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zims-left-shoe · 4 years ago

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Hello, I had a really cute idea for a request if you dont mind. Since it's been lockdown and stuff could I get a Zim x S/o where they're finally able to see eachother after isolation. Bonus for fluff if that's ok with you?

This request??? Amazing. Absolute perfection. And of course there’s going to be fluff!! Chaotic and feral Zim is great, but I love me some soft Zim.

Oh, and there’s no specific age here. Could be high school, could be adults, I’ll leave that up to the reader.

Blinking furiously, your eyes eventually settled on a squint as your phone cast painfully bright light into your face. The surrounding comfort of darkness was fended off by the harsh screen you continued to stare at. Nothing had changed in the past hour, nothing new was written. You weren't sure what you were hoping for.

A simple 'FINE' within a chat bubble marked the end of your conversation. Normally, you would snicker to yourself about how he flat out refused to write in lowercase, but the anxiety gnawing at your stomach prevented you from doing so.

Sighing, you rolled onto your side, hanging half off the bed in order to plug your phone in for the night. After that was accomplished, you flopped onto your back, staring into the black abyss that was your bedroom ceiling.

Quarantine had been a lot more difficult than you had originally thought. At first it was fun, you could be as much of an introvert as you wanted and could take care of your responsibilities on your own time and schedule, for the most part anyway. But once the weeks turned into months, and those months began to increase exponentially, it became a problem. Going just a bit stir crazy was bad enough, but the worst part was being unable to see Zim.

Again, at first, you didn't think it would be such a bad thing. He tended to get a bit clingy and possessive, so you thought a little me time would do you some good. But as time stretched onward, you realized that you missed the little roach bastard more than you had anticipated.

Of course you couldn't see him, considering not only the high human-to-human spread, but neither of you were quite sure to the extent Irkens would be affected, if it would be much more dangerous for Zim than an average human. As if that factor wasn't bad enough, Zim was already a huge germaphobe, so he rejected the idea of even socially-distanced hangouts with masks and all that.

So, being responsible and considerate, you had agreed to stick to text communication. It was fine at first, and you both talked regularly. Until about a month ago. Your worries began at the occurrence of two solid weeks of radio silence. Assuming the best, you waved it off as maybe he went to space and therefore couldn't get Earth cell reception. Finally, he had contacted you again, but brushed off any questions regarding the period of being off the grid. However, any response he gave you was short and simple, often a yes or no without elaboration, even to prompts where those answers weren't even valid.

This is where the unease began. Your mind began to run rampant with thoughts on the matter. What if he had gotten tired of you? The reasonable person inside of you told you that if that was indeed the case, then his loss, but that didn't mean you had to be happy about it. Just when you would convince yourself everything was fine, you managed to come back with something else, always a variation of the last negative thought. What if he had realized that he liked being alone, that he missed being a lone wolf soldier focused on destroying the world with no one to care about? You could never fully refute that one. After all, was a genetically modified alien soldier truly content being tied down by something such as a relationship?

The only thing that brought you any solace was that he had reached out to you that morning, requesting your presence at his base. Things had gotten better, allowing for the two of you to meet with contact, person to person. Well, person to Irken. Of course, your brain wouldn't let you enjoy that. It just had to spin some tale that would send you into a spiral of dread. Now, as you laid in your bed, sheets bunched in your fists, you were convinced that he wished to break up with you. Well, at least he had the decency to do so in person, if that even was the case.

You wanted nothing more than to be overjoyed that you would finally be able to see him after all this time. You had become quite attached to Zim, more than you ever would like to admit. You should be filled with excitement. However, you felt nothing but a sinking feeling that made your skin crawl.

"Just...please let me have a good night's sleep, would you?" You pleaded with your mind, shifting onto your side to face your wall, letting your eyes shut tight.

(more under the cut)

Unfortunately, you and your brain have two very different ways of defining 'a good night's sleep'. Trudging into the bathroom to get ready for the day ahead, you couldn't hold back the massive yawn. Stretching, about ten different joints popped as you remembered tossing and turning for a majority of the night. The worst part was the two or so hour period of staring blankly at the ceiling, mind racing with ideas of nothing at all.

Staring at your reflection in the mirror revealed you to be looking like hell...and not on wheels. More like hell discarded on the side of the road next to an empty shopping bag. Dark circles rested under your eyes, which weren't only from the previous night. Your sleep schedule had been almost non-existent thanks to quarantine, some nights you wouldn't surrender to slumber until three in the morning, and other days you would succumb to sleep's tantalizing claws at four pm.

Not to mention that you could barely remember the last time you had worn anything but pajamas or sweats. Groaning, you pulled on presentable clothes, as if this was the largest inconvenience you could ever be faced with. Not that Zim would care, but you didn't want to be shown up in the outfit department by a being from beyond who wore the same saturated pink military uniform every day.

You didn't even bother to glance at the time, it wouldn't matter. Either way, Zim would most likely chide you for being late, even if you were an hour early. You weren't sure if the construct of time even existed in the reality that was Zim's mind. Now that you thought about it, you couldn't say for certain if you had even set a specific time arrangement. All you had agreed upon was to be there some time in the morning.

It didn't matter regardless, he would be there whenever you decided to show up. He hadn't left his base once for the duration of quarantine. Zim had patience when it came to being cooped up for long periods of time, you would give him that much. It was about the only time he had patience, but it counted nonetheless.

That negative feeling wouldn't cease tugging at you as you meandered your way to Zim's base, quite literally dragging your feet down the sidewalk. Occasionally, you would come across a stray stone or pinecone, and you'd strike out with a half-hearted kick, watching it skitter across the pavement.

The entire walk was forgettable, and you had made the trek enough times for your brain to transition into autopilot until you made it to the fence line. The first few times you went to his place were unsettling. Now, you were completely unfazed as the security gnomes eyed you when you padded up the sidewalk, approaching the door. Their beady laser eyes tracked your every breath, but by this point you were unbothered. Besides, you were fairly sure that Zim had put you on the white list, so they shouldn't shoot at you unless it was a direct order.

You pressed the doorbell, folding your hands neatly in front of you as you waited for Zim to answer, scrambling to get a heartfelt speech together in your head. Whatever string of words you had managed to stitch together was thrown out the window when the door swung open, revealing a very animated GIR decked out in his doggy disguise. He frantically waved a black 'paw' to you, a grin splitting his face.

"Hi, Sparky!!" He hollered in your face, greeting you with a name that wasn't yours, per usual. Before you could even open your mouth to respond, he began talking again, in very much an outside voice. A chip right off the old Irken block. "Didja bring the pizza?!" The little robot inspected your arms curiously, stepping around you to make sure you weren't hiding the greasy pie behind your back.

"I, uh, wasn't aware I was supposed to be bringing pizza." You knew this was just an instance of GIR being GIR, but you went along with it anyway. He couldn't help himself, it was just the way he was wired. Or, maybe it was the fact that his brains consisted of useless pocket junk. It didn't really matter. GIR moved back to stand obediently in the doorway, you peering around the frame to see if Zim was anywhere to be found. He wasn't, which only made the nerves worse. Despite your worry, you kept your voice even and neutral. "May I come in?"

"Mhm!" He hummed, jumping aside to let you in. You closed the door behind you, standing around awkwardly for a moment before turning back to GIR, who was already shimmying out of his doggy suit.

"Do you know where Zim is?" Something seemed to click with GIR, however, it was not something that would answer your question. The poor robot burst into tears, which also wasn't out of the ordinary, falling face first into the floor and pounding his metal claw on the tile.

"That boy missed you so much!! He so sad, he even cried!! He loves youuu...!" He wailed, loud enough to draw Minimoose into the room who offered a soft and sad 'Nyah', seemingly agreeing with the statement. You couldn't confirm, since only Zim and GIR were fluent in the language you lovingly called 'Moosinese'. Tears continued to stream down the robot's metal face as he screamed, Minimoose resting a comforting purple nub on his back.

"Is that true?" Your response was calm, having dealt with GIR's outbursts many a time. You couldn't attest to the accuracy of his words, considering correct information was almost similar to a Russian roulette wheel when it came to GIR.

And as if nothing had ever happened, the robot immediately perked up, popping up to his feet with a smile, tongue lolling out the side of his mouth. "Yep!! Master's been down in the base the whole time!! Just sittin' there all shmoopy-like!" A giggle followed, pushing his previous bout of sadness into the past.

"Nyah!" Minimoose showed you a bucktooth grin as he looked to you purposefully.

"Really? Fascinating." Again, you couldn't speak Moosinese, but still, you nodded. The purple moose appeared to be satisfied with your response, floating off to who knows where.

"You wanna come play with the piggy with me?!" GIR bounced up and down, eager to drag you off to roll around on the floor and have a tea party with whatever pig he had brought home this week.

"Maybe some other time, GIR." You weren't opposed to spending time with the little robot, but he wasn't exactly who you were here to see. He didn't seem offended, all he did was shrug his metal shoulders.

"Okie dokie!" He brought his claw up to his forehead in a salute, turning away from you and making a mad dash to the kitchen. You heard a noisy metallic clang echo from the kitchen, and you didn't need to witness the event to visualize GIR smacking face-first into the cabinet.

"Careful, GIR! My milk squid experiment is in there!" A familiar voice rang out from the kitchen, and two immediate questions sprung to mind. The first was why in the name of anything would you keep milk in the cabinet (even if it related to a squid)? The second being just what in the hell had he been doing all this time?

The whiny complaints had quieted to low grumbles as just the alien you wanted to see paced into the living room, eyes cast downwards, antennae drooping. The words that had been forming in your throat were choked into barely a squeak when you got a closer look at him. Zim still didn't seem to notice you, red bug eyes trained on the tile, hands clasped behind his back. That wasn't the surprising bit. A jacket you thought you had lost some time ago was thrown on over his invader uniform. You couldn't remember if maybe you had left it there or maybe Zim had taken without your knowledge, but either way, he was swimming in it. The sleeves were rolled up to meet his wrists, gloved hands peeking out from the fabric. Most of the jacket itself was well past his thighs, stopping just above the knee. It had been just a bit big on you, so of course it would be massive on him. You felt any unease you were feeling immediately leave at the sight. Clearly, he hadn't been enjoying the separation as much as you thought.

"I was wondering where that coat went." A chuckle slipped past your lips. Finally, Zim seemed to notice you, head snapping in your direction, antennae perking up to attention.

"Eh?" He didn't quite register your phrase, almost as if he had been wearing your coat for so long that he had forgotten it wasn't a part of his usual attire. "Y/n, I don't-" Zim looked down at himself, finally realizing why you were staring at him like that. He wriggled out of the jacket faster than you could gush about how adorable it was, throwing it forcefully behind the couch. "YOU CAN'T PROVE ANYTHING!!" He shrieked, pointing a clawed finger at you, antennae flattening against his head in curt embarrassment.

"So, you like my stuff, huh?" You asked cheekily, relishing in his refusal to look at you as he unknowingly clutched the hem of his invader uniform, scuffling his boots on the tile. You couldn't help but snicker. It wasn't often Zim would let himself be sheepish, since he normally knew nothing of shame.

"Nonsense!" He waved a hand dismissively, eyes still refusing to meet yours, although without his contacts, it was a bit hard to tell where exactly he was looking if his head wasn't turned. Crossing his arms tight to his chest, he wracked his brain for possible excuses. "I was just, er, working on repairs and didn't want to get my clothes dirty! Yes! I found this filthy piece of clothing and figured it would suffice." You rolled your eyes, knowing full well he would never admit to the true motivations behind his actions.

Lucky for you, someone else chimed in to voice your exact thoughts. "That's a lie." The computer spoke up from nowhere in particular, monotone voice bringing a growl to rise from Zim's throat.

"YOU'RE LYING!! There is no evidence of this!" The Irken jabbed a claw up towards the direction of the many cables and wires strung across the ceiling. This wouldn't be the first time you've witnessed him get into a spat with his computer. They could be quite entertaining to watch, actually.

"Proof." The computer said in a matter-of-fact tone, the gargantuan TV screen buzzing to life, static clearing to reveal a recording of internal base camera feed. The date was in Irken, but you were wise enough to surmise that it was from some time over the quarantine.

The screen displays Zim begrudgingly wandering over to the voot cruiser in the hangar. In the video feed, he looks decently depressed, antennae slack and hanging limp, posture slouched. He climbed into the ship, looking for something. Whatever it was, his search came to an unresolved end as he lifted your jacket from the seat. Apparently, you had left it in there the last time he had taken you for a flight. His eyes darted around to make sure he wasn't being watched, slipping on the coat and hugging his arms to his chest. The sleeves extended well past his hands. He brought them to his face, sniffing them. A delighted smile ghosted his mouth as he rubbed the sleeves against his face.

"Why would you record that?!" His voice cracked at the end, and you were trying your best to hold in a laugh as the TV faded back to static for a split second before opening on another instance.

This time the video depicted GIR and Zim sprawled out on the couch, watching something on the TV. Zim was wrapped in your coat as if it were a blanket, seeming to be content enough with it. GIR had reached out a claw for the article of clothing, wishing to share. Zim hissed, yanking the coat away from his grip, swiping a clawed hand out like a cat. Clearly, he wanted it all to himself.

This time you couldn’t stop yourself from laughing. You tried to apologize, especially since the Irken standing next to you looked absolutely horrified. You were sure he felt his dignity had just faded away right along with the video feed.

"Oh, and my personal favorite." The computer added helpfully as yet another recording presented itself on the TV. This one was a bit tougher to make out.

Zim was down in the depths of the base, and much was dark, the only light being cast from a large monitor just off screen. You were able to see Zim, sitting on the floor, sporting your jacket. He stared longingly at the sleeves that covered his hands. After a moment he shoved his face into his arms and knees as tears slipped down his face. You could only make out the tears due to the light being thrown from the monitor, making them glisten like jewels. Separation appeared to be much harder on him than you had thought. Maybe that was why he had been ignoring you, although it seemed counterproductive. It was possible that texting you made him miss you more.

Zim was not amused in the slightest by this particular clip. He stamped his foot on the tile, making frenzied cutting motions with his arms.

"COMPUTER!!!" His voice was high in volume, but a nervous chuckle laced each syllable. "I think that is quite enough!"

The computer groaned, cutting the feed back to static, eventually switching the TV off completely. "I was just trying to be accurate."

"You only seem to care about accuracy when it is of no benefit to Zim!!" You could only imagine what was going through Zim's head in the moment, because from the outside, he was a ball of red hot rage. However, the computer was having none of his antics, going dormant once more.

"Zim? You're up here." You raised a hand above your head to indicate his anger level. "I need you to be down here." You lowered your hand to your abdomen, knowing that was a complete stretch to ask for. Especially since he was so upset he was stringing together curses in Irken. He would only speak in his native tongue around you when he was incredibly furious. His teeth were gritted tightly, foot tapping audibly on the tile.

"That damn computer." His growl was closer to that of a feral animal, and although he was calm enough to speak in English, he still required some de-escalation.

"Relax, we'll just pretend it never happened."

"Good. Forget about those recordings." His eyes were narrowed, but he was relenting his irritation.

"What recordings?" You shrugged, a smile playing at the corners of your mouth. Zim seemed appeased, and in a split second, all of his anger was gone and replaced by something else entirely. All the fight seemed to leave his body as he looked to you, red eyes softening completely when they caught your own. He seemed relieved to see you, as if being away was one of the hardest things he had been through in years.

Wordlessly, he strode over to you, wrapping his arms around you and burying his face into your chest. Soft Zim was a rare occurrence, but these moments were something you absolutely treasured. It almost made the months of isolation worth it.

You returned the action, and the second you put your arms around him, every muscle in his body relaxed. It was a bit strange, really. To have a hardened alien soldier all but melt in your arms. He wrapped his legs around you as well, clinging to you like a koala. It wasn't hard to maintain balance since he really wasn't all that heavy.

"Couch." He mumbled, his chin resting on your shoulder as his arms were draped around your neck, your own arms supporting him under his legs. A chuckle fell from your lips at his behavior. At first it seemed like he had no energy, but in reality, it was closer to him being soothed by your presence. You were about the only living creature, scratch that, the only thing in the entire universe that could ease him like this; even he wasn't sure why you had this effect on him.

"Sure thing." You walked him over to the couch, using one arm to snag your jacket off the floor before sinking down into the cushions. There was a bit of a strange smell emanating from where you sat, most likely due to GIR spilling countless snacks, messes that weren't completely cleaned up. It wasn't super potent, and in that particular moment, it wasn't one of your concerns.

As you sat on the couch, Zim remained cuddled into you. A snicker slipped out as you tossed your coat over him as if it were a blanket. At first you assumed he would protest, proclaiming that he wasn't cold, nor a weak little smeet who needs to be cared for. So when he removed his arms from you, you were bracing yourself for a lecture and/or rant. However, all he did was tuck the jacket around him better, silently snaking his arms back around you afterward.

"You really did miss me, huh?" It was a redundant question, since without even saying, you both were aware of the answer. Still, you wished to hear him say it. It would put you in good spirits.

"Your absence was...not pleasant." His voice was uncharacteristically hushed, muffled by your clothes. His words were chosen delicately, as they always were when he didn't want to admit to something that he knew to be true.

"So you missed me." The smile that was spread on your face shone through your voice.

"If that is what you would like to think." Zim made an attempt at being snarky, but any mockery in his words was half-hearted at best. Breathing a sigh, you let your head fall back against the back of the couch. You knew full well that was the best you could hope to glean from him, even in his current subdued state.

"For the record, I missed you too."

"As you should. Zim is very great." Looking down, you were met with a sight that melted your heart. The coat still wrapped around him, arms still clinging to you as if you would walk out any minute. Zim's eyes were closed as he laid his head in your lap, quiet purrs rising from his throat as your fingers absentmindedly played with his antennae. You almost thought he would fall asleep.

"I know. You're the coolest Irken I know." You may have only known one, but still. Zim was pretty amazing in your book, despite being a self-absorbed idiot at times. A pleasant silence settled over the room for a moment as you continued to twirl his antennae between your fingers.

His eyes still closed, Zim spoke again, mumbling, "Zim's next plan is to eradicate these abhorrent human pandemics." The words slurred together a bit, and although you knew Irkens to not sleep due to lack of biological necessity, whenever he was completely relaxed, he tended to get drowsy.

"Good luck with that. I support your efforts one hundred percent." Despite the first statement harboring a twinge of sarcasm, the second was completely genuine.

"Does Zim detect a hint of ridicule?" His words may have been a challenge, but not a single eye opened even a crack, not a single muscle in his body so much as twitching.

"All I'm saying is I haven't seen much progress on your original plan of eradicating the humans, and it's been how many years?"

"Quiet or I'll steal another one of your inferior human zip-cloth thingies." He may not have technically stolen the first one, but you had to make a mental note to keep track of your jackets and hoodies. Or at the very least, make sure to keep the ones you wore often out of reach. You supposed in the end it didn't really matter. You would know where to find them if they did happen to go missing. And besides, he did look rather cute in them.

#invader zim #invader zim fanfiction #invader zim x reader #zim x reader #invader zim fic #invader zim one shot #invader zim oneshot #one shot #oneshot #fanfic #fanfiction #request

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themonkeycabal · 4 years ago

Text

WandaVision Ep 4 SPOILERS

Yes, spoilers,

Wherein I watch and say stuff that might or might not be worth reading.

After a little bit of a lackluster start, there was good story progress last week. An escalation of weird, which I appreciated. I'll probably have to relive it, because Disney doesn't want to let me skip the previously. Ever. Why are you the way you are, Disney?

Geraldine/Monica is made of whispery voices and swirling dust and such. Weird. She's sitting in a chair, sleeping, and apparently being reconstituted. She wakes to a hospital room but outside is chaos. Lots of yelling and people running about. There's like swirling dust or human confetti everywhere, and other people are being reconstituted left and right. Seems unusual. Not the sort of thing that normally happens in hospitals. Oh, are they being un-snapped? The great un-snappening. The un-snapapalooza. The fall of the snappocalypse. I'll stop. I guess we're in a flashback of sorts.

Dudes, Monica just like full on hip checked some dude into the boards. She didn't mean it, but, damn, that guy went flying. Nobody knows what's going on, it's madness. A doctor recognizes her and asks where she went and Monica's all "uh, what? I took a nap?" Napping and then snapping and then popping back into existence. Ain't that just the way? Oh, sad, her mom died while she was missing for five years. :(

Sentient Weapon Observation Response Division — please nobody expect me to remember that. They have a Cape Canaveral looking compound with multiple launch pads and a very large hanger smack in the middle. Gee how neat for them that they get to operate out in the open, Phil Coulson says (in my head) with a whole lot of sarcasm.

Oh, right, they called it the Blip. The Great Un-Blippening. That doesn't sound as good. What on earth with the massive monitors in the main lobby. Nobody likes watching the news that much. Monica is trying to brazenly walk through the front doors with a badge that doesn't work and wow, security guy is kind of a dick. Oh, she belongs there. Captain Monica Rambeau. Captain, good for her.

And now security dick is revealed to be even more dickish, since this is just after the Blip and she's trying to go back to work. Like, SWORD couldn't put out a memo "Be on the lookout for recently unblipped personnel. Don't be massive dicks to them when their security badges don't work, because of how they got blipped and all"? Also maybe a reorientation packet, or like a desk out front "Back from the Blip? Talk to Lt. Mandy Smith in HR about your reactivation options today!" I'm just spitballing here. I get it was chaotic, but that's no reason to let the unblipped get a rude welcome. It wasn't their fault Thanos was critically dumb.

Blip no longer sounds like a word.

Anyway, the acting director is fortunately there to meet her before she could drop her gloves and punch the security dick in the dick. Aww, Maria Rambeau is on the Wall of Valor, or whatever they call it at SWORD.

Things aren't going well at SWORD. The Blip put the hurt on the division. Their remaining astronaut trainees have chickened out. Oh, what if there was like crew up in orbit that got blipped and then when they unblipped five years later … yikes. Well, I'll allow the 'lost their nerve' may have a solid basis in horribleness that probably occurred around the Blip. I retract the 'chickened out' comment.

This is a very long walk-and-talk. Maria Rambeau built SWORD "from the ground up". Bless.

The Director has grounded Monica. Well, actually, her mom grounded her, making protocols in case vanished personnel one day returned. Lol. Though, I mean, I'd guess she'd know, what with Carol and all. "I know it's a raw deal, but there is one positive takeaway. She believed you'd come back." Awww

So, she's off to deal with some sort of missing persons case in New Jersey overseeing the loan of one of their drones for the FBI. I guess Wanda will be the missing person. Yep, she's off to Westview. Which has seen better days.

Hey! It's Agent Woo! I like you Agent Woo! Did I know he was in this? I don't remember. Randall Park's great. A happy surprise.

Hmm, he has a missing witness. So, not Wanda, then. Hmm again. Agent Woo contacted known associates, family, friends — none of them have ever heard of the witness. A mystery!

Oh and there's another wrinkle.

"Pardon me Sheriff, would you mind repeating your claim about Westview to my colleague here?"

"No such place," he says, standing next to the 'Welcome to Westview" sign.

Hmmm, puzzling. Jimmy Woo can't reach anybody listed as living in town. So, wait, the town doesn't exist, except it does, but, nobody thinks it does, so where did he get the phone records for residents? The phone company was just like "here's your records for the imaginary city of Westview, all 3,000+ residents that never existed, and yet we have the numbers and we're just not going to question that". Weird.

