can’t happen. It was just jammed in so perfectly). Of course, we took a bunch of potshots at it, and cracked its hull with our only explosive barrel. We even got aboard and raided a few of its treasures before the crew realized we were there. (literally walked on from the dock. That’s how close they were) Btw, this was a tough ship; all the deck crew were gold-plated skeletons, while they had about 7 below decks crew of Crew Skeletons (as opposed to normal skeletons). Crew have slightly higher reflex rate and MUCH better aim. Long story short, that ship bellied out enough that game physics required it to roll off the sandbar and into deeper water. So we chased it around the island, before I managed to trick it into literally ramming the side of the island where it is rocky. She LIFTED out of the water. Only her rudder was still in the soup. By this point we were angry that such a simple shipkill had become an annoyance (seventeen Jigballs fired at us, as well as continuous Anchorballs gets you that way), so we used up the last of our cannonshot pounding her until she finally keeled. She keeled right at the secondary docks, so we just parked, waited, and claimed our glory. Missions accomplished, next step completed, and treasure turned in, we logged out for the night. It wasn’t the best run. But it was interesting. Hope BlackByrd caught a nice fish while we were gone.

[aliens-and-shiz]

Part 20: loss

More at: @aliens-and-shiz

The day began for President Falhaven as any other day. A report on the well being of the United States of America. He’s a proud American, as any other one should. From the tip of South America to the North Pole, he was in charge of half of humanity’s home planet. And some would say another third of the human race, populating Venus and Mars, although he allowed them to run a seemingly independent government.

“Sir, General Thane-“

“Ah fuck that bitch. Let me guess, raise the defcon again?”

“Yes sir.”

“Fuck that. Nothings going to happen. Unless someone has escaped our Vesta Prison, or the Lunar Colonies want independence, don’t give me any news today about space. Now then, what’s the situation in the Rockies?”

“Sir, the third civil war is continuing in our favor. Those who still hold the values from the losing side of the second civil war in 2019 are as stubborn as ever. But, it’s contained in the mountains, and I do not recommend moving ground troops into the mountains, rather to perform an orbital strike and cleanse the area in two weeks time.”

“Sounds good to me. Anything else?”

“China and Russia are bickering as always. The African Federation wishes to annex Egypt as well and control the continent, but Egypt is standing firm. That- what the hell is that!?”

His assistant stared in awe at the scene outside. Falhaven turned around and gasped. He slammed the button under his desk and the Oval Office itself descended into the Earth. A massive ship, larger than the city of DC itself had suddenly appeared over the city. Thousands of small craft detached from the ship and flew to the earth.

And attacked anything that moved. Cars were blown up, people sucked into the ships, confined and restrained. It lasted no more than 10 minutes. And in the blink of an eye, they were gone again. The planet burned, black smoke clogged the sky, and anyone lucky enough to have been spared stood in awe.

Earth has fallen.

————————

The news spread quickly, terror reigned across the solar system. Something destroyed their home. Venus retreated beneath the clouds, Mars abandoned their surface shelters, and retreated into the mines. The first true battle of war, and they didn’t even see it coming.

———————

General Thane awoke to a siren. Red lights danced against the walls to her rooms. Oh no. Not already. She ran from her bed, still in her pajamas and robe, and strode onto the Command Deck across the hall.

“WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED!?”

“Ma’am we are getting reports that Earth has been attacked. We do not know by what.”

Images began flowing onto the main display. Horrific images. New York- burning to the ground- London, Beijing, Sydney, Tokyo. And the most beautiful city of all, New Jerusalem, a shining beacon of peace in now-neutral Isreal, a cloud of smoke.

She fell into the command chair. Tears formed in her eyes. My home. My job was to protect you. I failed.

“It’s not your fault Linda.”

Dr. Sanchez walked into the room.

“What are you doing here?”

He looked at her. “You are relieved of your duties. I’ll take over for now. It’s not the first time I’ve dealt with this. If we hurry we can-”

“NO! NO MORE LIES! NO MORE! TELL ME WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON!”

The whole command deck stared at their leader in awe. The tension between the two couldn’t even be cut with a knife.

“…fine, but we’re going to have this conversation in the Reactor Room with Skre’ve.”

“Fine. Whatever. All hands, set course for Earth. We need to help them before anything else. I will be back soon.”

She followed Ricardo off the deck.

————————

Skre’ve sat in the middle of the room, meditating. Plasma surrounded him, creating patterns that only helped his trance. Suddenly, the light he had become used to disappeared.

Dr. Sanchez and the General stepped into the room. Two chairs and a table emerged from the floor and they each took a seat.

Why are they here…

The plasma resumed its deadly arcs.

“Now, tell me what the fuck is happening.”

Sanchez looked at her and smirked. “You sure you want to know, I doubt you’ll believe me... this is such a waste of time.”

“FUCKING TALK!”

“Fine. Firstly, my name is not Ricardo Sanchez, but after this you are to continue calling me that. And I am the oldest living human, weather you realize it or not.”

Oh. He told me this might happen.

“…what the FUCK?”

“Calm down. It’s not like I can live 438 years on earth and someone not take notice without changing my name. I’ve gone by many names. My current one is based off of an early-21st -century cartoon, which had a character strikingly similar to my own self. The name I’m most famous for, though is Albert Einstein.”

“…you are fucking kidding me.”

She looked at the man claiming to be one of the most famous scientists in history with a look of utter confusion and shock. Her face amused Skre’ve, but he decided it’d be better to stay silent.

The doctor nodded.

