#i don't even know how to tag it anymore

[krysmcscience]

Hi, I woke up to this yesterday, and my brain is still exploding.

I don't even know how they came across my Ko-fi with how little traffic I got, but they did and were wonderful and I am so unbelievably grateful???

I can't even remember the last time I felt truly hopeful, but here I am. Feeling hopeful.

Wow.

What a world.

[silverwhittlingknife]

hi Silver! o/ because that fanart made me wonder - would you happen to know when/where Dick's stuffed elephant plush Zitka turns up in the comics?

GREETINGS CAM <3333 THAT ART WAS SO CUTE

Yeah, I think your instincts are right - it's a truly adorable bit of transformative fandom, but I'm 95% percent sure it's not comics canon. Barbara has canon plushies, but I don't think anyone else does.

I got kinda invested in the investigation (it's hard to prove a negative!) and I ended up typing out an entire History of Elinore/Zitka, so, uh, if you're curious, meet me below the cut for:

Where does Elinore / Zitka - the animal - appear in comics?

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

Where does Elinore / Zitka appear in comics?

We're gonna go in chronological order!

Dick's circus elephant friend was first created for practical reasons: in Batman 436, Marv Wolfman does a big expanded flashback to Dick's circus backstory as a way to subtly show us Tim before officially introducing him (so that we can have a technically-solvable mystery-of-Tim's-identity in LPoD). In this comic, there's an elephant named Elinore who loves Dick:

Aww. Such a cute elephant!

Batman 436 comes out in August 1989. New Titans 60 comes out a few months later, in November, and guess what? When Dick visits the circus, he is suddenly surprised by an unexpected blast from the past! It turns out that even though it's been years, Elinore still remembers him!

Here's the part where Elinore remembers Dick:

SUCH a cute elephant. I love her.

(Guess who else still remembers Dick even though it was so long ago. Guess which other character is about to be an unexpected blast from the past. Guess which character Elinore is directly paralleling guess guess guess sorry everything is about Dick and Tim in my mind but I can focus I swear)

Four years later, in 1993, Batman: The Animated Series retells Dick's origin story. They like and keep Wolfman's elephant, but they change her name to Zitka:

Wolfman doesn't return to the elephant beyond those two appearances, and a few years down the line, New Titans gets cancelled and Wolfman's not writing Dick anymore anyway. So the animal gets abandoned for a while, until Devin Grayson, a fan of both Wolfman and B:tAS, revives the Wolfman-era Titans team in JLA/Titans and then the ongoing series Titans 1999.

Grayson then brings back the elephant in a flashback to Dick's past in Titans 16 (Jun 2000), where she imports the B:tAS name. Sometimes I'm skeptical of TV-to-comics imports, but honestly, I endorse this one. You lose the alliteration, which is a shame, but IMO Zitka is a better elephant name than Elinore.

Here's Dick with the newly-christened Zitka in Titans 16:

Grayson also briefly references the elephant in Gotham Knights 20 and - in a final angsty callback - in Nightwing 88 (Feb 2004), where Zitka tries futilely to comfort Dick in the midst of his trauma conga line:

... And... honestly, I think that's it for comic appearances? The two Wolfman comics plus the three Grayson comics.

Both Wolfman and Grayson are writing multiple titles - Batman, New Titans, Titans, Gotham Knights, and Nightwing between the two of them, spanning a big chunk of Dick's post-Crisis canon - and both writers use the elephant for heartwarming moments of nostalgia, which means if you're doing a post-Crisis readthrough for Dick, Elinore/Zitka feels memorable. But I don't think she actually shows up that much.

For post-2011, I am not as well-informed - throwing this out to the dash? anyone know? - but I feel like Zitka the heartwarming symbol of Dick's heartwarming circus past is, uh, thematically very at odds with the Court of Owls evil!circus vibes, so my instinct is that this story element was almost certainly dropped in the reboot.

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

In WFA, yes; in main comics continuity, no. Technically, I have not read every comic ever published, so I could be wrong!! But I don't think so.

Below, find my rambling reasoning on the tonal vibes of pre-Crisis, post-Crisis, and post-2011, and why this particular story element doesn't seem right to me for the first two.

