#i hope my pokemon drawing is half way decent

[weekly-gordie]

Week 2 of Weekly Gordie!

[spicyicetea]

So I once again got pre-occupied with my school work. I had a decently big test recently and I have two more on Tuesday and Wednesday so I’ve mainly been trying to revise. However in my down time I have done more work for the Pokemon stuff @witch-without-gender and I started [How you doing dude, hope you’re feeling ok]. I decided to make a separate post to cull the big chunky post a little.

✨So here’s the update✨

The region still remains unnamed but, from previous discussions in the longer reblogs, the region is connected to Unova and vaguely based on Canada. I haven’t put too much thought into the region itself, like it’s history as I wish to leave that to a group decision as it’s rather important information for me to decide it alone.

The Gym leaders for the region are chosen to be parallels for the Unova gym leaders, their typing being super effective against the BW2 Unova leaders. [Same as the elite four]. The types I chose are,

Fighting

Psychic

Fire

Ground

Water

Rock

Ice

Electric

And the elite four are,

Dark

Fairy

Bug

Flying

Ive only designed half on them so far,

One of the champions [This region has two] is the mother of one of the rivals I’ve designed. She plays many roles in the current main story that would be played if it were an actual game. In the beginning she gives you your starter as the regions professor is on a trip in Unova. The professor ends up being someone who works under her in an organisation she runs to keep an eye on the other champion who is rather scummy. Her organisation is framed as the bad guys by said scummy guy to keep her in line so he can keep control over the region. You would fight her as the champion but before you fight the other one to claim the title he would send you to take down her “evil team”. There you would face a second much stronger team of hers, only balanced by having a very large weakness to fairy, ice and dragon.

The rival and MCs have been a tad bit reworked since I last drew them but there’s no new context or information regarding them.

The biggest addition so far is this regions version of the battle tower, or I suppose the battle subway given I’m using Unova as inspiration for the entire region. [I do actually already have some ideas of characters who would get along/work with eachother across this region and Unova. My sister has been playing a lot of splatoon and I tend to listen to the soundtrack while drawing so I present to you, battle fest!

This would work as weekly in game battle tournament where you fight various trainers and then fight one of the leaders who has a full team and teams of rather strong Pokemon. It’s run by 5 separate trainers who all specialise in specific stats (hp, attack, defence, speed), although the actual leader has no specific stat and just builds their team around pokemon they like. Oh and they're all just different shades of autistic [I am autistic so I project onto them a lot, mainly the one I've drawn the most of so far]

If you can't tell, I adore these five. Levana is the one I projected onto the most (Oopsy) and shes designed to appear rather sweet and approachable but is feral, most definety tries to bite everything. Given these guys are new characters I'll give some extra information on them, or at least Levana as I haven't had too much time to dive into the others as I want to post this asap as I’m trying not to be inactive. Anyway, onto the information!

Levana was orphaned after the train line in their region was derailed by a wild Pokemon. Due to the Pokemon being protected and the area having no safe way to guarantee it wouldn’t happen again so it was never repaired. Being a small, at the time semi-non-verbal (not fully but after losing the only people she was comfortable around she struggled to talk to people). She was taken under the wing of the regional professor. She grew up around pokemon and were always comfortable talking to them, to a point where she seems to understand them and vice versa. Over time she gained a talent for battling as she would make mock battle situations with Pokemon she befriended around the lab and as she grew older she gained more confidence in herself and began speaking to people again at around the age of 15. By 18 she officially has her own Pokemon (A Noibat,King, and Honedge, Excalibur) and decides she has to do something with her life so buys a ticket to sinnoh to create the strongest team she can and attempt the gym challenge in her home region. In sinnoh she catches two sneasles, one being a strange discoloured version she wanted to bring back to the lab for the professor to research but she became attached to it. (Pringle and Bingo join her team) later she found a togepi while camping and she found it eating her toothpaste. She ended up feeding it and it followed her for a day before she offered it a pokeball and it joined her team (Colgate acquired) On the way back she has to go on a longer boat trip past other regions as she doesn’t like planes. She made friends with one of the other passengers who gifted her a charcadet called Wisp as a parting gift when she had to get off at her region. When she got back however, the professor was missing and she had no home to return to, after having a really harsh encounter she meets Briar, the water type gym leader who offers her a place to stay and they hit it off (they both autistic so they automatically click, if you know you know). Elesa comes to meet Briar regarding a modelling gig and meets Levana, who offers to let Briar bring her along to the studio so she wouldn’t be left alone (let’s be real Elesa is that one neurotypical friend we autistic people get somehow. She has experience with how the neurodivergent minds can work from Ingo and Emmet). While in Nimbasa, Briar bought her a cookie while they and Elesa did the shoot but a Joltik stole half the cookie while she was waving bye. She chased the Joltik into the subway station where she encountered the battle subway for the first time. The Joltik casually clambered onto her shoulder and she assumed, this was fate, and decided to try it to pass the time. She did decently well before encountering Emmet and getting her ass kicked. This however just inspires her to get stronger and she dubs him, and eventually Ingo when she meets him, her idols and she vows to beat them one day before heading home with Briar.[She was gifted the Joltik by the brothers and she dubbed him Crumble] With support from Briar she calls the friends she made on her travels and starts the BattleFest to get stronger and show her home region the joys of battling for fun and not just competition.

Thats all I have and this will prob be the longest info block about the battlefest people as she is important to the current story I have planned for the actual region. But uhh here have some fun facts about her:

She used to have a phobia of trains but after crumble basically ratatouilles her into the battle subway and she befriends Emmet it completely flips and now she’s obsessed with them. She has a model train in her apartment.

She sews small clothes and accessories for her Pokemon, Crumble have mini replicas of the Submas brothers’ jackets and hats.

She has to fight Colgate out of her bathroom because it likes trying to steal her toothpaste.

Pringle and Bingo are besties and often preform heists to steal Levana’s food.

Levana makes Pokemon friendly fur dyes/paints so she can make her Pokemon feel special and match her when she dyes her hair.

[This is all I have as of now but I will update by Wednesday and that’s a promise!]

[strangerofunova]

On learning to love the way things fell part 3; imprecise attempts

Beeheeyem and I were waiting alongside the other contestants at the Mistralton city contest, in a side area overlooking the arena. I had never seen him so excited since we started living together, and I hoped with all my might I wouldn't disappoint him. Around me were people and pokemon I could barely recognize, a much more varied group than I had seen around the gyms. Even in its infancy, this event was already drawing a crowd.

Brant, as per usual, had found a way to over-complicate things. He wanted to use Zen mode this time, and had somehow gotten permission to enter with his Darmanitan already roughed up.

Gardevoir took the role of my second, and I directed the best I could through my showcase. While we were confident, my team struggled to fill the arena with their performance, having only practiced in the comparably tiny lab, and were in the lower half of the resulting scores.

The battle stage went somewhat better. Beeheeyem used Signal Beam to keep his distance, while Gardevoir supported from behind with Heal Pulse, all the while raising her own stats. We closed it out with a Wonder Room boosted Stored Power from Gardevoir, winning in spectacular fashion and scoring decently. Brant had also done alright, despite being too aggressive in the battle stage. His showcase was competent, if messy, placing two spots above my own. 

Afterwards, we waited outside the arena to try and confirm our suspicions about the former dean. He noticed us immediately, and approached.

“What a pleasant surprise. You're a neuroscience major from Castelia college right?

One of his staff members gave him a strange look, then went back to work. The dean seemed focused on Brant, smiling. 

“It’s been quite a while, but do keep your voices down. I would prefer that name stayed lost to time, as I'm sure you understand.”

"What are you doing here?

Beuregard gave a smiling shrug, much to our confusion.

"It's a long story, one best saved for another time."

He seemed almost amused by our curiosity.

"But I suppose if you're so insistent, why don't you join me for lunch? I suppose getting a bit nostalgic wouldn't hurt today."

Brant and I agreed, the two of us oblivious to the chain of events this seemingly benign decision would start us down.

[kariachi]

Random rehash of my opinions on media adaptations-

His Dark Materials should have been and should eventually be adapted in animated format. Not live action with realistic cgi, but actually animated all the way through. That is how you deal with the ‘everyone has a daemon and some of the canon species don’t translate well to cgi’ problem. Not by removing daemons, not by changing species, by working with a format that can accommodate them from the start.

If the Valdemar series is ever adapted (and it should be adapted, it’s far from perfect but it’s still so very good- at least do the Mage Storms trilogy or The Black Gryphon please) it also should be animated rather than cgi. I think for the most part you could do the cgi well in a live action adaptation, but I think you’d need the freedom of full animation to really have any hopes of capturing the whole ‘looks exactly like a horse but when you see one you know damn well that’s not a horse but a holy creature’ thing the Companions have going on.

 If the Dragonriders of Pern series is ever adapted, it should be in full animation, because otherwise we’re gonna run into the same ‘oh we can’t cgi all of the critters’ problem we have with HDM and Pern’s gonna come out both looking far too much like just plain Earth and with far too few dragons. I also still say that Dragonsdawn is our best bet for an adaptation, make it a film or preferably miniseries, maybe the Harper Hall trilogy if a cinematic universe gets settled in enough to support it. And I do say ‘cinematic universe’ for a reason, I feel like we’re less likely to get a straight Pern adaptation so much as a re-imagining of Pern. Which means we’re not likely to get it until the rights are in Anne’s grandchildren’s hands, but still.

Counter to all of these- Digimon needs a live action film more than Pokemon ever did. You wouldn’t even need to make new ‘realistic’ models because using and mimicking the models and Digital World terrain from some of the more recent games, or even the commercials for the vital bracelet, would be entirely thematically appropriate. Rather than drawing from any of the canons, I would have the film be it’s own contained thing that maybe can get it’s own series later. A long film maybe, to make sure to explain enough that people unfamiliar with the franchise can get their feet under them, but still something all it’s own with it’s own characters, villains, tech, etc. Don’t add new digis for it though, love me a new digi but for this I would pull from pre-existing but lesser used species. The ones that just get thrown into the game rosters to bulk them out, like Yuki Agumon, Vegimon, and Insekimon.

And all of these need to come with some at least some fucking racial diversity, preferably with disabled and proper queer rep as well (”Achi, Pern’s already got queer rep” Pern gets half a point and will gain the other half when it’s got more than gay men who don’t matter or have any sort’ve power in anything). And I’m talking actual good representation with this shit, no ‘we have minority rep it’s just on the antagonist side’, no ‘here’s our walking stereotype’, no ‘you could cut this from the piece and it’d change little to nothing’, no ‘this character is here to suffer/be inspiration porn/be the weak link in the heroes side’. Actual fucking rep we wouldn’t have to throw somebody out a window for. Put in some fucking effort to be decent damnit.

[jeminy3]

old archie x maxie (hardenshipping) doodles i never posted, from 2017 or 2018. they were related to some of the doodles in this post.

I have a lot of unpublished drawings of these guys, and i never did elaborate on my headcanons for them. The truth is, I was (and still kinda am) very anxious and embarrassed about this fixation, probably because it centers around villains and “woobifies” them, but also because after playing and researching more into ORAS, i discovered that my personal canon was contradicted by actual canon and i felt invalidated.

For the sake of posterity, I’ll summarize my old headcanons below. (It’s still pretty long, ugh)

A grunt in Team Magma’s hideout says that Archie and Maxie “used to be on the same team.” In canon, this probably implies that they worked together on New Mauville, Sea Mauville, or another unnamed project, depending on how old they are and how long ago those projects started and ended.

However, like many other fans, I thought this meant they used to be in Team Rocket together, and I elaborated an entire backstory based on that:

+ Maxie and Archie were part of a group of Rocket recruits attempting to start a branch of Team Rocket in the Hoenn Region. The project failed because soon after they arrived, Giovanni was defeated in Kanto and officially dissolved Team Rocket, causing a schism to form within the Hoenn team over whether to give up the project or not. This eventually lead to the team splintering into two factions, one lead by Maxie and the other lead by Archie, which eventually grew and rebranded themselves into Team Magma and Team Aqua.

-Maxie and Archie met and connected enough to start dating, though they were emotionally dysfunctional. As problems arose and the Team began to splinter, their relationship also broke down and their separation was very messy.

Maxie clung to the ambition of staying in Hoenn and building up the Team as a paragon of human industry, pushing away Archie and anyone else he deemed as “not useful.”

Archie also wanted to make the Team work, but not in the way Maxie and his side wanted, at the expense of nature. Archie felt hurt and betrayed as Maxie pushed him away and disagreed with him, making him contradict and lash out at Maxie even more.

This all culminated in a huge fight between Archie and Maxie and their respective sides, involving both Pokemon battling and actual fist-fighting. Local authorities were called in, causing the teams to scatter, but not before Archie and Maxie promised to face each other again, reforging themselves as bitter rivals.

-- Maxie

+ Maxie is (the pokemon equivalent of) German/Japanese, and was born on Cinnabar Island. His birth name was Maximillian Matsubasa Von Brandt, but he prefers simply “Maxie”. He IDs as bigender, asexual and demi-homoromantic.

His father is a Kanto businessman named Masaru Matsubasa. His mother is from somewhere in or near Kalos, named Melissa Von Brandt. They were both wealthy and successful business people who frequently left on business trips, Masaru travelling between Kanto and Johto and Melissa to her home country.

Maxie was often left alone or with a nanny at home. He was well-provided for and self-sufficient, but he was lonely and emotionally stunted. He had a passion for geology and engineering, and showed interest in contributing to helping Cinnabar’s local issues, which were often tense because of the limited land space. Homelessness and unemployment were high, and development plans to alleviate these were stymied by parties who lobbied for the preservation of the local Pokemon wildlife by any means.

Maxie’s parents were skeptical of his choice in career but still supported him, if only half-heartedly. This lead Maxie to study Cinnabar’s volcano, which he found to be very much active and possibly dangerous. He developed a plan to build in and around the volcano in such a way that it would utilize extra space inside the mountain for housing/businesses and its magma for natural energy to power the city, possibly circumventing its eventual eruption.

He presented this plan to Cinnabar’s city council, but was practically laughed out of the meeting for such an ambitious and dangerous idea, especially by the wildlife parties. This damaged his reputation and caused him to be fired/demoted from his job. His parents reprimanded him, regretting their decision to support him.

Lost and disgusted with his life, Maxie found recruitment with Team Rocket and left Cinnabar to join their efforts on the mainland. When he presented his research to their higher-ups, they were impressed enough to pass it along to Giovanni himself, and Maxie ended up contributing to the construction of some of their underground lairs, like in Celadon City.

This also made him a prime candidate for the Rocket Hoenn project as a lead engineer and scientist, and he joined the project with high hopes.

+ His interest in Pokemon was soured by his past and usually only extends are far as his ambitions, which means he views Pokemon only as things that can be useful to whatever projects he’s working on, otherwise they are a nuisance. After becoming the leader of Team Magma and having to train a personal team to defend himself with, he warms up to Pokemon a bit more.

+ Maxie plays up his confidence and genius, but does have moments of crippling self-doubt and anxiety. Deep down, he’s socially awkward and has trouble expressing his feelings, tending to bottle things up until they spill out in moments of anger.

+ Maxie used to be a semi-heavy smoker in his youth to cope with his anxiety. After becoming the leader of Team Magma, his health was suffering and his grunts were visibly uncomfortable around him, so for the sake of his own health and that of his team, he quit, with help and advice from Courtney and Tabitha.

+ Maxie hates his parents and hasn’t contacted them since he left Cinnabar, which was over ten years ago by the end of ORAS events. He avoids them to the point that he uses a forged identity in Hoenn, named “Maxie Stormfront.” ‘Stormfront’ is a reference from one of his favorite metal bands, the Doom Hounds, because he is a nerd.

+ Years later, Cinnabar’s volcano did erupt and destroy the town, displacing its human population. Maxie has mixed feelings about this – he’s not sure if it’s righteous karma for the City Council rejecting his plans, or a sign that his old plans were doomed to failure and he was better off leaving Cinnabar after all.

-- Archie

+ Archie is (the pokemon equivalent of) Black/Hispanic and a Hoenn native. His birth name is Archibald Rodriguez. He IDs as a cis man (or trans?), pansexual and panromantic.

He was born to his father, Alexander Rodriguez and his mother, Alicia Fuentes (Rodriguez after marriage) in a small fishing town on one of Hoenn’s coasts, with its fishery being its only major industry. Most of its residents are middle-class or poor, and few members pursue an education after high school, usually joining the local fishing industry.

In his youth, Archie didn’t care much for school or work, preferring to spend his days playing with the local water Pokemon and his friends, Matt and Shelly. However, this exposed him to the effects that overfishing and pollution had on the local wildlife, and he eventually grew to want to pursue a career as a Veterinarian, specifically for water pokemon.

His parents didn’t believe he would be successful and his town had few resources to help him. The most he could do was research at the local library and a then-primitive internet.

Worse, his town was outright apathetic to the damage their industry was causing to the local wildlife because they depended on its capital to survive.

+A possible traumatic memory involves a young Archie nursing a sick Magikarp back to health for weeks, only to later discover it trapped in the nets of the fishery his father worked at, doomed to become food/products. When he attempted to cut the nets and save the Magikarp, his father restrained him and reprimanded him, claiming “it’s just a fish, boy! They’re all just stupid fish!”

Eventually, Archie was a depressed drifter in his 20s, unable to hold onto work and unable to afford to leave to a larger city. He often fought with his abrasive father and his mother was coddling, but unsupportive. This made Archie a prime candidate for Team Rocket recruiters as they arrived on Hoenn, promising a way out of his backwater town, decent pay, and a career where he’d be appreciated and be able to work with Pokemon to change the world.  He joined as a lowly Grunt, but was talented and well-respected within the Team.

-Archie has limited contact with his parents since he left home, only calling them once a year or so.

-Archie doesn’t like being referred to as his full name, it feels pretentious and brings back uncomfortable memories of his family.

+I used to headcanon Archie and Matt as biological brothers because of the “bro” thing, but I’m not sure about keeping that. If so, Matt’s name would be short for Matthias Rodriguez, because their parents liked pretentious names.

-Like some of his dialog implies, Archie is kind of depressed, pessimistic and cynical deep down, but hides it behind his boisterous, reckless attitude. At his worst, he’s downright bitter, uncaring of his own life or the lives of humanity in general, in favor of Pokemon.

[smallersocksx]

Pokemon Journeys Episode 74 (Ramblings/Review)

Introduction/Background:

I'll be honest I haven't been watching the series as actively since episode 65. That's because the episodic formula they chose to use for the series was honestly starting to grate on me and if you read my post on my issues with the Pokémon Journeys anime. I did bring up one of my issues being the episodic formula.

As time grew on through my issue with the episodic formula and some of the other issues of the series begun to annoy me even more so I needed to take a break. When they announced Dawn would be making an appearance, I knew I had to watch (the one instance where the episodic formula kind of worked in my favour). As Diamond and Pearl was my first game, my favourite anime series and had some of the best story-telling in my opinion. In comparison to Journeys, I think my main issue with the series is the lack of direction and not knowing where the story is going.

That element of surprise might be great for some people and if you’re enjoying the series that’s great too. Personally, I love the story-telling aspect of the Pokémon anime and watching these characters go on their own personal journeys. This is why watching a story-driven series, I want that level of clarity and direction provided by a linear narrative. This is why the episodic formula was starting to grate on me, Journeys is great when they are focusing on furthering a character’s goal or development, my issue lies with the huge gap in between which later results in a huge pacing issue that could easily be resolved if they gave time for certain aspects to be fleshed out more.

However, that isn’t to say Journeys is a bad series. I’ve certainly enjoyed a lot of the episodes and the slice of life aspect the series provides in comparison to earlier series. On the other hand, given that the series is meant to be focusing on travel that can be construed as a negative point as well.

And I've realised as I'm writing this, this may come across as a rant about the series rather than discussing the episode. So, if you're still reading thank you ^o^ But I thought it was necessary to give some background to explain how my opinions have been formed and if you recommend that I re-visit some episodes that’s great too!

So far, I've only seen the episode with some really poor subtitles. So, if I've misinterpreted a scene then you can let me know. But I think I got the gist of most of the episode. If you’ve read some of my other posts, I always try to break down these reviews/ramblings.

The Beginning:

I feel as though this episode is going to end up drawing similarities to the DP episode Sleepless in Pre-Battle. In which, Darkrai causes nightmares and Cresselia is unable to help the town for some reason, I can’t remember the exact reason in the original episode although in this case, it’s obvious as we see Team Rocket’s Matori Matrix attack and injure Cresselia. This sets up, the boys’ side of this DP mini-arc in which they’ll investigate the Darkrai side of the problem and something I greatly appreciated ASH! REFERENCED! HIS! BATTLE! WITH! DARKRAI!!! It was something I greatly appreciated and kind of wished Journeys took the time to reference some of Ash’s other achievements and experiences more often. Give him more of a mentor-ish role like he was to May back in AG. 

Rather than Chloe joining the boys in Sinnoh, originally, she was meant to be going on a trip with her family as the summer holidays had begun. However, those plans immediately went down the gutter as both her parents had work and her brother was joining his friend at summer camp (this is going by really horrible subtitles so I may be entirely wrong). I honestly don’t know if Chloe went to Sinnoh intending to join up with Ash and Goh or just going on a trip by herself. But I really liked the call back to Following a Maiden’s Voyage in which Chloe had packed too much the same as Dawn and her Mum ended up giving her a more appropriate-sized backpack. I think there might have been a Sword and Shield reference in there as well because at the beginning of the game the Mum says the backpack, she gives the player was the one she used for her journey and I think Chloe’s Mum said something amongst those lines. I don’t know I might be grasping at straws.

I loved all the Sinnoh/DP references earlier in the episode and to be honest I was focusing more on the Dawn and Chloe side of the episode rather than the boys (sorry Ash and Goh).

Chloe and Dawn:

Now I’ll be honest, I love Chloe for me personally she’s one of the stronger aspects of the Journeys series. However, in this episode, she annoyed me a little bit. From my point of view, one of the more subtle ways Chloe has developed after catching Eevee was that she learnt to relax and embrace being a kid primarily because of Eevee. This development was highlighted in the Glimwood Tangle episode where Chloe ended up playing with the group of Impidimp. If it had been Chloe from 20 or even 30 episodes before she may have handled that situation completely differently. Whereas, as of late she’s learnt to relax and have fun which at times was something I could have done when I was her age. 

Anyways, I’m going on a tangent once again. I just thought the whole argument with Dawn was rather pointless, I didn’t understand the need to create any conflict when they were getting on perfectly well beforehand. That was kind of my biggest gripe on the girls’ side of the episode. 

On the other hand, they also set up a good opportunity for Chloe to grow which I kind of hope they take. Another issue, I’ve been having with the Journeys anime is that they set up some great plot lines or potential development and fall through on delivery or never act on it. One aspect I loved about episode 63, was that they were setting up an interesting way for Chloe and Eevee to develop or find a goal by meeting other trainers that own an Eeveelution and learn why they chose that particular form. They could have even set up Ash getting in contact with May or Serena to talk to Chloe about Glaceon and Sylveon. But the writers never followed up on the potential storyline after episode 63, which is so frustrating.

This is why I’m hoping with Dawn’s influence Chloe actively begins to at least try things out to learn what is a good fit for her. This was an issue with Serena as well, before discovering Pokémon Performing, she didn’t really actively try out other things like battling as much. Even, Ash gave Contests a go and ended up developing some of his best strategies from those experiences such as the Counter Shield and the Ice Aqua Jet. Considering, Pokémon is an anime targeted towards children, it would be a good message to send, to at least try something once rather than not trying at all.

Climax:

Following their (unnecessary) argument and battle with a sleep-deprived Rhydon, Chloe and Dawn come across the injured Cresselia from the beginning of the episode. Going back to the Rhydon, in the original Darkrai film they did expand on Darkrai causing Pokémon to fall asleep and have nightmares but I can’t recall if the Pokémon were affected in Sleepless Pre-Battle. It was an interesting and small touch that I liked about the episode (also poor Rhydon).