“…wait a second, Einstein was born in 1879? And his whole life is very well documented. Also he got to a point and looked way older than you do. It’s impossible.”

“When you have the power I do, anything is possible. In fact that man in all the photos was the cover for me, to keep my true identity secret. I was really born in 1699 in England, named Ludwig Einstein. My parents, who were extremely wealthy aristocrats from the Ottoman Empire, fleed from the war against the Habsburgs in 1695, to London. They changed their names when they arrived in England to Einstein, to show that they were from Germany rather than the Ottoman Empire, and keep a low profile. They decided to stay there after the war, for but when I was 5 we traveled to the American Colonies.”

He paused, letting the General take it all in.

“My parents died when I was 15. It was 1714, and I was left a vast tract of land in what is now Maine, and an amount of money that would value 150 million dollars today. I made it grow to now value 52 trillion.”

“Holy shit! 52 TRLLION!?”

“Yeah. I have enough to build this same space station another 5 times over. And that’s just my bank account. See, here’s the account.” He flicked open his holowatch and turned it to show her. 52 trillion dollars showed up on the screen under account info.

“What the… how the… how do you keep it hidden?”

“You’d be surprised. Although owning the most influential nation in history, a continent, the bank my money is in, and multiple other multiplanetary organizations would help a lot.”

Skre’ve shifted in his seat. The look the General was giving the Doctor was pure fire. He spoke to me about this before. How he really controls the human race. And how he’s lived so long. He’s so much like our Emperor, but so much kinder.

“…No. You’re taking me for a fool. You can’t be telling the truth.”

“I’m sorry to say that this is the truth.”

She glared at him. “Fine. How the hell have you been able to live this long?”

“Oh, that’s a hard question. In fact it’s ironic, as it was a suicide attempt when I was 30. I don’t know what exactly I mixed together, but it was some combination of whiskey, bleach, sulfuric acid, ammonia, and mint. And something else I found that had a poison label on it. I took all of it and fell onto an electric generator and got shocked. I passed out for a week and woke up in a hospital bed. That’s the only way I can think of other than a possible genetic reasoning.”

She was bewildered. This is too much. One man can’t have that much power, or have done the things he has.

“Why, oh why didn’t you start publishing your work or any of that until the past 50 years!?”

“Oh. That’s when I was finally able to buy CERN. Also plastic surgery was finally perfected then. I’d just have to fake my death again and get a small surgery and bam, I’m a new person. Also, because the rest of the scientists were FINALLY catching up to my level of research and I didn’t have to build everything myself, like I did my first FTL drive.”

That’s not what he told me. He told me it was because he finally had a daughter. Something more valuable to him than anything else and had to ensure that she could do anything. He said the real reason he put the shielding up was because he just needed to talk about his daughter and how proud of her he was. And the downward spiral that he went through when even he couldn’t find her… This species has a gift of manipulation…

Her eyes widened. “What do you mean, your first FTL drive?”

“Ah, well, it was right after the American Revolutionary War -which by the way, I funded entirely, that’s how I literally own America. The main agreement behind it was I get 10% of the annual federal budget every year as payment for what I did. I again did the same with Russia when they installed their Communist regime, and made sure I kept that 10% when it collapsed and the current system took over- I had advanced computers in my mountain estate, and calculated how to create a jump drive. From there it was easy. From 1801 til 1863 I explored the cosmos. When I returned my ship burnt up in the atmosphere, and I parachuted to safety. I came back to America to see my nation in ruins. I was furious, and you’re welcome because if I didn’t step in and finally put my foot down on slavery, you’d still be in chains General.”

“YOU PUT YOUR FOOT DOWN!? THAT’S RICH!”

He sat there looking at her as he would a misbehaving child.

“Fine. Do you honestly still not believe me?”

“No I don’t. Not one ounce.”

“Alright. Well let’s go to the bridge. I want to show you something. And if you still don’t believe me after this, feel free to take me to take me straight to the prison on Vesta. I won’t be in there for more than 5 days before I’m released by Falhaven or Mai. And when that happens you’ll know I’m not lying.”

He turned off the antimatter reactor, and stormed out, fuming.

Thane shook her head. “Sorry about that Skre’ve. Is there anything I can get you?”

“Um, I mean… that steak was the best thing I’ve ever eaten… is there more?”

“Sure I’ll get you another steak.”

Oh by the Emperor this is amazing.

——————-

Fucking cunt not listening to me. It’s not like I’m totally paying her paycheck or anything or that it was my fucking idea to make the USF or anything or that I fund the whole bloody thing. Fucking bitch fucking cunt mother fucking…

The doctor swore under his breath as he stormed to the bridge, General Thane hot on his tail.

…fucking cuntbag stubborn saggy titty ass bitch fuckity shit… I need a drink. And now I have to show her, and EVERYONE ELSE ON THIS BLOODY SHIP that it can go faster than light… fucking wanted to wait til Xu got back so I had a scapegoat goddamnit mother fucker…

He stormed into the bridge.

“Get out of the FUCKING way!” He yelled at the helmsman, who quickly jumped away from the controls.

He sat down and placed his hand on the touchpad. It scanned it and did a biometric reading, confirming that it was Sanchez. He pressed a keypad at the same time, and the control panel slid aside to reveal an untouched panel of unknown use and origin. The helmsman looked at it in awe, while the General looked more puzzled than angry now.

“What are you doing?”

“…fucking bitch… How’s Sirius sound you fucking cunt!?”

He slammed a button and the ship warped to the wreckage of a couple days prior. Ships and debris scattered everywhere, dead aliens similar to Skre’ve floated in the emptiness. The general’s mouth dropped.