Pre-Crisis (...okay, mostly the Silver Age): stuffed animal, yes or no?

tl;dr no, requires too much background knowledge on the part of the reader, plus the elephant wasn't a thing until later

Elinore doesn't get created until post-Crisis, but also just generally, pre-Crisis callbacks are more along the lines of this reference in Batman 129 (published in 1960), where, wow, Batman and Robin are hunting jewel thieves - and it turns out Robin recognized this strongman! BUT HOW?!

The comic goes on to recap Dick's entire origin story in flashback, on the assumption that you may not know it.

(BTW, if you'd like to know more about Haly's Circus throughout the years, nightwingology has a great post here summarizing a lot of fun plotlines and characters!)

Basically: Silver Age comics are very self-consciously episodic and kid-friendly; they're not generally gonna do overly-elaborate callbacks because they don't know what comics their kid readers may have randomly picked up or remember.

By the time of post-Crisis, comic books were being written for an adult audience buying from the direct market, i.e. readers who are collecting whole runs & don't need or want Dick's origin story to be recapped to us in full every time it's referenced. That's why in post-Crisis, we get stuff like "hey, neat, this particular soda brand is getting mentioned in several different books!!" or "in order to understand this story arc, buy SIXTEEN DIFFERENT COMICS in FIVE DIFFERENT RUNS and read them ALL ACCORDING TO A NUMBERED ORDER and also you better be following the individual plotlines and recognize these five minor characters who we don't bother to introduce!! Good luck!!" But the elaborate post-Crisis plotlines - and subtler worldbuilding like a stuffed animal callback to Dick's backstory - don't make a lot of story sense UNLESS you're imagining your readers as completionist adult fans.

So IMO a stuffed animal wouldn't be a pre-Crisis thing unless it was The Episodic Story Of the Week, and I don't think a stuffed animal is action-adventure-y enough for the fast-paced storytelling of the Silver Age. (Unless it, like, came to life and tried to eat you or something.)

Post-Crisis: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr: no, Dick's a manly tough guy, he's not gonna have a stuffed animal, that'd be lame, like something Tim might do

Part of the edgy grimdark adult vibes in 80s/90s comics is that some characters who used to be kinda silly & goofy & lighthearted - like Batman and Robin - get reimagined as Serious and Angsty and Edgy in a Tough Cool Manly Brooding Way. This massively affects characterization for Bruce, Dick, and Bruce and Dick's relationship.

(I obviously love this change & love the tense Bruce-and-Dick interactions, but plenty of fans of the earlier fluffy comics really disliked the edgy retcons of Miller / Wolfman / Starlin / et al.)

The upshot is that post-Crisis is a period when you could have a recurring reference like a stuffed elephant, but you wouldn't have a stuffed elephant, not for Dick. I think a toy like that would be too cutesy / childish / effeminate to give a male character in post-Crisis, unless you were poking fun at him.

Now, you could probably let Tim have a stuffed animal, because Tim is sometimes cool but also sometimes a tryhard loser who is faking being cool and not entirely pulling it off (see e.g. the Robin comic where he practices tough-guy faces in the mirror, or the Teen Titans comic where Conner discovers his cringy Enya CD, or when he's fanboying over Connor and it's awkward, etc etc.). A stuffed animal would be deeply embarrassing, and you'd have to be careful to compensate by having Tim do something cool afterward - but Tim's character concept allows for "he's kind of a loser sometimes."

But Dick isn't!! In post-Crisis, Dick's a tough / impressive / "cool guy" character, the kind of guy anyone would want to be, even in the flashbacks where he's Robin, and even in the stories where he's more lighthearted than angsty. It'd be kinda lame for Dick to have a stuffed elephant, so he wouldn't. I feel like Dick would be more likely to poke fun at it if someone had one, like when he's making fun of Wally for liking the Hardy Boys. Dick could have a Batman action figure, at most, and if he had one he would have it ironically.