The preview for the next episode shows Chloe calming Cresselia or at least gaining Cresselia’s trust, and it made me think again this might be me just grasping at straws. But perhaps Chloe has some sort of affinity with Psychic-type Pokémon because we had that whole weird vision aspect (that was again never addressed) in the Glimwood Tangle episode where Chloe had that vision of Galarian Ponyta and Rapidash. I don’t know, that’s a theory I just developed that probably won’t pan out.

Conclusion:

All in all, it was a decent episode to come back into for Journeys. If I’m honest if they were promoting the DP remakes, I’m surprised they didn’t try to do anything that focused on the Creation Trio rather than the Lunar Duo however the Creation Trio did play a huge role in the DP films and Dialga and Palkia in the original anime so perhaps they wanted to give more spotlight on the Lunar Duo or even hint at Tobias’ return with Darkrai? 

If I’m completely honest I’m concerned about the pacing for the next episode as this arc is only meant to be two episodes, this episode did do its job of setting things up. In my opinion, it could have been faster in some areas, they could have even shown a Contest in this episode and have Dawn and Chloe meet in that way. Given in the next episode the two groups will meet up and attempt to defend Cresselia from Team Rocket and I don’t think they’ll have much time to show off anything Contest-related which is a shame because Contests were my absolute favourite aspect of the games and anime. 

If this were a three-episode arc maybe they could have used this episode to focus on Chloe and Dawn, next episode focuses more on Ash and Goh finding Darkrai have the groups meet up and then the third episode half-battling and half showing off contests. I don’t know this is just me throwing some ideas out there. As I think Journeys just has a huge issue with pacing for some reason and this episode was sort of slow in some areas and as I mentioned I’m worried the next episode is going to be really rushed.

But overall, it was a decent episode and I’m hoping we’ll get to see the rest of Dawn’s team next episode as I love her Pokémon to bits. Also, Pikachu and Buneary reunion, please!!!

(And I may watch this episode again with proper subtitles)

[heartofsnark]

This Is Love (Chapter Four): Through The Gates

Notes: We’re inching closer and closer to the Seed’s arrival, I know it’s a slow burn to the game events, but I’m enjoying building up to it and hope it will make the impact of it all just that much more meaningful. 

Word Count:  9098

Chapter Warnings: Cursing, Belligerent Drunk Man, Drug Overdose, Pratt and Dahlia being dumbasses

For chapter one and the warnings about this fics overarching themes, please click here!

For the previous chapter; click here!

A tall bearded man is on her porch; leaning against the railing. The familiar snake tattoos that curl down his forearms give him away; Lonny. The Eden’s Gate member who showed at the station to give her and Whitehorse a hard time. What is he doing at her trailer? There’s no reason for him to be here.

“Can I help you?” She asks, raising an eyebrow as she steps up onto the porch.

“Just figured I’d stop by, make a friendly visit to the new deputy,” he expression is somewhere between a smile and a predator baring its teeth.

“And, how exactly did you figure out where I live?”

“Small place, loose lips, word spreads fast.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, now, if we’re done with this ‘friendly’ visit-”

“Word spreads especially fast within our congregation, when someone starts arresting our members.”

“Maybe, your congregation members shouldn’t commit crimes?”

“The law of man matters little compared to the law of god.”

“Well, I get paid to enforce the law of man, so unless god starts signing my paychecks, I’ll be sticking to that.”

“Greed isn’t a pretty sin.”

Goosebumps prickle and creep up her skin at the word sin, making her throat tight, as the word settles over her. Memories of her stepfather claw at the back of her mind, phantom pain of beatings past making her body ache, the guilt and shame of being a sinner pitting in her stomach. She digs her nails into the palms of her hands and grits her teeth.

“Yes, so greedy, as you can tell, I mean just look around, ” she gestures around the dilapidated trailer park, “the used needles a foot away from the kiddy slide cost me extra, but I think they really bring the place together.”

“Charming.”

“I do try.”

“Look, I’ll make this stupidly simple, for you,” Lonny creeps closer, nearly standing on her, glowering down at her, “don’t step on our toes and we won’t step on yours.”

“Is that so?” She grins and literally steps on Lonny’s toes, crushing her boot down as hard as she can, until he finally grunts in pain and takes a step back.

“Don’t make a problem out of yourself, deputy….” His dark eyes flicker around, until finally landing on the shed behind her trailer, “that where you keep your bike?”

“Maybe, maybe not, whats it to you?”

“You know, a little generosity goes a long way to mending relationships, deputy. That motorcycle of yours would be a nice little gift to the flock and most importantly, me.”

“Get bent.”

“It’s important that we all do our part, deputy. That everyone gives a little, so that we all can flourish. As we inch closer and closer to the brink; that becomes even more important. What’s yours is mine, so,  which is more important, keeping your motorcycle or helping others?”  

He’s in her space again, hand reaching out and squeezing her shoulder in a pseudo-friendly gesture; that not even almost friendly smile on his face again.

“I’d sooner watch the world rot than give up that bike. Now, get the fuck off my property.”

She shoves his hand off her shoulder and marches into her trailer; slamming the door shut behind her. Dahlia could scream, could tear apart her entire trailer in rage. Where the hell does that guy get off? Demanding her bike; the motorcycle she slaved over. Her and Lloyd rebuilt that thing from nearly scratch after his son wrecked it; left it abandoned in their shed, a muddle heap of metal left to gather dust. She helped rebuild it; just a project at the time, something to keep busy while she was waiting to see if she got accepted to the police academy, meant to stave off the anxiety. And when it was done, perfectly functional and shining like it was brand new, Lloyd told her to keep it, she deserved it.

There’s not a lot of things Dahlia’s felt she earned; feeling every success has been a fluke, a mistake, a moment of luck. But, she earned that bike. She nearly fought Lloyd’s son when he visited that holiday season; trying to reclaim the bike now that it was fixed and she refused. Lloyd sided with her; because she earned it. Because she put the work and hours into it. And she’ll be damned if she’s going to let some bearded zealot barge in and demand she give it up.

The more she learns about Eden’s Gate, the less she likes them. Stealing booze, trying to take her bike, trying to scare her. She needs a cigarette; she decides and pulls the pack from her pocket; only to find it empty. Damn it. Dahlia starts digging through tossed aside pairs of pants and jackets; she has to have a half empty pack somewhere. She grabs up her duffle bag, still mostly unpacked other than what she’s worn or used this week, rummaging through the pockets for a pack of cigarettes.

A crumpled piece of something brushes against her hand and she yanks it out; only to find a scrunched up white pamphlet. She straightens it out a bit and groans when she reads the front; Eden’s Gate, We Love You surrounding a cross like symbol. Why is this group all over everything?

Giving up on finding a cigarette somewhere in her mess; Dahlia changes into some comfy clothes and plops herself down on the couch, turning the small tv on as background noise more than anything. She finds herself fiddling with that pamphlet again, placed aside before she changed.

Dahlia opens it; if this damn group is going to haunt all her days here, she might as well read their crap. It seems to be fairly standard religious fare. Casted out? Rejected by society? Try Jesus. Take a leap of faith, wash away your sins, confess, atone, and become stronger by joining their family. There are mentions of how corrupt the world is and how it’s all going to end; nice appeals to fear mongering, always have to appreciate that approach. Every word of the dribble reminds her of darker days, of her step father and his asinine sermons. The type of people who’d probably make a PSA about how Dungeons and Dragons is satanic, Harry Potter should be burned at the stake, and Pokemon is an evil atheist agenda to push evolutionary theory on kids.

The leader; man bun guy, calls himself The Father. Those goosebumps and bad memories come back. She knows assuming that all strongly religious people are like her step-father isn’t the best practice. But mentions of sin and calling himself something regarding father, just… doesn’t help.

He calls his siblings heralds; a sister and two brothers.

Her eyes glaze over as she absorbs the same crap she's had spewed at her for years, thoughts of making a donation to planned parenthood in their name pass through her mind. She doesn’t know for certain if the group is pro-life, but one can assume. The picture on the second page of the little pamphlet catches her eye and she sputters out a laugh.

Who the hell runs the PR for this church?

First the creepy statue, then the serial killer-esque drawing on him to open their book, and now a family portrait so awkward she might cringe herself into a coma. Three men and a woman; siblings according to the text. Man bun is in a chair in the middle; not even making eye contact with the camera. The woman, Faith, the siren she’s seen at the hotel and accidentally grabbed outside the diner is on the floor beside the chair. She looks annoyed, like a teenager being dragged to an awkward family dinner. Behind them are the two brothers. One with slicked back dark hair in a coat that appears to be covered in planes; which is… a look. And the other a mountain of a human compared to his sibling; ginger hair with the sides shaved, in camouflage, holding a red rifle.

It all looks ridiculous, from their expressions to their poses. Whoever thought this was a good way to market them is the epitome of human stupidity. Dahlia crumples the little pamphlet and tosses it into the trash; thankful for a laugh to cap off her night. She spends an hour or so watching tv, drifting off to sleep on the couch as she’s done every night.. Eyelids growing heavier and heavier with each second, until black blankets her mind. 

Her bladder wakes her up during the middle of the night, causing her to turn and flop around, rubbing sleep from her eyes. She stares at the ceiling contemplating if she has to pee bad enough to warrant making herself physically stand up; the effort feeling herculean in the bleary twilight hours of the night.

“What if I told you, you could be free of sin,” a male voice drifts from the tv and she groans; this shit again?

She sits up on the couch, sliding down onto the floor with the clumsiness of her sleep leaden body. On her tv, at four am, amid commercials for sexy single phone lines is an infomercial for Eden’s Gate.

One of the brothers; the one with slicked back hair in the plane coat, John Seed as the text on screen tells her. He dramatically talks about how all you have to do is say Yes, the power of Yes, walking around what looks like a red carpet covered in flowers; terraces laced with them around him, a crowd gathered around as he talks.

Is he the reason for the Hollywood style YES sign in the valley?

The crowd around him starts to chant the word yes; he’s saying ‘yes, I will be saved’, ‘yes, I will confess’, ‘yes, I will atone.’ And he gestures upwards; revealing a lit up sign of the word YES and she bursts out laughing; her stomach aching and her bladder upset with her for it. Once her laughter subsides, she does what any good decent young adult would do. She rewinds  it to the start of the infomercial, grabs her phone from the table, and records the cringefest to post online before finally going to the bathroom.

She goes back to sleep after,  still cracking up about this dumb religion and their dumb advertisement.

Dahlia wakes up around noon or so the next day, checking her phone while still curled up in the couch.  The post of the religious cringe has gotten some traction; someone making a reaction gif out of the guy gesturing to the yes sign. Jokes about how the guy must get off on the word yes, how insane it must have felt to be working on this, ‘imagine having a grown man in a plane coat telling you to chant yes while he dramatically touches his own tit’. The internet truly is a beautiful place sometimes.

She stretches out her muscles and decides to call the clinic, the one she gave  info about to Tweak. Dahlia wants to make sure he actually reached out and didn’t just use her good graces to avoid trouble and call it done.

“Hey, I’m Deputy Hale of the Hope County Sheriff’s department, I referred someone to contact your clinic about rehabilitation. I was calling to see if they contacted you.”

“Of course, could I have their name?”

“Aaron Kirby.”

“Yes, we did receive a call from Aaron Kirby, he’s been placed on our waitlist as our drug counseling services are currently at capacity and we can’t take on any more clients.”

“Understood, thank you.”  

She sighs; she can’t fault him for that. Hopefully, they’ll be able to get him in soon. Dahlia stretches, making her back pop, now what to do with the rest of her day. Maybe it’s Lonny trying to take her bike or maybe it’s the mention of those Clutch Nixon stunts yesterday; but she has an itch to go riding and do some stupid shit.

A quick shower and change of clothes; then she’s grabbing her helmet.

Music reverberating in her skull, the rev of her motorcycle engine beneath her, the wind whipping around her, and she’s healed from everything if only for a moment. Dancing and riding her bike are the only things to do this for her; or maybe it’s the music itself that does. But when her blood is pumping, her ears are ringing, and her throat is raw from screaming along to the songs; nothing else matters.

She’s not lonely as she takes a sharp turn right at the chorus.

She’s not sad or pathetic as she cruises down the road, passing cars.

She’s not a disgusting sinner as she takes one of the paths that goes through the woods.

She’s not rejected, worthless, and tossed aside as she hits one of the many ramps across the county, catching air before hitting the ground again.

Everything is pure chaos and adrenaline in her veins; no room for guilt or doubt or

Deer. Big deer, in the road, it isn’t moving.

She hits the brakes; the sudden jerk of a stop, pushing her body forward, losing her grip and being ejected forward. Dahlia hits the ground in a heap, head rattling but thankfully not split on the road. She forces herself to roll over on her back, body aching in protest. Her eyes close and she takes deep breaths, trying to gather herself.

Something fuzzy pushes against her hand, glancing down to see the large deer sniffing at her. It’s no worse for wear, so that’s good at least. She forces herself to sit up, body protesting,  and she peels her helmet off. The deer shuffles back a little but when she extends a hand it tentatively presses against it. She scratches its nose.

“You’re very lucky you’re cute.” She digs around in her pockets, finding a pack of crackers, she always has food on her if she can help it and she offers the deer a cracker. It eats from her hand. Maybe she’s just trying to avoid moving her bruised body, but she spends a few moments finishing the little pack with the deer before finally forcing herself to stand.

Her motorcycle is in good shape, a little scuff on the side, but nothing she can’t buff out if needed. Dahlia’s baby remains the most stable part of her life. She rides it back to her trailer, a bit more carefully. She’s managed to burn through most of the day with her reckless bullshit.

She calls Lloyd and Caroline that night; telling them about her first week, skirting around details that might sadden them. Going to the F.A.N.G Center is reduced to just going there, nothing of being overwhelmed and leaving. No mentions of Pratt tricking her when she talks about Peaches, just an old lady with a cougar Dahlia got to carry. No mention of being left out everytime Pratt and Hudson go to the Spread Eagle. No mention of Lonny, the threats, the religious group that seems much more involved with the community than she originally thought. Everything is fine, perfect, ideal.

The pain of her little crash has mostly faded by the time she shows up to work the next day; uniform properly on when she comes into the station bullpen.

“What the hell happened to you?” Hudson calls out and Dahlia can’t help the heat crawling up her face at the attention. Her forearms and some of her upper chest that’s exposed are covered in bruises; mottling blues and purples.

“Oh, uh, I had a little bike crash yesterday.” She shrugs.

“Jesus christ,” Pratt grumbles and pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Rook, you need a hobby,” Dahlia starts to say something, but Hudson continues, “one that doesn’t injure you.”

She likes to dance, but dancing completely alone isn’t as much fun, not awful but not as fun. And there's not exactly dance clubs in Hope County. Hmmm. Unfortunate. She shrugs, if her hobby kills her, it kills her.

During patrol, Pratt and her don’t talk about the F.A.N.G Center, they don’t talk about him being angry at her. An awkward cloud hanging over them as they patrol. She doesn’t even bother to ask to give tickets when they pull people over; already knowing Pratt won’t let her and not wanting the conversation. An emergency call to what’s called Sergey’s place breaks up the monotony, suspected overdose.

She digs her nails into the leather of her seat as Pratt flips on the sirens; what if it’s Tweak? Doubts of if she did the right thing running through her head. She wanted to help him; but if he ended up just being put on a waitlist and overdosing right after, how much good did she do?

Sergey’s place is a wooded area filled with abandoned train cars where homeless people and drug addicts gather. Dahlia rushes to where she sees a group of them gathered around; screaming and crying coming from the center.

“Clear the way, so we can help,” Pratt tells them, the crowd dispersing, a woman is seizing. Her entire body jerking and drool pooling from her mouth; another woman holding her close, crying over her.

“Did she take anything?” Dahlia asks.

“We were shooting up and then she was on the ground, I, it’s all my fault, I-”

“Understood, we’re gonna do everything we can to save her.”

Dahlia holds the seizing woman as still as she can, getting out the syringe of narcan that's kept in patrol cars. She plunges it into the woman’s arm, forcing the medicine into her system, watching as her seizing slowly starts to lessen. Removing it, she notices the large bruise and cut on the woman’s forehead.

“Dispatch,” Pratt radios in, “we need an ambulance out to Sergey’s place, confirmed overdosed, head trauma, female early twenties. Junior Deputy Hale has administered a dose of Narcan, over.”

Dahlia stays with the woman, to make sure she doesn’t seize again and hurt herself further. Meanwhile, Pratt clears the way and helps get the ambulance into the area when it arrives; the woman being taken away on the stretcher. They find out the one who was holding her was her sister, allowing her to go with her to the emergency room, while Pratt asks some questions of those who were around. Nothing suspicious; just an overdose, no one to blame.  

The younger deputy sighs and a hand clamps down on her shoulder; gently squeezing. Pratt is next to her and she raises an eyebrow at him. 

“We got here quick, she should be fine.” 

“Maybe, lets get going.” 

The conversation is still more than a little stilted as the day goes on; but it isn’t quite the awkward silence of before. Pratt making little comments and saying things, while she nods or hmms along.

Later in the afternoon, when they’ve stopped back at the station, for lunch and paperwork regarding the overdose. She yawns and stretches her arms, standing up from her desk to get coffee. Maybe she needs caffeine or maybe she’s just tired of sitting in one place; but either way she’s up and moving. 

She rubs a hand down her face as she enters the kitchenette where the fridge and coffee machine are. Dahlia grabs her mug; one that was bought for her by Lloyd and Caroline. It’s a little embarrassing, the picture of a black cat with the message, ‘horrible and adorable.’  

Warmth presses in close to her back, looming over her. The smell of Pratt’s cologne hits her just as a large hand plucks her mug off the counter. Pratt holding the mug high above her head. 

“Hey!” She tries to grab it from him but can’t reach, Pratt grinning as she makes the effort to stand on her tiptoes but still can’t quite get it. 

“Something wrong?” he smirks, “you can’t reach your kitty cat mug?” 

“Can you go five seconds without being an ass?”  She turns to face him, glaring at his shit eating grin, the mischief in his eyes as he crowds her and holds the mug just out of reach. 

“Hmmmm, no. Can you go five seconds without pouting?” He reaches up with the hand not holding her mug hostage and cups under her jaw to squish her cheeks together and force her lips to pout out; laughing at her. 

She smacks away his hand, making a grab for her mug, knocking against his chest in the attempt before he jumps back. 

Dahlia whines and he just laughs, dodging her again as she tries to take her mug back. Her fingers can barely reach his face, let alone high above his head where he’s holding her mug hostage. She clambers to grab a hold of his bicep; trying to pull herself up high enough to grab it, laughing at the ridiculousness of trying to essentially climb her coworker to get her mug.

“Jesus christ, you fuckin’ spider monkey!” He nearly falls over, but catches himself and switches the mug to his other hand, placing it on top on the cupboards.

She glares for a beat, still hanging off of Pratt’s arm before letting go. Dahlia can’t even reach the top shelf in the cupboards.

“I’m actually going to strangle you.”

“Something wrong, Thumbelina?” He taunts and ruffles a hand through her hair, the gesture far more rough and teasing than when Whitehorse does it to comfort her.

“Yeah, my coworker is an ass.”

“Not my fault you’re short.”

“If I get dirt on the counter, you’re cleaning it.”

“What do you-” he bursts into laughter when she box jumps up onto the counter, grabbing her mug. The deep rumble of it makes her smile, it’s ridiculous, but he’s left her no choice.

“The hell are you doing, Rook?!” Whitehorses’ voice cuts through Pratt’s cackling and she jumps down with a yelp.

“Pratt did it.”

The older deputy straightens up, after nearly bending over doubled from his laughing fit. Whitehorse pinches the bridge of his nose, Dahlia swears she can see the migraine forming in his head.

“I didn’t do anything,” Pratt defends himself,  “she managed that all on her own.”

“I, I just...no feet on the counter, that's where food goes, for fucks sake, ” Whitehorse looks from Dahlia to Pratt, “and no whatever you did.”

With that the sheriff leaves; weary of their bullshit. Dahlia jabs her fist into Pratt’s ribs, hard enough to jostle him but not enough to truly hurt.

“You got me in trouble!” She yells, sounding every bit a kid who just got ratted out to the teacher, and Pratt only snickers.

By the time Dahlia manages to get her coffee, her face hurts from smiling. The ache of happiness followed throughout the day, until Hudson and Pratt cap off the night with another day of chatting at the Spread Eagle, Dahlia left to go home alone. 

The next day a call comes in from Adelaide Drubman, Hurk Sr’s ex wife who owns the marina as Dahlia’s been told. She’s seen advertisements around for the older woman’s real estate business, telling people to call Addie. The woman pictured on the signs of those advertisements is a fair representation, albeit maybe a little more airbrushed, of the woman standing before them when they arrive. Older with dirty blonde hair and blue eyes, a red bandana tied in her hair. She’s all sly smiles and winks when she sees the two deputies walking towards her.

“Well, hey there, hon’,” she greets them, the southern Montana accent one of the strongest Dahlia’s heard since she’s arrived here.

“Hey, Addie,” Pratt replies in kind and Dahlia gives an awkward wave, “what’s wrong?”

What’s right, Dahlia can’t help but wonder as she looks at the property, clearly abandoned and dilapidated.

“Well, I think some squatters might have moved in on me, sweetheart. And, apparently threatening them with my gun is illegal, but having y’all run ‘em off with yours is fine. Go figure.”

“Yeah, the law is pretty picky about that kind of thing,” Pratt says with a laugh.

“I mean, I’m not complaining , at least I get a  chance to see some young pieces of ass in uniform.”

Dahlia chokes and coughs; heat flooding up to the apples of her cheek. That was blunt. Really blunt. Pratt doesn’t seem the least bit bothered, maybe he’s just used to this. Despite her embarrassment, she’s smiling. Something about Adelaide is comforting, warm and friendly, the kind of person who doesn’t know a stranger. Dahlia remembers the gross curmudgeon of an old man that use to be her husband.

“Speaking of which,” Adelaide continues, looking at Dahlia, “I don’t think I’ve seen you before, honey.”

“Uh, yeah, I’m new at the station.”

“Our probie junior deputy.”

“Adelaide Drubman, pleased to meet ya.”  

“Uh, this might be impolite,” she pauses, rethinking for a moment, but she needs answers, “but were you seriously married to Hurk Sr?”

“Un-fucking-fortunately.”

“Did you lose a bet?”

Adelaide starts laughing and Dahlia can’t help but smile, the sound absolutely heartwarming.

“I’m serious; lose a bet, piss off a witch and get cursed, broke a mirror and had seven years bad luck… It’s gotta be something, ‘cause that just don’t add up.”

“Well, aren’t you just the cutest thing,” the older woman tells her, “word of advice, don’t let anyone tell you you gotta stay with a man just ‘cause he knocks you up.”

“I’d rather die.”

“Good, keep that mentality, save you years of suffering.”

“Okay, enough chat, let’s go check out the place,” Pratt says, nudging Dahlia to get a move on. She sticks her tongue out at him as they walk into the rundown house.

There’s trash strewn around, thankfully no needles or sign of drug users here. Adelaide must have a lot of trust in whoever she has cleaning these places up for resell. They pass through rooms, looking for anyone who’s not meant to be there, knocking on doors and calling out. Most of the house is cleared through and the two of them head to the attic, a good place for any squatters to hide.

The stairs creak under her feet as she takes them two at a time, moving ahead of Pratt in minutes. She hears him grumble, he tells her to slow down, but she doesn’t.

It’s dimly lit, some abandoned furniture and old antique crap littering the area; blocking the window that might have let in even a glimmer of sunlight. She flicks on her flashlight. The light illuminates the dust that hangs heavy in the air, drifting across her vision. Something rustles, a box shuffling across the floor.

“What was that?” Pratt asks as he finally joins her in the attic.