"So you can't reach anyone inside and everyone on the outside has some sort of selective amnesia?" That does seem to be the case, Monica. Super odd. Agent Woo is very sanguine about the whole thing. He dealt with Scott Lang, I guess after that everything else is like, 'meh'.

"Why haven't' you gone inside to investigate?" A fine question, Captain.

"Because it doesn't want me to." That's just creepy, Agent Woo. "You can feel it, too, can't you? Nobody's supposed to go in." I guess this is where the drone will come in handy. Oh, it's the little helicopter that Wanda found in the bushes in the second episode. I'm going to pretend that super advanced SWORD drones would totally look like cheap RC toy helicopters. I guess that's a disguise?

Monica wants to know why she and Agent Woo are aware that Westview exists and nobody else is. Does that mean the Sheriff was standing next to the Welcome to Westview sign and just did not see it at all? He was just hanging out in the middle of nowhere with a weirdly laconic FBI agent who kept asking about the town that very clearly wasn't just right behind them? That's a little more than amnesia.

Also, Agent Woo's hero was Elliot Ness. Of course it was.

Oh no, the drone vanished as it crossed the town line! There's an energy field around the town that looks like what happens when you push your fingers against an old monitor and get the weird pixelly rainbow. Agent Woo's all "please no touch" and Monica's all "yes, I think I'll stick my whole hand in there." And she got sucked in. Agent Woo's gotta be like "WHY DOESN'T ANYBODY EVER LISTEN TO ME?"

24 hours later. Darcy! Some sort of transport van. A trio of other suits in the back, plus Darcy. She tries to talk to one of the dudes and he's all "we're not supposed to talk to each other!" "Boy Scout leader, got it." Relax, uptight guy. Pfft, what sort of team is that? The rest give up their specialty. Aww, bless, she went into astrophysics. "We've got the full clown car." heh.

Boy Scout leader finally caving to peer pressure: "I'm a chemical engineer." Darcy: "No one cares." lol. Missed you, girlfriend!

And in 24 hours SWORD/FBI whoever have set up a little military camp. Oh a "response base". How banally euphemistic. There's like a whole bunch of agencies there, as well as Army and Air Force.

Dr. Lewis. Oh, I'm so proud. I bet Jane was over the moon. Saved from poli-sci!

Elsewhere another drone vanishes. Darcy darcys a lot at an uptight uniform who is breathing down her neck "make your assessment" and it's delightful. Darcy notices some high levels of cosmic background radiation and also something weird layered over the top of that. Hmm, she needs a tv. "An old one, like not flat." One with vacuum tubes, perhaps?

In another part of the camp, they send in a guy in a hazmat suit, down into the sewers, looking for Monica. I guess he'll be the beekeper Wanda tosses in ep 2. Jimmy Woo is not optimistic about that plan. He tells the SWORD Director all about it.

"Someone must really miss you back at Quantico." "No, sir, softball season is over." Lol.

All their high tech scanning is turning up nothing.

Uhoh, screaming. Oh, nevermind, it's the laughtrack. While everybody else was dicking around with the LIDAR, Darcy has tracked down the last tube tv in New Jersey and has tuned into the Wanda Dimension. Episode one is playing.

Darcy is understandably particularly baffled by Vision. "Look, I know it's been a crazy few years on this planet, but he's dead right? Not blipped. Dead." Poor Vision. Alas.

Director wants to know if the broadcast is realtime or a recording. Or what? Darcy's like "how tf should I know?"

Jimmy asks the good question "So you're saying the universe created a sitcom staring two Avengers?" "It's a working theory."

Now SWORD fans out! And collects every ye olde TV on the eastern seaboard. Who doesn't love a good sitcom, amiright? (Me. Me do not love sitcoms). The Director storms off to wherever for whatever reason. I don't know, don't care. Jimmy and Darcy are on the case.

Darcy is IDing the other "characters" in the sitcom, who appear to be real people with NJ driver's liscenses, while Jimmy is wondering why the force field is hexagonal. You've got me there. And now we're montaging.

Jimmy ponders the big board of 'characters' and Darcy drops her cup o' noodles when she spots Monica in the second episode. He and Darcy discuss and he's like "is it an alternate reality, time travel, some cockamamie social experiment?" Darcy's all "it's a sitcom." A pure mystery.

Darcy comes up with the idea to reach out to Wanda via the radio in her kitchen. "Next time she's washing dishes — which by my count happens about once an episode, barf." heh. She tech babbles some and I'm very proud.

A minion agent runs up with the latest intel from the most recent episode, it's a picture of the SWORD drone that looks more retro (frankly it looks better than the 'real world' one.) Hmmm, such a puzzler. Why did it change, they wonder.

Darcy Lewis and Jimmy Woo are a partnership I can totally get behind. Jimmy was the voice trying to reach Wanda. Darcy's watching the show while Jimmy's trying the radio thing. It's the second episode where Wanda's talking to Emma Caulfield and things go weird. Good. I'm glad they jumped us to the outside world by ep four. While I thought the first two eps were slow, I think maybe they'll work better once we can watch the whole thing at a go.

Dude is still crawling through the sewers. I completely forgot he was down there. And the field extends below ground and he just crawled through it and became a beekeeper, and his safety rope snapped and … became a jumprope?

And then Wanda wishes him to the cornfield. (I guess? We don't see what happens to him.)

SWORD is watching episode three.

"1950s, 1960s, and now 70s. Why does it keep switching time periods. It can't be purely for my enjoyment can it?" Guys, it's so good to see Darcy. "I can't believe Wanda and Vision are having a baby." No really, Jimmy and Darcy, BFFS 4EVAH! They're eating chips and watching the episode. Delightful. Just delightful.

"Twins. What a twist." Jimmy gives Darcy a look. "I'm invested!"

Monica mentions Ultron and Jimmy and Darcy are like "Whoa!".

They notice the screen sort of glitches and then Monica is gone and it's the end credits. Like when Bee guy vanished. Darcy and Jimmy are confused. "Someone is censoring the broadcast." Yeah, Wanda. She's gone to the scary place, friends.

Alarms go off and they run off. But, we go into Wanda World the aspect ratio changes from 4:3 to 16:9 and it's a new angle on when Wanda went all scary at Monica, demanding to know who she is. And then, of course, she gets kicked out of Wanda World.

"Wanda, I'm just your neighbor." "Then how could you know about Ultron?"

Wanda brings up the glowy hands of scary. "You are a stranger and an outsider and right now you are trespassing here. And I want you to leave." And then she zooms Monica out through the walls and fences and fields and that looked like it probably hurt.

Oh gross. Wanda turns around and sees Dead Vision. The big hole in his head and his face all, you know, dead looking. She looks away and then he's normal when she looks back. Well, now this has turned all sad, you guys. "We can go wherever we want." "No, we can't." Sad. Poor Wanda. The aspect ratio goes back to 4:3. I’m sure Editorial was like “oh god, again?”

"Don't worry darling, I have everything under control."

I don't think so, Wanda.

Good ep! My only real takeaway is that none of this is going to end particularly happily.

So … Darcy and Jimmy, BFFS 4EVAH!

#wandavision #wandavision spoilers #darcy lewis #jimmy woo #wandavision liveblog

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davidmann95 · 4 years ago

Note

So... Morrison’s 10 part interview on All-Star Superman, along with all other older Newsarama articles, just seem to have ceased to exist. One does not simply live without having those interviews available to reread... Can I find them anywhere else?

Rejoice! I finally borrowed a computer I could put my flash drive into, and emailed myself my copy of the Morrison interview. Here it is below the cut, copied and pasted direct from the source way back when, available again at last:

Three years, 12 issues, Eisners and countless accolades later, All Star Superman is finally finished. The out-of-continuity look at Superman’s struggle with his inevitable death was widely embraced by fans and pros as one of the best stories to feature the Man of Steel, and was a showcase for the talents of the creative team of Grant Morrison, Frank Quitely and Jamie Grant.

Now, Newsarama is proud to present an exclusive look back with Morrison at the series that took Superman to, pun intended, new heights. We had a lot of questions about the series...and Morrison delivered with an in-depth look into the themes, characters and ideas throughout the 12 issues. In fact, there was so much that we’re running this as an unprecedented 10-part series over the next two weeks – sort of an unofficial All Star Superman companion. It’s everything about All Star Superman you ever wanted to know, but were afraid to ask.

And of course there’s plenty of SPOILERS, so back away if you haven’t read the entire series.

Newsarama: Grant, tell us a little about the origin of the project.

Grant Morrison: Some of it has its roots in the DC One Million project from 1999. So much so, that some readers have come to consider this a prequel to DC One Million, which is fine if it shifts a few more copies! I’ve tried to give my own DC books an overarching continuity intended to make them all read as a more coherent body of work when I’m done.

Luthor’s “enlightenment” – when he peaks on super–senses and sees the world as it appears through Superman’s eyes – was an element I’d included in the Superman Now pitch I prepared along with Mark Millar, Tom Peyer and Mark Waid back in 1999. There were one or two of ideas of mine that I wanted to preserve from Superman Now and Luthor’s heart–stopping moment of understanding was a favorite part of the original ending for that story, so I decided to use it again here.

My specific take on Superman’s physicality was inspired by the “shamanic” meeting my JLA editor Dan Raspler and I had in the wee hours of the morning outside the San Diego comic book convention in whenever it was, ‘98 or ‘99.

I’ve told this story in more detail elsewhere but basically, we were trying to figure out how to “reboot” Superman without splitting up his marriage to Lois, which seemed like a cop–out. It was the beginning of the conversations which ultimately led to Superman Now, with Dan and I restlessly pacing around trying to figure out a new way into the character of Superman and coming up short...

Until we looked up to see a guy dressed as Superman crossing the train tracks. Not just any skinny convention guy in an ill–fitting suit, this guy actually looked like Superman. It was too good a moment to let pass, so I ran over to him, told him what we’d been trying to do and asked if he wouldn’t mind indulging us by answering some questions about Superman, which he did...in the persona and voice of Superman!

We talked for an hour and a half and he walked off into the night with his friend (no, it wasn’t Jimmy Olsen, sadly). I sat up the rest of the night, scribbling page after page of Superman notes as the sun came up over the naval yards.

My entire approach to Superman had come from the way that guy had been sitting; so easy, so confident, as if, invulnerable to all physical harm, he could relax completely and be spontaneous and warm. That pose, sitting hunched on the bollard, with one knee up, the cape just hanging there, talking to us seemed to me to be the opposite of the clenched, muscle-bound look the character sometimes sports and that was the key to Superman for me.

I met the same Superman a couple of times afterwards but he wasn’t Superman, just a nice guy dressed as Superman, whose name I didn’t save but who has entered into my own personal mythology (a picture has from that time has survived showing me and Mark Waid posing alongside this guy and a couple of young readers dressed as Superboy and Supergirl – it’s in the “Gallery” section at my website for anybody who can be bothered looking. This is the guy who lit the fuse that led to All Star Superman).

After the 1999 pitch was rejected, I didn’t expect to be doing any further work on Superman but sometime in 2002, while I was going into my last year on New X–Men, Dan DiDio called and asked if I wanted to come back to DC to work on a Superman book with Jim Lee.

Jim was flexing his artistic muscles again to great effect, and he wanted to do 12 issues on Superman to complement the work he was doing with Jeph Loeb on “Batman: Hush.” At the time, I wasn’t able to make my own commitments dovetail with Jim’s availability, but by then I’d become obsessed with the idea of doing a big Superman story and I’d already started working out the details.

Jim, of course, went on to do his 12 Superman issues as “For Tomorrow” with Brian Azzarello, so I found myself looking for an artist for what was rapidly turning into my own Man of Steel magnum opus, and I already knew the book had to be drawn by my friend and collaborator, Frank Quitely.

We were already talking about We3 and Superman seemed like a good meaty project to get our teeth into when that was done. I completely scaled up my expectations of what might be possible once Frank was on board and decided to make this thing as ambitious as possible.

Usually, I prefer to write poppy, throwaway “live performance” type superhero books, but this time, I felt compelled to make something for the ages – a big definitive statement about superheroes and life and all that, not only drawn by my favorite artist but starring the first and greatest superhero of them all.

The fact that it could be a non–continuity recreation made the idea even more attractive and more achievable. I also felt ready for it, in a way I don’t think I would have been in 1999; I finally felt “grown–up” enough to do Superman justice.

I plotted the whole story in 2002 and drew tiny colored sketches for all 12 covers. The entire book was very tightly constructed before we started – except that I’d left the ending open for the inevitable better and more focused ideas I knew would arise as the project grew into its own shape...and I left an empty space for issue 10. That one was intended from the start to be the single issue of the 12–issue run that would condense and amplify the themes of all the others. #10 was set aside to be the one–off story that would sum up anything anyone needed to know about Superman in 22 pages.

Not quite as concise an origin as Superman’s, but that’s how we got started.

NRAMA: When you were devising the series, what challenges did you have in building up this version of the Superman universe?

GM: I couldn’t say there were any particular challenges. It was fun. Nobody was telling me what I could or couldn’t do with the characters. I didn’t have to worry about upsetting continuity or annoying people who care about stuff like that.

I don’t have a lot of old comics, so my knowledge of Superman was based on memory, some tattered “70s books from the remains of my teenage collection, a bunch of DC “Best Of...” reprint editions and two brilliant little handbooks – “Superman in Action Comics” Volumes 1 and 2 – which reprint every single Action Comics cover from 1938 to 1988.

I read various accounts of Superman’s creation and development as a brand. I read every Superman story and watched every Superman movie I could lay my hands on, from the Golden Age to the present day. From the Socialist scrapper Superman of the Depression years, through the Super–Cop of the 40s, the mythic Hyper–Dad of the 50s and 60s, the questioning, liberal Superman of the early 70s, the bland “superhero” of the late 70s, the confident yuppie of the 80s, the over–compensating Chippendale Superman of the 90s etc. I read takes on Superman by Mark Waid, Mark Millar, Geoff Johns, Denny O’Neil, Jeph Loeb, Alan Moore, Paul Dini and Alex Ross, Joe Casey, Steve Seagle, Garth Ennis, Jim Steranko and many others.

I looked at the Fleischer cartoons, the Chris Reeve movies and the animated series, and read Alvin Schwartz’s (he wrote the first ever Bizarro story among many others) fascinating book – “An Unlikely Prophet” – where he talks about his notion of Superman as a tulpa, (a Tibetan word for a living thought form which has an independent existence beyond its creator) and claims he actually met the Man of Steel in the back of a taxi.

I immersed myself in Superman and I tried to find in all of these very diverse approaches the essential “Superman–ness” that powered the engine. I then extracted, purified and refined that essence and drained it into All Star’s tank, recreating characters as my own dream versions, without the baggage of strict continuity.

In the end, I saw Superman not as a superhero or even a science fiction character, but as a story of Everyman. We’re all Superman in our own adventures. We have our own Fortresses of Solitude we retreat to, with our own special collections of valued stuff, our own super–pets, our own “Bottle Cities” that we feel guilty for neglecting. We have our own peers and rivals and bizarre emotional or moral tangles to deal with.

I felt I’d really grasped the concept when I saw him as Everyman, or rather as the dreamself of Everyman. That “S” is the radiant emblem of divinity we reveal when we rip off our stuffy shirts, our social masks, our neuroses, our constructed selves, and become who we truly are.

Batman is obviously much cooler, but that’s because he’s a very energetic and adolescent fantasy character: a handsome billionaire playboy in black leather with a butler at this beck and call, better cars and gadgetry than James Bond, a horde of fetish femme fatales baying around his heels and no boss. That guy’s Superman day and night.

Superman grew up baling hay on a farm. He goes to work, for a boss, in an office. He pines after a hard–working gal. Only when he tears off his shirt does that heroic, ideal inner self come to life. That’s actually a much more adult fantasy than the one Batman’s peddling but it also makes Superman a little harder to sell. He’s much more of a working class superhero, which is why we ended the whole book with the image of a laboring Superman.

He’s Everyman operating on a sci–fi Paul Bunyan scale. His worries and emotional problems are the same as ours... except that when he falls out with his girlfriend, the world trembles.

Newsarama: Grant, what are some of your favorite moments from the 12 issues?

Grant Morrison: The first shot of Superman flying over the sun. The Cosmic Anvil. Samson and Atlas. The kiss on the moon. The first three pages of the Olsen story which, I think, add up to the best character intro I’ve ever written.

Everything Lex Luthor says in issue #5. Everything Clark does. The whole says/does Luthor/Superman dynamic as played out through Frank Quitely’s absolute mastery and understanding of how space, movement and expression combine to tell a story.

Superboy and his dog on the moon – that perfect teenage moment of infinite possibility, introspection and hope for the future. He’s every young man on the verge of adulthood, Krypto is every dog with his boy (it seemed a shame to us that Krypto’s most memorable moment prior to this was his death scene in “Whatever Happened To The Man of Tomorrow.” Quitely’s scampering, leaping, eager and alive little creature is how I’d prefer to imagine Krypto the Superdog and conjures finer and more subtle emotions).

Bizarro–Home, with all of Earth’s continental and ocean shapes but reversed. The page with the first appearance of Zibarro that Frank has designed so the eye is pulled down in a swirling motion into the drain at the heart of the image, to make us feel that we’re being flushed in a cloacal spiral down into a nihilistic, existential sink. Frank gave me that page as a gift, and it became weirdly emblematic of a strange, dark time in both our lives.

The story with Bar–El and Lilo has a genuine chill off ammonia and antiseptic off it, which makes it my least favorite issue of the series, although I know a lot of people who love it. It’s about dying relatives, obligations, the overlit overheated corridors between terminal wards, the thin metallic odors of chemicals, bad food and fear. Preparation for the Phantom Zone.

Superman hugging the poor, hopeless girl on the roof and telling us all we’re stronger than we think we are.

Joe Shuster drawing us all into the story forever and never–ending.

Nasthalthia Luthor. Frank and Jamie’s final tour of the Fortress, referencing every previous issue on the way, in two pages.

All of issue #10 (there’s a single typo in there where the time on the last page was screwed up – but when we fix that detail for the trade I’ll be able to regard this as the most perfectly composed superhero story I’ve ever written).

I don’t think I’ve ever had a smoother, more seamless collaborative process.

NRAMA: The story is very complete unto itself, but are there any new or classic characters you’d like to explore further? If so, which ones and why?

GM: I’d happily write more Atlas and Samson. I really like Krull, the Dino–Czar’s wayward son, and his Stalinist underground empire of “Subterranosauri.” I could write a Superman Squad comic forever. I’d love to write the “Son of Superman” sequel about Lois and Clark’s super test tube baby.

But...I think All Star is already complete, without sequels. You read that last issue and it works because you know you’re never going to see All Star Superman again. You’ll be able to pick up Superman books, but they won’t be about this guy and they won’t feel the same. He really is going away. Our Superman is actually “dying” in that sense, and that adds the whole series a deeper poignancy.

NRAMA: Aside from the Bizarro League, you never really introduce other DC superheroes into the story. Why did you make this choice?

GM: I wanted the story to be about the mythic Superman at the end of his time. It’s clear from the references that he has or more likely has had a few super–powered allies, but that they’re no longer around or relevant any more.

For the context of this story I wanted the super–friends to be peripheral, like they were in the old comics. The Flash? Green Lantern? They represent Superman’s “old army buddies,” or your dad’s school friends. Guys you’ve sort of heard of, who used to be more important in the old man’s life than they are now.

NRAMA: Some readers were confused as to how the “Twelve Labors” broke down, though others have pointed out that Superman’s actions are more reflective of the Stations of the Cross (I note there’s a “Station Café” in the background of issue #12). Could you break down the Twelve Labors, or, if the cross theory is true, how the storyline reflects the Stations?

GM: The 12 Labors of Superman were never intended as an isomorphic mapping onto the 12 Labors of Hercules, or for that matter, the specific Stations of the Cross, of which there are 14, I believe. I didn’t even want to do one Labor per issue, so it deliberately breaks down quite erratically through the series for reasons I’ll go into (later).

Yes, there are correspondences, but that’s mostly because we tried to create for our Superman the contemporary “superhero” version of an archetypal solar hero journey, which naturally echoes numerous myths, legends and religious parables.

At the same time, we didn’t want to do an update or a direct copy of any myth you’d seen before, so it won’t work if you try to find one specific mythological or religious “plan” to hang the series on; James Joyce’s honorable and heroic refutation of the rule aside, there’s nothing more dead and dull than an attempt to retell the Odyssey or the Norse sagas scene by scene, but in a modern and/or superhero setting.

For future historians and mythologizers, however, the 12 Labors of Superman may be enumerated as follows:

1. Superman saves the first manned mission to the sun. 2. Superman brews the Super–Elixir. 3. Superman answers the Unanswerable Question. 4. Superman chains the Chronovore.  5. Superman saves Earth from Bizarro–Home. 6. Superman returns from the Underverse. 7. Superman creates Life. 8. Superman liberates Kandor/cures cancer. 9. Superman defeats Solaris. 10. Superman conquers Death. 11. Superman builds an artificial Heart for the Sun. 12.Superman leaves the recipe/formula to make Superman 2.

And one final feat, which typically no–one really notices, is that Lex Luthor delivers his own version of the unified field haiku – explaining the underlying principles of the universe in fourteen syllables – which the P.R.O.J.E.C.T. G–Type philosopher from issue 4 had dedicated his entire life to composing!

You may notice also that the Labors take place over a year – with the solar hero’s descent into the darkness and cold of the Underverse occurring at midwinter/Christmas time (that’s also the only point in the story where we ever see Metropolis at night).

It can also be seen as the sun’s journey over the course of a day – we open in blazing sunshine but halfway through the book, at the end of issue #5, in fact, the solar hero dips below the horizon and begins the night–journey through the hours of darkness and death, before his triumphant resurrection at dawn. That’s why issue 5 ends with the boat to the Underworld and 6 begins with the moon. Clark Kent is crossing the threshold into the subconscious world of memory, shadows, death and deep emotions.

Although they can often have bizarre resonances, specific elements, like the Station Café, are usually put there by Frank Quitely, and are not necessarily secret Dan Brown–style keys to unlocking the mysteries. I think there might be a Station Café opposite the studio where Frank Quitely works and the “SAPIEN” sign on another storefront is a reference to Frank’s studio mate, Dave Sapien. At least he’s not filling the background with dirty words like he used to, given any opportunity

NRAMA: For that matter, do the Twelve Labors matter at all? They seem so purposely ill–defined. They seem more like misdirection or a MacGuffin than anything that needs to be clearly delineated.

GM: They matter, of course, but the 12 Labors idea is there to show that, as with all myth, the systematic ordering of current events into stories, tales, or legends occurs after the fact.

I’m trying to suggest that only in the future will these particular 12 feats, out of all the others ever, be mythologized as 12 Labors. I suppose I was trying to say something about how people impose meaning upon events in retrospect, and that’s how myth is born. It’s hindsight that provides narrative, structure, meaning and significance to the simple unfolding of events. It’s the backward glance that adds all the capital letters to the list above.

Even Superman isn”t sure how many Labors he’s performed when we see him mulling it over in issue 10.  When you watched it happening, it seemed to be Superman just doing his thing. In the future it’s become THE 12 LABORS OF SUPERMAN!