Basically: in post-Crisis, a male character hugging a stuffed elephant feels more likely to be a punchline to me, not something poignant. (Even with Tim, Tim could have an embarrassing stuffed animal, but he couldn't hug it when sad - that's too far. Maybe Booster Gold might do this. Probably he wouldn't, but spiritually, he would. Sorry Booster ilu! <3)

Instead, Dick instinctively deals with his inner turmoil like the TORTURED ACTION HERO he is: by punching things and brooding and yelling and joining the mob and sleeping on rooftops and going on obsessive secret missions and acquiring Angsty Stubble!! Just like Batman!

(Technically I don't know if Bruce ever joined the mob but you know he would.)

Anyway as you know this is my favorite continuity and I am poking fun affectionately, but uh, yeah sdfsfdsfs. No stuffed animals.

Post-2011 / Infinite Frontier / Wayne Family Adventures: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr it's in WFA! Probably not anywhere else, but it could be.

Post-2011 stuff tends to be cutesier overall, most of all in the current Infinite Frontier era. So I don't feel like this would be tonally out-of-line with IF comics. Taylor tends to go for more meme-y references rather than fanfic references, though.

So the obvious best fit is WFA, which is aiming for a rough approximation of Silver Age family-friendly vibes - wholesome, episodic plots, Teaching Good Moral Lessons For The Youth, etc. - plus lots of Easter eggs for fanfic readers and some comic references.

And look, here we are:

Aww.

Whew - that's everything I could find!

Anyway as you can probably tell, I LOVE the elephant, so this was a very entertaining rabbit hole to go down, thank you <3

[mercymaker]

i spent quite a bit of time thinking, considering my options and wondering if i should even respond to the 'apology' to begin with, but i feel like i've been here before, in this exact same position (i didn't respond to his original 'apology' because it felt off how he omitted the fact that he pretended to be the victim for a whole week, but even then i decided to not say anything and just let the dust settle and give him a chance to learn and do better) and doing nothing eventually just caused more harm. even if i can't reach the other side and find common understanding, i wanted to at least express what's been on my mind for such a long time.

i always try to approach people and situations with understanding and try to assume ignorance instead of malice when someone says or does something i consider questionable or wrong. but i also know we all have our limits. we are all human. and you can't take the heart out of the equation.

one thing in this 'apology' that really stood out to me was this:

how is it not malice to completely disregard another creator, hell, another person and their wishes and feelings when they have made it very clear that your actions are causing them harm?

how is it not malice to outright lie and misrepresent other people and situations in order to portray yourself in a better light?

how is it not malice to disrespect the people you've stolen from and then, after they (by your own words!) rightfully address it and try to bring your actions to light, you then turn around and vilify them to your friends and followers? portray them as bullies and gatekeepers?

all while repeating again and again how the whole experience made you stop creating? as if your actions didn't force people out of this space, this fandom? have you ever sat down to think how the person that made you a 40 minute video tutorial on gif making, the person that taught you so much, no longer makes anything at all because you turned your back on her and copied her sets? kept doing it after she blocked you? after she made text posts expressing how upsetting your behaviour was? you didn't care and kept doing it anyway. even saying things like 'i always credit where credit is due' in response to copying numerous sets from @minthara, down to the caption without ever crediting her.

and if that wasn't enough harm, you then took it a notch further and straight up lied to the people around you, trying to vilify petra and i by saying how the whole thing should've been dealt with in private. how is it not malice to omit the fact that I DID, in fact, reach out to you privately. that i did it in a civil manner. that i tried to explain to you how your actions were wrong and were rightfully upsetting other creators. how you ignored everything i've said and when i expressed that your response (or lack of it) made me uncomfortable and that because of it i couldn't give you permission to 'recreate' (copy) my work, you then insulted me and told me that it didn't matter what i wanted? that you would do as you please and there was nothing i could do about it? how you then immediately blocked me so i couldn't even respond? how is that not malice?

and then this was from your apology back in march:

and you insist that after this 'apology' you've learnt and were never doing anything wrong again and yet you are saying the same thing again in your new 'apology'. how after the march events you went to @galedekarios anyway, asking for permission, didn't wait for her response and posted your copy of her set anyway. which just makes me think that you've never learnt. it just makes it seem that asking people for permission never stemmed from a place of respect and understanding, but from the need to cover your ass in case someone brings the fact that you're still copying up. which someone did, apparently.

at the end of the day, this is my opinion and i might be wrong, but following all of your words and actions, it just seems like you chose notes and attention instead of people. that you kept lying and misrepresenting things and throwing us under the bus for your own gain. and that you only stopped because enough people eventually found out, not because you suddenly felt remorse. and this 'apology' was just another 'ask for permission from a creator', all just for optics. you couldn't even bother to unblock us before posting the 'apology' which just shows how little you were actually thinking about any of us.