“I don’t know, yet.”

Scratchy noises echo through the room and she walks towards where she saw the box move. She crouches down and shifts the boxes out of the way, finding nothing but a dusty floor beneath them. Then something presses against her leg, a soft sniffing noise. 

“Oh my god!” She gasps as she looks down at the cute opossum staring up at her; baby pink nose sniffing at her jeans. A white face, tawny gray almost black body, with big soft dark brown eyes, its wiry whiskers curling at odd angles. 

“Is something wrong?!” Pratt yells out and comes rushing over, feet stomping across the floor; the heavy thuds making the opossum hiss and creep backwards. 

“You scared it, jackass.” 

“I,” he looks down at the hissing opossum, “I thought something happened.” 

“Shhhhhh…”

Dahlia reaches out; tentatively brushing her fingers against its narrow snout, feeling the short slightly rough fur. The hissing stops and it sniffs at her hand, letting her scratch up its face to the top of its head. It relaxes into her touch and she scratches behind its ear. 

“You can’t pet every animal, you meet, Rook.” 

“Watch me,” she says before scooping the opossum up in her arms, holding it close to her chest. A tongue licks over her cheek, the marsupial content in Dahlia’s arms. 

Pratt shakes his head and leaves the attic; Dahlia following him down the stairs. Adelaide is waiting outside the home when the two deputies exit. 

“Good news, Addie-” 

“I acquired a baby.” 

“Jesus fuck,” Pratt rubs a hand down his face at her interruption, “there’s no squatters.” 

“’Preciate ya coming out to check and taking care of the opossum problem.” 

“I fail to see the problem.” Dahlia’s new friend is trying to climb up her head, licking her scalp. 

“You really gonna try to sale this mess?” Pratt asks, rolling his eyes and ignoring the younger deputy’s new pet. 

“It’s my best chance of making any profit anymore; those fuckin’ Seeds are buying up any place thats actually worth a damn thing.  Flipping run down places is the only way to even hope of making money anymore. You know those bastards even tried to by the Marina.” 

“They’re gonna own the entire county before we know it.” 

Deputy Pratt shrugs his shoulders and Dahlia chews her lip; unsure if she likes how casually they talk about the local religious nutjob owning the county. The older deputy doesn’t even seem bothered by the thought; the idea of them buying everything just thrown out as blasé as one would say the time of day. 

“I swear to god, I can’t figure out what I wanna do more; punch John Seed’s face or ride it.” 

Dahlia raises an eyebrow at the older woman; she’s unsure what that means…but it sounds vaguely inappropriate… Her nose scrunches, brows furrowing as she tries to reason through this. Riding…like sitting on someone’s face? So, oh… Heat flares up Dahlia’s cheeks as the meaning hits her; definitely inappropriate. Very inappropriate. She covers the opossum’s ears, as if to protect the innocent being from the filth, meanwhile her own ears are burning. 

“Addie…” 

“I know, I know,” Adelaide waves her hand dismissively, “but you know what they say, the pussy wants what it wants.” 

“Not sure that’s the saying.” Pratt laughs

Dahlia raises an eyebrow before looking down at the opossum in her arms as if the little critter could answer her unasked question. Instead, its doe eyes just stare up at her. What cats have to do with Adelaide wanting to fuck John Seed is beyond Dahlia’s comprehension.

“You alright over there, hun?” 

“Don’t worry about her,” Pratt dismisses Adelaide’s concern, “she’s probably just wondering what cats have to do with anything.” 

“Oh lord.”

“How did you know?” Dahlia whispers, wide-eyed at Pratt, only getting a throaty laugh in response. 

“How old are you again, sweetie? Pussy, vagina, cunt; what’s between your legs. Well, maybe not yours, I ain’t got a chance to check y-” 

“I would like to change the subject!” Dahlia blurts out; face feeling like it’s been set on fire and no doubt a vivid flush a red. Adelaide’s little grin and Pratt’s laughter only serving to make her face more crimson. 

“Well…if we’re on the subject of faces I wanna ride, the Ryes are having their barbecue next Saturday, you and Hudson gonna make it out?” 

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.” 

“I’ll be seeing you then, Pratt, and hopefully you too, junior deputy. I gotta call my remodeling guys.”

They say goodbyes and wave off Adelaide, going back to the patrol car. Dahlia cuddling her new opossum friend as she goes. This is her baby now and will comfort her through humiliation at the hands of Hope County’s sex perverts. 

“What are you doing?” Pratt asks, when Dahlia opens the car door. 

“What do you mean?” 

“Fuckin’, put the opossum down!”

“No.” 

“You’re not bringing that thing into the car.” 

“I’m not abandoning my child.” 

“It’s literally a wild animal.” 

“It’s a opossum, not a bear, calm your tits,” Dahlia tells him firmly, opening the door and plopping down with her critter in her lap. Pratt groans and jumps in the driver side. 

“So, what, you’re gonna take it home and make it a pet?” 

“No.” 

“Then what?” 

“You know how some stations have like animals and stuff?” 

“You mean K-9 units, trained dogs? You wanna train a fuckin’ opossum?” 

“No, don’t be ridiculous,” she rolls her hand flippantly, “I’m not gonna train her, she’s perfect the way she is.” 

“Have fun getting the sheriff on board with this, that thing could be rabid for all you know.” 

“Opossums don’t carry rabies; like they physically can’t have rabies.” 

“Okay, fuckin’, opossum expert.” 

Dahlia spends a mile or two, just watching out the window at the world passing by as she scratches at her new friend’s ears. Passing by a sign for Rye and Son’s Aviation, she remembers the conversation with Adelaide. 

“Who’re the Rye’s?”  She turns her head towards Pratt, head cocking to the side in curiously. 

“Huh? Oh, they’re a couple who live not too far from Falls End. They have these big barbecues that basically the entire county shows up to; everyone brings some food, it’s a whole thing.” 

“That’s nice.” 

“You should come.” 

“I don’t know them.” 

“It’s open invitation, you live in Hope County, cook some food, show up. It’ll be fun.” 

“Just like the F.A.N.G Center?”  She raises an eyebrow 

“Well, if you don’t freak out and run off halfway through, yeah, things can be fun.” 

“Yeah, sure, whatever.” She rolls her eyes and sticks her tongue out at Pratt. 

Side eyes and double takes are taken at Dahlia as she walks into the station carrying a opossum. Dahlia just nuzzles her face against the top of the opossum’s head as they reach the office, plopping down in her chair and propping her feet up on her desk. Pratt walks past with his lunch and Dahlia grabs a handful of apple slice off his plate; making the older deputy stop and glare at her.

“Can I help you?”

“I gotta feed her.” Dahlia shrugs, letting the opossum munch on one of the slices of fruit.

“Feed her your lunch.”

“My lunch is an energy drink and a twinkie.” She ate the last of the lunches Caroline sent with her; an empty fridge and a sink full of Tupperware waiting for her at home. 

“How the hell are you still alive?”

“The world’s too cruel to end my misery.”

“Jesus fuck,” he rolls his eyes, “calm it down, Hot Topic.”

“What are you doing, Rook?” Heat zings up Dahlia’s cheeks when she hears Hudson’s voice and sudden fear that being the weird opossum girl might not be what she wants.

“Is that a fuckin’ rat?” A guy next to her, dressed in the standard officer uniform asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Feeding...opossum…Who are you?”

“Rook, this is Brennan, he’s one of our officers, Brennan this is-”

“The rookie deputy, I know, I’m officer Beau Brennan, nice to meet ya,” he says, extending a hand and she moves the opossum to properly shake it.  Beau Brennan, possibly the most southern sounding name she’s ever heard, especially this far up North.

“Nice to meet you, too.”

“But, uh, Rook,” Hudson looks at Dahlia, “should you really be bringing a wild animal into the station?”

“Maybe not...she’s friendly, though.”

“So, Joey questions you and she has a point,” Pratt swings his hand in an angry gesture, “but I do it and I get mocked?”

“Yes.”

“Well, why don’t you tell Joey, how you want the opossum to be the station pet?”

“Do you?” Joey raises an eyebrow at Dahlia, the younger deputy’s face turning a deeper shade of scarlett.

“...yes..”

“If you want the thing so bad, why not just take it home as your own pet?”

“That’s what I was asking!” Pratt butts in.

“Five seconds ago, you were asking how the hell I kept myself alive, you want me in charge of keeping something else alive?”

“She’s got you there,” Hudson looks back to Dahlia, mirth lighting up those olive green eyes, “what's her name gonna be?”

Dahlia suddenly has no coherent thought in her head. Just cricket noises as she realizes she’s never actually named an animal in her life. Every time she’s ever had a pet or something close to one, she just refers to it by species or someone else names it. The cat’s name is cat, dog’s name is dog.

“....Opossum…?”

“Not how names work,” Hudson pets behind the opossum’s ear, “Petunia?”

“Petunia, it is,” Dahlia flusters to say grinning, she’s actually okay with this, Hudson doesn’t mind the weird opossum girl.  

“Why are you encouraging her!?”

“‘Cause it’s annoying you.”

“I think the girls have you outnumbered, Staci.”

“Staci?” Dahlia looks over at Pratt, is that his first name? She’s never actually heard it before. His face completely falls, hazel eyes harsh and angry.

“Shut up.”

“Your name is Staci, oh my god.”

“Spelled with an ‘i’,” Beau adds, grinning as Dahlia starts cackling.

“Oh my god, you have a sorority girl name!”

“Laugh it up, you know when Whitehorse comes back, you’re gonna have to say goodbye to your new friend.”

“Eh, it’s Rook, so he won’t mind much,” Joey says, shrugging her shoulders.

“Huh?”

“You don’t know?” Brennan raises an eyebrow at her, “everyone knows that the sheriff is soft on you. Been hardly a week and it’s like he’s adopted you.”

Her cheeks hurt from grinning, Whitehorse sees her like his own child? She knows she’s lucky to even have gotten the job; let alone the way he’s been going the extra mile to make her feel at place here. But knowing he may see her like family lights up her heart. The sheriff already reminded her of Lloyd before, but hearing that cements the comparison.

“Dear god, if you were a dog, your tail would be wagging,” Pratt-Staci, grumbles as he pinches the bridge of his nose.

“It's cute,” Brennan defends her, “we don’t even need a canine unit with her around. Ow!”

Brennan jumps when Dahlia kicks him in the shin, hard enough to bruise she’s hoping. Hudson and Pratt laugh. Petunia is content and nuzzling into Dahlia’s neck as the four shoot the shit, the topic of the Rye barbecue coming up. Hudson and Brennan both plan on being there as well.  Dahlia finds herself sinking deeper into her chair, holding Petunia closer. Taking her phone from her pocket and checking the notifications on John’s little video. Other than someone claiming he looks familiar and another person saying he’s hot; it’s mostly more taunts. 

“What’s going on here?” Whitehorse’s voice cuts through the chatter, the sheriff coming through and spotting the gathered deputies and officer. His eyes landing on Petunia within a second, “Rook?”

“Yeah?” She scrolls past someone using a gif of John’s light up yes sign as a reaction gif. 

“Why are you holding a opossum?”

“She likes being held.” She doesn’t bother looking up from the phone. 

“She?”

“Her name’s Petunia.”

“You can’t have a opossum.”

“She’s the station opossum.”

“Rook,” Whitehorse sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose, “just go put her outside.”

“So, she’s an outside station pet?”

“I don’t care as long as she’s outside.”

“I’m taking that as a yes,” Dahlia says, finally looking up and grinning ear to ear. Whitehorse shakes his head and just waves her off before going into his office, no doubt looking for some Tylenol or Aspirin at this point.

“That’s it,” Pratt lets out a heavy exhale, shaking his head at Dahlia.

“Told ya, soft on Rook.”

“I’m gonna take Petunia outside, to her new home.”

“Do you think she’ll stay around?” Hudson asks, as her and Pratt follow after Dahlia, towards the little lot of land behind the department.

“If I keep feeding her, she should, right?”

“I’m gonna have to start bringing two lunches, aren’t I?”

“Nah, you don’t wanna overfeed her.”

“Hilarious.”

The wind is blowing just a bit; breezing by and shifting the grass around them. The sun starting to set as the evening arrives. Petunia licks her cheek and then runs up on Dahlia’s shoulder, little hands grabbing at her skin as she clambers up onto her head; curling up like she belongs there.

“Pffft,” Hudson sputters out a laugh, “look this way, Rook.”

Dahlia faces Joey, grinning with the apples of her cheeks flushing red. The older deputy has her phone out and snaps a photo of Dahlia with Petunia perched on her head. She’s not sure why the moment is worth catching, but she’s glad it was.

“Send that to me, if you don’t mind…” Dahlia asks as she puts Petunia down in the grass.

“No problem,” she taps away and Dahlia feels her phone buzz, “and don’t worry I’ll send it to you, too, Pratt.”

“I didn’t ask for it.”

“Didn’t have to.”

Dahlia sits down on the ground, petting Petunia as the sun sets. As always Hudson and Pratt leave that evening for the Spread Eagle, she catches Brennan talking about going to the Hollyhock Saloon with some fellow officers before she leaves. Everyone has their friend group, their routine. And it’s time for her own; going home to an empty trailer. 

And an empty fridge, she remembers. Oh god, she has to go shopping doesn’t she? It’s a break in the monotony but she’s not sure it’s a welcomed one. She also has to do dishes at some point…and laundry…  Adulting sucks. 

There’s a little family owned market in the Henbane River region; just a bit more to it than the general store in Falls End. The fluorescent lights irritate her eyes as she pulls off her helmet to look around. Never the cooking type; Dahlia’s hoard comprises of things that don’t require more than a microwave to prep. Frozen meals, snacks, and absolute garbage pile high in her cart as she scours the shelves for more. This might get her through for a week. 

Her phone buzzes, another Twitter notification, she’s sure someone else reacting to the Eden’s Gate commercial. She tugs her phone from her pocket; just like she thought a Twitter notification, but the message beneath it catches her eye. A text from Hudson, where she sent the photo of Dahlia and Petunia. The young deputy hasn’t gotten around to opening it; mind preoccupied. She opens the message. 

Dahlia doesn’t take pictures of herself and has never been particularly enthralled with her own appearance. But, she likes this photo of her. Petunia is perched on her head, dark eyes warm and soft. The evening sun setting behind Dahlia illuminates her in golden light; dark hair mussed, brown eyes lighting up amber where the light hits, and a wide grin on her face. 

Beneath the photo is a message from Hudson captioning it; 

‘cant tell who looks better here’ 

 Heat makes it way up to her hairline. Is…did Hudson call her cute? She’s comparing Dahlia to Petunia, a opossum, both Petunia specifically and opossums in general are cute. So if Hudson’s saying Dahlia’s looks are on par with a opossum; does Hudson mean she’s cute? But, not everyone thinks opossums are cute… Some people think they’re gross little trashy goblins, does Hudson think she looks like a trash goblin? She seemed to like Petunia, but just cause she was nice to the animal doesn’t mean she thinks opossums are cute. Dahlia leans her forehead against the freezer section for a moment; letting a turkey meal cool her flushed face as she forces herself to not agonize over this. 

A few deep breathes and a concerned passerby make Dahlia straighten back up, getting her bearings before heading to self-check-out. She quickly rings up her items and bags them, leaving the market with her grocery bags in tow. 

“Leave me alone…please…”  A soft demure voice whispers, a woman about Dahlia’s age stands beside the road a man towering over her with a beet red face. The smell of liquor coming off him on the wind. His hand is wrapped tightly around her wrist, her skin indenting under his grasp as she tries to fold in on herself to avoid his touch. 

“Wh-what, you scared daddy Joe’ll call you a sinner for spending some time with me?”

The stench of alcohol wafts off his breath with every drunken slur; even at a distance, the smell churns her stomach.  She drops her bags on the cement and makes a beeline towards them, she needs to keep this from escalating, or someone will get hurt. 

“Leave me alone!” The girl’s voice shakes as she tries to pry herself from the man’s grasp. 

“Fuckin’ peggie whore!”  

“Hey!” Dahlia yells out and runs as his other hand starts to raise and pull back. 

She gets between them just in time to feel the crack of his hand striking her face. An ache and echo of pain rings through her jaw; a metallic taste where her cheek scraped the inside of her jaw.  Glassy eyes widen, the man shocked at the interruption. 

“Wh-who-”

“I’m a deputy with the Sheriff’s Department, and unless you want some jail time for assault, I recommend you get the fuck out of here.” 

“Pssh,” he scoff, whiskey scented spittle spraying into the air, “li-”

“I’m giving you to the count of three to get out of my sight, sir. One,” she leans into his space, glaring him down and sneering as she counts, “two, th-“ 

“F-fine, fine, fuckin’ bitch.”

He makes a dismissive hand gesture as he grumbles a curse, but he stumbles away, leaving the two girls alone. Dahlia rubs absent mindedly at her cheek before turning towards the girl; a peggie, he called her. One of the followers of Eden’s Gate. She’s beautiful, five or so inches taller than Dahlia, with long black hair falling in waves down her shoulders. Delicate fine facial features, the deputy can’t help but feel the girl’s face might have shattered has it been struck.  Like the handful of peggies she’s seen, traces of tattoos and markings are on her. ENVY etched across her chest and a delicate tattoo of vines with blue flowers curling up her forearm.  

“Are you okay?” Dahlia asks her. 

“Oh yes, yes, I’m fine, but are you?”

The girl reaches out, fingers nearly brushing over Dahlia’s cheek. She instinctively ducks back, avoiding the touch. Strangers touching her is never something she’s been fond of, though she can’t imagine many people are. 

“I’ve taken worse from better; I’ll be fine.  You be careful and have a safe night, ma’am.” Dahlia nods at her and makes the quick walk to her abandoned groceries and bike. 

She stoops down and begins to collect the food that fell from her bags. A pair of slender hands join in, helping gather up a bag of microwave meals for her, the girl offering it to Dahlia once it’s secure. 

“Thanks,” Dahlia murmurs, taking it from the stranger, stashing her groceries in the little storage space under her motorcycle’s seat. 

“It’s the least I can do…I’ve never seen you before.” 

“I started here about a week ago.” 

“Really, that’s incredible…The Lord placed you here at the exact right time.” 

“Nah, I just needed groceries,” Dahlia shrugs, “well, hope you have a nice night.”

“Wait,” she knots a hand in the deputy’s shirt, “I’m Layla…” 

“Nice to meet you,” Dahlia offers, Layla’s dark brown eyes are darting around, avoiding eye contact. 

“I…was on my way to a sermon at Father Joseph’s church and-”

“Look, Layla, if you need my help just say the word. But, if this is the beginning of a conversion spiel; save your breath and my time, ‘cause it ain’t happening.” 

“I don’t feel safe, going there alone, right now. What if he comes back?” Her arms cross over herself, the thin cardigan not doing much to protect her from the night chill. 

“Oh, uh, you don’t have anyone who can go with you? Aren’t religions like, community things?”

“I was gonna walk there by myself, but…” 

“Fuckin’ hell, where is it?”

“Up the north bridge, one of the island’s in the middle of the county, it isn’t far.” 

“Here,” Dahlia shoves her helmet at Layla, “I got one helmet and if anyone’s brains are splattering on the road, I’d rather they be mine.”

Layla pulls the helmet on over her head, body still shivering. Dahlia shies and shrugs off her leather jacket; it’s only going to get colder on the ride there with wind whipping around. She hands it to Layla who smiles and takes it, pulling the worn black leather jacket on. Oversized on Dahlia and still marginally so on Layla. 

“Thank you,” Layla murmurs as Dahlia straddles her bike, then climbs on the back. Dahlia takes in a deep breathe when arms wrap around her midsection, Layla pressing in close to the deputy’s back as she starts the engine. The familiar nature of the touch contrasting with the fact they’re strangers. 

As Dahlia makes her way up to the bridge, Layla lifts the visor just a smidge so that she can whisper directions in the deputy’s ear. Once she’s past the bridge coming from the Henbane, the roads have fencing and barbwire, making it nearly impossible to go from the road into the woods on the island. She rides down the winding road, taking a left turn off the paved road onto a beaten path, rounding the corner she sees it. 

A cold sweat builds on the back of her neck, heart dropping into her stomach. It’s a collection of small white buildings, dark roofs, with Latin scrawled across some of the buildings; Luxuria, Acedia, and more she’s sure. All of it on a large piece of land, within she can see picnic tables, bundles of white flowers, where they might gather for picnics or barbecues. She pulls her bike to a stop just a distance from the white gate; Church of Eden’s Gate etched in the upper arches. 

People are all around, getting out of white trucks and cars, greeting each other with hugs and waves; throwing side eye glances at Dahlia when they notice her. Dogs are barking somewhere; she doesn’t know where from. Layla clambers off the back of Dahlia’s bicycle, pulling off her helmet and handing it back to her. 

“Sister Layla,” a deep masculine voice rumbles out, a familiar man standing by the white gates. Tall with a thick dark beard, his deep dark eyes are focused on Dahlia as he speaks to Layla. Theodore is what the other man called him that day when Dahlia caught them stealing from The Spread Eagle. He looks a moment away from ripping the deputy’s head off her shoulders; his shirt dipping in a way that exposes the way PRIDE etches across his chest, crossed out as are all sins the church members wear. 

“Brother Theodore, this is-”

“The new deputy, we’ve met, why is she here?” 

“I was just getting ready to leave, don’t worry.” 

“What,” Layla’s eyes widen and she grasps Dahlia’s arm, “you can’t.” 

“I can’t…?” Dahlia raises an eyebrow and shoots a pointed look where Layla’s grabbing her, making the girl let go. Layla’s trying to rope her into this shit, isn’t she?

“You came all this way Deputy, why not just come in, listen to the sermon.” 

“Not happening, I already told you, not my scene. Just give me back my jacket, so I can leave, okay?” 

“But,” Layla chews her lip, gears in her head turning, “how am I suppose to get home?” 

“I saw at least thirty people go in that church, I’m sure someone will be willing to give you a ride home.” 

“Oh, uh, I-” 

“Brother Theodore, Sister Layla, service will be starting soon!” Someone calls out from within the compound. 

“I have to go, I’ll be right back, Deputy!” Layla rushes to say and then runs off towards the church, Dahlia’s jacket still on her shoulders. 

“Hey, wait!” Dahlia jogs after Layla, hurrying through the little compound, but the woman vanishes into the steepled church ordained in cross symbols. 

She stops, just before entering the door and takes a step back. The crush of boots in dirt echoes beside her before coming to a stop, the looming of someone nearby. Body heat lingering near her side as she looks up at the cross on the topmost steeple of the church. 

“You going in?” 

“No.” 

“Have fun out here,” Theodore tells her, moving to press a heavy hand against the church door. 

“Those dogs,” she starts, listening to the barks ringing out around her, “they friendly?” 

“Why don’t you go find out?” He leaves her with a smirk, walking into that church. 

Dahlia lets out a harsh breath and pushes her hand back through her hair. A breeze pushes through, her t-shirt and thin uniform shirt does nothing to keep out the chill. She’s not leaving without her jacket; her wallet and phone all in the pockets.  Music echoes from inside the church as she plops down onto the ground outside it, balancing her helmet on her knees and resting her chin on it. 

If your soul has grown weary, and your heart feels tired… 

She fidgets with her helmet, chewing her lip. Please let this Joseph guy be short winded, she just wants to leave. The entire place sets her on edge, makes her skin crawl and she wants to hide away. 