NRAMA: And on a completely ridiculous note: All–Star Superman is perhaps the most difficult–to–abbreviate comic title since Preacher: Tall in the Saddle. Did you realize this going in?

GM: Going into what? Going into ASS itself? In the sense of how did I feel as I slowly entered ASS for the first time?

It never crossed my mind...

Newsarama: I’d like to know a little more about Leo Quintum and his role in the story. He seems like a bit of an outgrowth of the likes of Project Cadmus and Emil Hamilton, but in a more fantastical, Willy Wonka sense.

Grant Morrison: Yeah, he was exactly as you say, my attempt to create an updated take on the character of “Superman’s scientist friend” – in the vein of Emil Hamilton from the animated show and the ‘90s stories. Science so often goes wrong in Superman stories, and I thought it was important to show the potential for science to go right or to be elevated by contact with Superman’s shining positive spirit.

I was thinking of Quintum as a kind of “Man Who Fell To Earth” character with a mysterious unearthly background. For a while I toyed with the notion that he was some kind of avatar of Lightray of the New Gods, but as All Star developed, that didn’t fit the tone, and he was allowed to simply be himself.

Eventually it just came down to simplicity. Leo Quintum represents the “good” scientific spirit – the rational, enlightened, progressive, utopian kind of scientist I figured Superman might inspire to greatness. It was interesting to me how so many people expected Quintum to turn out bad at the end. It shows how conditioned we are in our miserable, self–loathing, suspicious society to expect the worst of everyone, rather than hope for the best. Or maybe it’s just what we expect from stories.

Having said that, there is indeed a necessary whiff of Lucifer about Quintum. His name, Leo Quintum, conjures images of solar force, lions and lightbringers and he has elements of the classic Trickster figure about him. He even refers to himself as “The Devil Himself” in issue #10.

What he’s doing at the end of the story should, for all its gee–whiz futurity, feel slightly ambiguous, slightly fake, slightly “Hollywood.” Yes, he’s fulfilling Superman’s wishes by cloning an heir to Superman and Lois and inaugurating a Superman dynasty that will last until the end of time – but he’s also commodifying Superman, figuring out how it’s done, turning him into a brand, a franchise, a bigger–and–better “revamp,” the ultimate coming attraction, fresher than fresh, newer than new but familiar too. Quintum has figured out the “formula” for Superman and improved upon it.

And then you can go back to the start of All Star Superman issue #1 and read the “formula” for yourself, condensed into eight words on the first page and then expanded upon throughout the story! The solar journey is an endless circle naturally. A perfect puzzle that is its own solution.

In one way, Quintum could be seen to represent the creative team, simultaneously re–empowering a pure myth with the honest fire of Art...while at the same time shooting a jolt of juice through a concept that sells more “S” logo underpants and towels than it does comic books. All tastes catered!

I have to say that the Willy Wonka thing never crossed my mind until I saw people online make the comparison, which seems quite obvious now. Quintum dresses how I would dress if I was the world’s coolest super–scientist. What’s up with that?

NRAMA: Was Zibarro inspired by the Bizarro World story where the Bizarro–Neanderthal becomes this unappreciated Casanova–type?

GM: Don’t know that one, but it sounds like a scenario I could definitely endorse!

Zibarro started out as a daft name sicked–up by my subconscious mind, which flowered within moments into the must–write idea of an Imperfect Bizarro. What would an imperfect version of an already imperfect being be like?

Zibarro.

NRAMA: I’d like to know more about Zibarro – what’s the significance of his chronicling Bizarro World through poetry?

GM: It’s up to you. I see Zibarro partly as the sensitive teenager inside us all. He’s moody, horribly self–aware and uncomfortable, yet filled with thoughts of omnipotence and agency. He’s the absolute center of his tiny, disorganized universe. He’s playing the role of sensitive, empathic poet but at the same time, he’s completely self–absorbed.

When he says to Superman “Can you even imagine what it’s like to be so different. So unique. So unlike everyone else?” he doesn’t even wait for Superman’s reply. He doesn’t care about anyone’s feelings but his own, ultimately.

NRAMA: The character is very close to Superman, so what does it say that a nonpowered version on a savage world would focus his energy through that medium? Also, does Zibarro’s existence show how Superman is able to elevate even the backwards Bizarros through his very nature?

GM: All of the above. And maybe he writes his totally subjective poetry as a reflection of Clark Kent’s objective reporter role. The suppressed, lyrical, wounded side of Superman perhaps? The Super–Morrissey? Bizarro With The Thorn In His Side?

But he’s also Bizarro–Home’s “mistake” (or so it seems to him, even though he’s as natural an expression of the place as any of the other Bizarro creatures who grow like mold across the surface of their living planet). He feels excluded, a despised outsider, and yet that position is what defines his cherished self–image. He expresses himself through poetry because to him the regular Bizarro language is barbaric, barely articulate and guttural. And they all think he’s talking crap anyway.

It seemed to make sense that an interesting opposite of Bizarro speech might be flowery “woe is me” school Poetry Society odes to the sunset in a misunderstood heart. He’s still a Bizarro though, which makes him ineffectual. His tragedy is that he knows he’s fated to be useless and pointless but craves so much more.

NRAMA: Zibarro also represents a recurrent theme in the story, of Superman constantly facing alternate versions of himself – Bar–El, Samson and Atlas, the Superman Squad, even Luthor by the end. Notably, Hercules is absent, though Superman’s doing his Twelve Labors. With the mythological adventurers in particular, was this designed to equate Superman with their legend, to show how his character is greater than theirs, or both?

GM: In a way, I suppose. He did arm–wrestle them both, proving once and for all Superman’s stronger than anybody! And remember, these characters, along with Hercules, used to appear regularly in Superman books as his rivals. I thought they made better rivals than, say, Majestic or Ultraman because people who don’t read comics have heard of Hercules, Samson and Atlas and understand what they represent.

For that particular story, I wanted to see Superman doing tough guy shit again, like he did in the early days and then again in the 70s, when he was written as a supremely cocky macho bastard for a while. I thought a little bit of that would be an antidote to the slightly soppy, Super–Christ portrayal that was starting to gain ground.

Hence Samson’s broken arm, twisted in two directions beyond all repair. And Atlas in the hospital. And then Superman’s got his hot girlfriend dressed like a girl from Krypton and they’re making out on the moon (the original panel description was of something more like the famous shot of Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr kissing in the surf from “From Here To Eternity.” Frank’s final choice of composition is much more classically pulp–romantic and iconic than my down and dirty rumble in the moondirt would have been, I’m glad to say).

Newsarama: Tell us about some of the thinking behind the new antagonists you created for this series (at least the ones you want to talk about...): First up: Krull and the Subterranosaurs...

Grant Morrison: We wanted to create some throwaway new characters which would be designed to look as if they were convincing long–term elements of the Superman legend.

We were trying to create a few foes who had a classic feel and a solid backstory that could be explored again or in depth. Even if we never went back to these characters, we wanted them to seem rich enough to carry their own stories.

With Krull, we figured a superhuman character like Superman can always use a powerful “sub–human” opponent: a beast, a monster, a savage with the power to destroy civilization. For years I’ve had the idea that the familiar “gray aliens” might “actually” be evolved biped dinosaur descendants, the offspring of smart–thinking lizards which made their way to the warm regions at the Earth’s core.

I imagined these brutes developing their own technology, their own civilization, and then finally coming to the surface to declare bloody war on the mammalian usurpers! It seemed like we could develop this idea into the Krull backstory and suggest a whole epic conflict in a few panels.

Dom Regan, the Glasgow artist and DC colorist, saw the original green skin Jamie Grant had done for Krull, and suggested we make him red instead. Jamie reset his color filters and that was the moment Krull suddenly looked like a real Superman foe.

The red skin marked him out as unique, different and dangerous, even among his own species. It had echoes of Jack Kirby’s Devil Dinosaur that played right into the heart of the concept. A good design became a great design and the whole story of who Krull was – his twisted relationship with his father the Dino–Czar, his monstrous ambitions – came together in that first picture.

The society was fleshed out in the script even though we see only one panel of it – a gloomy, heavy, “Soviet” underworld of walled iron cities, cold blood and deadly intrigue. War–Barges that could sail on the oceans of heated steam at the center of the Earth. A Stalinist authoritarian lizard world where missing person cases were being taken to work and die as slaves in hellish underworld conditions.

NRAMA: Mechano–Man?

GM: An attempt to pre–imagine a classic, archetypal Superman foe, which started with another simple premise – how about a giant robot villain? But not just any giant robot – this is a rampaging machine with a raging little man inside.

Giving him a bitter, angry, scrawny loser as a pilot turned Mechano–Man into a much more extreme and pathological expression of the Man of Steel/Mild–Mannered Reporter dynamic, and added a few interesting layers onto an 8–panel appearance.

NRAMA: The Chronovore – a very disturbing creation, that one.

GM: The Chronovore was mentioned in passing in DC 1,000,000 and would have been the monster in my aborted Hypercrisis series idea. It took a long time to get the right design for the beast because it’s meant to be a 5–D being that we only ever see in 4–D sections. It had to work as a convincing representation of something much bigger that we’re seeing only where it interpenetrates our 4–D space-time continuum.

Imagine you’re walking along with a song in your teenage heart, then suddenly the Chronovore appears, takes bite out of your life, and you arrive at your girlfriend’s house aged 76, clutching a cell phone and a wilted bouquet.

NRAMA: One more obscure run that I was happy to see referenced in this was the use of Nasty from the old Mike Sekowsky Supergirl stories. What made you want to use this character?

GM: I remembered her from the old comics, and felt her fashion–y look could be updated very easily into the kind of fetish club thing I’ve always been partial to.

She seemed a cool and sexy addition to the Luthor plot. The set–up, where Lex has a fairly normal sister who hates how her wayward brother is such a bad influence on her brilliant daughter, is explosive with character potential.

They need to bring Nasty back to mainstream continuity. Geoff! They all want it and you know you never let them down!

NRAMA: Speaking of Mike Sekowsky, I’m curious about his influence on your work. I have an odd fascination with all the ideas and stories he was tossing around in the late 1960s and early 1970s – Jason’s Quest, Manhunter 2070, the I–Ching tales – and many of the characters he worked on, from the B”Wana Beast to the Inferior Five to Yankee Doodle (in Doom Patrol), have shown up in your work. The Bizarro Zoo in issue #10 is even slightly reminiscent of the Beast’s merged animals.

GM: Those were all comics that were around when I was a normal kid, prior to the obsessive collecting fan phase of my isolated teenage years. They clearly inspired me in some way, as you say, but certainly not consciously. I’d never have considered myself a particular fan of Mike Sekowsky’s work, but as you say, I’ve incorporated a lot of his ideas into the DC Universe work I’ve done. Hmm. Interesting.

While I’m at it, I should also say something about Samson and Atlas, halfway between old characters and new.

Samson, Atlas and Hercules were classical mainstays of old Superman covers, tangling with Superman in all those Silver Age stories that happened before he learned from his friends at Marvel that it was possible to fight other superheroes for fun and profit, so I decided to completely “re–vamp” the characters in the manner of superhero franchises. Marvel has the definitive Hercules for me, so I left him out of the mix and concentrated on Atlas and Samson.

Atlas was re–imagined as a mighty but restless and reckless young prince of the New Mythos – a society of mega–beings playing out their archetypal dramas between New Elysium and Hadia, with ordinary people caught in the middle – and Superman.

Essentially good–hearted, Atlas would have been the newbie in a “team” with Skyfather Xaoz!, Heroina, Marzak and the others. He has a bullish, adolescent approach to life. He drinks and plunges himself into ill–advised adventures to ease his naturally gloomy “weighed down by the world” temperament.

You can see it all now. The backstory suggested an unseen, Empyrean New Gods–type series from a parallel universe. What if, when Jack Kirby came to DC from Marvel in 1971, he’d followed up his sci–fi Viking Gods saga at Marvel, with a dimension–spanning epic rooted in Greek mythology? New Gods meets Eternals drawn by Curt Swan/Murphy Anderson? That was Atlas.

Samson, I decided would be a callback to the British newspaper strip “Garth.” Although you may already be imagining a daily strip about the exploits of time–tossed The Boys writer, Garth Ennis, it was actually about a blonde Adonis type who bounced around the ages having mildly horny, racy adventures.

(Go look him up then return the wiser before reading on, so I don’t have to explain anymore about this bastard – he’s often described as “the British Superman,” but oh...my arse! I hated meathead, personality–singularity Garth...but we all grew up with his meandering, inexplicable yet incredibly–drawn adventures and some of it was quite good when you were a little lad because he was always shagging ON PANEL with the likes of a bare–breasted cave girl or gauze–draped Helen of Troy.

(Unlike Superman, you see, the top British strongman liked to get naked. Lots naked. Naked in every time period he could get naked in, which was all of them thanks to the miracle of his bullshit powers.

(Imagine Doctor Who buff, dumb and naked all the time – Russell, I’ve had an idea!!!! – and that’s Garth in a nutshell.

(Sorry, I know I’m going on and the average attention span of anyone reading stuff on the Internet amounts to no more than a few paragraphs, but basically, Garth was always getting naked. In public, in family newspapers. Bollock naked. Let’s face it, patriotic Americans, have you ever seen Superman’s arse?

Newsarama Note: Well, there was Baby Kal-El in the 1978 film...

(Brits, hands up who still remember the man, and have you ever not seen Garth’s arse? Do you not, in fact, have a very clear image of it in your head, as drawn by Martin Asbury perhaps? In mine, Garth’s pulling aside a flimsy curtain to gaze at the pyramids with Cleopatra buck naked in foreground ogling his rock hard glutes...).

Anyway, Samson, I decided, was the Hebrew version of Garth and he would have his own mad comic that was like an American version of Garth. I saw the Bible hero plucked from the desert sands by time–travelling buffoons in search of a savior. Introduced to all the worst aspects of future culture and, using his stolen, erratic Chrono–Mobile, Samson became a time–(and space) traveling Soldier of Fortune, writing wrongs, humping princesses, accumulating and losing treasure etc. Like a science fiction Conan. Meets Garth.

Fortunately, you’ll never see any of these men ever again.

Newsarama: How have your perceptions of Superman and his supporting characters evolved since the Superman 2000 pitch you did with Mark Waid, Mark Millar and Tom Peyer? The Superman notions seem almost identical, but Luthor is very different here than in that pitch, and so is Clark Kent. Did you use some aspects of your original pitch, or have you just changed his mind on how to portray these characters since?

Grant Morrison: A little of both. I wanted to approach All Star Superman as something new, but there were a couple of specific aspects from the Superman 2000 pitch (as I mentioned earlier, it was actually called Superman Now, at least in my notebooks, which is where the bulk of the material came from) that I felt were definitely worth keeping and exploring.

I can’t remember much about Luthor from Superman Now, except for the ending. By the time I got to All Star Superman, I’d developed a few new insights into Luthor’s character that seemed to flesh him out more. Luthor’s really human and charismatic and hateful all the same time. He’s the brilliant, deluded egotist in all of us. The key for me was the idea that he draws his eyebrows on. The weird vanity of that told me everything I needed to know about Luthor.

I thought the real key to him was the fact that, brilliant as he is, Luthor is nowhere near as brilliant as he wants to be or thinks he is. For Luthor, no praise, no success, no achievement is ever enough, because there’s a big hungry hole in his soul. His need for acknowledgement and validation is superhuman in scale. Superman needs no thanks; he does what he does because he’s made that way. Luthor constantly rails against his own sense of failure and inadequacy...and Superman’s to blame, of course.

I’ve recently been re–thinking Luthor again for a different project, and there’s always a new aspect of the character to unearth and develop.

NRAMA: This story makes Superman and Lois’ relationship seem much more romantic and epic than usual, but this one also makes Superman more of the pursuer. Lois seems like more of an equal, but also more wary of his affections, particularly in the black–and–white sequence in issue #2.

She becomes this great beacon of support for him over the course of the series, but there is a sense that she’s a bit jaded from years of trickery and uncomfortable with letting him in now that he’s being honest. How, overall, do you see the relationship between Superman and Lois?

GM: The black-and-white panels shows Lois paranoid and under the influence of an alien chemical, but yes, she’s articulating many of her very real concerns in that scene.

I wanted her to finally respond to all those years of being tricked and duped and led to believe Superman and Clark Kent were two different people. I wanted her to get her revenge by finally refusing to accept the truth.

It also exposed that brilliant central paradox in the Superman/Lois relationship. The perfect man who never tells a lie has to lie to the woman he loves to keep her safe. And he lives with that every day. It’s that little human kink that really drives their relationship.

NRAMA: Jimmy Olsen is extremely cool in this series – it’s the old “Mr. Action” idea taken to a new level. It’s often easy to write Jimmy as a victim or sycophant, but in this series, he comes off as someone worthy of being “Superman’s Pal” – he implicitly trusts Superman, and will take any risk to get his story. Do you see this version of Jimmy as sort of a natural evolution of the version often seen in the comics?

GM: It was a total rethink based on the aspects of Olsen I liked, and playing down the whole wet–behind–the–ears “cub reporter” thing. I borrowed a little from the “Mr. Action” idea of a more daredevil, pro–active Jimmy, added a little bit of Nathan Barley, some Abercrombie & Fitch style, a bit of Tintin, and a cool Quitely haircut.

Jimmy was renowned for his “disguises” and bizarre transformations (my favorite is the transvestite Olsen epic “Miss Jimmy Olsen” from Jimmy Olsen #95, which gets a nod on the first page of our Jimmy story we did), so I wanted to take that aspect of his appeal and make it part of his job.

I don’t like victim Jimmy or dumb Jimmy, because those takes on the character don’t make any sense in their context. It seemed more interesting see what a young man would be like who could convincingly be Superman’s “pal.” Someone whose company a Superman might actually enjoy. That meant making Jimmy a much bigger character: swaggering but ingenuous. Innocent yet worldly. Enthusiastic but not stupid.

My favorite Jimmy moment is in issue #7 when he comes up with the way to defeat the Bizarro invasion by using the seas of the Bizarro planet itself as giant mirrors to reflect toxic – to Bizarros – sunlight onto the night side of the Earth. He knows Superman can actually take crazy lateral thinking like this and put it into practice.

NRAMA: Perry White has a few small–but–key scenes, particularly his address to his staff in issue #1 and standing up to Luthor in issue #12. I’d like to hear more about your thoughts on this character.

GM: As with the others, my feelings are there on the page. Perry is Clark’s boss and need only be that and not much more to play his role perfectly well within the stories. He’s a good reminder that Superman has a job and a boss, unlike that good–for–nothing work-shy bastard Batman. Perry’s another of the series’ older male role models of integrity and steadfastness, like Pa Kent.

NRAMA: There’s a sense in the Daily Planet scenes and with Lois’s spotlight issues that everyone knows Clark is Superman, but they play along to humor him. The Clark disguise comes off as very obvious in this story. Do you feel that the Planet staff knows the truth, or are just in a very deep case of denial, like Lex?

GM: If I had to say for sure, I think Jimmy Olsen worked it out a long time ago, and simply presumes that if Superman has a good reason for what he’s doing, that’s good enough for Jimmy.

Lois has guessed, but refuses to acknowledge it because it exposes her darkest flaw – she could never love Clark Kent the way she loves Superman.

NRAMA: Also, the Planet staff seems awfully nonchalant at Luthor’s threats. Are they simply used to being attacked by now?

GM: Yes. They’re a tough group. They also know that Superman makes a point of looking out for them, so they naturally try to keep Luthor talking. They know he loves to talk about himself and about Superman. In that scene, he’s almost forgotten he even has powers, he’s so busy arguing and making points. He keeps doing ordinary things instead of extraordinary things.

NRAMA: The running gag of Clark subtly using his powers to protect unknowing people is well done, but I have to admit I was confused by the sequence near the end of issue #1. Was that an el–train, and if so, why was it so close to the ground?

GM: It’s a MagLev hover–train. Look again, and you’ll see it’s not supported by anything. Hover–trains help ease congestion in busy city streets! Metropolis is the City of Tomorrow, after all.

NRAMA: And there’s the death of Pa Kent. Why do you feel it’s particularly important to have Pa and not both of the Kents pass away?

GM: I imagined they had both passed away fairly early in Superman’s career, but Ma went a few years after Pa. Also, because the book was about men or man, it seemed important to stress the father/son relationships. That circle of life, the king is dead, long live the king thing that Superman is ultimately too big and too timeless to succumb to.

NRAMA: There is a real touch of Elliott S! Maggin’s novels in your depiction of Luthor – someone who is just so obsessive–compulsive about showing up Superman that he accomplishes nothing in his own life. He comes across as a showman, from his rehearsed speech in issue #1 to his garish costume in the last two issues, and it becomes painfully apparent that he wants to usurp Superman because he just can’t be happy with himself. What defeats him is actually a beautiful gift, getting to see the world as Superman does, and finally understanding his enemy.

That’s all a lead–in to: What previous stories that defined Luthor for you, and how did you define his character? What appeals to you about writing him?

GM: The Marks Waid and Millar were big fans of the Maggin books, and may have persuaded me to read at least the first one but I’m ashamed to say can’t remember anything about it, other than the vague recollection of a very humane, humanist take on Superman that seemed in general accord with the pacifist, hedonistic, between–the–wars spirit of the ‘90s when I read it. It was the ‘90s; I had other things on my mind and in my mind.

I like Maggin’s “Must There Be A Superman?” from Superman #247, which ultimately poses questions traditional superhero comic books are not equipped to answer and is one of the first paving stones in the Yellow Brick Road that leads to Watchmen and beyond, to The Authority, The Ultimates etc. Everyone still awake, still reading this, should make themselves familiar with “Must There Be A Superman?” – it’s a milestone in the development of the superhero concept.

However, the story that most defines Luthor for me turns out to be, as usual, a Len Wein piece with Curt Swan/Murphy Anderson– Superman #248. This blew me away when I was a kid. Lex Luthor cares about humanity? He’s sorry we all got blown up? The villain loves us too? It’s only Superman he really hates? Genius. Big, cool adult stuff.

The divine Len makes Lex almost too human, but it was amazing to see this kind of depth in a character I’d taken for granted as a music hall villain.

I also love the brutish Satanic, Crowley–esque, Golden Age Luthor in the brilliant “Powerstone” Action Comics #47 (the opening of All Star #11 is a shameless lift from “Powerstone”, as I soon realised when I went back to look. Blame my...er...photographic memory...cough).

And I like the Silver Age Luthor who only hates Superman because he thinks it’s Superboy’s fault he went bald. That was the most genuinely human motivation for Luthor’s career of villainy of all; it was Superman’s fault he went bald! I can get behind that.

In the Silver Age, baldness, like obesity, old age and poverty, was seen quite rightly as a crippling disease and a challenge which Superman and his supporting cast would be compelled to overcome at every opportunity! Suburban “50s America versus Communist degeneracy? You tell me.

I like elements of the Marv Wolfman/John Byrne ultra–cruel and rapacious businessman, although he somewhat lacks the human dimension (ultimately there’s something brilliant about Luthor being a failed inventor, a product of Smallville/Dullsville – the genius who went unnoticed in his lifetime, and resorted to death robots in chilly basements and cellars. Luthor as geek versus world). I thought Alan Moore’s ruthlessly self–assured “consultant” Luthor in Swamp Thing was an inspired take on the character as was Mark Waid’s rage–driven prodigy from Birthright.