A ship entered the veiw, massive in its own right, but puny to the Torus.

“OH HONEY WE ARENT DONE IM NOT A FUCKING ONE TRICK PONY!!! ALPHA CENTAURI ANYONE!?”

He slammed the button again, and suddenly they were in front of a space station. If she doesn’t believe me now I’ll kill her. I’m gonna memory wipe this whole crew but no I’ll fucking murder her. The Alpha Centauri station was on fire, a trail of debris followed it in its orbit around the binary system. Oh. They got here too. Must have been on their retreat from earth. I don’t care I’m proving this bitch wrong.

“ARE YOU HAPPY NOW!? YOU JUST HAD TO KNOW THE TRUTH AND NOW WE CANT CHASE THEM BECAUSE YOU CAN’T ACCEPT THAT SOMEONES ELSE KNOWS MORE THAN YOU!?”

She dropped to her knees at the sight in front of her, and tears slid down her cheeks.

“…I’m sorry.” She whimpered.

He got down next to her. And quietly spoke, “Oh, what’s that? I couldn’t hear you.”

Still just as quietly, “…I said I’m sorry.”

He looked up, across the room, and yelled at one of the security officers, “Private Singh, could you hear her?”

“No, sir.”

“IM FUCKING SORRY!!!”

“That’s better. Alright, let’s go back home. Oh, and Singh, shut those damned doors.”

He shut the doors, and the doctor smiled. He hit the warp button with one hand and lifted three fingers into the air with the other. By the time the Torus arrived at Earth, everyone on the bridge -with the exception of the General, the doctor, and the private- was dead in their seats, the private’s energy rifle still smoking.

Linda Thane screamed. The doctor came in close to her and whispered in her ear. “Try to expose me or undermine my authority again, and it won’t be your crew on the chopping block. I hope you value your daughter as much as I value mine.”

He stood up, and walked towards the door. “Clean this up, Private. Same protocol as the last time. You know, mind wipe the entire crew. Let her keep her memory this time though.”

He walked out, whistling a tune he loved from the 1970s. Do you remember, the 21st night of September…

[tymedfire]

Hallelujah, You’re Home

Read on AO3

          It’s been two years. Two years since they’ve felt rain on their faces. Two years since they’ve seen their families, since they’ve spoken to their families. Two years since they really started to learn what war was. Two years since they stopped being teenagers and became soldiers. Two years since they left Earth. Three, for Shiro.

           But now they’re going back. They’re going home.

           Well, for a little while, at least. The war isn’t over. The Galra Empire has been taking over the universe for over 10,000 years, it can’t be taken down in simply two. But in two years, the Voltron Alliance has grown substantially, and they’ve taken down enough Galra higher ups that Voltron is almost universally known and called upon, and with fame, comes questions. It’s not a secret anymore that the five Paladins of Voltron are from Earth. Everybody knows, so there’s no point in avoiding Earth anymore. At least, that’s what the Paladins keep telling Allura. Earth is vulnerable now; it’s a target, and with it’s technology as unadvanced as it was when they left, they’re at a serious disadvantage if the Galra ever attacked. They probably still have no idea that aliens even exist. Earth needs Voltron. Earth needs the Voltron Alliance, and the Voltron Alliance needs Earth.

           Also, Lance just really needs his mom.

           So, here they are, entering the Milky Way Galaxy, all waiting anxiously at their stations on the control deck.

           “Ha! Boom, bitches! Wi-fi is up!” Pidge punches her fists in the air in triumph and ignores the half-hearted look her father shoots her when she says “bitches”.

           The others have long since gotten used to Pidge and her amazing technical ability, but they still all look at her in shock, except for Matt. He had obviously helped her.

           “Pidge, how the hell did you get wi-fi in space?” Keith asks incredulously.

           Lance nods in agreement. “Seriously. Tell me how I can’t get a signal in the desert outside of Galaxy Garrison, but you can get one past Saturn.”

           At this, Pidge snorts and raises an eyebrow at them. “You didn’t have me. Or amazingly amplifying Altean technology.”

           “Something tells me it was mostly the Altean tech.”

           “Shh and bow before my genius.”

           Pidge, Hunk, and Lance all immediately grab their phones and start scrolling on them, ignoring Coran’s announcement that they’ll be to Earth in two dobashes.

           “Oh my god. They told everybody we’re all dead. We have a memorial!” Pidge exclaims.

           “Where? Is it a good one? How did we die?” Lance questions.

           Matt ends up answering, looking over Pidges shoulder. “At the Garrison. We’re in it, too. It says… ah. Training accident. Doesn’t really specify exactly what happened. Just that there was an accident and no bodies were recovered. I bet that went over well.”

           “Yeah, my mom would not like that at all. I wouldn’t be surprised if my parents sued them or something.”

“Same. Mom probably went absolutely ballistic, no way she would take three of her family members’ deaths with no bodies laying down.”

           “Oh man, they must have all been so sad. And now, after two years, we’re just back? There’s no way anybody is gonna take this well, especially if they hear about us being back before they see us. Do we really have to deal with all the politics first, Allura? It’s gonna take so long!”

           Allura smiles sadly at Hunk before responding, “Yes, Hunk, I’m sorry. We can’t have one of you getting shot down or taken in by your governments like last time. You’ve said that that is the usual response to unknown warships, yes? We must stay together. I’m sor- Lance? Are you okay?”

           The others all turn to see that Lance’s face has gone a sickly pale color and his hands are trembling. “Lance?” Hunk asks urgently, getting up to run to Lance’s chair. “Lance, buddy, what’s wrong?”