Let the water wash away your sins…

A cool breeze passes by, a soft whipping sound mingling with the singing. She scans the night sky, searching for her favorite and only known constellation, she has a feeling she’s going to be here a while… 

[fablecoingolf]

thots on LOGAN, on REAVER, on BEN FINN,

oh man, this might be long I warn you! I’m not sure how best to format it I think I’m gonna do like dots, coz otherwise it’ll be just a massive block of text

LOGAN:

honestly not as many thoughts as the other two aside from “nerd” and “inconsistent face” I look forward to trying to draw him one day and by look forward to I mean dread very much!!!

he’s totally not cishet look how he sits and his colour palette is pretty close to the ace flag so, though since he’s the villain for the decent amount of the game it’s important to be careful with that

I think that his design in combination with how the hobw tends to look feels antisemitic in a way that is recurring in fable that should be addressed more often I really hope if 4 ever happens they change the like good/evil morph pretty considerably, 3 is an improvement though

I don’t have many feelings towards him though as a character, there’s a thing with tone in 3 that I’ll talk about more with reaver that influences this I think, and just in general he sort of exists separately to everyone for most of the game, like he’s the player characters brother you should feel Something but there’s just no like. anything to their interactions. what’s his relationship like with theresa, with walter, with like Anyone, he just monologues at a map!!! do something talk to someone half a character is their interactions!!!! fuck!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

like he’s fun I’ve made posts about him before, on a surface level he’s fun but like past that I just don’t really feel anything towards him? so it’s kind of hard to talk about him

I had an image of him up on my screen while writing this so this entire time he’s been staring me down hdkdj

the uh, like art of him with, the front of the armor that’s shaped like a crown is very funny that’s supposed to go on your head what are you doing

I have my own idea of how Hero stuff works because this is my canon now and I can’t be stopped and I really don’t like some parts of how they say it works, but I don’t know if now is the best place or time to talk about that, it’s partially relevant to all these characters but it’s kind of hard to explain and I feel like by the time I reach the end of this I’ll have no more words so I should really save them? I don’t know, I bring it up because it’s relevant though I just can’t decide

REAVER:

it’s funny that that’s his name, dude’s not very creative huh? like a clothier named Tailor, we get it george you steal things

I mean my name is crow because.I like crows..but I’M allowed to name myself stupid things because I’M sexy and cool and awesome and my ideas are good ones always (sarcasm)

for real though my thoughts here are complicated because there are parts to this character that touch on things that I like(pirates,cool spooky void stuff,) but those don’t get like, any focus

I like him in 2! I only like him in 2. aside from the weird character design decisions 3 made, theres the tone thing I mentioned at logan that I’ve been thinking about lately I’m not sure I can word it right but I’ll give it a shot!

so like, I think, fable likes to be funny, the feel it generally goes for is fun and it’s a fantasy game yknow? characters like jack of blades and lady grey (and the crawler kiiiind of? a bit) are obviously bad but because of either the way the game treats them or the way the game feels or the things they do theyre fun villains who I like! reaver in 2 falls into this I think, yes pirates are real but, like knights and stuff there’s. I can’t think how to word it, there’s a difference between historical knights and fantasy knights and reaver is a fantasy pirate, the shadow court stuff is obviously bad but that’s also not real? the tone of 2 is more serious than 1 and I haven’t replayed it in a while so I’d have to play it to know how it lands Exactly. but reaver in 3 hits too real with actual things and lady grey is also evil rich person but the tone of the game carries that where 3 is serious about it and it’s effects that’s like the whole point and you can have a character and a game that does that but you can’t have that character Also be the fun villain because then it confuses things, that’s Also not to say the fun villain can’t be interesting or like metaphors or whatever obviously it’s just The Feel of the thing, fable 3 can have its evil factory guy but reaver isn’t the character for that for so many reasons. I really don’t think I explained this in a way that makes any sense I can try to word it clearer another time maybe

I have fixed this internal problem I have by pretending very very hard that reaver isn’t in 3 and that’s just some other guy and that’s fixed all of my problems, even that stuff aside from a character perspective I don’t buy it

I have a whole thing about what he’s doing in 3 because I don’t know who the onceler guy is but that’s not him. it’s very neat I think please ask me about it I need an excuse to talk about it and this is already an excuse sure but it’s already very long

anyone else noticed that he always wears things that cover his neck? I noticed it when compiling reference images for my animal crossing thing and I hate to give you the bad news but I am certain he’d never wear the sexy pirate shirt, if I had to design modern clothes for him he’d have a turtleneck

I feel like I could read into the way he dresses (gloves, high neck,yknow?) in an interesting way actually but I’d need to think on it more

also actually before I keep pretending he’s not in 3 I don’t want to brush over the transmisogyny in the poster which is supposed to be viewed as a positive thing since it shows up, like when the rebellion is progressing right? I don’t remember the exact point of the game but you get what I mean. or the dress which would be fine if he wasn’t an antagonist in this game + the poster making it clear it’s intended to be something to be made fun of

I have made pokemon teams for the fable 2 heros because I think about them a lot and pokemon a lot and I want to share but I might wait until I’m in a pokemon brain space so it’s easier for me to, but I have Thoughts

the man who lives forever by lord huron has oakvale reaver vibes for obvious reasons and it’s also a good song and you should listen to it

a few lord huron songs do actually but I don’t want to associate those other ones with him in my brain because I like them and,like, it’s not my fault our aesthetics overlap!! I hate that!!!!!! I’M the sexier bi/pan nonbinary occult pirate Back Off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He gets ONE lord huron song, ONE, no more!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have a few conflicting ideas of oakvale reaver actually I need to settle on one but I’m not sure which I’m gonna go with, one that song matches with way better

he wins second place in having inconsistent face hdkdhk

I’m always torn talking about him for like all the reasons I’ve stated and like, people talk about him plenty and maybe what I could say is different coz I think I interpret the character different to the way I see a lot, but it feels like I could put my energy elsewhere better same reason why it feels weird to draw him? he’s popular adding to that pile rather than like anyone else would feel weird of me, but my brain latches on to pirate and goes wild coz they’re important to me separately so, yknow I’m torn

I could say more probably coz like I said the fable 2 heros are my favourites and I have the most thoughts on them, but I’ve been writing this for actual hours coz words are very difficult to make and I have stuff I need to do today

anyway the oakvale ghost pirate is still cooler, he says yarrrrr and Didnt cause oakvales destruction, and he loves his wife!!! that’s like +1000 sexy points!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and he’s a ghost which rocks

BEN FINN:

he’s good : ) !

I like him! he’s good

my thoughts here are very simple and I can’t elaborate past “: ) !!!”

oh he’s trans and bi

and while I usually don’t care about ships unless they’re the seafaring kind, page+hobw+ben finn is cute

he’s just good I have nothing to say and no complicated feelings i just think he’s neat : ) !

one day I’ll elaborate on the hero thing I was talking about with logan I just don’t have the energy right now

I genuinely can’t think of anything right now I’m sorry hdkdjf I just like him that’s enough!!

[halberdierminister]

July Monthly Goals Check-In

1. Write 250 Words Each Day Well, I started out very faithful to this. But sometime around the middle of the month, I got pretty choppy. I honestly don't know exactly how many days I skipped. I'm gonna try to write a fair amount today when I can and hope that it is enough to make up for it. Which is fine. It has been an otherwise very productive month in many other ways, so I cannot be too upset about it. I may start running a wordpress blog with a friend of mine, and if I do that may keep me more on track with these.. We shall see. We shall see.

2. Read 55 Books This Year I finished reading 55 books in May! Last month I read 10 more books. THIS month, however… I read 31 books. That brings me to a total of 97 books read for the year!!! A lot of them have been VERY short books. Lots of poetry collections, manga volumes, graphic novels, etc etc etc. But not exclusively!! I was hoping to get to 100 books by the time I wrote this but the last couple days, I have not been able to make the magic happen. But that's fine! That's TOTALLY FINE. This will be a very significant get, but I have months to get over that hump. By the time you hear from me on this goals check-in next month, I will undoubtedly be decently well over 100 books, and I can talk about why that personally feels so good then!

3. Get A Full Time Job I did not get a full time job this month. BUT. I applied to 38 full time jobs. Got a bunch of rejections. HOWEVER, I have scheduled EXACTLY ONE JOB INTERVIEW so far so that is good news! And that would be a VERY good job if I were to get it! Some of these jobs are actually pretty exciting things and I feel confident for the first time in a while that I might actually find a good job IN MY CAREER PLAN!!!! Also I almost lost my part time job but the library director was able to convince the village to let me stay on as a substitute, and it has paid off surprisingly well. I've been working two to three shifts a week on that, which is more than any of us expected. So I guess what I'm saying is I am making good progress again and I hope I can have something positive to report by the time I'm thirty. Eugh.

4. Move Out Speaking of being almost thirty. I really do not want to be here. If I get the job I interview for, I would be able to move in with my friends in Milwaukee just about as soon as possible. So that is good news. Every day it gets more tempting to just say "screw it" and live down there. But that won't help me find a job. And the job really is the important thing.

5. Drink Less Soda I mean yeah. Occasionally, I drink-a the soda. But not too much. I am good at drinking less soda than I did last year or the years before that. That's because I would have several sodas each day, to the point where it worried some of the people I know.

6. Get Something Published Just found out that I'm getting something else published today! So that is one new poem published this month! I also had my fic in the Lalonde Zine come out, but it turns out that the Lalonde Zine was more of a shared Google Drive folder than an actual zine. Maybe I should offer to compile the zine into one document? I should do that. That would be a good thing to do and it would give me a lot of experience with doing that, something I haven't really done in a while. So the practice would do me good! And then I would feel better saying that I got published there too. But yes so besides the Lalonde fic, I have had two poems published in zines, one poem published in an online literary journal, and one fic published in an online fanzine this year! If you include the articles I wrote for school newspapers, I have gotten at least one thing published every year for the past fifteen years. If you don't count the articles (or the Lalonde fic yet), I have had 30 pieces of fiction and poetry published since 2005! That's pretty neat! I want even more though!!!!!! I found a publisher's website that accepts unsolicited manuscripts. I'm going to try to put together an honest to god actual collection of my poetry, one bigger than either of the two digital chapbooks I have made. I have a friend who is a professional editor -- not of poetry, mind you, but I might be able to convince her to give it a shot -- and I would honestly hire her at full price to take a look at it. I actually will need to seek a lot of feedback from a lot of people, so if you want to read a document full of a bunch of my poetry, lemme know and I will show you what I've got when I've got something.

7. Finish Writing A Legitimate Businessman Finished in April! No new news. But just because I completed this goal doesn't mean that is the end of it! I do still have the sequel to work on, even though I haven't done any of that this month. And one of these days I am going to get around to sitting down with the printed copy and a pen and editing the shit out of it so that I can write draft #2! I think I'll probably throw draft #2 up on wattpad (why not?? I've been curious about that website and know absolutely nothing about it) and maybe I'll make a nice looking e-book out of it that I can distribute on noisetrade or itchio or something! I wonder if I could get it printed on demand or something. Obviously not for profit. But like, maybe I have friends I want to send a nice printed copy to.

8. Write More The Revelation of Takaya According to Jin Finished in Februrary! No new news. A friend of mine has offered to bind a copy of it when he has access to the materials, and I think that'd be dope as hell. I ought to work on compiling it into a nice document. I don't know if that's what he would need. He would probably want to do that work himself. Sometimes I think about the concept of making an illustration for it? I don't know. I can't draw. But I might not need to draw for the thing I have in mind. Really I should be consulting with him on that. Ah well. Either way, I hope that ends up happening. That would be so friggin cool.

MINOR GOALS

9. Finish Playthroughs Of 1. The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild: Finished in January! 2. Persona 1 Main Quest Good Ending: I didn't do anything on this whooooops. Getting into the second half of the year without once having touched it. I ought to get back to this. 3. Pokemon Sword: Finished in March! 4. Pokemon Let's Go Eevee: Finished in February and March! 5. Persona Q2: I have finished the fourth dungeon and gotten to The Twist!!! It's weak. This really is the kids' version of a Persona game. Minus like… the fact that it's still rated M for partial nudity. There was exactly one moment of horror and even that was like… just a bit scarier than The Nightmare Before Christmas. But I did some of the side quests and those are actually decently fun. So I have the final dungeon left. I just wanna sort of power through this. I'll worry about completion when I do new game plus, whenever that might be.

10. Record More Ukulele Videos I did not do this. I want a new microphone. These are not inherently related things, as I do have a microphone already. I have everything I need to do this. I just haven't done this. And I would like a new microphone. Also, an amp for the uke would be nice. I should text my old coworker, see if he still has one to sell.

11. Record Let's Plays Neither did I do this. How could I? My parents think video gaming is the Devil's Lettuce. And they are always home. They would notice if they heard me talking to my computer. And that is assuming that I had something I could play on my computer that anyone would want to watch. I need a better computer. A gaming computer. An editing computer. I'm lucky that these are the same thing.

12. Duolingo? I was SUPER gung ho in the end of June and the beginning of July, but before too long I petered out. I've used a couple streak freezes and have really been doing mostly the bare minimum to not drop out of the emerald league. But I've got a streak of about 208 days, and that is nothing to sneeze at! Do I feel like I'm learning? I dunno. But I am at least interacting with Spanish just about every day so that… that's got to be helpful, right? right?

This was over one thousand five hundred words. Wait! Sixteen hundred exactly.

[buoyantsaturn]

I’m in Hell (8/?)

summary: Halloween is the ONLY thing that happens in this chapter

word count: 5,571 (104,865 total) ((finally broke 100k!!!))

read on ao3

It was Reyna’s last day in New York, though rather than going out and doing as many touristy things as possible, Nico and Reyna stayed back at the Solace household for the day. She had all of her belongings packed up just after lunch, which left her and Nico sprawled out on the couch for the next few hours until she had to leave to catch her flight.

“Is this what you do all day?” Reyna asked.

“Not usually,” Nico replied, and then tipped his head back in thought. “Well, I don’t know what I usually do anymore, not since I graduated and now that Bi’s back in school. And Will’s back to work. God, I’m going to be so bored when you leave.”

A moment passed between them until Reyna said, “Do you think you would want to have another kid?”

Nico frowned. “What? No, why?”

She shrugged. “Another kid would definitely keep you busy. Have you talked to Will about it?”

“About what, being bored? He’s got plenty to worry about besides me being bored.”

Reyna rolled her eyes. “No, you idiot, about having another kid. Does he know you don’t want another one?”

Nico sat up a little straighter. “No, we haven’t talked about it. Do you think he wants another kid?”

“You’ll have to ask him.”

“What do I do if he does want another kid?” Nico continued, already starting to spiral. “What if that’s some kind of a dealbreaker for him?”

Reyna sighed. “He would have told you already if it was that big of a deal. Just talk to him when he gets home - he loves you, and he’s going to support your choices. You have got to stop spiraling so fast, you know? Especially when everything can be solved with a quick conversation.”

Nico huffed. “I know, I just-- I don’t want to ruin this, you know? This is the best relationship I’ve ever been in, and I want to hold on to him for as long as I can.”

Shortly after Will and Bianca returned home from work and school respectively, Reyna packed her bags into her rental car and drove herself back to the airport. Bianca was sent to bed sometime after dinner, and as soon as Will had finished tucking her in, he grabbed his fiance by the hand and dragged Nico into their bedroom.

“What are you doing?” Nico asked with a laugh as he watched Will flop back onto the bed.

“Trying to cuddle with my fiance,” Will told him, pouting and reaching his hands out for Nico. “Babe, come on!”

Nico snorted and grabbed Will’s hand, only to get pulled off his feet and onto the bed. Will rolled himself halfway on top of Nico and buried his face in Nico’s neck, sighing contentedly and wrapping his arms around him as best he could in that position.

“I feel like I haven’t had any alone time with you in so long,” Will complained. “I’ve missed this.

“It’s been a week, maybe,” Nico pointed out, running a hand through Will’s hair.

“Feels longer,” Will muttered. “Did you have a nice time with Reyna before she left?”

Nico hummed noncommittally.

Will lifted his head and looked at Nico with a furrowed brow. “Did something happen?”

“No, we just sort of talked about...stuff.”

“Are you being intentionally vague because you think it’ll get me to drop this?” Will asked. “Because you should know by now that that won’t work.”

Nico sighed. He patted Will’s shoulder and shifted slightly until Will moved off of him enough that he could sit up and hug his knees to his chest. “I don’t think I ever told you that I never wanted kids.” He ran a hand through his hair, his eyes dropping to the sheets between them. “Don’t get me wrong, I love Bianca more than I ever thought it would be possible for me to love a kid, but the thought of having my own kid--” He shook his head. “I don’t know how you did it. Even with your help, I just… I don’t think I could.”

“Did you think I wanted another kid?” Will asked gently. Nico shrugged, and so Will sat up to wrap an arm around Nico’s shoulders. “I don’t. I never really wanted kids either, to be honest. Bi ended up as more of a...pleasant surprise, you could say.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, she’s technically my sister, you know?” Will reminded him. “I didn’t even know she existed until my dad showed up at my mom’s house one day when I was in med school, and he asked me to babysit for a few hours. I should’ve realized he wasn’t coming back, considering I don’t even think he gave me an excuse for why he couldn’t take Bi with him wherever he was going. I took Bi to the police station to get somebody to find my dad so he could take her back, but the police officer said she would’ve ended up in foster care until they found him. Honestly, I didn’t want anything to do with her, but I wasn’t going to force her into foster care either, and then soon enough...she just felt like she was mine, you know?”

Nico finally looked up at his fiance. “Apollo didn’t fight back when you adopted her?”

“He never even showed up to court,” Will replied, shaking his head. “I think Bi was probably a year and a half, maybe two years old at that point, and the judge decided that since I’d been taking care of her for so long already, and since Apollo couldn’t even bother to show up, that all of her parental rights should be transferred to me.” He sighed, leaning against Nico heavily and pressing a kiss to the side of his head. “I guess everything happens for a reason, right? If I didn’t have Bianca, then I never would have met you.”

“I’m sure we would have found each other,” Nico said softly, leaning back against Will just as much. “True love always finds a way, right?” Even as he said it, Nico couldn’t keep a straight face at the cheesiness of his words.

Will snorted unattractively in Nico’s ear. “That was so dumb.”

Nico pouted up at him. “I thought you loved me.”

“Of course I do, but that doesn’t change the fact that you just said a very silly thing.”

Nico turned himself to face Will fully, though Will’s arm around him didn’t allow Nico to go very far, which left Nico kneeling at Will’s side. “Oh, so now I’m dumb and silly?”

Will tugged him forward until Nico fell against his chest. “I love you so much. It’s dumb how much I love you. My love for you makes me silly.”

Nico rolled his eyes and tried to shove himself away from Will. “Oh, god, okay! I get it, now get off of me--”

“Get on top of you?” Will grinned at Nico’s loud complaints, and tipped them to the side until Will was laying on top of his fiance once more.

“No, you’re crushing me!” Nico moaned, tossing his head from side to side as Will tried to pepper his face and neck with kisses.

When Nico finally settled down, Will set his forehead against Nico’s and smiled down at him. “I think I’m going to change my name.”

“Huh?”

“When we get married,” Will clarified, “I want to change my name. I just haven’t decided which I like better: Solace-di Angelo or di Angelo-Solace.”

Nico’s breath caught in his throat. His mouth went dry and he felt a sting behind his eyes. He croaked out, “I guess we’ll each have to pick one, then.”

Will beamed, and pressed his lips to Nico’s once more.

Will didn’t remember the last time he heard from his sister Kayla, but, to be fair, he didn’t remember what day of the week it was half of the time, either. He got a text from her one day in October - really? Was it October already? That couldn’t be right, could it? - which made Will realize that he really should be making more of an effort to get into contact with his siblings.

From: Kayla; hey, bro! long time no see. I’m throwing a halloween party next weekend and you should totally come! costumes aren’t mandatory but I’ll have to disown you if you show up in normal people clothes.

To: Kayla; Sounds great! Mind if I bring a date?

From: Kayla; well now you HAVE TO!

Will tried to bring it up to Nico as soon as he got home, after spending the rest of the day trying to think up any decent Halloween costume he could craft for himself in the next week - he was not a store-bought costume kind of man.

He entered the kitchen where Nico and Bianca were sitting at the table while Bianca did her homework, and he walked up behind them to press a kiss to the top of Bianca’s head.

Nico tipped his head back to accept his own kiss on the lips. “Hey, Sunshine.”

“Hey, did you two know that Halloween is only two weeks away?” Will asked.

Will took Nico’s wide-eyed stare as a no.

“Yep!” Bianca replied.

Will and Nico exchanged a look. “Uh, Bi, do you know what you want to dress up as?” Will asked.

“I wanna be a pikachu,” she replied without looking up from her homework.

Will frowned. He had no idea that Bianca even knew what a pikachu was. “Like, the pokemon?”

“Yeah!”

Nico smiled, glancing between the two of them. “We’ve been watching Pokemon before dinner most days.”

“That show’s still on?”

“Please,” Nico scoffed, “we’ve been watching it from the beginning.”

Will smiled fondly at his fiance. Of course Nico would get defensive over something like that. “Alright, Bi, we’ll go out sometime soon to get your costume, because I’ll need to get one anyway.”

“What do you need a costume for?” Nico asked.

“Halloween. What else? You’re going to need one, too, by the way. I hope you don’t think you can get away with a skeleton t-shirt and devil horns two years in a row.”

Nico narrowed his eyes. “Yeah, alright, I’ve got something in mind.”

“Just going to keep it a secret?”

Nico winked up at him before Bianca drew his attention to her homework.

Once her homework was finished, Bianca went to the living room to watch another episode of Pokemon while Nico started making dinner - Will offered his help a few times, though Nico shut him down each time. Out of love, of course.

Since he couldn’t help, Will leaned against the counter, resting on his elbows as he watched Nico work.

“So…” Will started, drawing out the word. “Gonna tell me what you’re dressing up as?”

“Depends. Are you going to tell me why I need a costume in the first place?”

Will tapped his fingers on the counter. “Well, uh, you know how I’ve met like, all of your friends and family? How do you feel about meeting my siblings at Kayla’s Halloween party next weekend?”

“The same siblings that threw that Christmas party last year?” Nico asked innocently, though he snorted when he looked over his shoulder to see the look of realization on Will’s face. “Forgot about that, didn’t you?”

“Not...entirely,” Will replied, then groaned, dropping his head. “Nico, do you think Austin and Kayla remember me making an ass out of myself last year? I made such a horrible first impression - I can’t let something like that happen again!”

“Not to mention how you came back here and hit on me while I was emotionally vulnerable,” Nico reminded him.

“Yes, thank you for that reminder.” Will lowering his head onto the counter. “Maybe I can get away with it if I just don’t drink. That’ll work, right?”

“Depends on how pushy Kayla is, I guess,” Nico replied with a shrug. “If anything you should probably be more worried about finding a costume than getting drunk.”

Will sighed, and straightened back upright. “Yeah. What are you thinking about doing? Maybe we can do some kind of couple’s costume or something.”

“Oh, no, no. I’ve already got mine, and it’s a surprise. You’ll have to come up with something on your own.”

Will pouted. “Don’t you want to do a couple’s costume with me?”

Nico glanced at him over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow. “Do I look like the couple’s costume type?”

“No,” Will huffed. “Alright. I’m done a little early tomorrow, so I can pick Bi up from school, and I’ll take her costume shopping. Hopefully I can find something for myself while we’re out.”

It took Will about an hour to put on his Frankenstein monster makeup. It probably would’ve been easier to just ask for Nico’s help, but if Nico was keeping his costume a secret, then so would Will. He probably didn’t need to be quite so detailed with his stitches and skin discoloration, but he was a doctor, what else would he do?

When Will finally left the bathroom, he called out, “Hey, babe, are you gonna be ready to go soon?”

Their bedroom door swung open, and Nico stepped out, wearing familiar blue scrubs and a long white coat. Will’s heart leapt into his throat as he felt himself falling in love with his fiance all over again at the sight of Nico in Will’s scrubs.

Will took a hesitant step forward, as though his movement might break whatever spell had made Nico look so unreasonably perfect, then rushed forward to drag Nico back into their bedroom and press him against the closed door.

“I’ll take that to mean you like my costume,” Nico said as Will raked his eyes up and down Nico’s form again and again.