I tried to fold them all into one portrayal. I see him as a very human character – Superman is us at our best, Luthor is us when we’re being mean, vindictive, petty, deluded and angry. Among other things. It’s like a bipolar manic/depressive personality – with optimistic, loving Superman smiling at one end of the scale and paranoid, petty Luthor cringing on the other.

I think any writer of Superman has to love these two enemies equally. We have to recognize them both as potentials within ourselves. I think it’s important to find yourself agreeing with Luthor a bit about Superman’s “smug superiority” – we all of us, except for Superman, know what it’s like to have mean–spirited thoughts like that about someone else’s happiness. It’s essential to find yourself rooting for Lex, at least a little bit, when he goes up against a man–god armed only with his bloody–minded arrogance and cleverness.

Even if you just wish you could just give him a hug and help him channel his energies in the right direction, Luthor speaks for something in all of us, I like to think.

However he’s played, Luthor is the male power fantasy gone wrong and turned sour. You’ve got everything you want but it’s not enough because someone has more, someone is better, someone is cleverer or more handsome.

Newsarama: Grant, a recurring theme throughout the book is the effect of small kindness – how even the likes of Steve Lombard are capable of decency. And Superman gets the key to saving himself by doing something that any human being could do, offering sympathy to a person about to end it all.

Grant Morrison: Completely...the person you help today could be the person who saves your life tomorrow.

NRAMA: The character actions that make the biggest difference, from Zibarro’s sacrifice to Pa’s influence on Superman, are really things that any normal, non-powered person could do if they embrace the best part of their humanity. The last page of issue #12 teases the idea that Superman’s powers could be given to all mankind, but it seems as though the greatest gift he has given them is his humanity. How do you view Superman’s fate in the context of where humanity could go as a species?

GM: I see Superman in this series as an Enlightenment figure, a Renaissance idea of the ideal man, perfect in mind, body and intention.

A key text in all of this is Pico’s ‘Oration On The Dignity of Man’ (15c), generally regarded as the ‘manifesto’ of Renaissance thought, in which Giovanni Pico Della Mirandola laid out the fundamentals of what we tend to refer to as ’Humanist’ thinking.

(The ‘Oratorio’ also turns up in my British superhero series Zenith from 1987, which may indicate how long I’ve been working towards a Pico/Superman team-up!)

At its most basic, the ‘Oratorio’ is telling us that human beings have the unique ability, even the responsibility, to live up to their ‘ideals’. It would be unusual for a dog to aspire to be a horse, a bird to bark like a dog, or a horse to want to wear a diving suit and explore the Barrier Reef, but people have a particular gift for and inclination towards imitation, mimicry and self-transformation. We fly by watching birds and then making metal carriers that can outdo birds, we travel underwater by imitating fish, we constantly look to role models and behavioral templates for guidance, even when those role models are fictional TV or, comic, novel or movie heroes, just like the soft, quick, shapeshifty little things we are. We can alter the clothes we wear, the temperature around us, and change even our own bodies, in order to colonize or occupy previously hostile environments. We are, in short, a distinctively malleable and adaptable bunch.

So, Pico is saying, if we live by imitation, does it not make sense that we might choose to imitate the angels, the gods, the very highest form of being that we can imagine? Instead of indulging the most brutish, vicious, greedy and ignorant aspects of the human experience, we can, with a little applied effort, elevate the better part of our natures and work to express those elements through our behavior. To do so would probably make us all feel a whole lot better too. Doing good deeds and making other people happy makes you feel totally brilliant, let’s face it.

So we can choose to the astronaut or the gangster. The superhero or the super villain. The angel or the devil. It’s entirely up to us, particularly in the privileged West, how we choose to imagine ourselves and conduct our lives.

We live in the stories we tell ourselves. It’s really simple. We can continue to tell ourselves and our children that the species we belong to is a crawling, diseased, viral cancer smear, only fit for extinction, and let’s see where that leads us.

We can continue to project our self-loathing and narcissistic terror of personal mortality onto our culture, our civilization, our planet, until we wreck the promise of the world for future generations in a fit of sheer self-induced panic...

...or we can own up to the scientific fact that we are all physically connected as parts of a single giant organism, imagine better ways to live and grow...and then put them into practice. We can stop pissing about, start building starships, and get on with the business of being adults.

The ’Oratorio’ is nothing less than the Shazam!, the Kimota! for Western Culture and we would do well to remember it in our currently trying times.

The key theme of the ‘Dark Age’ of comics was loss and recovery of wonder - McGregor’s Killraven trawling through the apocalyptic wreckage of culture in his search for poetry, meaning and fellowship, Captain Mantra, amnesiac in Robert Mayer’s Superfolks, Alan Moore’s Mike Maxwell trudging through the black and white streets of Thatcher’s Britain, with the magic word of transformation burning on the tip of his tongue.

My own work has been an ongoing attempt to repeat the magic word over and over until we all become the kind of superheroes we’d all like to be. Ha hah ha.

Newsarama: The structure of the 12 issues involves both Superman’s 12 labors and his impending death. Do you feel the threat of his demise brings out the best in Superman’s already–high character, or did you intend it more as a window for the audience to understand how he sees the world?

Grant Morrison: In trying to do the “big,” ultimate Superman story, we wanted to hit on all the major beats that define the character – the “death of Superman” story has been told again and again and had to be incorporated into any definitive take. Superman’s death and rebirth fit the sun god myth we were establishing, and, as you say, it added a very terminal ticking clock to the story.

NRAMA: When we talked earlier this year, we discussed the neurotic quality of the Silver Age stories. Looking at the series as a whole, you consistently invert this formula. Superman is faced with all these crises that could be seen as personifying his neuroses, but for the most part he handles them with a level head and comes across as being very at peace with himself. You talked about your discussion with an in–character Superman fan at a convention years ago, but I am curious as to how you determined Superman’s mindset.

GM: I felt we had to live up to the big ideas behind Superman. I don’t take my daft job lightly. It’s all I’ve got.

As the project got going, I wasn’t thinking about Silver Ages or Dark Ages or anything about the comics I’d read, so much as the big shared idea of “Superman” and that “S” logo I see on T–shirts everywhere I go, on girls and boys. That communal Superman. I wanted us to get the precise energy of Platonic Superman down on the page.

The “S” hieroglyph, the super–sigil, stands for the very best kind of man we can imagine, so the subject dictated the methodical, perfectionist approach. As I’ve mentioned before, I keep this aspect of my job fresh for myself by changing my writing style to suit the project, the character or the artist.

With something like Batman R.I.P., I’m aiming for a frenzied Goth Pulp-Noir; punk-psych, expressionist shadows and jagged nightmare scene shifts, inspired by Batman’s roots and by the snapping, fluttering of his uncanny cape. Final Crisis was written, with the Norse Ragnarok and Biblical Revelations in mind, as a story about events more than characters. A doom-laden, Death Metal myth for the wonderful world of Fina(ncia)l Crisis/Eco-breakdown/Terror Trauma we all have to live in.

The subject matter drives the execution. And then, of course, the artists add their own vision and nuance. With All Star Superman, “Frank” and I were able to spend a lot of time together talking it through, and we agreed it had to be about grids, structure, storybook panel layouts, an elegance of form, a clarity of delivery. “Classical” in every sense of the word. The medium, the message, the story, the character, all working together as one simple equation.

Frank Quitely, a Glasgow Art School boy, completely understood without much explanation, the deep structural underpinnings of the series and how to embody them in his layouts. There’s a scene in issue # 8, set on the Bizarro world, where we see Le Roj handing Superman his rocket plans. Look at the arrangement of the figures of Zibarro, Le Roj, Superman and Bizaro–Superman and you’ll see one attempt to make us of Renaissance compositions.

The sense of sunlit Zen calm we tried to get into All Star is how I imagine it might feel to think the way Superman thinks all the time - a thought process that is direct, clean, precise, mathematical, ordered. A mind capable of fantastical imagination but grounded in the everyday of his farm upbringing with nice decent folks. Rich with humour and tears and deep human significance, yet tuned to a higher key. We tried to hum along for a little while, that’s all.

In honor of the character’s primal position in the development of the superhero narrative, I hoped we could create an “ultimate” hero story, starring the ultimate superhero.

Basically, I suppose I felt Superman deserved the utmost application of our craft and intelligence in order to truly do him justice.

Otherwise, I couldn’t have written this book if I hadn’t watched my big, brilliant dad decline into incoherence and death. I couldn’t have written it if I’d never had my heart broken, or mended. I couldn’t have written it if I hadn’t known what it felt like to be idolized, misunderstood, hated for no clear reason, loved for all my faults, forgotten, remembered...

Writing All Star Superman was, in retrospect, also a way of keeping my mind in the clean sunshine while plumbing the murkiest depths of the imagination with that old pair of c****s Darkseid and Doctor Hurt. Good riddance.

Newsarama: This is touched on in other questions, but how much of the Silver/Bronze Age backstory matters here? What do you see as Superman's life prior to All-Star Superman? (What was going on with this Superman while the Byrne revamp took hold?)

Grant Morrison: When I introduced the series in an interview online, I suggested that All Star Superman could be read as the adventures of the ‘original’ Pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths Superman, returning after 20 plus years of adventures we never got to see because we were watching John Byrne‘s New Superman on the other channel. If ‘Whatever Happened To The Man of Tomorrow?’ and the Byrne reboot had never happened, where would that guy be now?

This was more to provide a sense, probably limited and ill-considered, of what the tone of the book might be like. I never intended All Star Superman as a direct continuation of the Weisinger or Julius Schwartz-era Superman stories. The idea was always to create another new version of Superman using all my favorite elements of past stories, not something ‘Age’ specific.

I didn’t collect Superman comics until the ‘70s and I’m not interested enough in pastiche or nostalgia to spend 6 years of my life playing post-modern games with Superman. All Star isn’t written, drawn or colored to look or read like a Silver Age comic book.

All Star Superman is not intended as arch commentary on continuity or how trends in storytelling have changed over the decades. It’s not retro or meta or anything other than its own simple self; a piece of drawing and writing that is intended by its makers to capture the spirit of its subject to the best of their capabilities, wisdom and talent.

Which is to say, we wanted our Superman story be about life, not about comics or superheroes, current events or politics. It’s about how it feels, specifically to be a man...in our dreams! Hopefully that means our 12 issues are also capable of wide interpretation.

So as much as we may have used a few recognizable Silver Age elements like Van-Zee and Sylv(i)a and the Bottle City of Kandor, the ensemble Daily Planet cast embodies all the generations of Superman. Perry White is from 1940, Steve Lombard is from the Schwartz-era ‘70s, Ron Troupe - the only black man in Metropolis - appeared in 1991. Cat Grant is from 1987 and so on.

P.R.O.J.E.C.T. refers back to Jack Kirby’s DNA Project from his ‘70s Jimmy Olsen stories, as well as to The Cadmus Project from ’90s Superboy and Superman stories. Doomsday is ‘90s. Kal Kent, Solaris and the Infant Universe of Qwewq all come from my own work on Superman in the same decade. Pa Kent’s heart attack is from ‘Superman the Movie‘. We didn’t use Brainiac because he’d been the big bad in Earth 2 but if we had, we’d have used Brainiac’s Kryptonian origin from the animated series and so on.

I also used quite a few elements of John Byrne’s approach. Byrne made a lot of good decisions when he rebooted the whole franchise in 1986 and I wanted to incorporate as much as I could of those too.

Our Superman in All Star was never Superboy, for instance. All Star Superman landed on Earth as a normal, if slightly stronger and fitter infant, and only began to manifest powers in adolescence when he’d finally soaked up enough yellow solar radiation to trigger his metamorphosis.

The Byrne logic seemed to me a better way to explain how his powers had developed across the decades, from the skyscraper leaps of the early days to the speed-of-light space flight of the high Silver Age. And more importantly, it made the Superman myth more poignant - the story of a farm boy who turned into an alien as he reached adolescence. I felt that was something that really enriched Superman. He grew away from his home, his family, his adopted species as he became Superman. His teenage years are a record of his transformation from normal boy to super-being.

As you say, there are more than just Silver Age influences in the book. Basically we tried to create a perfect synthesis of every Superman era. So much so, that it should just be taken as representative of an ‘age’ all its own.

In the end, however, I do think that the Silver Age type stories, with their focus on human problems and foibles, have a much wider appeal than a lot of the work which followed. They’re more like fables or folk tales than the later ‘comic book superhero’ stories of Superman when he became just another colorful costume in the crowd...and perhaps that’s why All Star seemed to resemble those books more than it does a typical modern Marvel or DC comic. It was our intention to present a more universal, mainstream Superman.

NRAMA: In your depiction of Krypton and the Kryptonians, you show the complexity of Superman’s relationship between humanity and Earth even further. Krypton has that scientific paradise quality to it, but the Kryptonians are also portrayed as slightly aloof and detached, even Jor-El. But from Bar-El to the people of Kandor, they’re touched by Superman’s goodness. What do you see as the fundamental difference between Kryptonians and Earthlings, and how has Superman’s character been shaped by each?

GM: My version of Krypton was, again, synthesized from a number of different approaches over the decades.  In mythic terms, if Superman is the story of a young king, found and raised by common people, then Krypton is the far distant kingdom he lost. It’s the secret bloodline, the aristocratic heritage that makes him special, and a hero. At the same time, Krypton is something that must be left behind for Superman to become who he is - i.e. one of us. Krypton gives him his scientific clarity of mind, Earth makes his heart blaze.

I liked the very early Jerry Siegel descriptions where Krypton is a planet of advanced supermen and women (I already played with that a little in Marvel Boy where Noh-Varr was written to be the Marvel Superboy basically). To that, I added the rich, science fiction detailing of the Silver Age Krypton stories and the slightly detached coolness that characterized John Byrne’s Krypton, which I re-interpreted through the lens of Dzogchen Buddhist thought, probably the most pragmatic, chilly and rational philosophic system on the planet and the closest, I felt, to how Kryptonians might see things.

We also took some time to redesign the crazy, multicolored Kryptonian flag (you can see our version in Kandor in issue #10). The flag, as originally imagined, seemed like the last thing Kryptonians would endorse, so we took the multicolored-rays-around-a-circle design and recreated it - the central circle is now red, representing Krypton’s star, Rao, while the rays, rather than arbitrary colors, become representations of the spectrum of visible light pouring from Rao into the inky black of space. In this way, the flag, that bizarre emblem of nationalism becomes a scientific hieroglyph.

Showing Krypton and Kryptonians was also important as a way of stressing why Superman wears that costume and why it makes absolute sense that he looks the way he does. I don’t see the red and blue suit as a flag or as rewoven baby blankets. There’s no need for Superman to dress the way he does but it made sense to think of his outfit as his ‘national costume‘.

The way I see it, the standard superhero outfit, the familiar Superman suit with the pants on the outside, is what everyone wore on Krypton, give or take a few fashion accessories like hoods and headbands, chest crests and variant colors. In fact, all other superheroes are just copying the fashions on Krypton, lost planet of the super-people.

Superman wears his ’action-suit’ the way a patriotic Scotsman would wear a kilt. It’s a sign of his pride in his alien heritage.

Newsarama: Although All–Star Superman ties in with DC One Million, you style of writing has changed dramatically since then. How do you feel about One Million now?

Grant Morrison: I just read it again and liked it a lot. Comics were definitely happier, breezier and more confident in their own strengths before Hollywood and the Internet turned the business of writing superhero stories into the production of low budget storyboards or, worse, into conformist, fruitless attempts to impress or entertain a small group of people who appear to hate comics and their creators.

NRAMA: Obviously, this book is the most explicit SF–Christ story since Behold the Man, only...happy. Superman/Christ parallels have existed for decades, but this story makes it absolutely explicit, from laying his hands on the sick and dying to...well, most of issue #12. You’ve dealt with Christ themes before, particularly in The Mystery Play, but outside of the comics, how do you see Superman as a Christ figure for the “real” world?

GM: The “Superman as Christ” thing is a little too reductive for me, and tends to overlook the fact that Superman is by no means a pacifist in the Christ sense. Superman would never turn the other cheek; Superman punches out the bully. Superman is a fighter.

When did Christ ever batter the Devil through a mountain?

The thing I disliked about the Superman Returns movie was the American Christ angle, which reduced Superman to a sniveling, masochistic wreck, crawling around on the floor, taking a kicking from everyone. This approach had an odd and slightly disturbing S&M flavor, which didn’t play well to the character’s strengths at all and seemed to derive entirely from a kind of Catholic vision of the suffering, martyred Jesus.

It’s not that he’s based on Jesus, but simply that a lot of the mythical sun god elements that have been layered onto the Christ story also appear in the story of Superman. I suppose I see Superman more as pagan sci–fi. He’s a secular messiah, a science redeemer with tough guy muscles and a very direct and clear morality.

NRAMA: Continuing the religious themes, in issue #10, you have Superman literally giving birth to himself, both philosophically and as a character – a nice little meta–moment showing how Superman inspires a world where he is only fiction. How did that idea come about?

GM: It came from the challenge we’d set ourselves: as I said, issue #10 had been left as a blank space into which the single most coherent condensation of all our ideas about Superman were destined to fit.

I wanted to do a “day in the life” story. So much of All Star had been about this threat to Superman himself, so we wanted to show him going about a typical day saving people and doing good.

Then came the title “Neverending,” which comes from the opening announcement – “Faster than a speeding bullet!...” of the Superman radio show from 1940, and seemed to me to be as good a title for a Superman story as any I could think of. It seemed to distil everything about Superman’s battle and his legend into a single word. And the story structure itself was designed to loop endlessly, so it went well with that.

On top of that went the idea of the Last Will and Testament of Superman. A dying god writing his will seemed like an interesting structure to use. Then came the idea to fit all of human history into that single 24 hours. And then to show the development of the Superman idea through human culture from the earliest Australian Aboriginal notions of super–beings ‘descended” from the sky, through the complex philosophical system of Hinduism, onto the Renaissance concept of the ideal man, via the refinements of Nietzche and finally, down to that smiling, hopeful Joe Shuster sketch; the final embodiment of humanity’s glorious, uplifting notion of the superman become reduced to a drawing, a story for kids, a worthless comic book.

And also what that could mean in a holographic fractal universe, where the smallest part contains and reflects the whole.

Of course the next panel in that sequence is happening in the real world and would show you, the reader, sitting with the latest Superman issue in your hands, deep within the Infant Universe of Qwewq in the Fortress of Solitude, today, wherever you are. In “Neverending,” the reader becomes wrapped in a self–referential loop of story and reality. If you actually, seriously think about what is happening at this point in the story, if you meditate upon the curious entanglement of the real and the fictional, you will become enlightened in this life apparently. According to some texts.

NRAMA: On a personal level, you’ve explored all types of religions and philosophies in your work. What is your take on religion and how it influences humanity, and the Christian take on Jesus Christ in particular?

GM: I think religion per se, is a ghastly blight on the progress of the human species towards the stars. At the same time, it, or something like it, has been an undeniable source of comfort, meaning and hope for the majority of poor bastards who have ever lived on Earth, so I’m not trying to write it off completely. I just wish that more people were educated to a standard where they could understand what religion is and how it works. Yes, it got us through the night for a while, but ultimately, it’s one of those ugly, stupid arse–over–backwards things we could probably do without now, here on the Planet of the Apes.

Religion is to spirituality what porn is to sex. It’s what the Hollywood 3–act story template is to real creative writing.

Religion creates a structure which places “special,” privileged people (priests) between ordinary people and the divine, as if there could even be any separation: as if every moment, every thought, every action was not already an expression of dynamic ‘divinity” at work.

As I’ve said before, the solid world is just the part of heaven we’re privileged to touch and play with. You don’t need a priest or a holy man to talk to “god” on your behalf: just close your eyes and say hello. “God” is no more, no less, than the sum total of all matter, all energy, all consciousness, as experienced or conceptualized from a timeless perspective where everything ever seems to present all at once. “God” is in everything, all the time and can be found there by looking carefully. The entire universe, including the scary, evil bits, is a thought “God” is thinking, right now.

As far as I can figure it out from my own reading and my own experience of how the spiritual world works, Jesus was, as they say, way cool: a man who achieved a state of consciousness, which nowadays would get him a diagnosis of temporal lobe epilepsy (in the days of the Emperor Tiberius, he was crucified for his ideas, today he’d be laughed at, mocked or medicated).

This “holistic” mode of consciousness (which Luthor experiences briefly at the end of All Star Superman) announces itself as a heartbreaking connection, a oneness, with everything that exists...but you don’t have to be Superman to know what that feeling is like. There are a ton of meditation techniques which can take you to this place. I don’t see it as anything supernatural or religious, in fact, I think it’s nothing more than a developmental level of human consciousness, like the ability to see perspective – which children of 4 cannot do but children of 6 can.

Everyone who’s familiar with this upgrade will tell you the same thing: it feels as if “alien” or “angelic” voices – far more intelligent, coherent and kindly than the voices you normally hear in your head – are explaining the structure of time and space and your place in it.  This identification with a timeless supermind containing and resolving within itself all possible thoughts and contradictions, is what many people, unsurprisingly, mistake for an encounter with “God.” However, given that this totality must logically include and resolve all possible thoughts and concepts, it can also be interpreted as an actual encounter with God, so I’m not here to give anyone a hard time over interpretation.

Some people have the experience and believe the God of their particular culture has chosen them personally to have a chat with. These people may become born–again Christians, fundamentalist Muslims, devotees of Shiva, or misunderstood lunatics. Some “contactees” interpret the voices they hear erroneously as communications from an otherworldly, alien intelligence, hence the proliferation of “abduction” accounts in recent decades, which share most of their basic details with similar accounts, from earlier centuries, of people being taken away by “fairies” or “little people”.

Some, who like to describe themselves as magicians, will recognize the “alien” voice as the “Holy Guardian Angel”.

In timeless, spaceless consciousness, the singular human mind blurs into a direct experience of the totality of all consciousness that has ever been or will ever be. It feels like talking with God but I see that as an aspect of science, not religion.

As Peter Barnes wrote in “The Ruling Class”, “I know I must be God because when I pray to Him, I find I’m talking to myself.”

Newsarama: When we spoke earlier this year, you talked about some of your ideas for future All Star stories. Are you moving forward on those, or have you started working on different ideas since then?

Grant Morrison: I haven’t had time to think about them for a while. I did have the stories worked out, and I’d like to do more, but right now it feels like Frank and Jamie and I have said all there is to be said. I don’t know if I’m ready to do All Star Superman with anyone else right now. I have other plans.

NRAMA: You end the book with Superman having uplifted humanity – having inspired them through his sacrifice and great deeds, and with the potential to pass his powers on to humanity still there. Do you plan to explore this concept further, or would you prefer to leave it open–ended?

GM: I may go back to the Son of Superman in some way. At the same time, it’s best left open–ended. I like the idea that Superman gets to have his cake and eat it; he becomes golden and mythical and lives forever as a dream. Yet, he also is able to sire a child who will carry his legacy into the future. He kicks ass in both the spiritual and the temporal spheres!

NRAMA: The notion of transcendence – always a big part of your work. But the debate about All Star Superman is whether or not it "transcends its genre." Superman becomes transcendent within the series itself, and inspires the beings on Qwewq, but does the work aspire to more than that? Is it simply the greatest version of a Superman story, and that’s enough?