[sisterjaniswilde]

I am dead fucking serious when I say I wish I saw more fat women in public. I want to see fat models. I want to see fat women in department stores getting absolutely HYPE when they find racks and racks of clothing in their size and sizes up, so they too can get the "oversized, baggy fit" like women who fit into smalls and mediums. I want to see fat women wearing crop tops proudly and rocking mad midriff. I want to see fat women trying on clothing for their friends and family and saying "look! it compliments my body shape! it's like it was made for me!" I want to see fat women with "cankles" wearing pretty jingling anklets skipping and jumping just to show them off. I want to see fat women on TV, in magazines, on billboards, in all manner of ads, and in online shop images because I want to see my fucking self and all the women I know who don't see enough of themselves. I want to see fat women living, loving, and being visibly proud of who they are because they are beautiful, WE are beautiful. I want to see fat women because fat women need to see other fat women.

[teecupangel]

I just had a random plot bunny attack me at work. What if Desmond Miles was reborn as Sora from Kingdom Hearts with no memories of his former life? He goes through Kingdom Hearts (the first game) as normal but once we hit Chain of Memories things start to change. The plot of CoM is Memories and what is and isn't real. As Marluxia (or was it Axel) put it, "To lose is to find, and to find is to lose." Rather than Namine, Sora begins to remember his life as Desmond Miles. Kinda scaring Donald and Goofy. However it kinda goes away for a bit when Namine restores Sora's memories, for Kingdom Hearts 2 and Dream Drop. Yet Kingdom Hearts 3 is where it can get interesting again. Change out one of the 13 vessels for either Clay or Lucy and have Sora start to have an existential crisis and by the time of the Remind DLC when Sora uses the power of waking to save his friends, it's such a Desmond move that both parts of him are at peace.

Then he wakes up back on earth near the Grand Temple 11 years later, as the sixteen or seventeen year old Sora, or is it Desmond?

I’m gonna be honest with you, my highschool crush was Roxas so I wanna keep him in this idea but, my god, it would be so fun if Sora’s ‘nobody’ turns out to be one of his Bleeds.

But… we can actually keep Roxas since his looks is based on Ventus who was resting in Sora’s heart but we hint at his connection with Desmond Miles by making the prologue of KH2 dwell on his family and it’s talked about how he has an older brother, younger sister and younger brother. Namine later admitted that she wasn’t the one who wrote that in. It was Roxas himself who added that ‘detail’. ‘DiZ’ suggested that it was Roxas’ subconscious taking a bit of ‘memory’ from Sora but that doesn’t make sense when Riku tells him that Sora was an only child.

The real reason why they needed Roxas to merge with Sora is because Sora’s memories and Desmond Miles’ memories are not stable. His experience in Castle Oblivion and Namine’s powers only served to widen the gap between the two sets of memories.

Roxas, being both Sora and Desmond as his nobody, is meant to cover the gaps to stabilize him.

When the time came when Roxas and Sora became one, Desmond Miles’ memories go to sleep to stabilize Sora.

It wasn’t what DiZ wanted. He believed Desmond Miles’ memories was necessary for Sora to grow and defeat Organization 13 but they have no idea why Desmond Miles’ memories refused to resurface.

Until…

KH3 happens and everyone remembers Xion.

Because sure, one of the 13 vessels turn out to be Lucy or Clay (or maybe even Cross) but the most they were able to do was tell Sora that he wasn’t the chosen one. Desmond Miles was the chosen one. He just so happened to be a vessel to the real chosen one and Xehanort’s goal had been to awaken Desmond Miles to control Kingdom Hearts because Kingdom Hearts was an ‘artifact’ from another dimension that appeared in their dimension.