“You look too good,” Will told him. “I can’t let the world see you like this. You’re too good looking for any eyes that aren’t mine.”

Nico laughed breathily. “Is it better or worse that I had to roll up the cuffs on the pants, like, three times?”

Will dropped his forehead to rest against Nico’s as he failed to contain his own laughter. “Worse! That’s adorable!”

“Alright, what about this?” Nico reached for the pocket of his - Will’s - lab coat, and unclipped the name badge to show Will.

Will recognized it as his own ID badge, though Nico had taped a piece of paper over it so that it looked identical to the real badge aside from the picture and name - Nico’s picture replaced Will’s, and the name beside the photo read Nico Solace.

Will’s eyes widened at the sight and his heart started to pound in his chest. Was he sure he wasn’t dreaming?

“Nico Solace,” he whispered, his voice shaking, and he felt tears pricking at the backs of his eyes as he felt himself flooding with emotion. Will wrapped his arms around Nico’s waist and hid his face in his shoulder before the tears could start to fall. “You’re going to be a Solace.”

Nico rubbed his hands soothingly up and down Will’s back. “Hey, you’d better not be crying on me, di Angelo,” he teased. “You’re going to smudge your makeup.”

Will tugged Nico toward the bed, sitting on the edge of the mattress and pulling Nico down beside him. Nico lifted Will’s head and held his face in his hands.

“Are you going to cry like this at the wedding?” Nico asked gently.

“Probably! Like you’re not going to cry when we’re getting married?” Will argued, and then a moment later, realization hit. “Oh my god, we’re getting married in, like, two months.”

Nico tipped his head to the side. “More like one month, at this point. A month and a half, maybe.”

Will darted forward for a kiss. “I love you so much.” He kissed him again and again, and pressed him back onto the bed, kissing all over his face and down his neck as he hands traveled underneath Nico’s - Will’s - scrub shirt.

“Hey, you’re gonna rub all your makeup off on me!” Nico laughed.

He expected to touch skin underneath Nico’s shirt, though all he noticed was more fabric, so Will pushed himself back and pulled Nico’s shirt up to see that Nico had pulled the waistband of the scrub pants up nearly to his ribs.

Will started laughing so hard that he couldn’t speak, just dropping himself onto Nico’s stomach.

Nico shoved him away, rolling him onto his back on the bed beside him. “Shut up, it’s not my fault you’re a tree!”

They dropped Bianca off with Hazel and Frank on their way to Kayla’s, who threw the door to her apartment open only seconds after they knocked.

“Will, you’re here!” she exclaimed, and threw her arms around her brother. Then she pulled back and turned to Nico, throwing her arms up but holding back from hugging him. “And you must be his date!”

“Fiance. Nico, nice to meet you,” Nico replied.

“Fiance?” Kayla repeated, then grabbed Nico’s hand and dragged him into the apartment, up to the island that appeared to be the bar for the night. “Austin! Will brought his fiance!”

A man popped up from behind the island - Will’s brother Austin, Nico presumed - and said, “Oh! You must be Nico, right?”

Will followed behind them and took Nico’s free hand. “Have I told you about Nico?”

“Yeah, at the Christmas party, remember?” Austin answered. “You wouldn’t shut up about him.”

Will looked away in an attempt to hide his blush, but Nico saw right through him. He squeezed his hand and grinned. “You had such a crush on me.”

“Yeah, well, it paid off, didn’t it?” Will muttered.

“We should do celebratory shots!” Kayla exclaimed, already pouring out four shots. She handed one to Will, slid one over to Austin, and then held one out for Nico, though he held up his hands and shook his head.

“Oh, no thanks, I have to drive home later,” he said calmly.

Kayla and Austin downed their shots, though Will hesitated, shooting a look at Nico.

“Go on, one shot isn’t going to kill you,” Nico told him, and Will took another second or two before he drank his own shot.

Nico didn’t make it further than the kitchen for a while, though it was probably for the best that he could keep an eye on how much Will was drinking - he’d counted four shots in total, plus most of two mixed drinks that Austin made for him. Austin was a pretty good person to stand around and chat with, too.

Eventually, Nico ventured into the rest of the apartment in search of Will, and found himself pushed down onto a couch with his fiance dropping into his lap.

“God, you’re heavy,” Nico groaned, though he wrapped his arms around Will’s waist rather than pushing him away.

“Babe,” Will said, his face pink and warm from the alcohol, “Nico, babe, we have to invite everybody here to the wedding!”

Nico cocked an eyebrow. “Did you already invite everyone?”

Will pouted. “No, I didn’t! Of course not! I had to ask you first, but we have to, okay?”

“We only brought two invites, you know that,” Nico reminded him. “Do you really want to invite some people you just met over your own brother and sister?”

Will turned himself sideways in Nico’s lap and held himself directly in front of him, nose-to-nose. “Just think about it.”

Nico snorted. “Okay, sure.”

Will hummed and tipped forward, leaning heavier against Nico. “You look so pretty right now. And all the time, but especially right now.”

“You’re just saying that because you think I look hot in your clothes,” Nico replied.

“That’s true, too.” Will pressed his lips to Nico’s sweetly, though as his kisses trailed down toward Nico’s neck, they grew progressively sloppier.

Nico pushed him back before Will could go too much further, and said, “Do you need to go home?”

Will pressed himself closer once again to whisper into Nico’s ear. “Or we could just find a dark corner and see what happens.”

“Nope,” Nico said, loud and clear, and shoved Will off of his lap. He stood before Will could return to his seat, and said to him, “Start saying your goodbyes. I’m going to get Austin and Kayla’s invites from the car.”

Will pouted as Nico walked away, fully leaving the apartment and running down to the car for the invites. They fit perfectly in the deep pockets of the lab coat Nico was wearing - why hadn’t he thought to just stuff them in there hours ago?

When he made his way back into the apartment, he found Austin before he found either Will or Kayla. “Hey,” Nico said when he walked up to him, “have you seen Will?”

Austin nodded. “Yeah, he was just over here. He said something about inviting people to your wedding, and, I mean, I doubt you guys have my address, but--”

“Yeah, I have an invite for you,” Nico cut in, fishing the two envelopes out of his pocket. “Actually, could you take Kayla’s, too? I really have to find Will.”

Austin smiled the same sunshiney smile as Will always did - it was the first thing that really convinced Nico that Austin and Will were brothers. He took the invitations with a thank you, and promised that Kayla would get her invitation.

Nico wandered further into the apartment where he finally found both Will and Kayla, standing in the hallway outside the bathroom, hugging like they would never see each other again. When Will finally noticed Nico, he practically shoved his sister away, and he threw his arms around Nico instead.

“Nico! Nico, babe, Nico, Kayla has this friend who’s an ordained minister, and he’s here! RIght now!” Will exclaimed. “He could marry us right now! Let’s do it as, like, a practice wedding!” Will was practically bouncing in place, so Nico set his hands on Will’s shoulders to hold him still.

“You’re the one that wanted to get married in a church, remember?” Nico reminded him. “And it won’t be a practice wedding if the guy’s ordained. That’s just a wedding.”

Will pouted again, and Nico was starting to think that he looked like a kicked puppy when he did that. “Okay. Kayla can come to the real wedding still, right?”

“Yeah, I just gave her invite to Austin.”

“But if Austin has Kayla’s invite, then who has Austin’s invite?”

“Austin does. He has both of them.”

“Why does he get two invites?”

Nico sighed, dropping his head against Will’s chest. “Babe, please. Have you said goodbye to everyone yet?”

“Everyone but Austin,” he answered.

“Go say goodbye, then,” he said, and then turned around to talk to Kayla once Will had walked away. “Thanks for having us, Kayla, I--”

She threw her arms around him, nearly knocking him over. Yeah, she was definitely Will’s sister. “Of course! We have to hang out more, okay? I’m gonna have another Christmas party this year, and you and Will have to come, okay?”

“We’ll try to make it,” Nico told her, patting her back awkwardly until she released him. “And hopefully you can come to our wedding in a couple of months.”

“Hell yeah, I’ll be there! I’ll see you then! Drive safe!” Kayla bounced into the living room as she waved back at Nico. He really was curious to see what she was like sober.

He turned back toward the kitchen, and found Will giving Austin the same bear hug treatment that he’d given to Kayla.

“You’re my favorite brother, you know?” Nico heard Will saying as he approached the two.

“I think I’m your only brother,” Austin replied, laughing.

“We need to hang out more than once a year. I’ll see you again this year, right?”

“I hope so, man.”

“Our wedding is in December,” Nico cut in, drawing both of their attention and causing them to break the hug. “So, as long as you come to that, you’ll see each other again before the end of the year.”

Will draped an arm around Nico’s shoulders and pulled him close enough to press a kiss to the side of his head. “You’re so smart, babe.”

Nico smiled up at him. “Go find your coat, Sunshine.”

As Will stepped away, Nico turned to Austin. “Could you, uh, do me a favor and not mention tonight to Will the next time you see him? He was so worried about making a fool of himself in front of you again, and I don’t want him to get bummed out the next time we see you.”

“What?” Austin asked, his head tilting in confusion. “My cool older brother the doctor was worried about what I think of him? Dude, tell him that he can act like as much of a fool as he wants, and I’ll always be impressed by him.”

Will started getting handsy again as soon as they were alone again, and kept trying to touch Nico while he was driving. After Will’s hand found its way to Nico’s lap for the third time, Nico grabbed his hand and held it tight in his own, telling him, “You either hold my hand, or you keep your hands to yourself while I’m driving, got it?”

“Sorry, Darlin’,” Will replied, and pressed a kiss to Nico’s knuckles. Then another. And another. He untangled their fingers and pressed a kiss to Nico’s open palm, then a few more down his wrist before moving back up. He hummed against Nico’s hand for a moment before he stuck out his tongue and licked the length of Nico’s middle finger.

He ripped his hand away. “Will, I swear, if you don’t stop, then I’m going to make you sit in the backseat for the rest of the drive.”

“Sorry,” Will said again, and folded his hands on his lap, this time keeping them there until they arrived at home.

As soon as they were out of the car, Will was on Nico once again, pressing himself against Nico’s back and kissing up and down his neck as Nico tried to unlock the front door. Once they had made it inside, Will spun him around and pulled Nico in for a kiss, though Nico recoiled at the taste of alcohol on Will’s tongue.

Will had that kicked puppy look one his face once again when Nico pushed him back. “What’s wrong?” Will asked.

“You taste like alcohol,” Nico answered. “You know how I am about alcohol.”

Will’s shoulders slumped. “You still love me, though, right?”

“Of course I do,” Nico assured him, and then got an idea. “Maybe if you drink a bunch of water, then the alcohol taste will go away, and I’ll kiss you again.”

“Okay!” In his haste to get to the sink, Will nearly knocked Nico over when he rushed past him. He pulled a glass from the cabinet and held it under the faucet, chugging two full glasses before he turned back to Nico. “Can I kiss you now?”

Nico tapped a finger to his lips in thought. “Let’s find out.”

Will moved toward him again, wrapping an arm around Nico’s waist while he leaned in for a kiss. The taste of alcohol was diluted, but it was still there, and Nico pulled back once again. Will frowned. “Still there?”

Nico nodded. “Maybe it’ll help if you brush your teeth.”

“Good idea,” Will replied, and took off down the hallway, tripping over something in the dark before he managed to find his way into the bathroom. Nico followed after him, much slower than Will had gone, and found Will already brushing furiously at his tongue.

Nico grabbed his own toothbrush and bumped Will aside with his hip before he started brushing his own teeth. Approximately two minutes later, after Will had gargled with mouthwash, he dragged Nico out of the bathroom and across the hall to their bedroom. When he kissed him again, all Nico tasted was mint, but he still pushed Will back gently.

“Noooo,” Will groaned, wrapping his arms around Nico and holding him close, “c’mon, babe, I just wanna kiss you.”

“I know, Sunshine, but I want to change out of my costume first,” Nico told him. “And you should probably wipe that makeup off your face.”

“Then I can kiss you?”

“Yes.”

Will left the room, and while he was gone, Nico shed the coat and scrubs he had been wearing, and changed into the pajamas he’d been wearing the night before - which also just so happened to be Will’s clothes. He climbed into bed once he was changed, and was just plugging his phone in for the night when Will returned. He shed the sweater he was wearing and crawled on top of Nico on the bed, resting his full weight on top of him and guiding their lips together.

“Don’t you want to change into pajamas?” Nico asked when Will broke the kiss to breathe.

Will licked the side of Nico’s neck. “I’d rather we both get naked.”

Nico rolled Will off of him and laid him on his side. “Well, that’s not going to happen, because I’m already in my pajamas. I know what you’re trying to do, Will, but I’m not having sex with you until tomorrow morning at the earliest.”

Will pressed himself up against Nico, draping an arm around Nico’s waist to tug him even closer, and said, “Oh, I’m going to blow your mind tomorrow morning, babe.”

He pressed a forceful kiss to Nico’s lips, then dropped his head onto the pillow and fell asleep instantly. Nico snorted, and drifted off to sleep to the sound of Will’s quiet snores.

In the morning, Will woke up with a pounding headache and a weight across his hips. He cracked his eyes open, squinting against the glaring light, and saw Nico straddling his lap.

“Good morning, Sunshine,” Nico said, grinning down at him and laughing at Will’s groan in return. “I’m ready for you to blow my mind.”

Will’s groan was ten times louder than before as he reached for Nico’s pillow, hitting him with it once before pressing it over his own face. Will complained, his voice muffled by the pillow, “You’re the worst!”

Bianca dressed in her new pikachu onesie for school on Halloween, and Nico wore another borrowed pair of Will’s scrubs - without the name badge, unfortunately, since Will needed that to get around the hospital. Nico accompanied Bianca to school, just like he had the year before, and made sure to take as many pictures as he could of Bianca, her friends, and the costume parade.

Will managed to get off of work just in time to join Nico and Bianca for trick-or-treating, though he didn’t have time to change into his Frankenstein monster costume before they left. That just made Will and Nico’s matching scrubs look like a couple’s costume, though, so Will finally got his Halloween wish.

As they waited on the sidewalk while Bianca ran up to a house for candy, Nico grabbed Will’s hand and laced their fingers together. “I’m glad you’re here this year,” he said, squeezing Will’s hand. “I felt so weird last year, just loitering on the sidewalk for an hour or two.”

“I’m glad I’m here, too,” Will said with a soft smile. “It’s always better to loiter in pairs, after all.”

Nico snorted and leaned against Will’s chest until Bianca returned to the sidewalk.

After another hour of wandering through the neighborhood, the three returned home. Bianca was sent off to get ready for bed while Will dumped out her bag of candy onto the living room floor to start sorting through it all. Once Bianca was all tucked into bed, Nico put on whatever Halloween movie just happened to be on TV, then joined Will on the living room floor.

Will cracked open an Almond Joy and took a bite out of it. He leaned back against the front of the couch, draped and arm around Nico’s shoulders, and said, “Do you want to show me the pictures you took at the costume parade?”

Nico pulled his phone out of his pocket and settled against Will’s side. Before he opened up his gallery, though, he looked up at Will - still in his scrubs, backlit by a single lamp in the corner of the room, and eating a piece of his daughter’s candy. This was shaping up to be a lot like last Halloween - only so much better.

“You know, I think it was this time last year that I realized how much I liked you,” Nico whispered. “I mean, I knew I liked you for a little while before then, but right around Halloween was when it really hit.”

Will pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I think I was already a little bit in love with you by then.”

Nico rolled his eyes. “Alright, fine. I’m trying to have a nice moment here, but if you’re just going to one-up me, then whatever.”

Will wound his other arm around Nico’s chest and pulled him close, kissing all over the side of his face. “A lot sure can change in a year, huh?”

thanks for reading!

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[weekendwarriorblog]

The Weekend Warrior Feb. 14, 2020 – SONIC THE HEDGEHOG, FANTASY ISLAND, THE PHOTOGRAPH, DOWNHILL, OLYMPIC DREAMS

It’s Valentine’s Day on Friday and President’s Day on Monday, which means that this weekend is going to be absolutely nuts in terms of getting four new wide releases.  Last week’s Birds of Prey did not do even remotely close to where I predicted/projected – almost half!! -- and here I thought all those raves reviews might help, but apparently not. It will still make money with its global release but it’s gonna fall short even of last year’s Shazam! and many have already started questioning whether an R-rating is the way to go with a movie semi-targeted towards younger women. (Warner Bros. has already sent out a mandate to theaters to change the title of the movie to Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey. I cannot believe that it took this long for them to figure out what a terrible title they had previously!)

With the four-day weekend, it’s very likely that Paramount Pictures’ SONIC THE HEDGEHOG, will prevail, as it brings the beloved SEGA video game character to the big screen with James Marsdenand Jim Carrey, the latter starring in one of his first big-screen appearances in a while. It should be an easy victor this weekend in a market that could desperately use another strong family film.

For those unfamiliar with SEGA’s flagship video game “mascot,” Sonic has appeared in all sorts of other media including animated series and comic books, so one can say that the character is almost but not quite as well known and popular as Nintendo’s Pokemon, which has had a much wider reach in terms of both games and cartoons.

Of course, it’s impossible not to look at Sonic the Hedgehog and completely ignore the relative success of last year’s Pokemon: Detective Pikachu, which had the added benefits of a popular A-list star in Ryan Reynoldsand a summer release. That opened with $54.4 million and made $144 million domestic and $429.7 million worldwide.

On the other hand, Sonic does have Jim Carrey, who hasn’t been in an American wide release since the 2014 sequel Dumb and Dumber To, which only made about $156 million worldwide. At one point, Carrey was one of the biggest box office stars with multiple $240 million plus domestic blockbusters. Maybe the kids won’t be as invested in Carrey’s Mr. Robotnik, but many parents who grew up with Carrey’s comedies will be happy to see him in such a perfect role.

The Presidents Day weekend allows one extra day for parents with kids needing something to do with them sans school. Even so, the biggest movies on the weekend have been superhero movies, including Black Panther, Deadpool and Fifty Shades of Grey, the latter two definitely not for kids. (Daredeviland Ghost Rider also fared well on the weekend.) In fifth place for the weekend is Warner Bros’ The LEGO Movie, which made $62.5 million over the four-day weekend, but that was in its SECOND WEEKEND! So yeah, lots of money to be had for a family movie even though the biggest opener was Christopher Columbus’ Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief (now on Broadway!), which opened with $38.7 million ten years ago.

I have to imagine that Sonic is more popular, and even with the tragic misstep of that first trailer last year which got such a negative reaction to Sonic’s appearance, Paramount delayed the movie and went back to the CG drawing board, there will be enough fans interested to see how he translates to the screen that $40 million over the weekend should be doable even with three other wide releases. I also don’t think reviews will be so bad, so it should be good for $100 million plus.

Mini-Review: For whatever reason, Sonic the Hedgehog is the kind of movie that lazy critics love to dump on, maybe because it’s a kids’ movie or because it’s a movie based on a video game they played as kids, or more likely, a character their kids know from popular cartoons and comic books. It doesn’t help that judgments were mostly cast when the first trailer hit last year and Sonic looked different than what people expected. Regardless, I went into the movie with very low expectations, maybe because I really had no passionate connection to the character despite being generally familiar with some of the games.

We meet Sonic as he’s being chased by robots, and we flash back to him as a kid on a planet where he’s able to zoom around freely, until he’s discovered by predators that are hunting him (it’s never explained why), so his mentor owl gives Sonic gold rings that can take him off-planet. Sonic ends up in a small town called Green Hills where he watches the townsfolk in hiding for years, including a local police officer (James Marsden) and his wife Maddie (Tika Sumpter). The former eventually discovers Sonic after he causes a major power outage that gets the attention of the government and its genius robotics scientist, Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey).

Despite not having much previous connection to Sonic, it’s hard for me not to appreciate this character, because I’ve been known to zip around myself. I also enjoyed Sonic’s haste since who knows when we might see that movie based on one of my favorite comic characters, The Flash. Sonic does a good job capturing the intensity and yes, speed, of having speed powers in quite a masterful way compared to previous attempts, giving me hope that a Flash movie is possible. (Granted, they do rip-off the fun thing Quicksilver does in the recent X-movies by slowing everything around Sonic down to a halt, but it’s still amusing.)

Probably the most genius idea by Sonic’s filmmakers was to convince Jim Carrey to return to the big screen as Dr. Robotnik. He quickly reminds us how hilarious he can be when going as fully into a character as he does this one, and it’s prime Carey vs. the semi-lazy Carrey that made movies in the early ‘00s. Robotnik is a super-genius with no patience for anyone on a lower level of intellect (aka everyone), and Carrey takes that idea to the utmost extreme. (It’s hard not to compare what he’s doing in this movie to what Ewan McGregor does in Birds of Prey and see how Carey does it effortlessly whereas McGregor was clearly trying too hard.)

That’s not to take away from Marsden and Sumpter, Sonic’s other prominent human co-stars, who bring such a warmth and humanity to those characters that you rarely even think that you’re watching them interact with a fully CG-character. (Kudos to Ben Schwartz and what he brings to Sonic as his voice.)

Sure, the plot can be a bit predictable with certain parts clearly geared to kids, but there’s also slew of pop references that display some real talent in the writing of the movie so that it can be watched and enjoyed by people of all ages.

Is it possible that Sonic the Hedgehog is the first thoroughly entertaining movie of the year? Yes, indeedy. (Definitely stay through the first bunch of credits if you are a Sonic fan!)

Rating: 8/10

One of the more interesting releases of the weekend is BLUMHOUSE’S FANTASY ISLAND (Sony Pictures Releasing), which as you can guess is a PG-13 horror version of the popular ‘80s show, starring Michael Peña as Mr. Rouke, the head of a program in which people can pay lots of money to achieve their greatest wishes… with a catch! Since this is Blumhouse, you probably know that the catch involves some sort of horror/thriller premise, and if you’ve seen the trailer, you might get some idea how it works… or not. (I wish I can say more but I’m under embargo!)

The rest of the cast is decent including Maggie Q (from Mission: Impossible 3), Lucy Hale, Portia Doubleday, Michael Rooker, Ryan Hansen, Jimmy O . Yang and more, plus it’s directed by Jeff Wadlow, who last did Blumhouse’s Truth Or Dare (a very bad movie!) and then Kick Ass 2 before that. (He was supposed to direct Sony’s upcoming Bloodshot movie but he left that to do other things, like this.)

Unfortunately, Sony Pictures Releasing (another specialized imprint from the parent company?) seems to have taken a cue from Screen Gems by deciding not to screen the movie for critics until Thursday afternoon (just like with The Grudge!), plus there won’t be ANY Thursday previews for this. It’s a shame since… well, I can’t really tell you if I liked the movie or not since I’m under embargo until Friday. J

Either way, it seems like a strong enough counter to Sonic and Birds of Prey that it should be good for $15 million plus over the four days. Personally, I think it would have opened even bigger if Sony and Blumhouse had shown some balls and screened it for critics in advance, but what do I know? I’ve only written about this stuff for ALMOST TWENTY FUCKING YEARS! (Not sure I’m gonna review the movie but we’ll see.)

I know far less about Universal’s Valentine’s Day offering THE PHOTOGRAPH (Universal), which I guess is a romantic drama that’s targeting African-Americans looking for something to see on the biggest date nights of the year. In fact, we’ve seen some interesting hits on this weekend just by putting “Date” in the movie title, as was the case with Adam Sandler-Drew Barrymore’s 50 First Dates ($45.1 million four-day opening) and even Date Movie ($21.8 million), which satirized romantic movies. But the real winner has to be a movie that went all out for Valentine’s Day by actually going with the title Valentine’s Day, which helped it open with $63 million over the four-day weekend ten years ago. ($23.4 million of that was on Valentine’s Day alone!)