GM: That would certainly be enough if it were true.

It’s a pretty high–level attempt by some smart people to do the Superman concept some justice, is all I can say. It’s intended to work as a set of sci–fi fables that can be read by children and adults alike. I’d like to think you can go to it if you’re feeling suicidal, if you miss your dad, if you’ve had to take care of a difficult, ailing relative, if you’ve ever lost control and needed a good friend to put you straight, if you love your pets, if you wish your partner could see the real you...All Star is about how Superman deals with all of that.

It’s a big old Paul Bunyan style mythologizing of human - and in particular male - experience. In that sense I’d like to think All Star Superman does transcend genre in that it’s intended to be read on its own terms and needs absolutely no understanding of genre conventions or history around it to grasp what’s going on.

In today’s world, in today’s media climate designed to foster the fear our leaders like us to feel because it makes us easier to push around. In a world where limp, wimpy men are forced to talk tough and act ‘badass’ even though we all know they’re shitting it inside. In a world where the measure of our moral strength has come to lie in the extremity of the images we’re able to look at and stomach. In a world, I’m reliably told, that’s going to the dogs, the real mischief, the real punk rock rebellion, is a snarling, ‘fuck you’ positivity and optimism. Violent optimism in the face of all evidence to the contrary is the Alpha form of outrage these days. It really freaks people out.

I have a desire not to see my culture and my fellow human beings fall helplessly into step with a middle class media narrative that promises only planetary catastrophe, as engineered by an intrinsically evil and corrupt species which, in fact, deserves everything it gets.

Is this relentless, downbeat insistence that the future has been cancelled really the best we can come up with? Are we so fucked up we get off on terrifying our children? It’s not funny or ironic anymore and that’s why we wrote All Star Superman the way we did. Everything has changed. ‘Dark’ entertainment now looks like hysterical, adolescent, ‘Zibarro’ crap. That’s what my Final Crisis series is about too.

NRAMA (aka Tim Callahan): Continuing with the theme of transcendence: The words "ineffectual" and "surrender" are repeated throughout the book. Discuss.

GM: Discuss yourself, Callahan! I know you have the facilities and I should think it’s all rather obvious.  

NRAMA: What was the inspiration for the image of Superman in the sun at the end? (I confess this question comes as the result of much unsuccessful Googling)

GM: I didn’t have any specific reference in mind - just that one we‘ve all sort of got in our heads. I drew the figure as a sketch, intended to be reminiscent of William Blake’s cosmic figures, Russian Constructivist Soviet Socialist Worker type posters, and Leonardo’s ‘Proportions of the Human Figure‘. The position of the legs hints at the Buddhist swastika, the clockwise sun symbol. It was to me, the essence of that working class superheroic ideal I mentioned, condensed into a final image of mythic Superman, - our eternal, internal, guiding, selfless, tireless, loving superstar. The daft All Star Superman title of the comic is literalized in this last picture. It’s the ‘fearful symmetry’ of the Enlightenment project - an image of genius, toil, and our need to make things, to fashion art and artifacts, as a form of superhuman, divine imitation.

It was Superman as this fusion of Renaissance/Enlightenment ideas about Man and Cosmos, an impossible union of Blake and Newton. A Pop Art ‘Vitruvian Man‘. The inspiration for the first letter of the new future alphabet!

As you can see, we spent a lot of time thinking about all this and purifying it down to our own version of the gold. I’m glad it’s over.

NRAMA: Finally: What, above all else, would you like people to take away from All Star Superman?

GM: That we spent a lot of time thinking about this!

No. What I hope is that people take from it the unlikelihood that a piece of paper, with little ink drawings of figures, with little written words, can make you cry, can make your heart soar, can make you scared, sad, or thrilled. How mental is that?

That piece of paper is inert material, the corpse of some tree, pulped and poured, then given new meaning and new life when the real hours and real emotions that the writer and the artist, the colorist, the letter the editor translated onto the physical page, meet with the real hours and emotions of a reader, of all readers at once, across time, generations and distance.

And think about how that experience, the simple experience of interacting with a paper comic book, along with hundreds of thousands of others across time and space, is an actual doorway onto the beating heart of the imminent, timeless world of “Myth” as defined above. Not just a drawing of it but an actual doorway into timelessness and the immortal world where we are all one together.

My grief over the loss of my dad can be Superman’s grief, can trigger your own grief, for your own dad, for all our dads. The timeless grief that’s felt by Muslims and Christians and Agnostics alike. My personal moments of great and romantic love, untainted by the everyday, can become Superman’s and may resonate with your own experience of these simple human feelings.

In the one Mythic moment we’re all united, kissing our Lover for the First time, the Last time, the Only time, honoring our dear Dad under a blood red sky, against a darkening backdrop, with Mum telling us it’ll all be okay in the end.

If we were able to capture even a hint of that place and share it with our readers, that would be good enough for me.

#All Star Superman #Grant Morrison #Superman

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frelmidja · 4 years ago

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Have you got any personal headcannnos for any rarepairs in mha you ship?

ok I have spent WAY too much time making up backstory for EctoLoader... I wanted to put it together as a fic but I haven't made any progress on it in about 2 years, so I'm gonna try to summarize all the stuff I've come up with for them.

It’s a lot.

-Ecoplasm and Power Loader meet in high school - Ecto is at the top of his heroics class, and has a competitive friend group. He believes being a top hero is the only thing he wants to do with his life.

-Power Loader is the quiet, weird kid from out of town. He has trouble making eye contact and frequently runs his fingers through his hair, pulling his bangs down over his eyes. He also sometimes chews on his iron claws, which is very bad for his teeth but it's a nervous habit that he has trouble stopping. He's a wallflower just trying to get by until Ecto shows up in the support room with a broken helmet that needs fixing.

-At first Ecto sees him as a tool to repair his gear - the company their school uses to fix things takes forever, so support items often stayed broken for a long time. Power Loader doesn't have any close friends and is struggling in his support classes (his main teacher thinks he should be in a course based on his quirk, iron claws, and that he has no business being in support item development, so she was keeping him shut out of support opportunities) SO Power Loader gets pretty clingy to Ecto. Even though he knew he was being used, he figures that some kind of friendship is better than nothing.

-Ecto ends up spending a lot of time around Power Loader to keep him handy, but realizes that there aren't the same expectations from Power Loader that he has from his competitive peers. He can have some quiet downtime to relax and just hang out, which is really nice. Power Loader stays quiet and doesn't open up much, but he eventually shares his secret spot with Ecto - an area under some old, unused bleachers that he'd spruced up. Power Loader often goes there when the support room is full of students during breaks and lunch, and it ends up being a hangout spot for the two.

-Their friendship seems pretty stable until a guy who used to be a part of Ecto's friend group confronts Power Loader one day, taunting him about how Ecto is just using him and isn't really his friend. Power Loader tries to brush him off, but the guy uses his quirk (he can split his total mass into 2 versions of himself) and keeps getting in Power Loader's face. Power Loader ends up punching him in the gut, hard. The guy leaves Power Loader alone after that, but the damage is done - Power Loader can't stop thinking about what he said.

-Later at school, Ecto is looking for Power Loader to help with some scratches he got on his helmet. It's a rainy day, and he finally finds Power Loader huddled under the bleachers. Power Loader is curt with Ecto, and makes it obvious that he knows Ecto is using him to fix his support gear. However at this point, Ecto genuinely likes spending time with him. He manages to calm Power Loader down. Power Loader vents his frustrations about his support teacher to Ecto, who agrees that she's being unfair. Power Loader feels better knowing someone acknowledges his struggles. He offers to fix Ecto's helmet even though Ecto hadn't asked yet - but Ecto tells him no, it’s just cosmetic and if his gear is always getting fixed then someone will figure out what's going on and Power Loader might get in trouble. By the time the lunch bell rings, they're both in better spirits but it's raining pretty hard. If Power Loader shows up to class soaking wet he'd be in trouble, so Ecto tosses his jacket over Power Loader and darts into the rain - he has gym class next so he needs to change anyway. Power Loader is able to stay mostly dry and stammers a quick thank-you to Ecto.

-After this Power Loader opens up a lot more - he'll talk about projects he's working on at home/in secret, he doesn't tug on his hair as much, he's a lot more relaxed when they hang out, etc. Power Loader is also getting friendlier with the people in Ecto's friend group - he's not someone they consider competition, and they're warming up to him. Ecto's oblivious to the fact that Power Loader is crushing on him pretty hard, but a couple of his friends started to notice. They tease him about it but Ecto brushes them off, saying they're just friends.

-At one point Power Loader tries to ask Ecto out on a date to a new ice cream place in town. (Power Loader doesn't like sugary foods, but Ecto has a big sweet tooth) Power Loader uses the excuse that he doesn't want to go by himself and asks if Ecto would go with him... but Ecto misunderstands and invited the rest of their friend group. Power Loader's disappointed, but they still have fun.

-Power Loader tries his best in school but keeps struggling because his support teacher is blocking him at every turn. Ecto does great in his hero classes. He debuts his super move, Giant Bite Detention, during a vs. match with another school. This attracts a lot of attention and gets him an internship at a prestigious agency after he graduates. Power Loader ends up going to a 2 year tech school and lands a job at a company that repairs support items - not what he wanted, but not a bad start. They're really close friends by the time they finish high school, and Ecto is starting to see how Power Loader feels about him, but neither one addresses it and they stay close friends.

-About 3 years after high school, the friend group meets up for dinner and drinks - one last hoo-rah before they go their separate ways. They laugh and carry on, talking about what they've been doing and what their plans are. They're all a little tipsy by the time dinner is over, and Power Loader ends up going home with Ecto instead of trying to catch a late night train back to his apartment. It seems like things are going to get frisky, but Power Loader had too much to drink and winds up getting sick. Ecto takes care of him until he feels better; he makes Power Loader drink a bunch of water while he puts together a place for him to sleep. Ecto made a little setup on the floor in his bedroom, but when he turns around Power Loader has already crawled into Ecto's bed and fallen asleep. Ecto resigns himself to sleeping on the floor.

-Power Loader wakes up the next day and, thinking he's at his own place, is getting handsy with himself - which causes Ecto to wake up, startling them both. Power Loader is flustered, but when Ecto starts coming on to him he goes with it and it leads to them fooling around. They wash up afterwards and make some jokes about being 'friends with benefits,' both brushing it off as just a couple friends being dumb together. After having lunch out, Ecto goes to see Power Loader off at the train station. It's a bit somber because soon Ecto will be traveling halfway across the country for some hero work and they won't see each other for a long time. They make promises to keep up online and tease each other, all smiles by the time the train arrives. Ecto gives him a goodbye hug and heads home to pack after the train leaves. When it arrives at Power Loader's stop, he gets off and walks home, keeping his head down. He gets into his apartment and goes straight to his bedroom, where he buries his face in his pillow and cries.

-Power Loader and Ecto stay good friends, even though they don't get to see each other very often. Power Loader gets tired of his job at the repair company because there's limited opportunities to move up, and starts looking for a new job. Ecto is moving up as a hero. There's a lot of attention on him; he's in the running to become the number 1 hero when he takes on a job that requires a lot of discretion. Ecto just knows that this will give him the boost he needs to become number 1, and gets so caught up in trying to reach his goal that his overconfidence blinds him. On the day of the sting operation, he races ahead of the team he's with and corners the person they're after, who has a bone manipulation quirk. (she can morph the bones in her own body to use as weapons) She sends a razor-sharp sickle of bone his way, which he dodges. It curves around and destroys the clones he's using for backup, getting rid of his vision on everything but what's in front of him. Something sweeps his feet out from under him and Ecto falls to the ground hard. He catches a glimpse of the bone-lady getting away, holding something, but his head is fuzzy and he can't catch his breath. The rest of his group finally catches up to him and someone cries out, causing Ecto to turn and notice half his legs are missing and he's bleeding out. He falls unconscious just as they reach him.

-Power Loader is at work, just kind of running on autopilot. He's thinking about the jobs he's checked out, and about Ecto coming to visit in a few weeks. Break time comes and as he's heading to the cafeteria he notices a crowd in the break room. Curious, he squeezes in to see what's going on, and there on the TV is the report about Ecto being taken to hospital in critical condition. Power Loader is frozen in place for a moment before a coworker snaps him out of it, and he turns to leave - he HAS to get to Ecto. He feels like he can't breathe and sinks to his knees when he realizes it might already be too late.

-At the hospital several days later, Ecto has been stabilized. His agent fends off the worst of the press so that he can have privacy and time to recover. When Ecto is more awake, he refuses to fully acknowledge his missing legs. He does blame himself for not catching the villain though, and he's in a bad headspace, muddled by painkillers and self-deprecation. One day his agent shows up with a stranger in tow, and as he enters the room Ecto turns away and closes his eyes - he doesn't want to deal with anyone today. The agent introduces the man as the head of Prosthe-Tech, the company that will be working with Ecto to make combat-worthy prosthetics. Ecto vaguely acknowledges the man and hears footsteps approach his bed. When someone places a hand on Ecto's arm he pulls away and snaps at them, but then stops when he sees who it is. Power Loader greets him with nothing but relief on his face, and Ecto can't help but smile.

-Ecto's recovery is slow. Since Power Loader is currently working for Prosthe-Tech as a temporary gig, he's constantly by Ecto's side while his wounds heal. It's revealed that the doctor's couldn't reattach his legs because they couldn't find them, but there's very little other info about the incident. When it's time for Ecto to get measured for his prosthetics, he finally has to face his loss. He breaks down, and Power Loader holds him while he cries hard.

-Later, Ecto's finally healed enough that he's been fitted with prosthetics, and has been trying out various styles that Prosthe-Tech makes to see what will work for him. Power Loader's been tailing him throughout his rehab and physical therapy, taking notes on everything. Ecto is frustrated because he's in pain and none of the prosthetics work quite like he needs them to. The thought that he can't be a hero anymore starts to creep in, and he loses his motivation - Power Loader's the only reason he's even trying anymore.

-One day Ecto's going through his physical therapy like usual when Power Loader presents him with a set of combat prosthetics that he made specially for him. The head of Prosthe-Tech scolds Power Loader harshly about the peg-leg style design, but Ecto puts him in his place and insists on trying them. It takes a while to get used to them, but after a couple weeks Ecto reaches a point where he feels like the rehab treadmill is too easy. After a round of testing to check his progress, he slips away and heads to a nearby room set up with various obstacles meant for people at the very end of their recovery. Despite the objections of his nurses, his agent, and everyone else, he takes off running. He maneuvers the first few obstacles easily enough, and is delighted when he's able to catch himself from falling after a stumble. It gives him a boost of confidence, and as he turns he sees a rock wall with nearby targets hanging from the ceiling meant for people with flying quirks. He still ignores the shouting from his nurses and takes off, scaling the wall to the top before launching himself off and landing a solid kick on the closest target, knocking it to the floor. He's out of practice, but manages a passable roll as he hits the floor, coming to a stop. His heart's pounding as he turns and walks back towards the group, who's staring at him with their mouths hanging open. The head of Prosthe-Tech start to commend him but Ecto pushes right past him and engulfs Power Loader in a tight hug, giving him a tearful thank-you. Power Loader returns the hug, and they have a nice moment together as if no one else was around.

-Now that Ecto has prosthetics that fit his needs, his recovery speeds up a lot - he's able to use his clones to help work on muscle memory and get back into fighting shape. He still struggles with pain and self-doubt, but Power Loader is around to offer moral support and make adjustments to the prosthetics as needed. During downtime when the two are resting after therapy or while Power Loader is working on the prosthetics, Ecto struggles to come up with a way to tell Power Loader how he feels - he's unsure if their past fling meant anything or if they're just friends. He fights a LOT with his feelings, and when Power Loader has to leave because his contract with Prosthe-Tech is up, Ecto has a hard time saying goodbye. At the airport, Power Loader teases him like he did at the train station several years ago, but Ecto's smile disappears as soon as Power Loader does.

-Ecto gets back into hero work, but he struggles with his pain and has a hard time keeping up with his peers. He's in constant contact with Power Loader which helps, but he eventually feels like there's no point in trying to continue hero work - he just can't fight the way he used to. After a long night laying in bed awake, he makes up his mind. He goes to Power Loader's apartment and breaks down, saying he can't do this anymore. He cries hard again, exhausted enough that he falls asleep. He wakes up on the couch in Power Loader's arms, and doesn't want to move. Eventually his legs are sore enough that he has to (he fell asleep with his prosthetics on) and Power Loader makes him some tea and brings him a damp washcloth to wipe his face and legs after removing his prosthetics. Ecto is ashamed of himself for giving up, but Power Loader offers support and comfort.

-Ecto calms down some, and asks Power Loader what he’s been up to. Power Loader talks about how he's looking into becoming a teacher - it would give him the opportunity to work with support items in the way he's always wanted, and he could be the support teacher he wishes he had while in school. The conversation drifts, and Ecto can't help but find himself wanting to confess how he feels about Power Loader. He awkwardly tries to steer the conversation in that direction. He brings up their fling from several years ago, asking Power Loader if that meant anything. Power Loader reluctantly admits that he was head-over-heels for Ecto - and still is, much to Ecto's surprise. After realizing the feeling is mutual, they have a laugh about it and snuggle up together, talking about little nothings until they fall asleep on the couch.

-In the morning, Power Loader wakes up to see that Ecto is gone - but he left a note. Ecto arrives at the local news station in full hero attire to make an announcement to the public. The air is tense as he explains that he's stepping down from trying to become a top hero - he talks about his struggles and how hard it's been, but also about the support he's received - and if someone can make that much of a difference to him, why can't he do the same for others? He reveals that he's stepping down to become a heroics teacher, which is met with overwhelming approval. As Ecto is heading out of the news station with his agent, Nezu approaches him about an opportunity at UA.

-Later on after Ecto has been working at UA for a while, Power Loader has finished his teaching certificate (Ecto got a fast pass from Nezu, since he was already a pro-hero of high ranking) and has applied at UA to become the support teacher. He does well at both his verbal interview and teaching assessment, but because of the huge focus on heroics at UA he has to pass a combat test. He debuts his power frame for the first time here (he's used it for general testing, but not much hands-on combat yet) and Nezu has him face off against 3 of the staff at UA to see his fighting skills.

-His first match is against Midnight. He barely gets a chance to try his power frame because Midnight gets carried away, knocking him out with her quirk very quickly. Since he's asleep and unable to keep fighting, he loses this round.

-His second match is against Cementoss. He fumbles with his fighting style indoors. He's getting a better handle on things until Cementoss surrounds him in a concrete barrier, rendering him immobile. Though Power Loader manages to crack the cement, he can't get out and has to yield.

-His third match is against Eraserhead, but as Eraserhead steps towards the outdoor arena, Ecto cuts him off. Ecto questions what would be the point of Eraserhead being his opponent if he'll just negate Power Loader's quirk and defeat him instantly? He argues that the point of these combat tests are to see how Power Loader does in a fight. Eraserhead agrees, saying that how quickly Power Loader is defeated can be a perfectly valid way to test him. Eraserhead also accuses Ecto of wanting to go easy on Power Loader because the two are friends. They butt heads and Nezu has to step in. He allows Ecto to be Power Loader's last opponent, much to Eraserhead's chagrin.

-As Ecto steps in the ring, he warns Power Loader that he's not going to go easy on him. Power Loader seems to be considering something. When Ecto reminds him that this is his last round and he needs to make it count, Power Loader just smiles mischievously. As soon as the fight starts Power Loader surprises Ecto by rushing him. Ecto starts to manifest clones, the first of which Power Loader obliterates with a swipe of his massive power frame hand. Ecto regains his composure and fights back. While trying to deal with clones darting in an out, Power Loader can't react fast enough and Ecto lands a hit, knocking the wind out of him. He reminds Power Loader that he won't go easy on him, and to prove his point he manifests more clones, surrounding Power Loader. They quickly close in but Power Loader turns several of them away by dragging his hand across the ground in an arc, sending a huge spray of dirt and rock. By the time Ecto and his clones recover, Power Loader has dug his way underground.

-Ecto spreads his clones out quickly and stands still, trying to locate Power Loader. One clone takes a step towards where he thinks Power Loader is and is caught off guard when a massive hand bursts from the ground and grabs onto the clone, dragging it under where it's smothered beneath the dirt. Ecto shudders at the feedback he received before the clone dissipated, but holds his ground. Power Loader makes a few blind grabs, but can't tell where Ecto is and has to resurface.

-Power Loader tries to face them down, guarding himself more closely while he takes out Ecto's clones one by one. Ecto is circling him and realizes that Power Loader is trying to make him run out of clones. He spots an opening and darts in but is caught by a backswing of the power frame's massive metal arm, sending him flying. Power Loader cries out because he didn't mean to hit Ecto that hard, but after landing roughly Ecto lets out a huge plume of smoke and manifests his Giant Bites ability. Because of the power frame's extended reach, Power Loader is able to catch the giant clone by its jaws - just barely. It bares down on him and a warning light comes on in Power Loader's helmet. The mechanism in one of the metal arms gives out just before Power Loader yanks the giant clone to the side, throwing it to the ground. It explodes into a massive burst of smoke. While Power Loader is trying to regain his bearing, Ecto rushes out of the smoke, pinning Power Loader to the ground and demanding that he yield. Power Loader tries to get up but there's sharp pain in his shoulder. He yields, and Ecto staggers away as the UA staff approach them.

-Everyone is impressed by the way Power Loader held his own against Ecto, even though he lost. Power Loader tries to get up again, and realizes he dislocated his shoulder when the mechanism in his power frame arm gave out. Cementoss helps set his shoulder and Recovery Girl heals him up with a quick smooch. Ecto requests aid as well, revealing that when Power Loader sent him flying it broke several ribs and gave him a nasty bruise. Power Loader apologizes profusely even after Recovery Girl heals him up. Power Loader and Nezu have a quick chat to summarize his interview, but the two leave not knowing if Power Loader got the job or not.

-At home, Power Loader is being extra cautious with Ecto and keeps apologizing for hurting him. Ecto reassures him, and they have dinner together as they talk about how the interview went. Power Loader isn't feeling great about it, and Ecto isn't sure what to think; he’s worried he might have messed it up for Power Loader.

-The next morning, Power Loader continues trying to baby Ecto the moment he wakes up. Ecto keeps insisting he's fine, just more hungry than usual. Later in the day they pick up their mail, and Ecto presents an envelope to Power Loader - it's an acceptance letter, welcoming him to the staff at UA!

there are more scenarios that I've toyed with, including

-PL's mom coming by for a surprise visit, and PL having to explain that he and Ecto are partners/dating

-Ecto having a second encounter with the bone-lady that took his legs

-Private civil union scene that I dunno if I want to keep or not

-Ecto and PL visiting PL's mom in the country, with Ecto getting to know her neighbors and see PL in the kind of environment he grew up in (I headcanon that he was a country bumpkin who was really good at techy stuff - his mom works with cars/farm equipment and his interest in cars came from helping her fix things as he grew up) There’s some backstory about PL's siblings (that he didn't grow up with) and PL's mom struggling with her own issues and how it affected the way she raised PL. There’s also some backstory about Ecto's parents and why they're not really part of his life anymore, followed by PL's mom telling Ecto how proud she is of him then hurrying off to make them breakfast when Power Loader wakes up.