And Desmond Miles was an otherwordly soul, the only being that can control Kingdom Hearts.

And the reason why Sora can’t fully remember his life as Desmond Miles?

Because he wasn’t the true vessel.

See…

Desmond’s true vessel wasn’t actually Sora.

It was Ventus.

Sora was a ‘replacement’ because of what happened to Ventus.

And that was why Xion doesn’t have any of Desmond Miles’ memories nor did she ever take his face. She was an imperfect replica so she wasn’t capable of even trying to hold Desmond’s memories in the first place.

Cue Sora having an existential crisis of who he truly was because he was honestly getting on board with the whole idea of being Desmond Miles as well.

[c-hrona]

Hi guys!

I'm very sorry to be late, some issues in the last test prints caused some delay, but finally!

THE PRINTS HAVE ARRIVED!!!!

They are beautiful, I'm. Absolutely speechless and so so so happy of how they came out.

Here's a little wip!

(Still cellophanned because. Gosh. They are too precious to even touch the air I breath honestly).

What's next:

So, from tomorrow I'll start to pack them. I don't know how long this process will take me, I'll try to be as quick as possible. I'll probably start shipping them in batches from next week, but I will keep you updated.

Thank you so much for the patience guys!

[a-tale-of-legends]

( random conversation I thought of, not sure if it's something that I would consider canon. Might be ooc for characters)

Blue: Aaaaand that's everything that happened today! Which.... isn't a lot but whatever.

Red: ....

Blue: .....( Leans back) Sooooooooo. How's things for you? You haven't, ah, really said much since you came back down Mt. Silver...( Tries to perk up a bit,forcing a smile) You're usually such a chatter box, you know?! Gotta be something interesting for ya today, right?

Red: .....

Blue: ........( Grimaces slightly, still trying to keep smiling. His voices lowers, as if the whole world would hear if he goes any louder) Come on Red, you- throw me a bone here, something-

Red: ( his eyebrows furrow slightly) .....

Blue: ( immediately back pedals) O-only if you wanna, I don't - you don't - ( he sighs, exasperated) Green? H-have you at least talked to Green?

Red: ( he flinches at that. The punch to his face still fresh in his mind. It was a year ago. And even so-) .....

Blue: ( he should back off. He really should-) Your mom? Have you at least talked to your mom?

Red: ( that causes him to outright glare at his....friend? Rival? Babysitter? What are they now? He doesn't know. But he doesn't like this conversation.) . . . .

Blue: R-right! Right, of course you- ( he takes in a breath. Why does he feel so sweaty.) Sorry. Sorry, that was just- Let's just forget I said anything, yeah?

Red: ( his glare softens, looking at his....whatever they are to each other, with concern. He doesn't know if he'll get used to Blue Oak apologizing for anything ever. He raises his hand to sign-)

Blue: ( he raises his hand before Red does, eyes pleading) Let's just forget I said anything, okay? ( Please )

Red: ..... ( He lowers his hand. He hates the look blue is giving him. He blames himself for it, as always) ( Okay )

[moki-dokie]

hey non-americans, yall are aware that cowboys still exist today right? yall know they aren't just from tales of the wild west yes???

please say yes

[rainintheevening]

Hungry to write, not knowing what project to pick and work on.

[crownedwille]

Are there still Crown Prince!Wilhelm stans out there despite S3 turning it into the number one problem? Please report, we need to unite and no, that doesn't mean that I don't support Wille's mental health and happiness and that I love the monarchy, some people out there must get it

[catkin-morgs-kookaburralover]

questioning sexuality is so exhausting

[justcommander]

Picture 1 being the redraw of possibly my first human OC ever back when I was so edgy and hopping around on Deviantart and absolutely obsessed with Team Rocket and cloned pokemon and edginess. Tried to keep the same mood / paint style because it's only fair.

Picture 2 is the picture I found in a usb key the other day and reminded me of this foul creature I completely removed from my brain till today. I'm not joking this probably from 2008 and that's an OBVIOUS base. And that's a thing drawn with a mouse.

And now i'm feeling nostalgic.

[everybodyknows-everybodydies]

On a day that isn’t one, Sheogorath tries to break into Aetherius.