Since I won’t see The Photograph until Weds. night, I can only talk about the little bit of marketing I’ve seen and what’s out there. Apparently, this is more in the vein of Valentine’s Day in that it’s a series of intertwined romantic stories, but it has an impressive cast of African-American actors who are on the verge of breaking out such as the great LaKeith Stanfield and amazing Kelvin Harrison Jr., as well as Rob Morgan (from “Daredevil” and Mudbound) and Courtney B. Vance. I’d be neglect if I didn’t mention any of the women involved and having Issa Raefrom the TV show “Insecure” as the primary female lead is something that shouldn’t be ignored. Stanfield isn’t the only connection to Jordan Peele, though, asLil Rel Howery from Get Outis also in this movie as is Peele’s actual wife, Chelsea Peretti!

I actually had to double check to make sure Peele wasn’t one of the film’s producers, but no, this is from Will Packer, a producer who is responsible for so many huge hits among African-Americans that one of these days I won’t underestimate his drawing power, even though all three of his 2019 movies underdelivered, including the comedy Little (co-starring Rae), although did well compared to their lower budgets.

In that sense, The Photograph could be compared to Packer’s Screen Gems comedy About Last Night, which opened with $27.8 million in just over 2,200 theaters in 2014, but that also had the power of proven box office draw Kevin Hartto bring in audiences. I certainly don’t want to be accused of underestimating Packer again, but with such a generic title and premise (and next to no marketing?), I’m just not sure the movie will deliver despite being decent counter-programming for AA audiences. With that in mind, I think the movie will probably make somewhere between $12 and 14 million.

Then there’s DOWNHILL (Searchlight Studios), the new movie from The Way, Way Back directors Nat Faxon and Jim Rash (who also won the Oscar for cowriting Alexander Payne’s The Descendants), this one being a direct remake of Swedish filmmaker Ruben Östlund’s 2014 film Force Majeure.

In this version, Will Ferrell and Julia Louis-Dreyfus play a squabbling couple who travel to the alps with their kids, but after barely escaping an avalanche – one in which he runs away leaving his family behind – they start questioning their lives. The film also stars Zach Woods (also from “Veep”), Miranda Otto and Zoe Chao, and though it premiered at the Sundance Film Festival (just like the duo’s previous movie), it did not receive great reviews, as it currently sits at 48% on Rotten Tomatoes.

I don’t think that will matter since like Carey above, Ferrell hasn’t been oversaturating the market with movies in the past couple year, maybe because his last movie, Holmes & Watson, reteaming him with John C. Reilly from Step Brothers bombed with $41 million worldwide after horrifying reviews. Fortunately, Louis-Dreyfus is far more loved thanks to her run on “Seinfeld” and her Emmy-winning run on HBO’s “Veep,” and that should help get people into theaters despite all the competition aboe and below.

Searchlight (no more Fox!!) will be releasing the movie into roughly 1,500 theaters, a moderate release to see how it fares, and the extended holiday weekend (plus the chance of it attracting older moviegoers on Valentine’s Day) should help it make $5 million plus over the extended weekend.

Mini-Review: If you’re reading this review hoping for a play-by-play of how Downhill differs from Ruben Ostlund’s Force Majeure, then you’re bound to be disappointed, because a.) I don’t really remember it, b.) I wasn’t as big a fan of the movie as so many others, and c.) I’m going to assume that a lot of people never got around to seeing it.

In this version, it’s Ferrell and Louis-Dreyfus as Peter and Billie Stanton, and there’s much more focus on their roles as parents and the responsibility that goes with that. Once again, Peter runs off when a controlled avalanche comes their way, but they don’t really talk about it so much even as it hangs over their heads.

Nat Faxon and Jim Rash once again find a manageable way of making “dramedy” out of a situation, making sure not to go for constant visual laughs or the zaniness Ferrell usually goes for. (Granted, we can totally believe him as a careless father/husband who does dumb things.) In fact, Ferrell plays his role fairly toned down, which allows Louis-Dreyfus to shine in what’s, oddly, a quite rare movie appearance. How they deal with the aftermath of the avalanche comes to a head when Pete’s work-buddy Zack (Zach Woods) arrives with a ladyfriend (Zoe Chao) allows the two to go at each other. It doesn’t get quite as intense as Marriage Story, but it’s obvious that they both have reached the point in their marriage where they need a separation.

It is kind of amusing that Miranda Otto almost steals her scenes with the two leads because she’s so funny as a hot-to-trot European guest they keep running into and who sets Billie up with a hot Italian ski trainer. There’s a few other funny characters but it mostly stays on Ferrell and Louis-Dreyfus either alone or together, and that’ll be enough for most people.

Faxon and Rash find interesting ways to play with the basic premise, although Downhill is very much comedy with a lower-case “c,” and like the original movie, it should lead to some interesting conversations.

Rating: 7/10

This week’s Top 10 should look something like this… (bearing in mind that the below are all four-day projections). It’ll be interesting to see if the name change for “Birds of Prey” will make a difference, but look for NEON’s Parasite to make its first foray into the top 10 this weekend after 19 (!!!) weeks in theaters, thanks to its Best Picture win last Sunday.

1. Sonic the Hedgehog (Paramount) - $44 million N/A (up $1.5 million)* 2. Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey  (Warner Bros) - $20 million -39% (down $1.5 million)* 3. Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island (Sony) - $15.8 million N/A (up $.3 million)* 4. The Photograph (Universal) - $13.5 million N/A 5. Bad Boys for Life (Sony) - $8 million -35% (up .2 million)* 6. 1917 (Universal) - $7 million -23% 7. Downhill (Searchlight) - $5.6 million N/A (up .2 million)* 8. Parasite (NEON) - $5 million +300% (up .4 million and one place) 9. Dolittle  (Universal) - $4.5 million -30% (down .4 million and one place) 10. Jumanji: The Next Level  (Sony) - $4.2 million -24%

*UPDATE: A few minor updates based on actual theater counts with Parasite being expanded into 2,000 theaters, the widest its been so far. I feel like most of the new movies will do well, including Downhill (which will be in 2,301 theaters vs. the 1,500 estimated earlier in the week). Anyway, it should be a fairly hearty and robust weekend at the box office.

LIMITED RELEASES

Before we get to the regular limited releases opening Friday, I want to mention two special releases for Weds. night, Trafalgar Releasing is giving a one-night screening of The Doors: Break on Thru - A Celebration of Ray Manzarek, which I haven’t seen but I’m definitely interested in as a fan of the ‘60s group (and Manzarek’s keyboard work). You can get tickets for that here. Also, Kino Lorber is giving one-night release of Emily Taguchi & Jake Lefferman’s doc After Parkland to commemorate the second anniversary of the shootings at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida that killed 17 people and began a nationwide student movement for gun control. It’s a fairly sobering and emotional doc, as you can imagine, especially since so little has been done to prevent incidents like this even two years later.

My favorite movie of the weekend is Jeremy Teicher’s OLYMPIC DREAMS ( IFC Films), opening at the IFC Center Friday. It stars Nick Kroll (who you’ll know from “The League,” “Oh, Hello” and other things) and (actual Olympian distance runner) Alexi Pappas, who you may or may not be as familiar with. Pappas plays Penelope, an American competitor in the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea, who is feeling lonely and unable to connect with others until she meets Kroll’s volunteer dentist, Ezra. While at first, it wouldn’t seem like they would have anything in common, they spend a night hanging out and while some might be expecting something romantic, since this is opening on Valentine’s Day, well I won’t ruin what does or doesn’t happen, k?  Either way, it’s a wonderful film co-written by Teichter, Pappas and Kroll, and if that sounds like a familiar formula, then it is indeed the one Richard Linklater used for his sequels to Before Sunrise with Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy. Olympic Dreams isn’t nearly as deep and philosophical (or wordy), but the two actors are so wonderful together, and they actually filmed this in the Athletes Village at the Olympics (the first film to do so) which adds some authenticity to the sweet little movie. (There will be a sneak preview Weds night at the IFC Center with Teicher, Kroll and Pappas all in attendance!)

Danish filmmaker Lone Scherfig returns with THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS (Vertical), a star-studded ensemble piece starring Zoe Kazan, Andrea Riseborough, Caleb Landry Jones, Jay Baruchel and Bill Nighy (who appeared in Lone’s previous film Their Finest). This is a New York City story about six strangers whose lives intersect and mingle while trying to find help, hope and love. I know it sounds like the Crash-style movie we’ve seen far too many times before, but I have faith in Ms. Scherfig and hopefully I’ll have a chance to watch it in the next day or two.

I also still haven’t gotten around to watching Kenji Tanagaki’s action-comedy ENTER THE FAT DRAGON (Go WELL USA), starring the always-amazing Donnie Yen as police officer Zhu, who is sent to Japan on a routine police escort of a suspect… who mysteriously dies, forcing Zhu to call upon a former undercover inspector to help solve the murder. I’m assuming the latter is the “Fat Dragon” and Yen didn’t gain 200 lbs. for the part.

Opening at the Quad Cinemaon Friday and in L.A. on Feb. 21 is Dimitri de Clercq’sFrench/Belgian film You Go to My Head (First Run Features) about an architect who finds a young woman lost, alone and in a fog in the Sahara after a mysterious accident, but when he takes her to the hospital, he claims to be her husband. As she gets better, he creates an elaborate life to fill in the life they shared which she can no longer remember. It also sounds perfect for Valentine’s Day, so you have plenty of options!

I didn’t have too much to say about Céline Sciamma’s PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE (NEON), because I think I wrote about it last year, and I haven’t seen the movie since the New York Film Festival. Set in the 18thCentury, it’s about a woman painter who travels to a remote island where she’s commissioned to do a painting of a grieving widow, who she ends up falling in love with. I probably should see the movie again as it didn’t really connect with me the first time, but I can totally understand why others love it so much. (Unfortunately, the 7:10 screening on Friday night at the Angelika with a QnA moderated by my pal, Valerie Complex, is already sold out!)

The second documentary in the last year about a man named “Cunningham” (a different one this time) is Mark Bozek’s The Times of Bill Cunningham (Greenwich) about the famed photographer who died in 2016… and whom I know even less about than I did dancer/choreographer Merce Cunningham. Apparently, he was a New York Timesphotographer for four decades and had a long relationship with First Lady Jackie Kennedy, and this doc is even narrated by Sarah Jessica Parker! It also opens at the Angelika and City Cinemas 1, 2 & 3, and maybe L.A.?

Due to the usual conflicts and circumstances, I wasn’t able to see Lisa Barros D'Sa and Glenn Leyburn’s Ordinary Love (Bleecker Street) as planned, but it’s an appropriately-timed romantic drama starring Liam Neeson and Lesley Manville as a middle-aged couple who must deal with her beast cancer diagnosis. I actually am interested in seeing this, especially to see Neeson back in serious drama mode (it’s been a while), so hopefully I’ll have a chance to see this down the road.

Also opening Friday is Tanya Wexler’s Buffaloed (Magnolia), starring Zoey Deutch as Peg Dahl, a young woman living in Buffalo, the debt collection capital of America but hopes to get out of town and into an Ivy League university. When she’s accepted to her top choice but can’t afford the tuition, she gets pulled into the rope of debt collection.  Also starring Judy Greer, Germaine Fowler, Noah Reid and Jai Courtney, it will open at New York’s Quad Cinema, the Loz Feliz 3 in L.A., Buffalo’s North Park Theater and more theaters.

Opening at the Quad Cinemaon Friday and in L.A. on Feb. 21 is Dimitri de Clercq’sFrench/Belgian film You Go to My Head (First Run Features) about an architect who finds a young woman lost, alone and in a fog in the Sahara after a mysterious accident, but when he takes her to the hospital, he claims to be her husband. As she gets better, he creates an elaborate life to fill in the life they shared which she can no longer remember. It also sounds perfect for Valentine’s Day, so you have plenty of options!

Another SXSW 2019 movie is Richard Wong’s Come As You Are (Samuel Goldwyn), starring Gabourey Sidibe, Grant Rosenmeyer, Ravi Patel, Hayden Szeto and Janeane Garofolo. The three guys in the middle play men with disabilities who go on a road trip to a Montreal brothel to get away from their suffocating parents. Sidibe (from Precious) plays their travelling nurse who drives them across the border to help them lose their virginity. This is an English remake of the Belgian Film Hasta La Vista about the real-life adventure of Asta Philpot.

Sara Zandieh’s indie rom-com A Simple Wedding (Blue Fox Entertainment) also opens in theaters and On Demand on Valentine’s Day, this one following an Iranian-American named Nousha (Tara Grammy) whose hopes for a Persian wedding are dashed when she falls for a bisexual artist/DJ named Alex (Christopher O’Shea). She has to make sure her parents don’t realize they’re living together before marriage. The film also stars Shohreh Aghdashloo, Rita Wilson, Maz Jobrani, Peter McKenzie and James Eckhouse.

LOCAL FESTIVALS

Some cool festivals and series in New York are happening this weekend to offer competition for all the choices above.

Let’s begin with the “Winter Showcase” for one of my favorite annual film festivals, the New York Asian Film Festivalsubtitled “Love at First Bite,” since they’re including a special Valentine’s Day screening of the Korean hit Extreme Job followed by a reception including delicious Korean food. The rest of the line-up is probably more appropriate for the rep section as it will including Asian classics like Stephen Chow’s God of Cookery (1996), Ang Lee’s Eat Drink Man Woman (1994),Tampopo (1985) on Saturday, as well as Ritesh Batra’s amazing The Lunchbox and more on Sunday.

Up at Film at Lincoln Center, there’s the annual “Neighboring Scenes,” the annual celebration of “New Latin American Cinema,” opening Friday with Joanna Reposi Garibaldi’s Lemebel, a documentary about writer/visual artist Pedro Lemebel and his controversial performances amidst Chilean upheaval. Of course, I’m most interested in the Brazilian offerings, but sadly, there just isn’t enough time in the day/week to see as many of the films in this series I’m curious about including the New York premiere of Ema from Chile’s Pablo Larrain (Neruda, Jackie). Click on the link above and check out that line-up.

Further North (in terms of global geography) but South (in terms of New York City geography) is this year’s “Canada Now” series, taking place at the IFC Center from Thursday through Sunday. It will kick off with Guest of Honor, the new film from Canada’s Atom Egoyan, starring David Thewlis and Laysla De Oliveira as father and music school teacher daughter whose lives become complicated when she’s put in prison for earlier crimes. There are seven other movies in this series, most of them getting their U.S. debuts, so that’s another alternative for what could be a busy movie-going weekend.

STREAMING AND CABLE

Lots of stuff premiering on streaming services this weekend including the British animated sequel A Shaun the Sheep: Farmageddon on Netflix, as well as the rom-com sequel To All the Boys: PS I Still Love You, which will premiere on Weds and may end up being the “Netflix and chill” choice for many young people on V-Day. (I honestly never got around to seeing the first movies of either of those yet!)

Over on Hulu, they’re premiering the gender-swapped series loosely based on Nick Horny’s High Fidelity, this one starring Zoe Kravitz, the daughter of Lisa Bonet, who appeared opposite John Cusack in Stephen Frears’ adaptation of Hornby’s book from 2000 that was one of my favorite movies that year! Wait a second, even though Kravitz plays a character named Rob, just like Cusack, is she meant to be the daughter of Cusack and Bonet’s characters in that movie? That would be intense! (But probably not. I’m sure I’ll check it out.)

REPERTORY

METROGRAPH (NYC):

The Metrograph’s Valentine’s Dayweekend offerings include Casablanca (1942), Howard Hawks’ 1944 film To Have and  Have Not, the 1932 film Trouble in Paradise, Douglas Sirk’s Written on the Wind (1956) and another screening of Makoto Shinkai’s animated Your Name. The “To Hong Kong with Love” series continues through the end of February, this weekend screening Yellowing (2016), which I haven’t seen.This weekend, the  Welcome To Metrograph: Reduxwill offer two more screenings of Edward Yang’s 4-hour 1991 film A Brighter Summer Day, while Late Nites at Metrograph  will screen Nagisa Oshima’s 1978 film Empire of Passion, also which I have never seen! Rounding out the weekend’s Asian offering is the Playtime: Family Matineesoffering of Yoshifumi Kondo’s 1995 animated film Whisper of the Heart, which guess what? I haven’t seen that either! Clearly, I need to try to get to one of the four movies, right?  

ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE BROOKLYN (NYC)

Tonight’s “Weird Wednesday” is the Susan Sarandon-James Spader romantic drama White Palace (1990). Oddly, the Alamo is CLOSED on Valentine’s Day.. is this true?!? On Sunday is a special “Drew Believers: Drew Barrymore Movie Marathon” with four of Barrymore’s movies in 35mm! (As of this writing, there are a few seats available near the front.) Monday’s “Fist City” is Sam Raimi’s The Quick and The Dead from 1995 and that’s quickly selling out as well. The “Terror Tuesday” is James Gunn’s hilarious Slither and then next week’s “Weird Wednesday” is the 1987 Ken Russell film Gothic.

THE NEW BEVERLY (L.A.):

Wednesday’s “Afternoon Classic” is the 1961 Oscar-winning musical West Side Story. Weds and Thursday night’s double feature is Robert Altman’s 1971 film McCabe & Mrs. Miller and Sydney Pollack’s 1972 film Jeremiah Johnson, starring Robert Redford. This week’s “Freaky Friday” offering is the classic The Bride of Frankenstein (1935, while Friday’s midnight movie is True Romanceand Saturday’s midnight is 1978’s Mean Dog Blues in 16mm! This weekend continues the “Kiddee Matinee” run with the Alfonso Cuaron-directed Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Monday’s matinee of David Lynch’s Wild at Heart is already sold out but that night is a Robert Clouse double feature of The Pack(1977) and Darker than Amber (1970). Tuesday’s Grindhouse double feature is 1976’s Sky Riders and 1981’s Force: Five.  

EGYPTIAN THEATRE (LA):

Thursday is a “Black Voices” double feature of Car Wash (1976) and Cooley High (1975) with guest including Bill Duke in person. John Sayles and Joe Dante will be on hand Friday night for a “John Sayles: Independent” double feature of Piranha (1978) and The Howling (1981). This weekend is the “HFPA Restoration Summit” including a Saturday afternoon presentation called “Serge Bromberg Presents from the Silent Era” with the Lobster Films founder, while the one and only Jane Fonda will be on-hand Saturday evening to present a 4k restoration of the 1972 film F.T.A., which she produced with Donald Sutherland. Saturday night is a screening of The Black Vampire, the 1953 Argentine adaptation of Fritz Lang’s M, and there’s more classic cinema on Sunday as part of the series.

AERO  (LA):

Thursday’s “Antiwar Cinema” matinee is Richard Attenborough’s Oh! What a Lovely War from 1969 with an all-star cast, while that night is a Eugene Levy/Christopher Guest double feature of A Might Windand For Your Consideration. The AERO is ALSO showing Casablancaon Valentine’s Day and then Saturday is another Levy/Guest double feature of Best in Show (2000)and Waiting for Guffman  (1996) with Levy doing a discussion between films. John Sayles and Frances McDormand will appear in person for a Sunday afternoon double feature of 1996’s Lone Star and 1999’s Limbo.

MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE (NYC):

MOMI is going a bit crazy with its Valentine’s offering but it’s a good one…Jane Fonda in 1968’s Barbarella as part of its new 2001-inspired series “See It Big! Outer Space”! (If MOMI wasn’t all the way in Astoria, I’d totally go.)  It will play again Sunday with Tarkovsky’s Solaris (1972) playing on Friday and Saturday and 1979’s Star Trek: The Motion Pictureon Sunday. Sunday will also be a repeat of Kubrick’s 1969 film 2001: A Space Odyssey in 70mm with a discussion before the movie between Doug Trumbull and Piers Bizony. There’s also the usual DCP screening of 2001on Saturday afternoon, as part of the exhibition. On Saturday, they’ll screen Marjane Satrapi’s excellent Persepolis(2007) as part of its “World of Animation.”

FILM FORUM (NYC):

Starting Friday, the Forum will be screening a DCP restoration of Luchino Visconti’s L’Innocente (1976), starring Giancarlo Giannini. This weekend’s “Film Forum Jr.” is Guys and Dolls from 1955, starring Marlon Brando, Jean Simmons and Frank Sinatra. (If you read this on Wednesday, you can catch Joseph Strick’s 1963 film The Balcony, starring Shelley Winters, Peter Falk and Lee Grant, in 35mm.

QUAD CINEMA (NYC):

The Quad’s run of Pandora and the Flying Dutchman continues through the weekend, and there will be Valentine’s Day screenings of Alex Cox’s Sid and Nancy on Thursday and Friday night. (How romantic!)

ANTHOLOGY FILM ARCHIVES (NYC):

The Anthology’s great “The Devil Probably: A Century of Satanic Panic” continues this weekend with screenings of Robert Eggers’ The Witch, Alan Parker’s Angel Heart, another screening of Rosemary’s Baby, as well as screenings of Race with the Devil on Weds. and Thursday night. I missed it last week but they’ve been showing Mark Rappaport’s 1975 film Mozart in Love the past week, as well.

ROXY CINEMA (NYC)

The Cage-athon continues Weds. with Neil Labute’s The Wicker Man (2006) and 2009’s Knowing on Thursday. Valentine’s Day sees screening of Baz Lurhmann’s Romeo + Juliet, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes, as well as the 1987 Nicolas Cage movie Moonstruck, co-starring Cher. Spike Jonez and Charlie Kaufman’s Adaptation (2003), starring Cage, repeats on Saturday.

NITEHAWK CINEMA  (NYC):

Williamsburg‘s “Uncaged” series continues Friday with last year’s Mandy at midnight and 1983’s Valley Girl on Saturday morning. Casabalanca is also playing at the Prospect Park on Thursday, and unrelated but Back to the Future will play there on Monday night. Billy Wilder’s 1954 film Sabrina, starring Bogart, Hepburn and Holden will play on Saturay morning.

IFC CENTER (NYC)

Weekend Classics: Luis Buñuel is back with Belle de Jour from 1967, starring Catherine Deneuve.  Waverly Midnights: Hindsight is 2020 will screen the animated Ghost in the Shell, while Late Night Favorites: Winter 2020 will also go with an Anime film, Paprika.

MOMA  (NYC):

Modern Matinees: Jack Lemmon is off Weds. and Thursday but will return Friday with Billy Wilder’s Irma La Douce (1963).

BAM CINEMATEK (NYC):

BAM will continue to show Horace Jenkins’ 1982 film Cane River through the weekend.

Next week, the second to last week of February (man, it flew right by!) will include Fox’s The Call of the Wild, starring Harrison Ford, and the horror sequel, Brahms: The Boy II.

[whaleyoufeedmenuggets]

Im too lazy to look at the questions so DO ALL OF THEM. (if you dont wanna then go on a random number generator and get 5 random numbers)

ITS REALLY LONG BUT I DID IT KJSHADJS HERE GOES i love oversharing my lifealso im putting a read more line bc its hella long

1. coffee mugs, teacups, wine glasses, water bottles, or soda cans?

water bottles

2. chocolate bars or lollipops?

ehhh depends on my mood. i’d say it’s (dark) chocolate most of the time (love that 70% dark chocolate mmMmMm)

3. bubblegum or cotton candy?

cotton candy!! except when it gets all over my face and hair o no

4. how did your elementary school teachers describe you?

common report book comments included

- very active

- bright

- “the live wire of the class”

- usually distracted but still does well

- mischievous

- playful

5. do you prefer to drink soda from soda cans, soda bottles, plastic cups or glass cups?

bottles so that i can close it and save the rest for later and not have to chug it yeet

6. pastel, boho, tomboy, preppy, goth, grunge, formal or sportswear?

sportswear #sweatpantsalldayeveryday

7. earbuds or headphones?

def headphones but they’re inconvenient sometimes :/

8. movies or tv shows?

tv shows!! (also, my adhd ass can’t get through a movie without zoning out oops)

9. favorite smell in the summer?

i haven’t experienced /real/ summer (thank u singapore’s tropical climate) but i rly like the smell of rain :”)

10. game you were best at in p.e.?

making up excuses to skip pe

11. what you have for breakfast on an average day?

belvitas before morning practice

croissant sandwich and chocolate milk after practice

if there’s no practice, then scrambled eggs from the dining hall lolol

if i’m too lazy to go to the dining hall, then cereal

12. name of your favorite playlist?

it’s literally called jams and the description is “a clusterfuck of stuff i’ve jammed to at some point”

13. lanyard or key ring?

key ring

14. favorite non-chocolate candy?

gummy bears/sour patch kids

15. favorite book you read as a school assignment?

death of a salesman - arthur miller

16. most comfortable position to sit in?

with one foot up on the chair and the other leg sitting normally

17. most frequently worn pair of shoes?

a pair of asics sneakers

18. ideal weather?