           For a few seconds, Lance doesn’t answer, which worries them all more; he just stares at his phone. When he does answer, his voice is barely above a whisper. “My… it’s… my mom. Marie just posted… it says… oh god.” His voice breaks and his hands shake harder as his chest begins to heave. Hunk gently takes the phone out of his friends hands. Once empty, Lance’s hands wrap around his middle and he tries to get his breathing under control.

           As Hunk reads what’s on Lance’s phone, his eyes grow wider and wider. One hand comes up to cover his mouth as he gasps. Lance’s head snaps around to Hunk when he starts to speak, as if making sure that Hunk can see it, too.

           “It says… oh god, Lance.” Hunk looks at Lance, then looks at the rest of his team, tears filling his eyes. “His mom. His mom is dying. Marie says that the doctor says that she maybe has a day or two left. Oh, Lance.” He turns to his best friend and wraps his arms around Lance, who freezes in Hunk’s grip, clearly in shock. Lance sits still for a few seconds as the others process this turn of events before his head snaps to Allura and he says, in the most broken voice Pidge thinks she’s ever heard,

           “Allura. Please, I can’t- please. Plea-”

           Allura interrupts before Lance can even finish begging. “Of course. Of course. When we get to Earth, go see your mother. But someone needs to go with you.”

           Hunk looks up at this and starts to say “I will” before Pidge interrupts him.

           “No,” she says fiercely, seriously. The others look at her, surprised. “Hunk, you’re the best human diplomat here besides Lance. You need to stay here to cool whoever Allura is talking with down. I’ll go with Lance. We all know I would just go off on them anyway and probably make things harder. I’ll go with him.” More than a little pleading seeps into her voice toward the end of her speech.

           “Well, by those standards, I should go with y’all, too!” Keith cries.

           “No, Keith,” Shiro puts a hand on his shoulder. “We can’t have too many of us gone, you know humans. They need to be able to trust us. We don’t want them to think we’re up to something.” He looks sadly over at Lance. “Pidge has him.”

           Pidge nods determinedly, grateful for Shiro’s look of confidence.

           Throughout the entire debate, Lance had just sat in his best friend’s arms, alternating staring at each of his teammates. Pidge is honestly surprised he hasn’t started crying yet, but perhaps it isn’t real to him yet. She knows that, after two years, learning her mom was dying wouldn’t feel real until she actually saw her.

           She doesn’t think she’s prepared to deal with a crying and broken Lance.

           Sure, she’s spent a fair amount of times with homesick Lance. They took turns finding each other in the middle of the night, just missing home and their families. Pidge knows his family almost as well as she knows her own by now. And, she’s seen him cry. They both cry with each other on particularly hard nights, when talking and reminiscing doesn’t help the ache in their hearts.

           This is different, and Pidge’s heart aches for her pseudo-big brother. She wishes she had a time machine, so she could go back and just… stop everything. Stop Lance ever leaving his family. Stop the Kerberos mission from leaving. But things turned out okay for her in the end. She has her brother and her father back, however damaged they may be.

           “We’ll check in on you guys once we’ve made solid contact with the United Nations.”

             They walk into the hospital silently. Lance and Pidge are both wearing their normal clothes, with their bayards strapped to their lower backs. Lance doesn’t know how to feel. It doesn’t feel real. His mom can’t be dying, she can’t be sick. He’d imagined so many scenarios in space, of their meeting, or lack thereof. He’d imagined coming home to his house, finding his entire family there, celebrating a birthday or a holiday. They would all cry when he came in, and hug him tight for hours. There’d be food and a party. Celebration.

           Sometimes only his mom would be home in his fantasies. She’d hug him and kiss him and they’d cry together. She’d call the rest of his family through her tears, but they’d be happy tears. He could talk to her forever, content in her arms.

           He’d imagined never getting to come home. He’d vividly visualized his team finding his family back on Earth. They’d have to tell his family that he hadn’t died on Earth, but he’d died in space, protecting them. Maybe heroically, maybe because of one of his own stupid mistakes. He’d always been so afraid of leaving them wondering, of never coming home.

           He’d never imagined he’d come home to find home leaving him.

           He has to work to steady his breath as he looks around for a receptionist. He feels a hand sneak it’s way into his and he shoots Pidge a small smile. He squeezes her hand. He’s glad she’s here.

           A second later, she nudges him and points with her free hand to a tv in one of the waiting areas. It shows a news report of an alien ship hovering just inside orbit. “So far, it appears non-hostile. Sources say the ship has contacted the UN, though the details have yet to be released. There is no need to panic at this time.” Pidge snorts at the anchor woman’s last line. Lance is about to try to say something sarcastic, if only to lighten the mood a bit, when he hears -

           “Lance?”

           Lance whips around and he can’t help the tears that spring from his eyes when he sees his oldest brother for the first time in over two years. Javier stares at him, mouth hanging open in disbelief for a solid twenty seconds. Lance stares back, tears falling freely from his eyes, too afraid to move. He doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know what to feel, doesn’t know how his brother is going to react until -

           Javier drops the shopping bag in his hands and charges at Lance, wrapping him in a hug tighter than even Hunk’s most passionate hugs. He’s speaking, whispering Lance’s name over and over again, and he’s crying. Lance is astonished. He’s never seen his older brother cry. Lance buries his face in Javier’s neck, not worrying about how wet he’s making his shirt. He cries, happy and sad tears. He’s so happy that Javier is here. Lance hadn’t realized it, but he had been sorely hoping he wouldn’t have to see all of his family all at once. He needed a little bit of preparation, and Javi was the perfect person to give it to him.