It’s just a matter of going there, really. Going places is easy. So she does.

The great golden dragon is waiting just over the threshold. THIS PLACE IS NOT YOURS, it says—or rather, the words exist where they did not before, because the dragon wills them to. Its mouth never even opens. Show-off.

“No,” says Sheogorath with a smile. “But I’m everywhere else. Why not?”

ECLOSING ONE, HALF-DIGESTED THING. YOU DO NOT BELONG HERE.

“I belong where I am. I am everywhere but here. Now I am here, so now I belong.” She starts forward.

The great head lowers to block her path, eyes ticking brightly. WHO ARE YOU?

“Sheogorath,” she says, as her mouth tries to form another name. “The eyes want to see; I brought them to have a look. They’re here, aren’t they?”

THEY ARE ALL HERE, SAVE THOSE WHO ARE NOT. The dragon blinks, sidewise. She mimics, just to see if she can. YOU ARE NOT.

“But I am,” points out Sheogorath. “I’m right here. As you see.” And then, from her mouth but Before, “Please.”

DOES IT HURT?

“Oh, no; I’m done hurting now, thank you.” She tilts her head. “Did it hurt when you ate him? Was it—the same?”

YOU UNREMEMBER THE ASCENT. IT DID NOT HAPPEN THAT WAY, IN YOUR TIME.

“Didn’t it? Opened your great big jaws and then snip-snap! Just you, and no more of him. I was there, you know. I saw you.” Sheogorath taps her temple solemnly. “But that’s fine. It doesn’t have to be the priest. I don’t think the eyes want to see him anyway, the liar. Someone else, just to look. The last one told me ‘closure’—or it might turn out ‘closer’; I haven’t decided yet how it went—”

WHO ARE YOU?

“I told you already. Pay attention.”

SPEAK TRUE OR NOT AT ALL IN THIS PLACE. The wings unfurl—the dragon blots out the void above, rumbling dangerously. AND YOU CANNOT. YOU WILL LEAVE, UNWINDING ONE.

Sheogorath does not move. She listens, instead; it’s becoming increasingly difficult to pin down the Before thoughts, the ones bound to the name she doesn’t use anymore. It was the Before that wanted to be here, where the blurred faces came. The words of the dragon are, she identifies, making the Before thoughts sad.

“I see,” she says knowingly, and discards the sadness, as she has done. “We’re done with all that, you know.”

She gives a sweeping bow. The realization flits through on butterfly wings: Sheogorath doesn’t remember why she came here. Just to see if she could, more likely than not. She’s always doing things without a why. “Well. I have places to be that aren’t here, and better conversation partners to engage.”

The dragon only looks at her, silent.

This is the correct way—the only way—for it to end, of course, she acknowledges as she turns: no matter how else it went, the dragon was always silent, at the end.

But this is a Before thought, so Sheogorath puts it away.

[qcomicsy]

Lately I've only been wishing to grab a comic about my favorite character and just have a genuinely good time reading it.

[i3utterflyeffect]

I wonder how Purple and Mango would react to meeting Plushie?

both sort of scared, confused, but also........ yeah this seems in-line with whatever the hell the selkie!becker family has going on

[lost-in-fandoms]

Logan and Max have a talk. Sort of. (I have never written Logan before, so I don't know if this even makes sense. Almost nothing happens, but there could be a second part in the future, who knows (not me)).

Logan wishes he was better at telling Alex no. He doesn't want to be at this party, for a race he barely even took part of, his car giving up on lap 15. He doesn't want to be standing here, near the wall, as he watches the other drivers drink and dance, ignoring him completely. He doesn't want the drink Alex placed in his hand before disappearing, without even telling him what was in it. He wants to go to bed. He wants to call his mom.

One hour, that's how much time he has promised himself. He'll stay one hour, long enough to say he was there, not long enough to make him want to get completely smashed and sob into some girl's chest (that had been one time, but it had been a low point he does never want to repeat), and then he'll go back to the hotel. He doesn't remember the time difference well enough to know if he'll be able to talk to his mom before going to sleep, barely remembers in which country they're in.