-Ecto feeling bad that PL keeps dropping his projects to take care of Ecto, and PL revealing that he almost did something really stupid when he was in high school because of how hopeless he felt, but after meeting Ecto it changed everything for the better. Ecto talks about how if PL wasn't there to help him through losing his legs, he isn't sure where he'd have ended up. Kinda sappy bit about how they saved each other from themselves.

#long post #ectoloader #ectoplasm #power loader #I've never been great at chatting casually about characters #so here have this massive info dump instead lol #Anonymous

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effervescentslut · 4 years ago

Text

how you meet | fred and george weasley

Requested: Yes

Content Warnings: None tbh... well, a lot of Ron degradation dslnfjfgnkjsfnskdjdnkjsf all jokes, though...

A/N: Woop woop we’re diving into the Harry Potter universe!! Sorry this took a bit to put together, I’ve been in a slump recently. I hope you enjoy! Friendly reminder that requests are open!!

Gryffindor!Reader

you became friends with ron in first year after he accidentally walked in on you changing into your robes on the train fkjcnxnjasndkjwefenkwrj

“blimey, i’m so sorry--”

you wanted to die tbh

but his quirkiness charmed you so you stuck with him for the rest of the train ride

even though his nose was dirty HA

you were tired of boarding with isobel macdougal, she was a nutcase

after following ron back to his compartment, you were acquainted with harry

they were pretty chill; apparently harry was some wizzy legend but you could not care less

you wanted to get off the mf hogwarts express™ your motion sickness was going berserk

ron seemed comfortable with the idea of attending hogwarts; he rambled about his older brothers nonstop who also went to school there

meanwhile you and harry were nervously looking at each other like

later that evening you get sorted into gryffindor ayyyy RAWR!!!!!

you met hermione after you both reached for the yorkshire pudding at the feast and she snatched her hand away from yours and blushed bc she accidentally touched you swenkdqknanjadnjwejfknw LMFAO POOR SHY GIRL

fred and george made a point to introduce themselves to ron’s new buds, much to his dismay, before everyone split off at the gryffindor tower

settling into school was pretty easy

you already had a great group of mates to hang around, they brought out the best in you

one day you’re walking to potions class with ron, harry, and hermione

you’re about to take a test hhhhhhhhhh nothing is more intimidating than being a gryffindor in the same room as professor snape

ron has been anxiously complaining about it to you guys and his brothers for weeks

“merlin, y/n, how am i supposed to know that eel eyes and frog eyes make the bulgeye potion? we’re only first years!”

hermione butts in, “actually ron, it’s eel eyes and beetle eyes--”

“shut it, hermione!”

the twins™ pop in, making sure they catch ron before his impending doom

“maybe you should listen to her ron”

“yeah ron, you wouldn’t want mum to find out you failed your first potions test--”

“--when the potion only has two ingredients!”

ron’s cheeks and ears are flaming red ohhhh boy

fred and george turn around

“good luck to you, harry” *they shake his hands*

“good luck to you, y/n” *they shake your hands*

“good luck to you, herm-- ah, who are we kidding, she doesn’t need luck”

they turn back to ron

“good luck you especially, ronald”

“yeah, your life depends on it!”

they ruffle his hair and run off

you giggle at them and ron is f u m i n g

you watch them scamper away and fondly admire them :’)

ron straightens his hair and says, “that was bloody embarrassing”

“to be fair, what they said was true, ron” you reluctantly chime in

“oh, shove off, y/n”

... ron ended up flunking the test

after potions the next day, fred and george are RELENTLESS at dinner

you know those people who say virtually anything and you laugh like it’s the funniest thing to have ever been spoken? it’s me, i’m y/n. gemini tingzzzz

to you, that’s fred and george

they immediately learn this when you’re trying your damndest to not choke on your lamb chops while laughing

... and simultaneously trying to not laugh at ron because he’s your friend

but boy are his brothers funny

the twins feed off of your reactions and continue to brutally torment their younger brother

to the point where you ACTUALLY choke on your food and have to excuse yourself to the bathroom, still coughing and wheezing during your laughing fit

harry tries to not laugh with (and at) you

hermione is like.... uhh wtf just happened can i eat my treacle tarts in peace please??

ron is clearly annoyed by the entire situation

fred and george are smirking and ease up on their teasing because your reaction was better than anything ron could have mustered up

after that night, fred and george’s sole purpose for teasing ron around you was to gauge your reaction

scratch that

any time you were with the twins, they just HAD to get you to laugh at least once

ron was getting f e d u p

“honestly, y/n, they’re not even that funny!”

you roll your eyes

every time you were with ron you secretly hoped fred and george would show up xcndjksdnjkewnrwkjfna

the twins never teased you though bc they have a soft spot for you

cheering for harry, fred, and george at gryffindor quidditch matches!!

siding with the twins when they argue with ron about quidditch stuff

soon you become actual friends with fred and george

meeting a bunch of their friends from their year so now you have a bunch of upperclassmen mates i was the same exact way i would just be a groupie among my older peers hahahah

they’d help you pass cheat in any class you’re in

you’re their biggest supporter

just say the word and they’d do ANYTHING for their new “adoptive” sister

“maybe we should swap you out for y/n, ron”

percy knows to keep away from you because he’s afraid the twins are tainting you dncwdjkfnkwjefnkjew but he still keeps an eye out, ya know?

molly CAN NOT wait to meet you

she sends you an owl one day and makes you promise to keep fred and george in line... oh, and ron too LMFAOO

Non-Gryffindor!Reader

let’s face it

gryffindor or not...

no matter what year you’re in...

everyone knows who fred and george weasley are

you’re the same year as the weasley twins and they had already built up quite a reputation for themselves...

AS SECOND-YEARS!!

there had been so much gossip about these prankster twins floating through the corridors the past two years

even the professors had begun to complain LMAO

“those weasley boys are nothing like percy!”

“poor minerva must have her hands full with those rambunctious twins!!”

and sure, you’d had the occasional inter-house class with them, but hardly ever interacted with them

to be fair, they are a bit overwhelming to be around

anyways

it was quidditch season!!

and you hade made the chaser position for your house’s team!

so one day your team is playing against another (non-gryffindor) team

and like... you’re good

BLOODY GOOD

you score quite a couple goals and the seeker even catches the snitch! (as if you needed the snitch to win the game liiiiike you really carried your team)

fred and george are supporting your team because 1. they know good quidditch when they see it and 2. you’re definitely the mvp

the unspoken mvp of your team

and they’re scared for gryffindor’s match against your house fkjsfnkjrnrkfw

because they’re beaters

and the opposing team’s beaters were allegedly good uh oh

how tf are they gonna juke you out??

anyways

after the match you’re celebrating with your team

you bid them goodbye and head back to your common room so you can finish your paper for history of magic

when a pair of identical, red-haired, gryffindor boys take you by surprise and pop up out of nowhere

your grip on your quidditch bag slips and you drop your bag

you sigh, “can i help you?”

“brilliant work out there today!”

“sorry about your bag”

george hands you your duffel

your eyes narrow as you grab it, your focus flitting to fred and then george

“listen, binns is gonna have your heads if you don’t write two separate papers this time--”

“we don’t want to talk to you about class right now...”

“...we’re here to beg for your mercy on us when you play gryffindor in a few months”

you snort and push past them, “if you two stop pestering me in fourth hour, then i’ll consider it”

you spin around on your heels, “and i have a name, you know!!”

“we know your name, y/n!”

“we know who EVERYONE is!”

“go write your papers!!”

#harry potter #harry potter imagines #harry potter headcanons #fred weasley #fred weasley x reader #george weasley #george weasley x reader #fred and george #fred and george weasley #weasley twins #weasley #fred weasley headcanons #fred weasley imagine #george weasley headcanons #george weasley imagine #george weasley imagines #fred weasley imagines

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sincerelyreidburke · 5 years ago

Note

Omg can I please have a fic where Quinn (possibly backed by all of SMH) absolutely throws down N*te. And then maybe comforts a Sad Nando bc nando is Soft and needles all the cuddles and support

Okay, this has been in popular demand for quite some time now. It may be 1:31 AM, but I’m counting this as a little birthday present for Nando.

Set during Quinn’s summer in Arizona. :D

One of the first steps of taking your boyfriend home for the summer is showing him around.

For the past six days, that’s what Nando has taken it upon himself to do. He can’t believe, actually, that he and Quinn have been home from school for an entire week already— well, a week tomorrow, but still— and yet here they are, arrived at the last day of Nando’s extensive tour of the Phoenix metro area. They’ve spaced it out— something one day, something another— like dinner at Tio’s one night, an afternoon meeting his best friends from home, showing Quinn his childhood rink.

He’s satisfied with his own performance as a tour guide, but tomorrow means his first shift at Tio’s restaurant, which means that summer job season is really beginning. Which, like, obviously he and Quinn can still hang out— they’re living under the same roof; and if it’s not Mama or one of the girls, Quinn is the first person he sees every morning. It’s just that once he has a summer job schedule, their days won’t be entirely their own anymore.

For Quinn, he knows, that might be a little weird, at least for these first three weeks until Gabi and Rosa get out of school. Once they’re done, the summer theatre stuff starts up, and Quinn is getting paid to do that, so he’ll have something to do.

In the meantime, though, Nando knows he brought things with him. Like his knitting stuff. And a few books. And his camera.

And until tomorrow, the time is still theirs.

“Okay, my love,” Quinn says, at the kitchen table, over his toast and eggs. The morning is all theirs; Mama is at work, so once they got the twins out the door and onto the bus, Nando made him breakfast. “What’s on the agenda today?”

Nando grins at him. “Oh, you’re curious?”

He shrugs. “In a way.” He’s wearing a baggy KMH shirt tucked into his pajama bottoms, and he hasn’t even done his hair yet. Nando lives for seeing him like this— his obsessively proper boyfriend, who won’t be caught dead in jeans outside of a party, in his pajamas in his family’s kitchen.

It has been six days, and having Quinn at home has given him enough fuel for domestic daydreaming to last a lifetime.

It’s going to be a good summer.

“Well, I saved a good thing for last,” Nando tells him, reaching for his hand across the table. “We’re going to the beach.”

Quinn raises his eyebrows, skeptical. “In Arizona.”

“Yes,” he chirps back, because two can play at this game. “I’m driving you eight hours south to the ocean. Do you have your passport?” Quinn laughs a little, and he adds, “No, baby, the beach by the river. There’s a little park there. We can sit by the water in the sun.”

“Ooh.” Quinn smiles. “That sounds lovely.”

“But first,” he adds, squeezing his hand. “I’m taking you to my favorite Starbucks.”

Quinn cocks his head, with amusement in his smile now. “You have a favorite Starbucks?”

“You don’t have a favorite Starbucks?” he replies.

“I…” He trails off a little. “I can’t say I do, actually.”

“Well, I’ll educate you.” He brings his hand to his face, kisses it, and says, “Maybe this one will become your favorite.”

Quinn’s smile is the cutest shit he has ever seen. “Maybe so.”

In the truck, on the way there, Quinn is watching out the window. “So why is it your favorite?”

“Huh?”

“The Starbucks.” He looks to him across the console. “Why is it your favorite?”

“Oh.” Nando grins. “Well, okay. It’s, like, classic Arizona architecture, and—”

“Wait, you like it because of the architecture?” Quinn chuckles a little. “Are you Ben?”

“Jesus, baby, are you chirping me?” Nando jostles his arm, and Quinn laughs. “You’re a regular KMH member. I’m impressed.”

Quinn shrugs. “I suppose you’re finally rubbing off on me.”

“Wow.” Nando loves his boyfriend. “I’m honored. But FYI, I was only starting with the reasons I liked it.”

“Okay, continue, then.”

“Okay, so it has a lot of really nice outdoor seating.” Nando pauses. “It’s, like, near a shopping center, but it’s separate from the rest of the stores, so it’s not just some ugly spot. They always have the good cake pops, and plus, the manager is cool. They have blue hair and they wear a bunch of pride pins on their apron.”

“Okay.” Quinn nods, as Nando watches him process. Or at least sort of watches him, because he is, technically, still driving a vehicle, cute as the boy in the passenger’s seat may be. “That does sound like a good Starbucks.” He pauses. “What do you mean by the good cake pops?”

“Lemon ones,” he replies. “And chocolate. And, during Pride month, rainbow.”

“Oh my goodness.” Quinn closes his eyes, like he’s having a moment. “Now I’m craving a cake pop.”

“Well, it’s a good thing we’re on our way there,” Nando replies, and he laughs.

It only takes a few more minutes to arrive. The parking lot is sort of crowded, but it doesn’t look like a mob scene, which is nice. Nando sees an empty table for two under a palm tree on the patio that has their name on it.

“Here we are,” he remarks, parking the truck across the lot from the door. “Our cake pops await.”

Quinn puts on his sunglasses. Their lenses are rose-gold and circular, and he looks criminally adorable in them. And also kind of super hot. That’s the thing about Quinn. He’s the cutest thing in the world and he’s also the source of literally all of Nando’s thirst. And he can turn on a dime. “I’m ready,” he tells him, combing back his hair. Already, with the past week in the sun, it’s gone a little lighter blond on the top. “I’ll have you know, my expectations are extremely high.”

“Oh, this won’t disappoint you,” Nando assures him. “I promise.”

They walk hand-in-hand across the parking lot, and Nando grabs the door for him. Inside is sweet air-conditioned bliss, and it smells like fresh-roasted coffee beans and the bakery case. Nando hasn’t been in here since Christmas break, and it’s been too long.

There’s a small line, but it won’t take more than a few minutes to get to the register. He tries to see who’s working, in case it’s Shai, but he can’t get a good look at the cashier, and there’s no sign of their blue mohawk among the baristas making the drinks.

Shai is actually, like, thirty, and possibly married, but they memorized his drink order in high school and always complimented him on his pride shirts, so they’re one of those older queer people Nando has just imprinted on. And, okay, yeah. He was totally excited to bring his boyfriend in here to meet them. It’s the little things.

Going around town with Quinn is like showing him off, and he has never been happier.

As they get in line, Quinn wraps his hand around his elbow, leaning into him. “It smells good in here,” he hums, with his head against his shoulder.

“I told you,” Nando replies, kissing his temple. “This is a magical place.”

He checks his phone, briefly, while they wait in line; he hasn’t actually looked at it since he woke up this morning. He has a few Snapchats in the cricket group chat, plus one from Nursey (he and Dex just got engaged, which, !!!!!!), and a separate text from Rhodey (it looks like he sent him a TikTok; Rhodey is obsessed with TikTok). He opens the cricket group, turns his front camera on, and snaps a selfie. Quinn is smiling with his cheek against his shoulder, and he himself looks like a little bit of a meme, but Quinn looks cute, so he saves it before he types the caption (coffee run y’all want anything) and sends it through.

In exactly twenty seconds, Rhodey replies. It’s a picture of himself in his work uniform— he delivers pizzas in Providence— and he’s flashing a peace sign at the camera. His hair is in a pink, blue, and yellow striped scrunchie. ya get me an americano. also yall are gay

Quinn snickers. “Well, I would sure hope so, Ben.”

Nando pockets his phone and hooks his arm around his neck. “Super gay.”

Quinn leans into his shoulder. “Mm.” He nods. “The gayest.”

They move forward a spot in line, then another. In fact, they move forward three entire spots without incident. Quinn is humming some showtune— it’s from Spring Awakening; he recognizes it— and Nando is keeping his eyes peeled for Shai, or at least someone he knows. Look at me! I’m in love and I’m happy.

But then God says, be careful what you wish for.

Because as they move into the spot where they’re up next to order, he catches the sound of the cashier’s voice. “... and can I get a name for the order?”

All of the life leaves Nando’s body.

“Holly? Great.” The voice is nasally, and a little artificially cheerful. He hasn’t heard it— outside of a few drunk voicemails— in over two years, but it evokes a visceral reaction in him. He feels sick, all of a sudden. “That’ll be right up.”

He must be tense all of a sudden, because Quinn peers up at him. “Sebastián?” he asks, and what a difference between two voices. “Are you alright?”

He tries to take a deep breath. “I, um.” He pauses. “I think we have to leave.”

“Next customer, please?”

“Leave?” Quinn squints. “But we’re next!”

The people in front of them step to the side counter, and Nando sputters too long. “We, uh—”

But when the way is clear, it’s too late. “Sebby!”

Nando wants to die.

“Holy shit!” Nate has a different haircut, and a Starbucks apron, but otherwise he’s the same— the same pasty pale skin, the same bony stature, the same face so easily twisted into a scowl. Right now, though, he’s smiling, which, honestly, is an expression that looks alien on him, based on Nando’s memory. “You didn’t tell me you were home from school!”

What he wants to say is, Nate, why the fuck would I tell you I was home from school, but what he does say is, “Uh, hi.”

He is going to cringe himself to death. He’s been home for no less than six days, and he is already running into his ex with his boyfriend.

When did he start working here?

“It’s been forever!” As Nate keeps on this weirdly cordial tangent, Nando feels Quinn still next to him. Quinn knows vaguely what Nate looks like, but what he knows better is the way he used to act, and the fact that he used to call him Sebby. Also, he’s wearing a nametag. And Nando feels as stiff as a board. “How’ve you been?”

Very carefully, Quinn unwinds his arm from his, and takes a firm, obvious grip on his hand.

“Jeez, I keep trying to reach out to you,” Nate continues, like they’re old friends running into each other, and not exes with a toxic history. “We really should catch up sometime, now that you’re in town.”

Nando takes a long breath, like it’ll fix the tension in his chest. He squeezes at Quinn’s hand, which helps a little. Quinn leads when they step up to the counter, and he inhales like he wants to order, but Nate is still fucking going. “Who’s your friend?” he asks.

“Boyfriend,” Quinn blurts, in his I’m pissed and I mean business voice, which, thank God for this boy. “I’m his boyfriend.”

Nate raises his eyebrows a little, looking at Quinn like he’s a five-year-old having a tantrum. “Oh,” he says, shrugging. “My bad. Although, I should’ve known.” Nate’s eyes dart to him for a second, and Nando wants to scrub himself clean of that gaze. “He tends to go for the little guys,” Nate continues, to Quinn, gesturing between the two of them like he’s comparing their heights. Then he shrugs again. “Gotta balance it out, y’know?”

Nando’s stomach turns. It stings, so much, and as soon as this is out of Nate’s mouth he feels Quinn squeeze his hand so hard it’s like he intends to break bones. He squeezes right back, and God, he knows it’s cruel and unnecessary and shouldn’t bother him, and it’s been almost three fucking years since he had to deal with Nate, but it still hurts. It hurts just as much as every comment like that did from him. It sends him back to memories of hating and second-guessing himself, and he just. He feels so fucking humiliated.

Quinn takes a very long breath, his eyes on Nate, while he digests this, and then he says, “Can I get a peach green tea, please.” He pauses, still squeezing the circulation out of his hand, and it is the only thing keeping Nando from tearing up. Which is pathetic. But he’s just. It hurts. “And he’ll have a—”

“Mocha frappe. Yeah. I know.” Nate chuckles a little, already grabbing a cup. “Extra whip, right?”

Quinn bristles, face flushing, and finally, Nando finds his voice. “Actually,” he says, “no.” Because even though that was what he was going to order, he doesn’t want to give Nate the satisfaction of thinking he still knows him that well. His Starbucks order may be the same, but there’s so much about him that’s changed since Nate knew him. So much about him that’s better now. Without him. He orders his second favorite. “An iced vanilla latte.” And then, because even though he really doesn’t feel like being polite to him, he feels like Mama might manifest in this Starbucks and kick his ass if he doesn’t say it, he adds, “Please.”

“Hm, my mistake,” Nate says, with a shrug, as he’s writing on the two cups. “I guess you’re a new man, Sebby. We really should catch up.” Quinn’s death grip intensifies, because he knows how much Nando cannot stand being called that. He brings his other hand back to wrap around his elbow, too, like he’s being protective, and Nando has never been more grateful for him.

“Anyway, that’ll be right up.” Nate looks so unbothered, just the way he always did, years ago, when he’d make a comment that left Nando’s self-esteem reeling for days afterward. “I guess I don’t really need your name for the order, huh?”

He’s writing on the cup, and Nando can’t see— or just doesn’t want to— but Quinn must be able to, because he says, “His name is Sebastián.”

Nate raises his eyebrows. “Ooh, feisty.” And of course Quinn sounds mad— but Nate making fun of him will do nothing but add more fuel to the fire. Nate looks to him, past Quinn entirely, and adds, “Does he speak for you all the time like this, or—?”

Nando wants to melt into the floor. “Just give us our total, Nate,” he says, because the faster they can get out of here, the better. Quinn is bristling next to him, but stays quiet.

Nate sighs, shrugs a little, and punches into the cash register. “If you say so,” he says, then announces, “6.23.”

And he thinks that’s going to be the end, but then, as he’s handing over his card, Nate keeps fucking talking. “Oh!” he says, still all faux-fake. “Sebby, you should take him to the lake. Remember, when we’d go down there in high school?”

Quinn’s grip on him tightens. This transaction cannot process fast enough. “We had a lot of fun,” Nate says, like he’s reminiscing. “Always did. It’s a shame; I feel like we never really had closure.”

Finally, finally, after what feels like a million years, he hands his card back, and Nando pockets it in a hurry. “C’mon,” he says to Quinn, because he cannot stand here for one more second, and as they walk away, Nate calls after them.

“Hey, give me a shout sometime!” He’s doing the fake-smile thing again. “We should really hang out, now that you’re in town again.”

Nando squeezes his eyes shut and takes a tight breath; he didn’t realize it before, but it’s hard to breathe. He feels sick and humiliated and awful, and when they’re far enough away to be out of earshot, he looks to Quinn and whispers, “Baby, I am so sorry.”

Quinn is surprisingly calm, at least in comparison to his clear irritation at the register. He shakes his head and rubs his arm with the free hand that’s not holding his. “Don’t apologize,” he says. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“But I just—” He wants to melt. “I had no idea he started working here; I haven’t even seen him since before freshman year, and it just— like, it figures, right—”

“Sebastián,” Quinn says, and his even voice pulls Nando out of his head. “I’m going to get our drinks, and then we can get out of here, okay?”

Nando lets all his breath out at once, then nods. “I— yeah. Okay. That’s— perfect. I’m sorry, baby.”

“Do not be sorry.” Quinn rises on tiptoe and kisses his cheek. “None of that was your fault.”

Quinn seems surprisingly collected for someone who was just ignored and insulted a minute ago, and Nando has this feeling, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he’s planning something, some kind of revenge— but what could he do, with Nate just working?

They station themselves against the wall by the pick-up counter, and it isn’t lost on Nando how touchy Quinn is being— not that they’d hold back in public for any reason in general, but he’s definitely going the extra mile right now, rubbing the inside of his elbow and leaning his head on his shoulder and holding his hand all at once. Not only is the touch grounding; Nando is also fully aware that Quinn is trying to rub it in Nate’s face should he glance over from his spot behind the counter.

Which, good. Let him fucking stare if he wants to. Nando hasn’t felt that humiliated in a long time.

And he hates that he let it hurt him, that one stupid comment— but it was such a reminder of worse times, times when he’d have to process things like that from the person who was supposed to be his partner all the time, and it was just. It was always hard, and it was always awful, and being with Quinn has helped him work so much on all of that. Quinn taught him, so early on, that he deserved better. Everything with Quinn is better.