           Javier pushes Lance back and just stares at him, a watery smile growing on his face. “You’ve gotten taller! Ah, you look… so grown up, Lance, where - where have you been?!” Before Lance can answer he’s pulled back into a hug, his older brother’s hand ruffling his hair. Lance lets out a sigh. He’d missed that.

           “I’ll explain, I promise, but… I don’t think I can do it more than once right now. Um… Mom?” Javier squeezes him once more before letting him go and wiping his eyes. He nods, picking up the bags he had dropped.

           Javi sighs. “Yeah. She’s not doing well. It’s a good thing you got here when you did.” Javier squints at him, considering something. “That ship on the news. That’s where you’ve been, isn’t it?” Lance hesitates, then nods. “I thought so. How’d you know to come here, then?”

           Before he can answer, Pidge pipes up, startling them both. Lance had forgotten she was there. “That was me. I hooked up the internet and we saw Lance’s sister’s post. We came straight here.”

           “Yeah. That. Sorry, Javi, this is P-”

           “Katie,” Pidge interjects, holding out her hand, then withdrawing it quickly with a blush as she realizes Javier’s hands are full.

           Lance furrows his eyebrows at her, but decides not to question her. “Right. My friend, Katie. Katie,” Pidge rolls her eyes at him. “This is my oldest brother, Javier.”

           “Nice to meet you, Katie. You were one of the cadets that went missing with Lance, right?”

           Pidge nods, impressed. “Observant. The Garrison never figured out who I was, even with my brother and dad being so well known. Yeah, we’ve been together this whole time.” She suddenly blushes and scrambles to correct herself. “I mean, no, not - not together but - yeah.”

           “Right, yeah.” Javier smiles at her. “Come on. Mom is this way.”

           Walking slightly behind Javier, Lance leans in close to Pidge, smiling slightly despite himself.

           “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you that flustered before. Javier’s cute, but he’s a little old for you-” He gets a shove in response.

           “No, I’m just. This is your family. I feel like I know them already, you’ve talked them up so much, and I don’t wanna make a bad impression!”

           Lance pulls her in for a side hug. “You’re family, Pidge. Impressions don’t matter. Excuse me, Katie.”

           Pidge huffs. “Oh, shut up. You don’t have to call me Katie. Katie is just… my Earth name. It feels right on Earth, so Earth people should know me as Katie, but Pidge is my space name I guess. My space family calls me Pidge, my Earth family calls me Katie.”

           Before Lance can respond, they reach the room. The small smile leaves Lance’s face instantly. His heart is hammering in his chest as he stares at the closed door. He doesn’t want to go in. He doesn’t want to see his mom, his beautiful, strong, perfect mother, sick and dying, tubes and wires sticking out of her. He can’t handle that, he can’t.

           Javier is watching him. He meets Lance’s eyes for a second before saying, “Wait here,” and slipping into the room. Lance can hear him talking behind the door, but he can’t make out the words.

           “I can’t do this,” Lance whispers, hands trembling. He feels like his chest is being crushed and he hasn’t even gone into the room yet. He never imagined he would ever not want to see his family, but right now he wishes he was anywhere but here.

           Pidge steps closer to him, slipping her hand in his and holding tight. “You can,” she reassures him. “You can. You have to. You’ll regret it for the rest of your life if you don’t. You’re not alone, Lance. You can do this.”

           Lance hears strangled screams from the room, and then the door is flung open.

           “Lance.” He’s not sure who says it, not sure who grabs his shirt and pulls him into the room, into a hug. Maybe it was more than one person. There are tears everywhere, and people hugging him and whispering his name, but he pushes past all of them, his eyes on his mom. She looks just like he imagined her. There are tears streaming down her face as she reaches a hand toward him. He gets to her as fast as he can, taking her hand and leaning over to hug her. He’s careful not to put too much weight on her, and he hates that he can’t hug her as tightly as he wants to.

           “Oh, my baby, my Lance. You’re alive, you’re alive, my baby boy is alive.” He’s sobbing loudly into her shoulder. With great effort, he pulls back and just looks at her, holding as tightly as possible to her hand. She looks paler than normal, and skinnier, but her eyes shine just the way he remembers. There are tears streaming down both of their cheeks and he can hear others in the room softly crying and whispering to each other, but he can’t take his eyes off his mama. “How? How? Where have you been?”

           Through tears, and holding her hand, Lance explains. He doesn’t tell her everything, doesn’t mention being blown up and glosses over the danger of it all, but he can tell that she knows. As he speaks he can hear gasps from his family, but otherwise the entire room is silent.

He doesn’t let go of her the entire time, and she holds onto him just as tightly.

           He’s not prepared for how extremely sad she looks when he finishes.

           “I’m… I’m so sorry, Mama. I didn’t mean to leave you, I just… I’m so sorry.

           The hand not holding onto his comes up to stroke his cheek. “Oh, baby. You’ve been… You’ve been in a war? You’ve been…” she lets out a breath. “I know you’re sorry, but you’ve been doing something good, haven’t you? You’ve been helping people?”

           “I’ve been trying.”

           His mom smiles at him, tears in her eyes. “I am so proud of you. So proud. I missed you so much, honey, but you’ve been doing good, and that’s all I can ask for you.”

           Lance gapes at her, speechless for a second. “But – no! I should have been here, with you! I – “

           Lances mother fixes him with a stern look. “Lance Alejandro McClain. This is not your fault.” Lance had forgotten how good she was at reading him. Missed. He’d missed it. He’d missed her, so much. “It’s not your fault, baby. I’m so glad you’re home.” She dissolves into a coughing fit, pulling the hand on his face back to cover her mouth. Lance’s father moves to help her sit up.