He's contemplating his glass again, trying to decipher what kind of alcoholic concoction is in there and to ignore the thumping bass, when a pair of sneakers and blue jeans appear in his line of vision.

He looks up and finds himself face to face with three-soon-to-be-four times world Champion Max Verstappen. He doesn't think he's ever been in a one to one conversation with Max before, so he can't think about a single reason why he should be standing in front of him, looking straight at him. Unless he's here to kick him out? Would Max kick him out of the party for being too pathetic?

Now he's being self-pitying, he needs to stop. No drinking and sobbing incidents tonight.

"You okay, mate?" Max asks, voice barely loud enough over the music, eyes intense. The glass in Logan's hand feels slippery, he's afraid he'll drop it.

"Yeah, fine!" he replies, cringing at his own basic response, even if he doesn't know what else he could have said. It's not like Max is asking because he really cares, and it's not like he could give him the truthful answer either.

Instead of moving on and going back to the party like Logan is expecting after the somewhat failed social interaction, Max keeps looking at him, tilting his head slightly, eyes narrowed, before he steps closer and plucks the glass from Logan's hand, placing it on a nearby table.

"Follow me," he orders. He doesn't wait before turning around and walking away. For some reason, Logan doesn't even question it, just unsticks himself from his wall and follows him to the bar, where Max orders a beer and another g&t, and then up a flight of stairs, onto a balcony.

"Are we allowed to be here?" Logan asks, looking at the very obvious DO NOT OPEN sign hanging on the balcony door Max is already pushing open.

Max just shrugs, going outside and sitting down on a lawn chair, placing the drinks on the low table in front of him. Of course, Logan reminds himself, he's Max Verstappen, who's going to tell him no? He probably could buy this whole place out himself if he wanted to.

Logan sits down next to him.

"Here," Max says, passing him the beer. Again, Logan doesn't question it before taking a sip. Much better than Alex's weird drink.

For a long moment, they just sit in silence. They can still hear the music from downstairs, but it's different out here, with the sounds of the city and the fresh air. Logan almost forgets about being confused and upset, about wanting to go home. Home home. Then Max speaks again.

"We can talk about why you are sad, or we can sit here until I finish my drink. Both are okay."

Logan doesn't understand. Why is Max, of all people, wanting to talk to him about his shitty season? And why would he want to just sit there with him? Does he look that pathetic?

He tries to feel upset, tries to look for the spark of indignation, but he comes up empty. He can just stare at Max's profile as the other takes a sip of his drink, eyes fixed on the skyline, throat working.

Max doesn't ask again. He must accept that Logan's answer is silence, doesn't even seem put off by it, but Logan's brain can't stop buzzing, questions bouncing around so fast he can barely keep up with them.

They stay quiet. Max finishes his drink. Logan keeps watching him as he stretches slightly, before he stands up and turns to face him.

"If you want to come talk to me, I know how it feels, to be hungry" he says slowly, measured, like he's been thinking about this for the whole time. "But if you want advice right now..."

It takes a second for Logan to realize Max is waiting for a sign, and he rushes to nod. Max's lip curls up slightly, his eyes crinkling, before he turns serious again.

"At some point, you will of course have to decide if you want to lay down and wait for the team to take pity, or if you want to bite and make them work with you."

Logan blinks. Max blinks back.

When it's clear that Logan isn't going to say anything, Max nods, turns around, seems to rethink and turns back, his eyes impossibly bright.

"I can show you how to take what you want, whatever you want." Suddenly, it feels like they're not just talking about racing anymore. Logan's neck feels hot. Max licks his lips, something dangerous in his expression that is usually reserved for the track, for when things aren't as he'd like. Logan has seen it before, but never turned towards him. He's stuck on his chair, feeling like prey despite Max telling him he could, and should, take.

He waits for the blow, he knows it's coming, but is still completely unprepared for the way Max smiles when he speaks.

"I will even call you a good boy, if you do it right."

The sound Logan lets out is undignified enough it will have to go in the lowest points list right next to the drinking&crying episode, but Max laughs, not unkindly, squeezing Logan's shoulder.

"You have my number, and you know where I'll be next week. Drink your beer."

Logan has the bottle pressed against his lips even before Max has made it across the balcony, going back to the party.