15ºc/60ºf when its like cool but not too cold but also not ridiculously hot and also when theres no insane wind (a light breeze is fine)

19. sleeping position?

on my left side and hugging a pillow/bolster/soft toy

20. preferred place to write (i.e., in a note book, on your laptop, sketchpad, post-it notes, etc.)?

i like the feeling of pen and paper but im disorganized as hell so an apple pencil + ipad makes a good enough substitute

21. obsession from childhood?

frogs (i’ve loved them since i was 3 hehe)

22. role model?

a dude i used to train with for a while in 2014. he retired last year but he’s always looked out for me like an older brother since we trained together (he’s 8 years older than me lmao) and even thought i’m so far away rn he still checks in on me and stuff and idk he’s probably one of the swimmers i respect the most.

23. strange habits?

i cant fall asleep at night if im not hugging something.  like. it could be a pillow. or a soft toy. literally anything. once on a school trip i hugged a pair of sweatpants to sleep bc i legit cant fall asleep if im not hugging something.i have no problem falling asleep in class/on buses/cars/planes though.

24. favorite crystal?

idk i never really paid enough attention to crystals to actually have a favorite and know their names. they’re all rly pretty tho.

25. first song you remember hearing?

uhh h h i honestly can’t remember. probably some classical music bc i played the violin and that was my first experience of music that i was actually aware of????

26. favorite activity to do in warm weather?

switch on the aircon and take a nap / sit in bed on netflix/playing on my nintendo switch. and swimming outdoors i guess.

27. favorite activity to do in cold weather?

switch on the heater and take a nap / sit in bed on netflix/playing on my nintendo switch.

do u see a pattern here

28. five songs to describe you?

jet lag - simple plan (bc time zones suck and i miss my fam & friends)

avalanche - bring me the horizon (pretty much sums up how tf my brain feels)

high hopes - p!atd

astronaut - simple plan

the reckless and the brave - all time low

29. best way to bond with you?

doing dumb shit with me

also Quality Time™️ like idk even if we’re chilling and doing our own shit i like just spending time with people im comfortable enough with

30. places that you find sacred?

idk

31. what outfit do you wear to kick ass and take names?

a hoodie and sweatpants

for no reason other than that’s what i wear 90% of the time

32. top five favorite vines?

I AM CONFUSION!!! AMERICA EXPLAIN

this bitch empty. yeet.

im in my mom’s car VROOM VROOM

the one of that dad playing the saxophone (???) and the kid slamming the oven door open and shut

road works ahead “haha yea sure hope it does!”

33. most used phrase in your phone?

either lmao or lolol or LMFAO or yeet

34. advertisements you have stuck in your head?

gOD i had spotify ads stuck in my head all the time before i switched to premium and now i cant remember any of them (thank god)

35. average time you fall asleep?

i’d say 12:30-1ish

36. what is the first meme you remember ever seeing?

the tROLL FACE MEME LIKE those rage faces idk what they’re called but BASICALLY THOSE 2010-2012 era memes

37. suitcase or duffel bag?

suitcase!!! i like sitting on them and yeeting myself around on them or getting people to push me around and then falling off

38. lemonade or tea?

lemonade

39. lemon cake or lemon meringue pie?

ngl i havent had either of them before

40. weirdest thing to ever happen at your school?

so in jc2 (aka 12th grade), for some reason PEOPLE WERE PUTTING PRE-PACKAGED HARD BOILED EGGS ALL OVER THE SCHOOL. like they were still in their wrappers and all but u could open ur schoolbag and find like 5 eggs in there. and no one knew where they came from. i think at one point there were even eggs hanging from the pull-up bars. all i know is that they were everywhere and people in my batch still remember it as the egg invasion of acjc.

41. last person you texted?

my mom

42. jacket pockets or pants pockets?

def jacket!!! especially when they have zips hehe

43. hoodie, leather jacket, cardigan, jean jacket or bomber jacket?

hoodie

44. favorite scent for soap?

idk man depends on my mood

45. which genre: sci-fi, fantasy or superhero?

sci-fi bc im a fricken nerd

46. most comfortable outfit to sleep in?

shirt and sweats

47. favorite type of cheese?

cheddarrr also i like mozzerrella sticks

48. if you were a fruit, what kind would you be?

a fineapple B)

lmao jk ummmm maybe a watermelon bc when u hit it it sounds hollow, just like how my skull would sound if someone hit it (h a)

49. what saying or quote do you live by?

here for a good time not for a long time

never give up without a fight

50. what made you laugh the hardest you ever have?

idk probably some dumb meme. i laugh at a lot of stuff like i laugh anything even mildly funny. some that i can think of off the top of my head are:

- i was tryna type ducky but typed fucky instead and sOmEOnE (could be the person who submitted this ask, idk tho) changed my facebook messenger nickname to fucky and the notification was like ”poopy butthole changed your nickname to fucky” and i think that’s still the funniest sentence i’ve read in my whole life

- one time we went to mcdonalds and a friend said mcfluffy instead of mcflurry and idk why but i laughed so hard at that

- once @doduo and i spent half a chinese lesson cutting out random faces from the chinese newspaper and sticking them randomly all over the classroom and idk. it was the funniest thing ever. until the teacher came over and confiscated my scissors rip.

51. current stresses?

- an essay draft (that i am procrastinating rn by doing this, oops)

- CANADIAN TRIALS (but thats a good kind of stress)

- submitting a proposal for a group project but none of my groupmates are freaking replying my texts ugh

52. favorite font?

avenir next!! i find san serif fonts way easier to read than serif lolol.i like helvetica neue too.

53. what is the current state of your hands?

dry af but also i just got my nails done so they pretty rn hehe

54. what did you learn from your first job?

i…havent had a real job yet

55. favorite fairy tale?

idk i was never rly one for fairy tales even as a kid.

56. favorite tradition?

chinese new year when we get CASH and we spend 3 days just eating junk yEET im rly sad im gonna be missing it the next few years tho

57. the three biggest struggles you’ve overcome?

hh h h hh hhh hh hh they’re pretty personal i don’t /really/ wanna put it out here but i can text you the answer to this if you want (i’m perfectly fine with that!!)

58. four talents you’re proud of having?

- i think i’m pretty intuitive!!! i can guess anyone’s mbti if i’ve spent enough time with them/gotten a detailed enough description of them /winks/ and i can read people pretty well in general and i can draw links to themes/symbols in lit pretty well….???

- i’m somewhat decent at lettering…i think

- i’m good at pull-ups and also vertical jumps i’m secretly a froge

- i’m decent at photography…i guess….

59. if you were a video game character, what would your catchphrase be?

yeet

60. if you were a character in an anime, what kind of anime would you want it to be?

pokemon !!

61. favorite line you heard from a book/movie/tv show/etc.?

/sweats/ i’m not very good at remembering lines from books/movies/shows WELP

62. seven characters you relate to?

JAKE PERALTA - b99

rosa diaz - b99

linguine - ratatouille (he’s permanently confused and he let a ratto take over his job bc he had no idea what he was doing like damn what a big mood)

dory - finding nemo/finding dory (i relate to the forgetfulness)

percy jackson

kale bae /winks/

mitt (during bad phases) /winks again, but sadly/

63. five songs that would play in your club?

idek man i wouldnt even be at my own club i’d be at home taking a nap i’ll just ask someone else to handle my playlist

64. favorite website from your childhood?

club penguin !!!

65. any permanent scars?

yE one of them was from jumping onto a treadmill going at 13km/h 2 years ago bc i thought i was a good idea

66. favorite flower(s)?

i dont have any

67. good luck charms?

i eat pancakes for breakfast on meet days!!!! altho i think this is more of a habit than a good luck charm tbh lmao.

also i guess pip???? he’s my emotional support narwhal :’)

68. worst flavor of any food or drink you’ve ever tried?

durian. i cant stand the stuff or anything flavored like it ugh.

69. a fun fact that you don’t know how you learned?

red food coloring is derived from beetles

70. left or right handed?

right

71. least favorite pattern?

overly-floral patterns i guessssss. also i hate wearing stripes.

72. worst subject?

chinese

besides that, math and physics

73. favorite weird flavor combo?

i rly like vanilla ice cream and fries

also i would eat ketchup with nearly anything

74. at what pain level out of ten (1 through 10) do you have to be at before you take an advil or ibuprofen?

i usually just suck it up and go to sleep when it comes to pain but i guess an 8??? idk. i usually take advil/ibuprofen only for fevers

75. when did you lose your first tooth?

i got my first loose tooth on january 11 2005 and it fell out on january 18 2005 & it was a tuesday (pls don’t ask me how i remember this bc i dont know)

76. what’s your favorite potato food (i.e. tater tots, baked potatoes, fries, chips, etc.)?

tater tots

77. best plant to grow on a windowsill?

cactus i guess. idk im not good at plants.

78. coffee from a gas station or sushi from a grocery store?

grocery store sushi (it was pretty decent in singapore so yeeeee lmao also i ate a lot of that as a kid)

79. which looks better, your school id photo or your driver’s license photo?

its the same photo for both so yeAh

80. earth tones or jewel tones?

earth

81. fireflies or lightning bugs?

idk i always called them fireflies

82. pc or console?

console I LOVE THE FEEL OF BUTTONS

83. writing or drawing?

drawing (more like doodlign for me bc i cant draw for shit)

84. podcasts or talk radio?

neither but if i rlllllly had to choose then podcasts i guessss s sss

84. barbie or polly pocket?

neither LMAO i gave all my barbies haircuts when i was a kid bc i didnt know what to do with them

85. fairy tales or mythology?

mythology for sure!! i love greek mythology (may or may not be bc of percy jackson lolol)

86. cookies or cupcakes?

cookies

87. your greatest fear?

losing those i love and care about (could be drifting or actual death it goes both ways)

88. your greatest wish?

rn, for my essay to write itself

for the short-term, to make the olympics (and WUGs…and worlds…and sea games…and asian games…and commonwealth games lmao)

for the long-term, uhhh idk. i just wanna live a life i’m satisfied with and to have a job i actually like and to be able to support my parents

89. who would you put before everyone else?

my mom

90. luckiest mistake?

i always say that i regret doing a year of college in singapore instead of coming here for freshman year but if i’d come in a year earlier like i was supposed to, i proba wouldn’t have made it past swim team tryouts and i made some pretty great friends in my first year of college soooo it all worked out i guessi cant think of any others rn

91. boxes or bags?

bags

92. lamps, overhead lights, sunlight or fairy lights?

fairy lights are rly pretty!!but i like natural light :”)

93. nicknames?

deb

debs

debo

debbo

alpha childuhh h h i think thats about it??? i cant remember any others

94. favorite season?

spring’s pretty great rni like fall too (before it gets cOLd)

95. favorite app on your phone?

insta/tumblr/telegram

96. desktop background?

a photo of me looking rly cool at the starting blocks before a race B)

97. how many phone numbers do you have memorized?

4 - mine (singapore & US), my mom’s and my dad’s

98. favorite historical era?

uhh h h idk the ice age seemed pretty cool haha sike it was actually coldmedieval times seemed pretty cool too like damn i want a suit of armorWHEW I SPENT WAY TOO MUCH TIME ON THIS but i had fun so yeet

also if you read all the way down here ily and you’re cool

[tumblunni]

Hhhh bunni legs pain accomplishment day

I HAVE FINISHED THE SHOPPING OF HELL

Tfw u only get paid 4 days before christmas and have to rush everything aaaa

It was bad enough today so i'm so glad i got it done before it got even more busy!

Misc boring essentials i bought for myself: new phone charger cos broken, new trousers cos i spilt hair bleach on my only two pairs, new shoes cos my left shoe literally snapped in half down the middle like wtf even happened there, cheap pink hair dye from a discount store cos i wanna try different colours but in a thrifty way

Now for EXCITING CHRISTMAS PRESENT TIME!!!!

First off SO MANY pc and xbox 360 games from Every Charity Shop In Cardiff, St Mellons, Rumney and Llanrumney. My sis has been trying to find some games to play but was like 'dont worry about it i can just wait til the charity shop gets something good'. So i thought i'd get some stocking stuffers via all the charity shops on my side of town. By our powers combined we will blitz the entire vale of glamorgan's discount gaming scene!!! I found SO MANY good stuff for £1/£2/£3 like holy shit i love when charity shops dont know the proper price for shit XD

speaking of which i also found a WEBCAM for £2! If its that cheap it probanly isnt great but itd still be fun to play around with! :D and the same store also had an old vintage G1 My Little Pony coffee mug in excellent condition. Oh god the nostalgia! My support worker gave me a lift to llanrumney so i had to awkwardly explain why i had an armful of weird 80s mugs and big teary eyes!

Speaking of vintage, i found this new vintage toys and games shop in cardiff called Galactic Attic! The name hooked me in and then they actually DID have pokemon inside! As well as all sorts of stuff ranging from 40s to 90s, wow! There was even a lil pile of old 90s gaming magazines in the corner, covered up by a bunch of boxes. I'm glad i noticed them! I got the announcemt issues for pokemon diamond pearl and platinum in a weird old pokemon fan magazine that i loved as a kid. Im kinda sad that nowadays we just have one official magazine fpr each console and not the wild madness of amateaur journalists failing horribly to get news from japan. Shame they didnt have Beckett Pokemon cos that one was infamous fot drawing its own terrible interpretations of pokemon sprites to avoid copyright. And speaking of terrible, they even had bootleg pokemon!! I talked to the cashier and he was like "you know those are fake right" and i was like "yeah its so nostalgic thats why i want em" and he was like "lol yeah they actually sell pretty well so i'm not mad my supplier ripped me off". It was a pretty good and awesomely terrible fake at the same time? There was this exact replica of some japanese display stand for the product and then the actual pokeball toys looked perfect BUT the mini pokemon inside were.. Really not. I am so damn happy with the surprise inside my one, surprise inside has never been more accurate! I can't take a picture now cos my phone is charging but REGICHEETO. Just..just imagine that, and whatever you're imagining it is probably worse. I love it so fuckin much. Also less hilariously there were some bootleg mini pika plushies with actually (as far as i can tell) their own unique design? They have cute lil winter scarves and an art style that reminds me of the Magical Pokemon Adventure manga. A really cute and good bootleg that i would have loved to see as a real product! The only way you can even tell its a bootleg is because there's no marking on the tail. I dunno, maybe if i still have some brown fabric in the cupboard i could fix it? Or maybe its unique tail makes it even more special! I mean there's Cosplay Pikachu with its double tail marking so maybe this is her cousin Accessory Pikachu with no markings? He just likes wearing scarfs and hats and stuff. OMG HE'S THE POKEMON GO EVENT PIKACHU!!!!!!

Along the miscness of finding a few things for myself, i also found: cute lil pokemon pencilcase, kingdom hearts blind bag, cheap copy of Fruits Basket volume 1 cos the new remake is coming out soon and i wanna Get Hype! The KH blind bag was really weird cos i didnt know they now have an entirely different set as well as the keychains i bought before. Its kind of a shame the art style doesnt match cos vexen is only in the keychains, alas! But i do really love these ones! Theyre apparantly made by funko pop but dont have the art style AT ALL, they just look like really accurate versions of the characters in mini form. Its kinda like the 'distance animation' style in steven universe? (Incidentally they also do SU ones but they missed the opportunitu to actually use the distance style, lol) I got a Sora in his kh2 outfit and i'm decently happy with that, its not one i really wanted but its not a bad one either. But i think now i've tried the fun of surprise once i'll just buy the actual ones i want off ebay later. They have roxas in his organization outfit! With a happy smile!!!

Oh oh and then EVEN MORE XBOX GAMES OF THE WILD THRIFT STORE VOID! i managed to find the whole fable series, two assassins creeds, saints row, gta, some misc shooter games and racers that she wanted but i dont know much about, mass effect 2 and ff13. I think maybe one or two others cos i cant fully remember right now. Theyre all in separate bags strewn across the room and my shoulders feel like death so i'll sort through them later.

Aaaand i wrote up like 14 paragraphs more but tumblr didnt save my draft fpr some fuckin reason and now im way too tired to do it again

Briefer summary:

* had a huge horrible panic attack getting stuck in a skyscraper shopping centre clothes place full of screaming and every perfume smell and WHY DO I HAVE TO NAVIGATE THIS HELL MAZE TO FIND THE ESCALATOR and seriously i was my most primal animalistic self and i went full fight or flight on this bitch

* had a lovely time visiting Cool Shop Grandma and rambled the story of how i met her and how we became friends but hhh too tired to rewrite. But anyway today i gave her a christmas pikachu plush as thanks for everything and cos her shop is moving on to its next location soon. She got really teary and gave me a big hug! She's gonna be at a comic con in march so i hope i'm able to go to that and see her again.

* went on a wild goose chase looking for harry potter merchandise and eventually found a gold plated replica of the movie prop version of the time turner and HELL YES my sis will love it!

* rambled about several market stalls that were cool but i can make a separate post about that in the morning when i find their contact details to advertise them

* got a plushie delibird and decided to take selfies with it everywhere to try and fight my social anxiety somehow. We went to a neat lil restaurant and had cheesy fries and a coke float!

* asked for a refund on an item for the first time ever and im proud of myself

* went off on a mystery bus trip to buy a preowned 3ds and pokemon games from a lady in an online preowned stuff facebook group and it didnt go horribly and i am glad! She was really nice and i witnessed A Good And Smart Parenting Moment and man it healed my heart and i wish i'd been raised that way. Again i'll probably ramble about the details later when im less tired, it really touched my heart seriously! And now i have MANY GIFTS FOR SIS!

* in total i was out present shopping from 9am to 8pm and i clicked my shoulder out of its socket for a split second from.all the heavy bags. Now im in a lot of aches and i need a sleeps

The End

[selie1412-blog]

 Lets see how many Waluigi fans I can trigger with this post. Super Smash Bros Ultimate will be my first video game review. I believe everyone of there internet is familiar with this game series by now. If not, then what rock have you been living under for the past 20ish years.

The review will be split into two parts. First the review for the storyline, and then the review for the multiplayer section. It will become obvious as you continue reading. I sure hope you do so...

Spoilers of the story mode will be shown below. Proceed with caution. 

Super Smash Bros Ultimate: 

With an arsenal of 76 fighters to choose from and various assist trophies, cough Waluigi cough, from many different games and pokemon to also join in the battle the possibility for this game seems endless. Although, then Mr. Sakurai of course had to go above and beyond literally everyone’s expectations to add the spirits section which includes characters from countless other games, adding approximately 1200 new characters to the game. (I know that there is more than this, but the last hundreds is just spirits of all the fighters so I was not counting them.)

Summary: 

The World of Light story mode for Smash Ultimate takes place when a new villain, Galeem, eliminates all the fighters and brainwashes them into serving its needs - basically turning them into his puppets. This all goes along to its plans except for the precious start child, Kirby, Mr. Sakurai’s beloved creation (well other then the entire Smash series). Kirby is then faced to *read in Morgan Freeman's voice* save the entire world! Then after beating Galeem for the first time a new villian emerges from the darkness, Dharkon, who seems to hold an impressive grudge again Galeem. The two seem to be in a constant battle with the recovered fighters only watching from the sidelines as their battle takes place. 

For the multiplayer section of the game the format of it has changed drastically from Smash 3 and Smash 4 respectively Smash 3Ds and Smash Wii U. The rule section is now a mandatory passage into the game and the stage selection now comes before the character selection. The rules also can not be changed once you select them unless you back out all the from the match to change them. Multiple other features have also been implemented such as smashdown and a tournament mode. Spirits can also be used in multiplayer battle as well between friends.

Review:

I have to give some kudos (Shinichi AUGGGG!!! Sorry little fangirl episode. I apologize for the interruption.) to the story line overall. The plot was something unique and unexpected, and oddly entertaining considering the sheer lack of cutscenes and lore to go along with it. Being able to come up with a interesting storyline like it has after the Subspace Emissary is quite impressive. When watching through the Smash Directs waiting for the game to release I absolutely knew that there was going to be a new story mode to go along with this game, but I was unsure on what exactly it was going to be because the Subspace Emissary seems almost perfect. The World of Light appears to be a battle of good and evil where one can not appear without the other, yet can not survive without each other. I believe MatPat's description of the lore can be one possible interpretation of the story mode, but I also believe that there are others as well. In creating my review of this integration I did use The Game Theory’s theory for some inspiration and guidance, so I will be drawing off of that as a source. 

Galeem and Dharkon physically seem to represent light and darkness respectively, so it would be obvious that they would be enamines. Then why do they both encapture all of the fighters who are supposed to be on the good side. Why would they both do so. Well the short and simple answer of that is that, as the cut senses show that is not the point. In the aspect of Galeem and Dharakon the fighters are meaningless, they have no value. Going back to the origin of it all, the fighters are supposed to simply represent a child playing with them and bringing them to life. In a matter of light and darkness the person playing or controlling the figure decides on how that they will behave. By the fighters being abducted by Galeem and Dharkon itis a simple change of hands. I mean even Master hand, general of Galeem, and then Crazy Hand, general of Dharkon, can easily represent order and discord. Each are traits of it varios counterparts. We, the player, are simply spectators watching a match between rivals of sorts. Each side has a general, 3 captains, various amounts of sargents (being the abducted characters), and then plentiful amounts of pawns (being the Spirits themselves). This battle we witness between the two is an war between light and darkness. 

The ending of story more is only obtained through defeating both Galeem and Dharkon at the same time. This is the true ending which will set all the spirits free. If only defecting a single one then the other will destroy the world. Each which is called the bad ending. This true ending then meaning that light can not exist without darkness and then darkness can not exist without light. If simply darkness exists then the world will be thrown into chaos and discord while is only light exists then nothing would get done and everything will cease to exist. A balance is needed for harmony to happen. Throughout the final map of the game as spirits were defeated Galeem and Dharkon constantly fought for power to overtake the other. The player, not shown, represent this balancing act. The act of calming and defeating both of the large giants restored order to the world, adn allowed life to continue. Quoting Kingdom Heart, (Its a good game series lay off!) “ The closer you get to the Light, The Greater Your Shadow Becomes.” In order to maintain a balance as light grows the darkness should also grow. As the balancer in the game you are returning balance to the world that was taken out of balance when Galeem first tried to overtake Dharkon by taking all of the fighters into its own ‘hand’, and then when it was taken out by the balancer the shift in powers went over to Dharkon who’s power rose. Think of it as a see-saw, as one side rises the other sinks, but if you then release the side the rose it will then sink and the other side will rise.

(Wow! That was a lot of writing just on the lore, lol. I congratulate all who actually read through that.)

The playthrough of the story mode itself I was sadly a bit disappointed int. With The Subspace Emissary you could play multiplayer and there was even some playforming that characters could travers. I was sad when both of those features were taken out of the game. The graphics of the story mode itself was impressive though. I could see the real dedication to each aspect of the map, and how they tried to fit each portal area to a certain theme to a game. Like there was a Monster Hunter area, Bowser's Castle, Legend of Zelda, and a Castlevania. The avatar of every single character was impressive as well. I mean creating all of the sprites especially fro this one small thing was no small feat, so that trait I appreciated. I know the big theme for Smash Ultimate is, “Got to go fast” as quoted from the Sonic the Hedgehog series, but sometimes its a little nice to stop and smell the roses. Like in the story mode! I would honestly sacrifice about half of the spirit battles in spirit mode to have some fun platform levels of some sort. Even if it was just put in as minigames I would be happy. Like Hit the Target or Find the Exit from melee, or maybe even just reskining some of the platform levels from Subspace with a HD addition to it and throwing it into World of Light. Any of that would be amazing! I believe that added a lot of fun to the overall story mode itself, and it was one of the main reasons that made me actually want to replay and beat the story mode multiple times because it was something a bit different from the rest of the game. It made the story mode very unique, and it made it stand out.