When she finishes, she looks at Pidge, who had tucked herself in the corner, out of the way, and smiles warmly. “Lance, aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?” She holds her hand out toward Pidge, and the smaller girl takes hesitantly. Lance’s mom doesn’t wait for him to actually introduce them, though, instead taking it upon herself. “I’m Lances mom. You’re my son’s friend?”

Pidge nods, still holding the older woman’s hand. “Katie,” she says quietly. “He’s my best friend.”

“It’s wonderful to meet you, Katie. You take care of my boy, okay?”

In another life, Pidge thinks that she and Lances mom could have been good friends. She nods her assent and the older woman’s hand tightens around her own.

She smiles at Lance, then around the room. She lets out a breathy laugh and says, “For the first time in months, my entire family, everyone I love, is in one room.” She smiles, tears in her eyes, and gently caresses Lances face. “I couldn’t be happier.”

           Lance’s momma dies thirteen minutes later.

          Her funeral is three days later. Pidge had gone home, but not before hugging Lance tight and assuring him she’d be back with the team for the funeral. The three days in between that, the McClain house is anything but quiet. Javier has to wrangle kids down more than once, though not as much as he’d expected. Lance seems content to gather all the kids up and start a new game any time they get out of control. Javier spends a lot of time watching his little brother, as do many of his relatives. He can tell that his brother is different, and not just because of their mother. He carries himself differently. He still acts like the same old Lance just – more confident. Javier catches him, more than once, sitting quietly, staring off into space, then closing his eyes and smiling softly, before getting up and joining the conversation again. When he asked about it, Lance smiled and said,

           “Oh, that’s Blue. Sometimes the team.” When Mariposa, their sister, gave him a questioning look, he elaborated. “We have a mental connection, all five of us. It’s not as strong when we’re not in Voltron, but after all this time it’s always there. We can’t, like, talk to each other or anything, but I can always feel them. It’s nice. Comforting. We check on each other.”

           Not for the first time, Javier really wants to meet the rest of Team Voltron.

           The mood at the funeral is somber, but joyful. Mrs. McClain didn’t want her family to be too sad, but to celebrate her life, and enjoy their time together. So, they smiled and cried at the same time. Lance was particularly good at that.

           Just before the ceremony begins, everyone’s attention is pulled to a small ship landing some yards from the cemetery. Javier and Mariposa watch side by side as Lance breaks away and walks toward the direction of the ship. He stops after only walking a few feet, and waits.

           Javier can’t see his brothers face, but he can tell when Lance stands up taller that he’s spotted the small crowd coming toward them. He’s a little surprised at the amount of people leaving the ship. Hadn’t Lances team only had six other people?

           The small one, Katie, is the first to reach Lance. Once she’s within six yards of Lance, she sprints toward him. She crashes into him like a small torpedo. She buries her face into his stomach and Lance’s arms instantly lock around her, burying his own face in her wild hair. Lance’s old friend, Hunk, isn’t even a step behind Katie, throwing his arms around Lances shoulders from the side, tears streaming down his face. Lance wraps one of his hands around Hunk’s wrist, the other still clutching the back of Katie’s shirt. A kid, shorter than Lance, but taller than Katie, with black hair and Asian features reaches the group at the same time as a taller man with orange hair and pointy ears. Keith and Coran, Javier thinks. The latter goes to the side of Lance that’s devoid of Hunk, placing a hand on his shoulder and leaning in, whispering. Keith, no longer hesitant with physical affection with his teammates, wraps his arms around Hunk and Coran, behind Lance, and presses his face into the side of the other boys neck. A tall, muscular man Javier recognizes as Takashi Shirogane and an equally tall and beautiful woman with pointy ears reach the group last, all the other people they’d come with hanging back a bit. Javier surmises that the woman has to be Princess Allura. The princess smiles sadly at the group and reaches forward, untangling Lance’s hand from Katie’s shirt and clutching it between her own two hands, squeezing comfortingly. Shiro is the last to reach out. Javier is slightly surprised when the man reaches forward and tangles his human hand in Lance’s hair, pulling his head up so that Lance is looking at him. He then presses his forehead to the younger boys and closes his eyes. Javier has to smile at how similar a gesture it is to the one that he himself used to do to get Lance to calm down when he was having a panic attack when he was younger. He can see Lance shaking, and is close enough to hear his voice hitch as he tries to hold in his sobs. Appreciation surges through Javier as he watches these people comfort his baby brother.

           It seems his brother has found another family. A good one. Javier can only be happy about it.

           As the group untangles themselves, Katie tries to pull away, but Lance’s arms tighten around her. “I’m right here,” Javier hears her say. “I won’t leave.” Lance nods and lets her go. He gives them all a shaky smile and jerks his head, telling them to follow him. They do, and Javier doesn’t miss how Katie stands so close to Lance that their arms are touching. He reminds himself to tell them how grateful he is to them later. They take care of his little brother, and Javier can’t thank them enough for that. They all seem to understand Lance and just what he needs.

           The group behind Team Voltron, Javier realizes upon closer inspection, are the paladin’s families. He recognizes Hunk’s parents and younger brother. Another family can’t be anybody’s family but Katie’s; the two kids are practically identical. There’s one other family, two parents and two kids, but Javier isn’t sure if they’re Keith’s or Shiro’s.