He just focuses on holding Quinn’s hand for a minute, until Nate puts their drinks out at the pick-up counter. “Stay here, honey,” Quinn tells him, squeezing his hand before he unwinds his fingers from it. “I’ll be right back.”

“Okay,” Nando replies, and watches him go.

Quinn squares his shoulders, takes a short breath, and walks to the counter. Nando is suddenly very aware that something might be about to happen. He leans against the wall and listens in, as he watches Quinn take the two drinks from across the counter.

He’s right. Quinn looks Nate dead in the eye and says, “Hi, could I just remind you of something?”

Oh my God. Nando widens his eyes. Is Quinn about to chew him out?

Nate says nothing, but looks unamused, and Quinn continues. “You broke up with him,” Nando hears him say. “After you cheated on him, by the way. Just in case you forgot.” Nate raises his eyebrows, but stays silent. Quinn is reeling now, and there’s no stopping him. “And I happen to know an awful lot about the way you treated him, and how much that hurt him, so don’t you dare try to act so friendly, like you didn’t break him.” Nando is frozen in place, as Quinn picks up both of the drinks. “He owes you nothing. He clearly does not want to reconnect with you, and I sure as hell wouldn’t want to do that either with someone who did nothing but make me feel awful about myself for two years.” Quinn isn’t even making a scene— the only reason Nando can hear what he’s saying is because he’s not standing that far away— but Jesus Christ, if this isn’t the most satisfying thing to witness in the world. Nate is red in the face and absolutely silent, and Quinn is staring daggers at him; if looks could kill, he’d be dead on sight. “If you wanted to be his friend, maybe you shouldn’t have stomped all over his heart.”

Nando cannot believe his ears.

“And,” Quinn adds, like it’s the end of a big monologue, “I’m going to need two straws.”

Nando is so in love with this boy.

He watches, trying not to smile or even laugh, as Nate fumbles into the thing of straws and shoves two in Quinn’s direction. Quinn takes them, flashes a big, stage smile, and says, “Thank you!” before he turns and walks back in Nando’s direction.

The fake smile turns self-satisfied in a second flat, as he meets Nando’s eyes again. Nando is still kind of frozen, but he wants to kiss him, right in the middle of Starbucks.

All he can say is, “Baby.”

Quinn is all smiles. He looks the way he does when he comes out of the stage door after a great show. “Ready to go, honey?”

“Am I ever,” Nando says, and they join hands again as they head for the door. He’s not sure if Quinn knows that he heard what he said. “That… was kind of the most satisfying thing I’ve ever witnessed in my life.”

“Oh,” Quinn replies as he sticks his straw into his iced tea, “trust me, Sebastián. It’s the most satisfying thing I’ve done as long as I can remember.” He pauses, as he takes a sip, and then adds, “I’ve been wanting to do that for longer than I can even say.”

“It was hot,” he says, because, well, it was. “And just… jeez, I— maybe something good did come out of this situation.”

“Of course it did,” Quinn replies. His smile is kind of maniacal, and Nando is into it. “I got to have the confrontation of my dreams, and I got an iced tea.” He holds up his drink. “Cheers!”

Nando bumps his vanilla coffee against it and laughs. “Cheers, baby.”

Quinn squeezes his hand. They walk back outside into the summer day, and Nando doesn’t look back.

Not even a glance.

#crickets #nandoooooooo #mini quinny #quindo #fuck n*te hours #ficlet #mel writes

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ginnranger · 4 years ago

Text

A Strange New Student

Summary:

Ginn is a new student in a prestigious London private school. It’s pretty obvious she is not the type to be in private school, but is that going to stop her? Honestly, she doesn’t even know the answer to that one.

But she does have a pretty good guess, when she meets Alex, Martin, George, Louise, and Elsie. They are pretty different from her. They seem nice enough, but will her past lessons allow her let them in? Another good question.

Word count: 6542

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The large, stone hallways of Churchill high school were a lot less busy than Ginn’s old public school back in Liverpool. She guessed that was because barely anyone was able to afford the tuition to actually attend this school. How she got in was a complete miracle, sparked by some pretty unfortunate events.

The biggest understatement of her life.

Ginn was not used to anything that she had already faced in this new school at all, and she had only been in the building ten minutes. The students hanging around in the hallway before class were well behaved, milling around and chatting instead of running and fighting. The floors and lockers were clean, free of graffiti and chewing gum. The uniforms were the weirdest part; everyone wore it neat and proper, the boys’ ties being evenly tied, their shirts neatly tucked into their trousers, which were not sagging halfway down their butts, and their blazers free of burn holes and glue stains. The girls’ skirts were closer to the knee than the butt, their blouses also neatly tucked, and their cardigans neatly buttoned. Everyone’s shoes were perfectly shined, not a scuff in sight.

Every student had neatly styled hair, not a strand out of place. They all had perfect posture, shoulders squared and backs straight, the girls tending to keep their feet touching each other. Their faces shone with happy, satisfied smiles. There was no anger, hunger, or sadness in these people’s lives. Very different to what Ginn saw back in Liverpool. It was obvious these teenagers knew their place in the world. So did Ginn, and it was not surrounded by these people. They made that clear with their odd looks.

She stood out for many reasons around these people. For one, she was the only girl wearing trousers and a tie. Ginn flat out refused to wear a skirt, and the rules said trousers could not be worn without a tie, so she was stuck in the unflattering, unfitted, too big boy’s uniform. Her tie was relatively neat, but she had not buttoned the top of her shirt, and pulled the tie down slightly to accommodate the room the lack of a top button provided. her blazer sleeves had been rolled up slightly to accommodate her shorter arms. Her shirt was tucked in, but it was not neat. the sides of the shirt were bunched up, as she had tried to angle it in a way it was more fitted to her feminine frame. It was not working, but she felt comfortable. When Ginn stood, she leant on one leg, arms crossed, and her feet obviously not touching. Her shoulders slumped, and her hands folded into fists, no matter whether she was walking or standing. When she walked, her back curved forwards slightly, and her eyes shifted between everything that moved, glaring into every pair of eyes she met. Ginn had to be aware of everything that was happening around her. Just a little compulsion of hers. Her hair was cut short, mostly jar length, with layers getting shorter as they went up, and a fringe cut in line with her eyes, parted favouring the left side, and whilst that was not abnormal for girl, it was expected that she would make an attempt to calm and style her messy mop of ginger hair. But she didn’t. She liked it messy. It gave her an excuse to have her fringe covering her left eye. You see, Ginn had heterochromia. Her right eye was a bright, electric blue, whilst her left eye was a shining light brown, almost orange when the light hit it just right. Ginn preferred to cover her left eye with her hair, as it blended in with the orange strands better than the blue did. That, and the brown colour was not the genetic colour. Her mother had blue eyes, and her father had green eyes, so brown was definitely not a family eye colour.

Ginn could tell people were looking at her as she wondered the fancy hallways towards the administration office, though she couldn’t tell if this was because of her rough, stand-offish appearance, or the fact that it was early November, and she was a new student entering year 10. Honestly, Ginn didn’t care which one it was. She didn’t expect to form relationships with these people.

She managed to reach the administration office, where she was expected to pick up her time table and ID card, after a few minutes of cluelessly wondering around, following strange signs written in the worst font for someone like her; cursive. How is that acceptable, you may ask? It honestly isn’t, but this school had an aesthetic to stick to. Ginn was dyslexic, so anything that wasn’t block letters or her own handwriting was torture to read. As she reached the old looking, oak wood door, she straightened her back and readjusted her backpack, forcing her face to change from confrontational to neutral. This was the face she preferred to show in front of adults, as they could never figure out what emotion she was feeling so they struggled to ask her questions. She opened the door and walked up to the desk, waiting for the old woman sitting, typing on her computer, to look up at her. She did quickly, luckily.

“Hello there! What can I do for you today?” Her voice was far too perky and high pitched. It irritated Ginn’s ears. Ginn forced her face to remain neutral, pushing down her natural, uncomfortable reaction, so she could respond as quick as possible.

“I’m the new student. I was told to pick up my stuff here.”

“Ahh, yes! Ginn Ranger, am I correct?” The woman squeaked, smile never faltering.

“Yeah, that’s me.” Ginn avoided eye contact, uncomfortable with her full name being announced.

The woman rooted around the organised mess that sat on her desk, until she found the right envelope that held Ginn’s ID card and timetable. She handed it to Ginn and asked her to sit down for a moment, as the headmaster wished to speak to her before classes started. Ginn forced herself to swallow a groan as she nodded and took a seat next to the desk, facing the door to the headmaster’s office. Her leg bounced quickly as she stared into space, trying to concentrate on her thoughts rather than the loud world she lived in. She slouched in her seat after finding a comfortable place in her imagination to rest. Sadly, it only took two minutes for her to be called into Headmaster Windsor’s office.

“Hello, Miss Ranger.” Mr Windsor was far more serious. much more pleasant to Ginn’s ears. “It is a pleasure to finally have you here.”

Ginn only forced a smile as she sat awkwardly in the chair. Her eyes quickly scanned the room, taking in every detail she could. the shelves behind Mr Windsor mostly held the textbooks this school studied. Two of the four shelves held the textbooks. one held a collection of frames, some holding pictures of what Ginn assumed to be Windsor’s family, other holding certificates. One was a certification of first aid, one an inclusivity certificate, another being Windsor’s degree in teaching. The inclusivity certificate intrigued Ginn, as she knew for a fact that this school was pretty exclusive.

‘Guess it’s for everything except class.’ She thought to herself.

The final shelf held folders, ordered by category. The first was labelled ‘Enrolment’. The second was labelled ‘Disciplinary Reports’. The third was ‘Human Resources’. The fourth one was what Mr Windsor pulled off the shelf and flicked through. It was labelled ‘Inclusive Support’. Yay.

“So, Miss Ranger-” Ginn interrupted Windsor.

“Call me Ginn.” She said quickly and sheepishly, shoving her hands under her legs to avoid her usually gesturing that annoyed so many adults. “I prefer just Ginn.”

“Ok then.” Mr Windsor peered over the top on his reading glasses, unhappy with the interruption. “Ginn. Your old school transferred us your files and records last week, and I feel we must discuss some things before you head to classes.”

Ginn bit her lip and nodded. She had always gotten pretty good scores in lessons, but she was by far the favourite student to any teacher she ever had. She had a tendency to speak her mind, even when out of terms. Especially then, actually. She also did not have the best track record when it came to peer relations. Most of her past incidents were not her fault, but she had to claim some as her own doing. What could she say? She knows how to stick up for herself.

“These records say you are a very smart young girl, you could thrive in an academic environment, if provided with the right resources. This is why our scholarship program chose you to be our first representative of the… less fortunate.” Windsor hesitated with that last part. He really needed to brush up on his appropriate language book.

‘Just say I’m poor and move on.’ Ginn thought to herself.

“However,” the dreaded sentence conjunctive. “You do have a worrying amount of negative peer relations reports. I must tell you, Ginn. Fighting is strictly prohibited on the campus of this school.”

Ginn let her voice take the lead. “What’s your stance on fighting in self-defence? Mine is that is fine to fight, as long as you don’t start it. Pretty sure those records say that’s what I did.”

Oh dear. She really should have thought before speaking.

Windsor looked exasperated. Ginn was clearly not the first wise crack he had dealt with. “I believe anything can be sorted with the right words. As long as it is reported, it will be dealt with.”

“What about the times it can’t be reported?” Ginn’s voice deepened as she became serious. “That’s what happened in my experience. I couldn’t report it, and if I could, nothing happened, so I sorted it myself. Sure you wont have to worry though. This doesn’t exactly seem like the place where fights happen.”

Windsor chuckled and nodded. “You are an interesting young lady, miss- Ginn. I’m sure you will fit in with the class I have placed you in. All of your teachers have been informed of your mental heath and learning difficulties, as per your request.”

Ginn hated how that was phrased, but she thanked him anyway. ‘Gotta try and be polite’, after all.

“I have assigned a young man to help guide you around school as you settle in.” Oh no. forced interaction. “He should be outside now.”

as Windsor finished his sentence, the phone device on his desk beeped, and the voice of the receptionist through the door sounded out, saying ‘a Mr Peterson was here to see Headmaster Windsor.’ Windsor told the receptionist to send him in, and the device buzzed, causing Ginn to cringe. That sound was horrible!

Before she could fully recover, the door opened behind her and a boy around her age walked in. He had pale white skin, with bright blond hair, shaved at the sides and combed over, the parting favouring the right side of his head. His eyes were cornflower blue, shining and bright. He had a small, wonky smile on his face as he greeted the headmaster and took a seat on Ginn’s right side.

“This is Alex Peterson. He will be, what we call, your class escort.” Windsor introduced the boy to Ginn, and the boy turned to Ginn and smiled, offering his hand to shake, which she just looked at nodded to him. Windsor broke the awkward tension between the two and continued. “He will show you around until you are comfortable with your surroundings.”

Ginn hated this idea. She could see why they implemented it, many people would want it, but she was not one of those people. She would much rather just figure it out on her own, even if it meant being late to all her classes.

“The bell is about to ring. You two should head off now.” Windsor gestured to the door, and the two teens picked up their bags and walked out.

“So…” The boy, Alex, said, drawing out the ‘O’ sound. “Can I see your schedule? Just so I know for sure where you are?”

Ginn wordlessly shoved the piece of paper into Alex’s hand, still avoiding eye contact with him. Alex shot her a strange look, realising this was going to be so much harder than he originally thought. He did think she would be quiet, being new and all, but dang.

“Cool, you’re in mine and my friend’s form.” he handed back the paper to the new girl and started walking, being closely followed by her. “You’ll like Mr Caxton, he’s fun.”

Ginn hummed in response. God, she was not making it easy for Alex.

The bell rang and Ginn tensed, her shoulders squaring, and her fists clenching. Another loud, irritating noise. This school was just made to make her uncomfortable.

Unfortunately, Alex had noticed her reaction to the sound. “You ok? It’s just the bell, no need to worry.” he chuckled.

“Fine.” Ginn grumbled through gritted teeth. She started storming off down the corridor without a plan, and luckily Alex jogged to catch up to her before she reached the turning point.

Alex desperately wanted to break the awkward air between them, but did not know how. This girl seemed tense, understandably, as she seemed quite strange to the standards of this school, so he did not know how to approach anything with her.

“So… where you from?” Alex asked, trying to study her body language. She walked like she was trying to look tough, as well as be silent in her steps. She succeeded on both aspects as she definitely looked intimidating, and her steps barely echoed around the halls.

Ginn subtly looked Alex up and down, figuring out his motive, in both the question and with helping her. He stood straight and proud, taller than her by a good few inches. Although, that wasn’t hard, as Ginn was only 5”3’. She estimated him to be about 5”9’, and she guessed he still had room to grow. He was looking at her expectantly with a small smile, his blue eyes shining in curiosity. She could see no malice in his wonderment, so she answered.

“Liverpool.” She said, bluntly. To be exact, she lived in a small terrace house, in Roscoe Street, very close to her primary school, Pleasant Street Primary. Ginn had hopped around several high schools in the past four years, so she couldn’t say how far she lived from them. She did not live in a great area, but it was close to the city centre, and she always felt safe there with her parents. She missed Liverpool.

Alex nodded, biting the inside of his mouth in mild frustration at Ginn’s refusal so converse. “Cool. Good city. What brought you to London then?”

“Family stuff.”

The two sighed, knowing that conversation was not going to happen right now.

The two arrived at the classroom after everyone else had arrived and sat down. Alex greeted the teacher with a cheerful ‘good morning’ and he sat down on a table for four, with two other boys, whom he greeted and immediately started chatting and laughing with. The boy sitting next to him had slightly more tanned skin than Alex, but he was still quite pale. He had neat, honey brown hair, with a full fringe that was cut just under his eyebrows, the top of head was thick with hair facing forwards, and what Ginn estimated as one inch clipped shaving around the rest of his head. His eyes were forest green, thoughtfully staring at Alex as he spoke, but also at someone on the other side of the room Ginn couldn’t locate. The other boy had his back to Ginn, but from what she could see, he had dark, sun kissed skin, and the only messy head of mahogany brown hair she had seen in this school. Well, there was an order to this mess, unlike the mess that sat on her own head. His hair was methodically spiked up, then brushed forward. He appeared to have every portion of his hair cut to a similar length, apart from the front.

Ginn heard her name and she turned, seeing the teacher beckoning her towards his desk. she walked over, head down.

“You must be Miss Ranger!” Oh god, he was perky. “Now, I like to ask before I start teaching new students, if you don’t mind, what would you like me to call you, and what pronouns shall I use for you? And are they the same in class, privately, and in front of other adults?”

Ginn blinked at the sudden questions as she let her mind catch up with her ears. “Just Ginn, thanks. Female pronouns, all the time.” She said quietly.

“Perfect.” Mr Caxton smiled softly at Ginn, then continued. “I have been told of the support you require, so don’t be afraid to approach me any time!”

Ginn felt extremely awkward, biting her lower lip, and nodding, avoiding eye contact. She always hated it when her personal stuff was brought up by other people. She knew they were only trying to help, but it never helped Ginn. all she did was nod.

“Ok, so everyone in this class has their seat. I had everyone choose to sit somewhere at the beginning of the year and that is where they sit for the rest of the year. The only available seat is across from your guide, Alex. Go sit down, and we’ll start up, ok?”

Ginn glanced over at the table of three boys. She would be sitting next to the dark-skinned boy. He looked like the more energetic person in the trio. Freaking fabulous. At least the seat was on the left side, so she wouldn’t be bumping elbows with the seemingly right-handed boy.

Ginn had nothing against boys. Truly, she didn’t. She was just very insular, and teenage boys tended to be pretty rambunctious. She also didn’t exactly have a perfect track record with relations. Not just with boys, girls too. But, well, Ginn’s short, slim stature was not a good match up when she fought with boys. Luckily, she is quick, so at least she has that going for her.

She sighed and walked over to the table, unslinging her bag off her shoulder and sat down, immediately leaning on her hand and staring at the floor. She dazed, and started thinking about what she could draw. She thought of characters from tales she enjoyed, and she started moving her finger on one spot of the table, mimicking drawing. This was something she did when uncomfortable. Actually drawing is much better, but she hated showing others her stuff, so rarely drew when sitting at a table with strangers. Or classmates, as she should call them.

the three boys had noticed Ginn sitting down, and turned to her to smile and greet her, but she was avoiding all eye contact. Alex shrugged, realising this was going to be his week. Boy to Ginn’s right decided to break the awkward silence by introducing himself.

He went to speak, nudging her first to get he attention, but before he could speak, she jumped at the sudden touch, tensing her shoulders and clenched her fists, straightening her back and gasping lightly. Her duel coloured eyes stayed locked staring forwards, and she took a few breaths before she snapped her head to look at the boy and growl, “What?”

Now she could see his face, she took in his features. He looked nervous, likely due to Ginn’s aggressive nature. He had warm, russet brown eyes that where currently wide in shock. He was handsome, with a square jaw, and strong cheekbones. His mouth was tight in shock at her reaction. Luckily for him, he recovered quickly. His eyes softened into a more relaxed form, and his tight mouth morphed into a cool side smile.

“Hey,” his voice was smooth and joyous. Enjoyable to Ginn’s ears. Wait what? “I’m Martin Williams. This is George Groden, and you’ve met Alex. It seems like we’re desk mates!”

Ginn struggled to relax her muscles from the sudden touch. She swallowed and forced her hands to open as she shoved them under her thighs. Her voice was failing her, so she just looked back at the table and nodded, humming ‘mm hmm’.

The boy, Martin, made eye contact with the other two, concerned by the reaction. He decided to pry a little, tying to get Ginn out of her shell. “Ginn, right? Interesting name, never heard it before. Where’s it come from?”

Ginn was shocked by the question. Usually when people found out about her name, they made a joke about alcoholic parents, or threw out guesses as to what it was short for. Her name was Ginn. Not Ginera, or Ginevra, or even Geneva, shockingly. This question made Ginn happy, and her vocal cords decided to work.

“It’s a combination of Gill and Finn.” Ginn kept her head down but was smiling lightly for the first time in a while. “Gill was my mum’s mum, and Finn was dad’s dad. They wanted to honour both of them, so it was either Ginn or Fill, and Ginn was pretty gender neutral.”

She huffed in amusement at that last bit. the story of her naming was always interesting to her, especially when you think of the whole story of a young pregnant woman and her husband staring at each other, trying to make the other back down, until they came to the compromise of combining the names.

“That’s cool!” Martin said, enthusiastically. “You have such an interesting story! I’m just names after my grandad!”

Ginn smiled, amused by the boy’s excitement.

Before they could continue, the teacher cleared his throat and started the lesson. It was English. This was not the best subject for Ginn due to her dyslexia, but she had a creative mind, and enjoyed story telling, so it wasn’t so bad. Well, unless they were reading old stuff, like Shakespeare or Jane Austen, they were utter torture for Ginn’s brain. Sadly, that is exactly what they were doing. Romeo and Juliet, to be exact. They started the lesson reading the play, the characters being assigned to a random assortment of students. Ginn struggled to follow along as they worked, not understanding anything they were saying. The words were floating around the page, lines and letters flipping and swapping place, it was giving her a headache. It didn’t help that the most dramatic character in the play, Mercutio, was being voiced by Martin, who was slowly becoming more and more dramatic in his reading, his movements rocking the table, making reading even harder for her.

After they had finished the first four scenes, Mr Caxton instructed the class to discuss them as a table. Ginn was thankful for this as she could finally rest her eyes for a minute. She rubbed her eyes and led her hands up to brush her hair up out of her face, letting it fall how it wanted, which was apparently not in front of her eyes. She looked at the trio of boys expectantly, waiting for a conversation to start, when she noticed they were all staring at her. Alex looked shocked, staring curiously, eyes switching between each of her eyes. George seemed curious, one eyebrow raised, and a small smile spread on his lips. Martin was far too excited for Ginn’s taste.

“Woah!! You have heterochromia?!” He said far too loud. “That’s so cool!”

Ginn quickly dipped her head and brushed her fringe over her brown eye, feeling her face flush red.

“If you say so...” She muttered under her breath.

This conversation was clearly going nowhere, much to the dismay of the three boys. Ginn was obviously not a conversation person, and the boys were not interested in discussing Shakespeare, so decided to further press.

“You don’t think so?” George questioned.

“Let’s just say it’s not my favourite thing about myself.” Ginn grumbled, shooting them a sarcastic and awkward smile. The boys shared a look, all expressing different thoughts and emotions. Martin locked eyes with his friends, then looked at Ginn quickly, and back at them, wiggling his eyebrows and smirking. The boys shot him warning looks, but he ignored it, turning around to look at Ginn, leaning his elbow on the table and putting his head on his hand, wearing his flirtatious, lopsided smirk.

“Well,” He said, making Ginn look us at him. Once she saw his face, she huffed, rolling her eyes, and looked back down at her work. “I think they are beautiful, completing the gorgeous image you hold all over.”

Ginn felt panic rise in her chest. She had never been complimented like that before from the mouth of someone who... had little to no obvious ill intentions. This boy did not seem to be particularly threatening, but still, Ginn could not be help but be wary. She clenched her fist around her pen in panic, as her defence mechanisms snapped into position.

“Say anything like that again,” She turned and glared at Martin through her hair. “And I break your hand.”

Martin tensed up, squeaking in fear as his arm slipped off the table in surprise. Ginn did not break eye contact, however, needing to maintain her tough exterior.

“Well ok then.” He squeaked. Pleased with herself, Ginn looked back down at her work, deciding to do the work herself. The boys fell silent and just did the work, quietly discussing Shakespeare out of fear for their hands.

At the end of the class, after a long lesson of awkward silence between the four tablemates, the boys packed up and met with Elsie and Louise. Ginn had rushed out of the classroom a lot quicker that the others, so Alex had already failed at his job of making sure she was ok. This was going to be a rough day.

The final class of the day was P.E. Luckily for Ginn, sport was something she excelled in. Unluckily for Ginn, she had to get changed in front of other people, which was less than ideal.

Alex instructed her to follow Louise and Elsie to the girls’ changing rooms. Ginn kept her head down and shuffled along with the other girls as they chatted, complaining about the lesson they were going into.

“P.E. sucks, I hate it so much!” Louise groaned, dramatically. “I mean, I like exercise, but the structure of P.E. is so messy, and its so boring!”

“I know!” Agreed Elsie. “It’s even worse right now, doing those weird drill things.”

Ginn perked up at that comment. If they were anything like the ones she used to do in Cadets, she was golden! She didn’t look at the other girls, but she did smile and huff in satisfaction.

“You like P.E., Ginn?” Said Louise, sounding surprised. The girl looked Ginn up and down quizzically. She did not exactly fit the typical description of a fit girl. She looked very skinny, but Louise guessed that was mainly due to her oversized uniform.

Ginn hesitated with her answer, wondering how to answer without sounding weird. “Yeah, kind of. I like exercise, and I’m used to pretty strict sessions, so nothing really bothers me much anymore.”

The other girls seemed satisfied with her answer luckily.

After only moments, the three girls had reached the girls’ changing room. As the tried to find a free section of bench to place their bags and clothes, Ginn was silently praying that no one would pay attention to her so she could change and slip out unnoticed. She utterly hated changing in public. Sadly, her prayers were not answered, as the only available space was on a bench in the middle of the room, with a group of chatty girls surrounding it. Perfect. The three set down their bags and started undressing, quickly swapping from blouse to P.E. polo shirt. Ginn was particularly mad about their easy method of swapping from skirt to shorts without presenting their underwear; slipping the shorts on under their skirts, then taking off the skirt from above. Ginn, wearing trousers, had no such luxury, so had to take advantage of her too big shirt and take off her trousers, hoping they would cover her behind as she slipped the shorts on. Now for the bit she dreaded: changing from shirt to polo. She wanted to do this as quickly as possible, but struggled due to her ever growing anxiety. She slipped off her tie and unbuttoned her shirt, then readied her polo shirt to be the correct way to slip on as soon as she rid her back of it’s professional cotton attire. Quickly, she took off the shirt, and immediately heard what she feared.

Louise and Elsie had gasped, quietly. They had finished changing and lacing up their trainers, and were waiting for Ginn to finish changing so they could walk out together, and happened to glance up when they saw her take off her shirt. The two girls were sitting on Ginn’s right, so they could see what Ginn was worried about clear as day. Right across her back, from the bottom of her shoulder blade, creeping up to the top curve of her right shoulder, were two long, pale, jagged, and bumpy scars. They looked awful, and the two girls were certain that they were from a horrible incident from a long time ago. This scared them, as they worried about Ginn’s safety and current situation.

Before they could say anything, Ginn tugged her polo shirt over her head, hiding the scars before anyone could ask questions, or, god forbid, anyone else saw them. Louise opened her mouth to speak. She was not sure what she would say, but it was instinct. Before she could make a sound, however, Ginn shot her a warning glare, her blue eye shining like a lightning storm, her amber eye shimmering like a raging fire. Her lips were tight and eyebrows knitted in a tight V-shape. Her ginger hair had fallen before her face, blocking the light from reaching her face, only making the looming pit of aggression in Ginn’s aura stronger. Her fists were tight. Louise only just realised the new girl’s flat and scarred knuckles. Louise immediately shut her mouth. She offered an awkward, slightly scared smile, but Ginn just straightened her back, slipped on her battered old trainers, and started towards the door. Louise and Elsie shared a concerned look, then darted up and dashed to keep up with Ginn, who had suddenly developed a quick, strong stride.

Once all of the students had gathered in the sports hall, the P.E. teacher, Mr Dullan, called registration and introduced the aim of today’s class. The class knew they would not like this lesson. Mr Dullen was clearly in a bad mood, he was completely stiff and glaring at everyone who made eye contact with him. Ginn was not happy when he grabbed her shoulder and pulled her to face him when she marched into the hall, so he could interrogate her about who she was. He seemed satisfied after a full 30 seconds of comparing her to the ID picture that was on his register. But, this was a respectable school that definitely would not accept her doing what she wanted to do at that moment, and tuition was far too expensive for her to be kicked out on her first day, so she let it go.

“Ok, everyone!” Mr Dullen shouted, making a huge, distracting echo ring around the room. Ginn knew she would barely be able to understand him immediately. “I don’t want to deal with teaching you all today, so you’re just going to do run laps around the school grounds all lesson.”

The entire class groaned and started quietly complaining to themselves and their friends. Well, all except Ginn, who enjoyed running. Also, the echo in this room was getting to her, and she was finding it hard to concentrate. She silently thanked every deity she knew of that the run was outside.

“Alright, alright, quit the complaining!” Mr Dullen yelled, making Ginn bunch up the hem of her polo shirt in her hand to squeeze. She found early on that this was a better coping mechanism than her automatic reaction, which was covering her ears and gripping locks of hair and pulling. Distractions from bad noises are always oh so fun. Mr Dullen carried on, interrupting Ginn’s thoughts, “Everyone get your butts outside!”

The crowd of grumbling students headed towards the doors leading to the yard so they could start the run. Before Ginn could disappear into the crowd and go off to enjoy her run, Louise had grabbed her wrist and started to speak.

“Hey, are you ok? We should talk abo—”

“Do not touch me!” Ginn growled, ripping her hand away from Louise, immediately marching off in a strong, quick pace.

As soon as she set foot on the outside area of the school grounds and witnessed part of the crowd all heading in the same direction, she started her rounds of the school with a light jog, preparing her body and lungs for a long, pleasant run. She really needed to calm her mind, after everything that had happened today, especially in the last few minutes.

Louise was incredibly confused by that reaction. She had noticed Ginn tense up and ball her shirt in her fist, and she knew Ginn had not calmed down from whatever emotion she was feeling after presenting those scars in the changing rooms.

“What was that about?” George said, the four friends walking up to Louise so they could walk the laps of the grounds together.

“She’s seemed pretty tense all day.” Alex offered. “Maybe you just scared her and she reacted.”

She definitely has something she’s hiding.” Elsie said, as the group wondered outside and started walking. “She had two huge scars on her back. She got real tense, more than usual, when we saw them.”

“Let’s go find out what’s up with her.” Louise said, determination in her voice. Then, she sounded unsure. “If we can catch up to her...”

Ginn was no where to be seen as they walked their round. They knew this because Ginn was extremely noticeable in the crowd of students, being one of the only people in the school with ginger hair. She was even more noticeable because her hair was messy and choppily cut short, and her P.E. kit, like her uniform, was too big and looked it. They walked quickly around the grounds, talking and looking around. Ginn was nowhere to be seen.

“She must actually be running.” Martin shrugged. “That girl is an enigma.”

“An enigma you’re crushing on!” Alex said teasingly, elbowing his friend in the side and laughing.

“Shut up!” Martin pushed Alex to the side, a crimson blush rising in his cheeks. “I am not!”

“Then what was that comment in the changing room about?” George smirked and raised and eyebrow.

“Ok!” Martin’s dramatic flare revealed itself as dramatically waved his hand in the air and pointing at nothing in particular. “You have to admit, she is quite pretty!”

Martin stared a the group, waiting expectantly for their response, to which he got a couple nods, but mostly just looks of ‘my dear boy, calm yourself’.

The group continued to walk around the school grounds, giving up on searching for the strange new girl, she was far gone and they could not see her at all. The lesson went by relatively quickly, the group only lapping the school once and only going another 20 yards before Mr Dullen blew his whistle and called everyone into the changing rooms five minutes before the final bell rang. The five friends wondered back into the school, avoiding the stares of disapproval from Mr Dullen.

Louise and Elsie were slowly changing out of their kits when Ginn finally appeared by their side. She was sweating slightly, despite the November chill outside, and her breaths were long, quick, and laboured. As expected, she did not greet the girls, she just started changing, first preparing her shirt to be quickly thrown on after she removed her polo. Louise and Elsie tried not to look at her, feeling her haste and discomfort with being around people after what happened earlier. However, Louise is a pretty stubborn girl, so waited for Ginn to finish changing before she confronted her.

“Hey, where were you all class?” Louise tried to keep her voice perky and welcoming, rather than the interrogating tone she almost used. “we were looking for you when you ran off.”

Ginn let out a small growl of annoyance. “Ahead of everyone. Just needed to run.”

She removed her shorts, her shirt covering her underwear, and slipped on her trousers, then sat down to put on her school shoes. She never looked at Louise. Not that that was expected. This girl is so strange.

“You must be quick then!” Louise laughed lightly. Ginn just hummed. “It’s pretty impressive, running is pretty hard.”

This made Ginn’s head snap up, shooting Louise a confused look. “How is it hard?”

Louise and Elsie shared an amused look. Elsie laughed lightly and said, “You know, keeping pace without losing your breath, stuff like that.”

Ginn hummed thoughtfully whilst finishing up lacing her shoes. Once she was done, she stood and picked up her bag, just in time for the final bell to ring. Ginn attempted to supress her cringe at the sound, but her efforts were in vane, as the other two girls noticed. Luckily for Ginn, all they did was share a look and stand with their bags.

“Not sure I follow, but ok.” Ginn broke the silence, starting to walk out alone. However, Louise and Elise had other plans, both speeding to catch up to her and standing on either side.

“You’re a real enigma, you know?” Louise chuckled. That was apparently the wrong thing to say, as Ginn glared at her, a quiet and low growl echoing from the bottom of her throat. Her eyes raged, like a fearsome lightning storm and a blazing fire. Even though she is a very small person, Ginn knew how to make herself look large and terrifying.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Erm... well, I... I just meant that you, well,” Louise stuttered and squeaked, as if she were learning how to speak again. “I just mean that you’re, you know, pretty mysterious...”

Ginn grunted and said something like ‘that’s the point’ as she stormed off, out of the building and around the corner towards the front gates, not to be seen again that day.

“Well, you kinda fucked that one up, huh?” Elsie chortled anxiously.

“Thanks for helping there Els. Come on, let’s just go find the boys.”

Alex, George, and Martin exited the boys changing room a few minutes later. The girls explained what happened as they walked out of the school and back home. The only thing they could all agree on when it came to Ginn: She would be very difficult to befriend.

#no war au #rangers alive au #ginn ranger #Alex Peterson #george groden #martin williams #louise mitchel #elsie brown

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booksandeverything-in-between · 4 years ago

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My journalism journey

... has only just begun!

This is my post for the “Life Narrative” assignment for JTC 326. I’ve added a “keep reading” tab because I hate putting extremely long posts on my dashboard! Keep in mind too, I’ve formatted this to fit the platform, so it’s not strictly professional.

Also — this is the first time I’ve shared my Tumblr with anyone who is not my sister, but it’s the perfect platform for this.

** All pictures were taken by me unless otherwise specified, some taken from my old blog posts on here.

A note before I start: When I first thought about this assignment, I had so many things I thought I could share, a lot of them deeply personal, somewhat dark and just not the right fit. I had a bit of a crisis; I cried a little. There is so much in my past that makes me, me, that I’ve only ever really shared with my therapist, but have generally wanted to write about. But it’s hard, and I don’t know how. And a whole lot of other stuff. BUT THEN

I realized I could share a story that I have always wanted to share! It perfectly relates to our class too and basically everything anyone would ever need to know about me! It’s amazing! I’m so excited! I hope you like it!

(line break)

It’s the summer before sixth grade. That’s how I define, or sort, my life, in my memories. It’s the year of school, or it’s the summer before/after. It’s not my age, or the calendar year; it’s school. For a long time my whole identity revolved around school, so it fits.

Anyway, I’m bored. My older sister and I can only do so much Netflix-watching (because we didn’t have cable) on the Wii (because this was 2011), and I need something to stimulate my active mind. Here comes books!

I’ve always, always been an avid reader. I was the first person in my first grade class to start reading chapter books — something I liked to brag about a lot back then. But I’m about to be a middle schooler, so I need to find something a little more mature. My parents decide that I’m at an appropriate age to start reading some of my sister’s old books, which were originally marked for garage sale.

One of these books has a long, juicy title, with a teen girl posed on the cover in a preppy school uniform, hand on her hip. I don’t have to look this up to remember; it is forever in my mind. The book is I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You by Ally Carter. Juicy, right? AND I LOVE IT. Seriously. Love. It.

Photo: I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You by Ally Carter.

... And I guess I move on. That part is a little fuzzy. Enter: Back to School Night, sixth grade. I always would go with my mom, because I loved school, and nights like those I thought were super cool. So, I’m hanging out with my best friend Sydney by the stairs, and she has this book from the school library with her.

Do you believe in fate? Was it kismet? I do not know; I will not guess. But I do know, I freaked the f*ck out. Because it was the book, by Ally Carter!! I loved that book! When I asked Sydney where she got it, she said in the library, and there were a bunch of other books like it.

That made me pause. Honestly, I couldn’t believe it. Because, what do you know, it was a series!! There were three other books to be read! How, oh how, did I not know this? It had to be fate.

I can still picture exactly where the books are, in the Preston library. The smaller shelf, up against the wall, right by the opening into the conference/meeting room space (I don’t know what we called that room???). Bottom shelf.

Who knew a series about teenage girls going to a spy school would set me on this path?

Suddenly it’s the summer after sixth grade, and once again, I’m bored. But, I have access to a netbook, that my grandpa gave us. Something entices me to start Googling these books. I find Ally Carter’s website. I found out that there are going to be two more books in the series. And I stumble upon this Google search suggestion, with the word fanfiction.

And wow.

Stories, countless stories, about my favorite books. Eventually, I make my own account on fanfiction.net, I try my hand at some of my own stories, I get a smartphone and make this very tumblr account when I turn 13, I find a place where I can express all my nerdiness in peace and all-caps, without any sort of ridicule fear.

But that’s not the end, nor the point, of this story.

Photo: The first four books in the Gallagher Girls series by Ally Carter.

(line break)

So here I am, spending all my free time secretly reading fanfic and trying to write it, and hating my life sometimes and thinking about what I want to study in college because that’s my best chance at escape from this life that I feel I’m stuck in.

But I can’t think of anything to write! I love to read; I enjoy writing; I am learning more about grammar because my dad has me grading his grammar quizzes he gave his JTC 300 students; but still, something isn’t right. I viscerally hate English class.

But! There’s a way I CAN write, without it being creative! My dad is going to school for photojournalism, my sister took a high school journalism class, and now it’s my turn to register for classes in high school. I sign up for Journalism 1, the precursor to Journalism 2, which is the class that houses the student newspaper. It’s a great plan. It was a good class.

I was looking through my old journal the other day, and I came across this line dated from September 23, 2014, just into the beginning of my freshman year of high school. “I want to be a journalist.”

Photo: A journal entry that reads, “I want to be a journalist.”

My sophomore year of high school, I take Journalism 2 and join the paper. I’m kind of terrified because there are a bunch of people I don’t know and now I’ll actually have to go out and report and talk to people ... but we do some really fun team-building, and people seem to like me, and I relax. I feel, just a little, like a really belong.

And I had felt that way before, during band, and with some of my friends, but this thing, this journalism thing, I’m actually good at it. And there’s this one moment that sticks out to me still.

It’s probably 7:20 a.m. I’m trudging up the steps to Spanish class, and I do not want to be there. It’s not that I don’t like school, or I don’t like my classes, because I do. But I’m tired, and it’s not what I want to be doing. I think, if I could spend the entirety of my day in my journalism class, I would be happy.

To this day, as a college student, I am jealous of the people who get to spend their whole days doing journalism.

I’ve found more than a home. I’ve found a place where, for what feels like the first time, I can speak my mind. I can be sarcastic, I can make a pun and I can also point out when there’s a bad typo somewhere and have that be appreciated.

Halfway through my first year writing for the paper, I’m given extra responsibilities and get to start copy editing articles from the students in the J1 class, and I start to learn how to redesign/maintain our Wordpress site. I go on a class trip to Los Angeles, an amazing feat of independence for me, and I feel valued. And then, I’m award the position of Copy Editor for the next school year! It’s amazing.

I learn my junior year that the freshmen whose articles I edited were afraid of me. Afraid, of me! (For reference, I am five feet tall). But once they met me, they were like ‘Woah, Serena’s not scary!” and now we’re good friends. I’ve since learned to be less harsh/blunt in my editing.

My senior year, I was Editor-in-Chief. That was something I dreamed about as a freshman, but wouldn’t let myself actually fathom. And even though I felt like I could have done a much better job, and I had a lot of personal sh*t to do with too, by the end of the year, I knew that I was leaving behind a strong legacy.

It’s really something special when people you love give you a speech, crying, telling you how much you welcomed them, how much you made them feel like they had a place to grow, to be, and how much you’ve inspired them.

Because journalism, especially student journalism, is about so much more than the news. It’s about a community. It’s community with your fellow reporters and editors, it’s comradery while kicking ass, it’s creating a community with your readers and your peers, it’s learning about the community you live in and sharing the ups and downs of life.

Photo: A screenshot from my Instagram account of my high school journalism family, taken at our end of the year picture my junior year of high school. We had this running joke that I was going to be a world-dominator type person (because I’m so tiny and quiet) and my teacher said, “Okay, Serena now push Katie over” because I was taking over as EIC. Photo credit goes to my teacher (not going to post his name here).

(line break)

I have a lot of setbacks, too. I have anxiety. Like, a lot. Of anxiety. I haven’t been formally diagnosed with General Anxiety Disorder, but I think I should be.

I used to think I was just shy. And that was partially the case. But I grew from it, in large part because of journalism. I went from not sitting in my designated seat at the beginning of class because there were older kids in the way my freshman year, to leading the entire class three days a week my senior year. I liked high school journalism because I could get away with asking my friends for quotes, or just not really quoting anyone at all.

I spent one quarter at the University of Denver last year, and it was somewhat the same thing. They didn’t have any strict standards on a number of sources, and I wrote articles that didn’t require speaking to a lot of people. But then, I took over nine months off from school in what should have been my freshman year of college, and thus took nine months off from journalism and reporting. So starting at The Collegian was a challenge.

I am still damn proud of myself for getting up the courage, on the second day of classes at CSU, to go down to the newsroom and ask about reporting. I wouldn’t be where I am today if I didn’t, and I love where I am today.

To think that wasn’t even a year ago ...

Photo: Here I am, remote copy editing for The Collegian, the week after Spring Break. Photo cred to my dad.

When I started at CSU, I felt good. I was nervous, but transferring was a really good decision, and I’m from Fort Collins, so I felt more comfortable. And at first, my reporting felt really good.

But then I got too stressed with school and work, and that stress led over to increases social anxiety when I was reporting. I went to this community meeting and tried to talk to people there, but I felt helpless and quiet and I left and cried to myself. I then conducted my interviews over the phone.

I even had to take a break for a few months last semester, because I had a panic attack with the mere thought of approaching people I didn’t know.

But I worked through it. Aided by Xanax and peer support, I interviewed a bunch of people at the Eva Schloss event and felt really good about it. I also saw my high school journalism advisor, because his wife works at CSU Hillel, and talking to someone who knew my struggle felt good.

For a long time I’ve doubted if journalism, if news reporting, is something I’ll actually be able to do. It’s the only real thing that makes me feel like I have a purpose, the only thing that makes me not feel depressed about life, but I am still so worried I’ll hold myself back in some way.

That hasn’t happened yet.

(line break)

It’s the summer before my junior year of high school, and I am about to go meet up with the other members of the new leadership team, Katie and Kathleen, at Starbucks. I’ve recently got my license and it feels really good to be driving myself around.

I go to Target and buy a fancy looking notebook with the last $15 I have to my name, because I don’t have a job yet. I go to Starbucks and discover I like drinking tea. I talk with Katie and Kathleen and we brainstorm what we want the journalism class to look like next year. What we want to change, how we’re going to get students to know that we exist.

It’s the summer before my senior year, and I bring this same notebook to a meeting at Dazbog that I have with our leadership team to get ready for the school year. I’m in charge. It’s weird, but in a good way. There are a lot more people there, and I fill pages upon pages of ideas, and agendas I want to start the first weeks with.

So much had changed in a year. My parents got divorced, I started working a lot, I was looking more seriously into college. But so much was the same. The same people, the same work, the same purpose. It was good.

It’s the second semester of my first year at CSU, my sophomore year of college. I’m at home, cleaning my room, procrastinating because I don’t want to write my final essay. I get a text from Laura, asking if I’ve heard back about the editorial board yet. I had shut my phone off because I was checking my email so obsessively.

And there it is. I am going to be the 2020-2021 News Editor for The Rocky Mountain Collegian. I still don’t fully feel like I know what I’m doing, even though I have all this experience. News is happening, but it’s summer. Do I write about it? Do I ask other people to write about it? Can I express the authority and knowledge I know I have, to people who have more experience at the paper than I do? It’s still early.

The day I get the news, I pull out an old, blue notebook that’s barely filled. It’s the perfect place to start brainstorming the things I want to change on the desk and the things I think are super important for Laura and me to talk about.

I forgot that I had notes from my Editor-in-Chief days in there.

Photo: The notebook!

It feels like I’ve completed a circle. Like all the highs and lows of my last few years have led me to here, right back to where I’m supposed to be. Where I’ve always known I would be.

I know who I am; I know where I belong; I know my place and my purpose in this world.

Ally Carter’s Gallagher Girls series brought me to writing, and writing brought me to journalism. In my obsession with those books, the unofficial motto of the CIA really resonated with me. “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.”

Community and truth, that’s journalism.

I want to be a journalist.

I am a student journalist.

I am a journalist.

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tenroseforeverandever · 5 years ago

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The Perfect Blend Chapter 3

Characters: Tenth Doctor (aka James Noble); Rose Tyler; Clara Oswald; Amy Pond; Jeanne Poisson; Donna Noble; Sylvia Noble; Wilfred Mott; Mickey Smith; Martha Jones; Clyde Langer

Tags: Human AU; fake relationship AU; coffee shop AU; stalkerish!Reinette; hurt/comfort; angst; romance; fluff; Christmas; New Year; New Year’s kiss

Story Summary:

Trying to escape from an predatory ex-girlfriend who will not accept their break-up, James Noble (aka The Doctor) finds himself in a coffee shop where he meets a barista (aka Rose Tyler) who makes him the perfect cup of tea and lends a sympathetic ear to his tale of woe.

Chapter Summary: James and Gramps discuss James’ Christmas announcement; and on New Year’s Eve, Clara and Mickey are concerned that Rose is mooning.

Chapter Notes: Sorry for the wait. Real life is messing with me, right now. I hope the next chapter won’t take quite as long.

As always, a big hug of thanks to @rose--nebula and mrsbertucci, for taking precious time out of their lives to beta my work. As always, all mistakes are mine.