           Introductions are made (Javier finds out the mystery family is Shiro’s), and the ceremony begins. There are no chairs for the sheer amount of people. As Lance gets to his spot he feels a tug on his pants. His niece, Daisy, looks up at him with the best puppy dog eyes he thinks he’s ever seen, and holds up her arms. Lance obliges and sets her on his hip. He stands there as the ceremony starts, surrounded by his family; blood on his left, found on his right. His heart aches for his mother, but it fills as he realizes how much he has left. His gigantic, beautiful, stubborn, annoying, wonderful family. He cries for his mom some more, but he can almost feel her beside him, smiling sweetly and telling him to “take it all in, mijo”.

           As the ceremony winds down, his niece looks at him questioningly. “Uncle Lance?”

           “Niece Daisy?” The response doesn’t get the giggle it usually elicits.

           “You’re fighting in a space war, right?” He hums affirmative, not liking how she phrased the question. The little girl bites her lip uncertainly. “Are you gonna die? Like abuela did?”

           Lance’s heart breaks for the second time in four days. He’s not sure how to respond. He doesn’t want to lie to her, but he doesn’t want to tell her the truth either.

           He pulls the little girl to him in a hug. “Oh, honey. I… You know how your mama will always protect you? And how your daddy always picks you up and cleans your scrapes when you fall down? How your family always has and always will protect you?” She nods. “It’s like that. Up in space I have another family that keeps me safe. They protect me just like I protect them.”

           She looks at him thoughtfully. “But… abuela died. Did we not protect her right?”

           “Oh, no. We protected her with everything we had, but she was ready to go. Sometimes the time is just right. She was done. She was happy. But I’m not gonna be done until I come back and take you all around space, ya got that?” He tickles his niece lightly and blows raspberries into her cheek, making her shriek with laughter.

           Lance could listen to that laugh forever.

           He puts Daisy down and the little girl runs off immediately. He feels a warm presence come up behind him and he turns to see Hunk smiling sadly at him. Lance gives him a smile in return and Hunk’s turns into a full on grin. He pulls Lance into a bear hug and Lance thinks he hears Pidge giggle. He leans into Hunks chest, happily wrapping his arms around his best friend. There, in his best friends arms with both his families all around him, Lance thinks he might be okay.

[cupcakeshakesnake]

Watching SWR for the frist time: Through Imperial Eyes

Yep, been looking forward to this episode. Again, not sure if I’ll do any more SWR reactions, but yeah, I’m gonna do this one for sure.

(spoilers ahead)

-Through Imperial Eyes.  If you take the first letter of every word, you get TIE.  What else has the word TIE in it?  Yes, the TIE fighter.  Let’s take a look at the TIE fighter, shall we?

According to Wookieepedia, it was “the standard Imperial starfighter seen in massive numbers throghout most of the Galactic Civil War and onward.”

-But wait!

Did you see that?

ILUMANITI CINFORMED!!!11!1!!

-*cough cough* Okay, let’s get back to the actual episode.

-Did he just wake up? What time is this, 2a.m.?

-He sleeps in his uniform?

-”Battle stations, sir!”  “Yeah i’m just gonna ignore that and go back into my room to waste water.”

-If the top button closes doors and the bottom one opens doors, what happens if you press one of them repeatedly?

-If I was on a Stardestroyer I would get to the nearest one of those doors and just keep pressing the two buttons alternately until the troopers throw me out of the airlock. I love buttons. I’m so gonna break all their doors.

-He sleeps in his armor?

-I finally understand all the Kallus Simulator jokes on my dash.. but seriously, Imperial Agent Simulator 2017 v3.16, created with Unity Engine and supported on Space Windows Vista, 8, 10 and Space Mac OS 7 and up...

-At first I was like “Holy hell, his room is dark,” but then I realized I had turned down my monitor brightness a lot over the past few days.

-*turns brightness all the way back up to 100* That’s better.

-His sink doesn’t have a drain?

-Yep, he’s definitely been sleeping.

-How do time zones even work in space? You could determine it based on the part of the planet you’re orbiting on, but then you could go to the other side in a very short time. Maybe time just loses its meaning when you’re in space. Only relative. Two hours of sleep, sixteen hours awake, ten hours sleeping because you're going to a faraway planet, it’s not “Lunch on 2o’clock”, it’s “Lunch 5 hours after your last meal”.

-Eyyyyyyyy it’s Yogurt List again

-If you’re not under attack then why the fuck did you ring all those sirens

the fuck did you wake me up for bitch

-That shuttle looks like a plastic lunchbox.

^+kallus= the sideburn squad.

for a moment I thought either the stormies were super short or Kallus was on stilts.

-DUN DUN DUN it’s Ezra

-Nice voice changer mask Ezra, did you get it on eBay?

Sabine Paintjob™

-You were expecting Ezra

bUT IT WAS ME, DIO!

-(I’m so sorry.)

-AP-5, sassy as always, and Chopper, with that Imperial paintjob tactic again.

-I just realized the letters C1-10P are supposed to look like ‘CHOP’.

-WHY DOES AP-5 SOUND LIKE SNAPE FROM HARRY POTTER

I see an A, a B, an X, a Y, aaannnnd some illegible symbols.

-Wait, sure the Empire is big, but if Ezra is a rebel Jedi on the loose, wouldn’t there be posters of him all over the place?

-Kallus: *stands and does nothing*  Ezra: “Stop! I’ll tell you anything!”  Lyste: wow he’s good

-THRAWN

-WE’RE SEEING THRAWN

-I’m sure AP-5 would have winked there if he had eyelids.

-Poor Lyste. On the other hand, I don’t think being summoned by high-ranking officers in the Empire is all that good. They might be out for your throat for all you know.

-How the hell did Thrawn get that drawing on his ship?  Seriously, that’s an Imperial Class Star destroyer according to the Internet, it’s supposed to be 1.6 km long, did he just get a bunch of droids to turn the ship upside down to get that gigantic paint job?

yep, no visible barrier, nothing is being sucked out into space because Star Wars.

-KANAN AND REX ARE WEARING STORMTROOPER ARMOR AGAIN

-DID THEY STEAL ANOTHER SHUTTLE

-Jesus Christ the Empire needs better anti-theft mechanisms

Heyyyy it’s that officer again, what was her name? Oh yeah right, Captain Brunson. I spent ten minutes looking for that name on the internet.

-But Lyste has a cylinder right there...

-I feel like I am constantly reminded of how those are not pens these days. Okay, okay, I get it. Also I know in some other places I said those were insignia, and it’s not a precise term but it’s not wrong either because 1) the code contain information about the officer wearing it including their rank, and 2) the numbers and colors of the cylinders differ based on said officer’s rank/position.

is that a fucking hat

-THERE’S THE CLIP THE ENTIRETY OF TUMBLR WAS GOING CRAZY OVER.

-Override code: *german word*

-(I know it’s not German but it just sounds like it... I am learning German and their ‘ch’ is so hard to pronounce correctly...)

-How tf did he close the door though

-I have a feeling he let them hear the override code on purpose.

-Or... HE WAS SIDING WITH THE REBELLION THE ENTIRE TIME

-DUN DUN DUUUUN

-Sorry.

-Oh it’s that guy now. Disney certainly didn’t feel like modeling any new Imperial officers.

-Ahahahaha lizards  Let me guess, ysalamiri?

-YULAREN

-YOU’RE CANON NOW- hold on, A New Hope.  YOU’RE 3D ANIMATED NOW- oh wait, Clone Wars. YOU’RE IN REBELS NOW

-WOOHOO

-When Yularen has had more canon appearances than Thrawn.

-Every single Imperial acquaintance seems to come from ‘the Academy’.  “Hey, remember me? We ate lunch in the Academy together.”  “Remember me from the Academy bathroom?”  “I’m from your Academy, remember?”

His eyes are saying “yes you Kallus, you little shit, i know you’re fulcrum you lil bitch yes you right there”

He still has the Phoenix Squadron graffiti... and the lothcat doodle

-”--must be unmasked quickly”  Idk why but at first I thought he said “must be on Mars”

Free the Rose Quartzes-- oh, wait, wrong show.

-And now we run into Irina SpalkoPryce... It’s like they scraped all the Imperial characters together and put them on one ship.  Except those who are dead.  R.I.P. Aresko and Grint,Grand Inquisitor, Minister Tua, Fifth Brother, Seventh Sister, Eight Brother, and countless stormtroopers.

-Kallus: whoops another person i hate, let me just get rid of this person i hate so he can go with her

-Kallus: actually lemme just make them hate each other

-Kallus: i am such a genius

-Kallus you manipulative mutton chop

Aw come on, you can’t get tired of his shit already! How are you going to survive among the Rebels?

-Was Ezra hanging by his chin or something

-Lyste is so serious about this omfg  He wants to prove himself  Poor dude

-EZRA IS WEARING AN OFFICER’S UNIFORM

-Wait

-How the hell did they find the right size

-Are there smol officers on board

-ARE THERE

-”We’re not here to steal art!”

-Yep, because Thrawn’s definitely gonna look at that map later and go “Welp I guess this one planet here suddenly moved twenty light years to the side, nothing weird about that”

-Lyste’s in big trouble now. I feel sorry for that guy.

-Thrawn smells the traitorous scent.

-KALLUS WAS HIDING THERE

-WHY IS THIS SO FUNNY

-HE DIDN’T PULL ANY CLEVER ANTICS, HE JUST WENT AND HID IN A DITCH IN THE WALL

Is... that supposed to be Imperial insignia as well?

-How the hell did Kallus change the override code

-Wooo, Thrawn action!

-Ouch.  He alright tho

-What did he say? “Nix”?

-”Shuttle TY992, you are clear to land.″  NO IT’S NOT  IT’S A TRAITOR SHIP WITH TRAITORS IN IT

-”There must be some kind of mistake sir--”  Pryce: HOW DARE YOU ASSUME MY GENDER

-But really, gotta love how she didn’t even let him finish the first sentence, didn’t take any of the Jedi bullshit and just said “shoot him”

-She chill af

-DAMN SHE’S A BADASS

-I feel really sorry for Lyste but I can’t help cracking up for some reason

-Yularen why did you come alone

-You could have just brought a bunch of stormtroopers and tased the lot from a distance, or would Ezra’s huge plot shield deflect that too

-Annnnd Pryce faints. Again.

-Dammit Lyste.

-Poor Lyste, and poor Kallus.

-THRAWN’S ACTUALLY PAYING ATTENTION TO THAT PURPLE LOTHCAT DOODLE

-Thrawn knooooowwwssss... He aaaaalwaaaaayyyyssss knooooowwwwwssssssssssss...

-But seriously damn I’m gettin’ chills here.

-”I believe Agent Fulcrum will prove far more useful to the Empire than Kallus ever was.”  DAAAAmn

-Kallus is so screwed

-KALLUS. IS. SO. FRICKIN. SCREWED. D’YOU. HEAR. ME.

-This is such a good episode; I don’t usually rewatch episodes, no matter what franchise, but this one I want to watch again.