As for the multiple player section there was a number of new additions and fighting formats that actually improved the overall experience and gameplay of it, but there was also some aspect that made me frustrated at. My favorite aspects by far was the implications of the smash down and tournament sections. The have finally added a tournament section, and that makes me soooooo happy! I no longer have to make homemade tournament charts!!! T^T The shashdown is also very helpful to play with people who are really only good with one person, and that one person can pretty much wipe you out no matter what you do. It adds a lot of fairness to the game which succeeds in making it a lot more fun for the people out there who are good at a lot of characters, but not really good at just one (I actually sit in between these people. I have 3 mains who I like to fight as a lot, but I am decent at pretty much everyone else in the game. Well except for Mr. Game and Watch and Olimar. My mains by the way are: Mewtwo, Ganondorf, and Lucas.)

My main drawback with the multiplayer section of the game is actually how the rule selection is set up. For tradition Smash mode you have to go through the process of first choosing your rules for the match, picking you stage, and then choosing you fighter. This is path you always have to go down when entering in the smash mode after exiting the game. if you finish a match it just takes you back to the stage selection section. The problem exists when you finish a match, but you realize you made a mistake in the rule creation. In order to fix it you first have to back all the way out of the match, then open up the select rules tab that you specifically created for this match set, then edit what you want, finally save it, and then back out after selecting it and proceeding onto the rest of the match. Now this would not be as much as a problem if you were able to set a rule tab as default, so you could enterally skip that one step and continue onto the match. Also, if you were allowed to edit the rules while inside the match selecting process such as when you are choosing you stage because you forgot to turn off the stage morph or stage hazards or you start selecting you character and realize that the match is still on time and not on stock. If these features were implemented then the rule section would only need to be opened when it was needed to create a new set of rules. I am not saying that I dislike the aspect of creating a custom set of rules to use for match because I think that is a very nice user friendly option for the players, but I do think that it need a little more work to be better. This is a new feature that just needs a few bugs worked out, and the it would be perfect.

For the fighters and the battles themselves, I have stated previously that the theme of Smash Ultimate is, “Gotta Go Fast,” so that is what everything is. The speed of all the characters have improved - making all the heavy characters now usable competitively - as well as the final smashes. This speed change has really made the game itself into the fastest, most adgil, and adaptive are the best. So it is no surprise that Sonic, Mewtwo, and Inkling has all made it into the top tiers for being if not the fastest, most adgil, and adaptive characters in the game respectively. The final smashes on most of the characters have changed in one way or another, some for the better and some for the worse.  There is now a feature also to do diagonal air doges as well which helps out considerable for air movement and combat. Also the idea of perfect shielding has been improved, so it grants the player a chance attack the opponent when their defences are down a bit. There is not really much else to say in this area.

I am not going to touch on the classic mode much or the all-star mode much because they are pretty much the same as the previous game. Classic mode you fight about 6 battles with the last being either Master Hand or both Master Hand and Crazy hand at varying levels of difficulty. All-star mode is continuous matches with short breaks in between which goes on until you fight and defect every single smash fighter. I will only say this, which I have already stated before, I missed the small platforming levels inside Classic mode. It added something different to the overall flow which was a nice change of pace and mixed up the game some. 

Overall Smash Ultimate is an amazing game that has blown not only mine but everyone elses socks off. From the vast amount of characters included to the thoughtful and in depth storyline, and all of the new features that it includes. I sincerely believe that Mr. Sakurai has outdone himself, and is in need of a well needed vacation. He has done an amazing job at trying his best at making every fan and every series present in this game feel loved. With all of that though I will be honored to give Super Smash Bros Ultimate an astounding score of a 9/10. Splitting each part up into its various categories the World of Light Story mode receives a not too shabby 8.5/10. This is because of the lack of platforming areas (tear) and for the lack of official lore or true story line which has left a lot of fans trying to actually deceivers what it means, me included (given my own interruption above). Then with the multiplayer section receiving an impressive 9.5/10. Only docking off points for the wonky rules section which could possibly be fixed in a later update. 

Once again thank you very much for reading my update. If you actually succeeded in reading all of it. I apologize it was a bit long this time around, but there was a lot of content I had to cover.  If you have any further comments or additions I may have missed please put them in the comments below or simply PM me. Again, I will state this every time, if anyone has any requests for anything they wish for me to review in the future please once again post them in the comments below or PM,

Finally, if anyone is interested you are welcome to join my discord server where we will talking about various anime, manga, video games, and other sources of media. I have posted the link below! :)

 https://discord.gg/tvBR8Jn

[11jj11]

Far From Yesterday - Ch 19 - Marissonshipping

Here’s chapter 19.

Alex was still getting use to waking up with someone next to him.

His silver eyes cracked open every morning, always blinking at the green mass curled up next to him. The Electrike was a canine, so he shouldn’t be surprised that he liked to stick close to others, but he never knew what to make of seeing Lucas. It wasn’t like the Pokemon was the best to cuddle, his fur was stiff and rough, occasionally sparking with electricity. But yet Alex didn’t mind that one bit.

‘Wake up,’ He grunted at the Electrike– shoving him away with a clawed arm. Lucas let out a yelp, fur standing on end in alarm as he was suddenly jerked out of his sleep. Alex stood up, slowly stretching.

‘What was that for?!’ Lucas demanded, sparks running across his body.

‘You’re not going to learn a new move sleeping,’ Alex said, scratching at a loose scale. ‘Besides, half of what we do here is sleep.’

‘Well, we can’t do anything exciting thanks to those darn humans!’ Lucas snarled. ‘They just dump food in here– where is the thrill of hunt?! The reward from guarding your territory? And most importantly I can’t battle Father for alpha-ship while I’m in here!’

‘Fire Fang will do more damage to a Manectric than your electric moves would,’ Alex said. ‘If you want to fight him for alpha that would be your best bet.’

‘Of course, lightning can’t hurt us,’ Lucas said proudly.

Alex was about to comment on how electric types resist electric moves, but aren’t immune to them, but then he realized that Lucas was probably referring to his ability. Alex wasn’t sure if it was Volt Absorb, Lightning Rod or what not– many electric types had the ability to absorb electricity and convert it. He had no electric moves to test Lucas’ ability for himself, so he simply nodded.

‘Okay,’ Alex said, heading toward the other side of their enclosure. ‘Fire Fang works just like Thunder Fang. You bite in the same way, and channel the elemental energy into your target. If you bite just right you might even be able to make them flinch and land a second attack before they can.’

‘Awesome!’ Lucas said, lowering himself into a charging position. He opened his mouth, electricity dancing across his teeth.

‘But you need to summon fire– not electricity,’ Alex said, letting fire fill his mouth. Lucas paused, thinking, before summoning another mouth full of sparks and voltage, and the Charmeleon closed his eyes. ‘No, no– fire! You’re too used to electric type moves, but you can’t focus on that!’

‘But that’s how I battle!’

‘Focus on heat,’ Alex said, swinging his tail around so Lucas could see the flames. ‘A spark is like a bite– swift and painful– but fire is like pressure. Starts out gentle and warm, but becomes harsher the more energy to feed into it. It flickers, grows hotter and hotter, imagine it filling your mouth.’

He wasn’t quite sure if this would even help– he had summoned fire his whole life so he didn’t know how to explain it to someone else. He didn’t expect his words to do much, so he was very surprised when Lucas suddenly started coughing, stumbling back as smoke filled his mouth. Alex perked up, while the Electrike hacked up puffs of smoke.

‘Yeah!’ Alex said excitedly. ‘Like that– but more flames!’

‘It tastes horrible!’ Lucas howled.

‘It won’t if you can get flames next time,’ Alex said, bouncing towards his friend. ‘That was much quicker than I thought– come on– try again!’

They spent about an hour trying to get a Fire Fang to form, mostly smoke and a few cinders coming from Lucas’ mouth. The closest he got was a small jet of flame that came from his mouth. It was much too small and short lasting to be considered an Ember, and no where near acting as fire would need to for a Fire Fang, but it was progress.

Eventually Lucas got bored, and fell back onto the much more familiar Thunder Fang, and began attacking Alex.

He humored the electric type with the spar, holding back on his attacks so he didn’t knock Lucas out right away. What the Electrike lacked in power he made up for in speed, darting through their cage in a blink of an eye, pelting Alex with several attacks before he could even land one. The Charmeleon was sure that with a bit more power behind his moves and a good trainer, that Lucas would be an amazing battler.

‘Roar in pain!’ Lucas demanded as he slammed into Alex with a Spark attack. ‘It’ll make me look more epic!’

‘More epic?’ Alex asked, swiping with a Shadow Claw. ‘But that would be suggesting that you already are epic on some level– and you’re not.’

‘Hey!’ Lucas cried.

Alex jumped out of the way of a Charge Beam, laughing at the look on the canine’s face as he processed the insult. He zipped at Alex with a Quick Attack, nicking him in the leg. The energy for a Dragon Pulse began to form in his mouth, waiting for when the Electrike would be in firing range. He was still racing about with a Quick Attack, coming in to attack again.

Suddenly Lucas stopped in his tracks, staring at the bars behind Alex, eyes wide.

“Char!” Alex declared triumphantly, releasing the Dragon Pulse and knocking Lucas back into the shadows. ‘Hah! Take that!’

Lucas grunted, rolling to his feet, eyes still staring behind Alex. He let out a sharp bark, his entire body tensing up defensively. ‘Humans!’

Alex paused, and then turned around to look at the bars– it was much too early for their meal. He stared in surprise when he saw two humans watching him and Lucas, their nicer clothes showing that they weren’t the workers they usually saw roaming these halls. His insides twisted, and he hoped that they realized that the battle they had seen was only a friendly spar.

Lucas bolted forward, fur standing on end as he stood in front of Alex, letting out harsh barks at the humans. ‘Go! Away! Leave! Go! Away!’

“That one was captured by a young trainer in Hoenn,” The man said, gesturing to Lucas. “But it was simply too much for them to handle, which was why he was sent here. Not the strongest Pokemon, but definitely has the attitude you want if you think you can get it to listen.”

The other man, who had piercing dark eyes, chuckled. “Obedience is not a problem– there are many ways to get a Pokemon to listen,” His eyes flickered over Lucas, before falling onto Alex. “However, what really captured my focus was that Charmeleon. What a handsome beast, definitely not from your standard Charmander line.”

Alex wasn’t sure what they wanted, but he let out a low snarl as Lucas began growling.

“I’m afraid that one isn’t one we can sell quietly,” The first man said. “Its trainer still has expressed interest in it despite the history behind it– it’s attacked humans, you see– and questions would definitely be raised if it was taken.”

Alex hated the way those dark eyes watched him. “The exotic moves, and of course that intimidating appearance,” He muttered. “Even if it couldn’t perform well in the ring, it would most certainly rake in some high bets.”

What?! Alex thought, confusion rushing through him. Betting? ‘The ring’? Those weren’t terms for an average battle.

“But from what I’ve just seen it can fight,” He continued, eyeing Alex as if he were merchandise in a store. “It’d need an everstone, of course– they don’t like flyers participating in the fights– takes away the suspense that you get with pitting them in the ring.”

The first man shrugged. “I never saw the appeal of such bloody fights, but the underground matches pay well,” He sighed. “But like I said, the Charmeleon has a trainer, and drawing attention to yourself wouldn’t be good for you or the underground.”

Alex’s heart was hammering as he listened to the humans. Illegal battles, everyone had caught whiff of them sometime or another, matches that pit Pokemon against each other in the cruelest of fights. It wasn’t a trainer guided sport, but rather bloody matches with money betted on the outcome. Of course such things had to be kept quiet though, with such battles breaking dozens of human laws– so why was someone that was a part of it at a league facility!?

But the more he thought about it, the more sense it made. This whole building was made to hold Pokemon deemed too aggressive for trainers or just the general public. Pokemon like him, that were seen as a risk. Wild Pokemon that became too bold. And Pokemon like Lucas, who simply didn’t adjust to the idea of listening to a trainer.

To hold them here for the rest of their life would cost so much money, something humans hoarded. So why pay for food and water to keep aggressive Pokemon in cages when they could sell them to the underground looking for such Pokemon? The Pokemon in here were ones that were feared, ones that no one cared about– ones that no one would notice if gone.

“You deem whether they go back to trainers or not, don't you?” The man with those horrible eyes laughed. “Tell the trainer it’s too aggressive to be returned, wait a few weeks until they forget about it, then it’s free to do what you wish with it.”

The first man sighed. “Very true. Besides, seeing that it attacked a pregnant woman I’m not sure if the league will want it back on the streets anyways,” He turned to face the other man. “So you want the Charmeleon then? You’ll have to wait a while for it though.”

“Yes, I’ll take both the Charmeleon and the Electrike,” He said, black eyes drilling into Alex. “That wild Ursaring and Fraxure also caught my eye. I’ll take all four, pick them up in, let’s say... a month’s time? More if needed?”

“Well, um–”

“I know that’s quite the time to hold them, but I’ll pay you extra,” The man said. “Cover their expenses for food and such as well. Do we have a deal?”

The first man thought this over, then held out his hand. “As long as that ‘extra’ is something decent, then I’d be more than happy to,” He said, and the two men shook hands. “I’ll let you know if anything else worth your while comes in.”

Alex was as stiff as a statue as the two men walked away, heart thundering in his chest.

‘The humans think they can take me!?’ Lucas snarled, clearly not understanding what they had witnessed. ‘They’ll be sorry!’

‘It doesn’t matter what I do... they’re... they’re going to take me from Alain...’ Alex whispered. ‘Pit us in fights... oh Yveltal they’re going to put us in fights!’

‘Should have Dragon Pulsed the both of them!’ Lucas snarled.

Alex closed his eyes. ‘...No more training– let’s start digging.’

‘I thought you thought the hole was a waste of time,’ Lucas said, blinking.

‘It probably is,’ Alex agreed, heading towards the shadowy half of their enclosure. ‘But it’s probably our only chance. This place is twisted– we can’t stay here. They’re... they’re going to...’

‘Humans,’ Lucas snorted. ‘They just can’t be trusted.’

‘It’s worse than that,’ Alex said, jumping into the hole, clawing desperately at the soil. ‘Much, much worse.’

Lucas still didn’t seem to understand just what could happen to them, but he read the tone. For once his gaze softened with worry, and he jumped into the hole to join Alex, his small paws working alongside Alex’s claws as they attempted to dig deeper.

-------------------------------

There was a tremble in Alain’s hand as he set the plate on the counter.

He couldn’t look Professor Sycamore in the eye as he set the uneaten breakfast in front of him, his blue eyes distant. His heart was thumping with a fear he hadn’t felt in a long time, and one that he hoped he’d never have to face again. His fingers curled into fists, turning away– why was this happening?

“She didn’t even touch it,” Alain whispered. “She just said she wasn’t hungry.”

“You know her appetite has been anything but constant these last few weeks,” He said gently. “We’ll try offering her something else later.”

“...She won’t come downstairs either,” He muttered. “She’s just sitting there... Professor, I can’t let her go through this again, I can’t–”

A hand grabbed his shoulder. “This is different,” Sycamore said. “Not that this will be any less sorrowful, any less difficult– but it is still different. Mairin will need time to mourn, she’ll need time to come to terms with what’s happening, and she’ll need her space,” His voice softened. “And I think you’ll need the same thing– please don’t lock up your emotions, Alain. Let yourself mourn.”

“Who said I was locking anything up?” Alain snapped.

“Because I know you always try to be the strong one,” He said softly. “I’ve seen you hide behind a mask so many times– and no one should have to do that to themselves. Things may seem beyond repair, but–”

“Our child is dying,” Alain whispered. “Nothing will ever fix that.”

Sycamore tried to say something more, but Alain pulled himself away from the professor before a word could escape his mouth, eyes glued to the ground as he briskly made his way out of the kitchen. His emotions were humming, and he wasn’t sure if his sorrow, angry, or fear was stronger. They were all rushing through him, burning through his veins with an intensity he didn’t know. He kept his gaze locked on the ground, refusing to look at anyone as he passed them in the hall.

The stairs seemed to get longer each time, as if more steps were added with each trip he made up them. He allowed his gaze to flick up as he crested the stairs to the second floor, before pressing down the hallway. His fingers traced the wall as he headed towards their bedroom, coming to a stop right outside it. He touched the doorknob, but made no effort to open it, only pausing to listen.

His heart twisted as he heard the quiet sobs coming from the bedroom, and he could only imagine Mairin curled up on their bed, crying as she had last night. It took everything he had to not burst in and wrap her in his arms, to kiss her and comfort her, to simply be there for her in the way he had always known. His mouth was dry as his pulled his hand away from door, and continued down the hall.

What had happened last night, this morning– meant nothing. She was hurt, and had needed the comfort. She hadn’t clung to him out of love, but out of desperation. If she needed to be held again, then he’d be there, but it’d be wrong for him to be the one to make that first step. To force her into a situation that she might regret later. Walking away from her hurt, knowing that she was in tears, but yet his steps didn’t slow.

Alain eventually came to the room she called her own, and he pushed open the door, eyes sweeping her room. His gaze soon settled onto her Pokeballs that rested on the dresser, and he knew that she’d want them to be close, probably more than she wanted to be around him. If she didn’t want to leave their room then he could at least bring her Pokemon to her. He looked down at the belt of Pokeballs as he picked it up, before carefully removing Bébé’s empty Pokeball– she didn’t need anymore sorrow right now. She didn’t deserve to feel anymore of this bitter sting.

...She was crying– that was the one thing he had to remember. She was letting herself cry, she was letting herself show and feel these emotions.

An image rose in his mind, shivers running through him as he pictured a pair of empty amber eyes staring at him, the dull gaze emotionless. Her skin was pale from hiding away in her dark room, refusing to come out, refusing to let anyone linger near her. Her once rich tone had become monotone, uncaring...

Alain closed his eyes, shoving the thought from his mind. He wouldn’t let that happen to her again, he refused to watch her shut down again.

...Professor Sycamore was right. This was different. This sorrow they were feeling, this horrible weight that was pressing down on them... it was different. Painful. Sorrowing– heavy. But it was sorrow, not guilt. As much as it ached, as much as Alain wished he could tear it from their hearts... there was no one to blame.

Fate was cruel, he could simply imagine it laughing at him right now. Mockingly watch as the one perfect person, the one that deserved no harm, drowned in this pain. Refused to give mercy to the one who had done no wrong.

Alain’s eyes scanned the room once more for anything else Mairin could possibly need, and his eyes flickered to her bedside table, frowning at a stack of books resting there. He slipped the Pokebelt over his arm, making his way to the bedside and picking up the book on the top of the pile. The sticker on the front showed it was from the Lumiose Library, and the title read ‘Pokemon of Hoenn’. A frown crossed his face, and he began looking over the rest of the books: ‘Hoenn Sealife’, ‘Absol– Omen or Guardian?’, ‘Pokemon of Eastern Hoenn’, ‘Pokemon of Western Hoenn’, and ‘Competitive Dark Types’.

He knew that Mairin would have had no time to get these recently, meaning that someone else must of checked these out for her, and his stomach twisted. He glanced at the Absol book, hoping that was what she had been researching, but judging by all of the other Hoenn books he had a feeling that hadn’t been her goal with this reading. He closed his eyes, before gathering all of the books into his arms. He flipped the lights off as he went out of her room, quietly shutting the door behind him.

He hadn’t wanted to go anywhere today, he had simply wanted to curl up and wish time away. But now he had several books to return to the library– he doubted that there was anything in them that could lead her to remembering those horrible moments... but he couldn’t take risks. Not now. She didn’t need to remember the guilt she had put herself through, not when she was going through all of this.

It pained him to think that way– he wanted nothing more than the Mairin he could call his own back... but eighteen year-old Mairin was emotionally stronger than the woman of the memories she had lost. What they had learned yesterday was breaking her... but he couldn’t risk her shattering again. As horrible as the shambles of this life was, this was probably the most stable she could be right now.

Getting her through this would come first, restoring her memories would have to come later.

“...I love you, Mairin,” Alain whispered as he walked by his door, gaze softening, knowing she was in there. “I promise you I’ll protect you... I’ll... I’ll...”

Protect her? How could he protect her when he couldn’t even protect their child? Their innocent baby who had yet to even experience this world, who was being taken from them, torn right from their arms.

Tears blurred Alain’s eyes, resisting his fight to keep them back. The pain in his chest burned, and a sob burst from him. His shoulders hunched, clutching the books to his chest as his tears spilled over. He wanted to be stronger than this, he wanted to carry them through this horrible pain.

But he realized he, too, was breaking.

-----------------------------

“Naught...”

“I’m not hungry, Chespie,” Mairin said softly, her starter’s face falling as she said this. The towering grass type nudged her, again attempting to offer her the bag of chips Ruby had brought up from the kitchen. She sighed, picking up the bag and setting it off to the side. “...Maybe later, but not now...”

“Ches,” He rumbled, the Chesnaught laying a monsterous hand on her knee. She stared down at his claws for a moment, the Pokemon having refused to leave her side all day. She placed her hand on top of his, hoping that this would help calm her starter. Even if there was nothing she could do with the painful emotions running through her, Chespie didn’t need to go through this as well.

She turned away, eyes staring out the window as her Pokemon let out more concerned noises. Despite it being late out, lights still shone in through the window. Alain’s room faced the front of the lab, meaning that the street lights illuminated his room even at night. Mairin shakily inched her way to the edge of the bed, Chespie watching her as she slowly pushed herself to her feet.

She stumbled to the window, reaching for the blinds. The room darkened as she slid them shut, before pulling the curtains closed as well for good measure. Mairin stood there for a moment, her body feeling weak. She hadn’t eaten a single thing all day, and despite her feeling its effects, she still didn’t feel hungry. She stared at the green curtains, feeling slightly dizzy, and she looked back at Chespie.

She stared at his missing spike for a few moments, but it vanished from sight as he turned to look at her as well, his shell now facing away from her. Mairin let her gaze slide to the ground, stumbling back towards the bed. A part of her wondered if she should simply go to her own room, but the mere thought of heading out into the rest of the lab made her sick. She didn’t want anyone to see her right now, not like this.

She laid back down on Alain’s bed, head being buried into one of the pillows. Chespie drew a blanket up over her shoulders. Her fingers dug into the pillow, tears stinging her eyes, but no sobs came from her. She had spend the entire morning up here crying, and there was simply nothing left. It felt like everything was being taken from her, and was she starting to wonder if it was even worth the effort to fight it. If the world wanted her to lay here, to suffer as everything slipped through her fingers like grains of sand, then that’s what she’d do.

Mairin’s eyes flicked open as she heard the door sliding open, and she heard soft footsteps entering the room, a hushed voice speaking. “Is... is she asleep?”

“...No,” Mairin muttered at the same time Chespie shook his head.

Alain let out a soft sigh, and she could feel the mattress shifting as he sat down. “Have you been up here the entire time I’ve been gone?”

“Where were you?” Mairin whispered.

“...That doesn’t matter,” Alain said gently, laying a hand on her shoulder. “All that matters to me right now is you. Will you please come downstairs for a few minutes? Everyone else is in bed, so you wouldn’t have to worry about that.”

More tears stung her eyes as Alain said this, shoulders shaking. “N-not again, p-please.”

He shifted, moving closer to her. Her heart thumped, split between embracing him and shoving him away. Bitterness welled up between her sorrow, barely even listening to the soft words he was saying. How could he do this now? After everything that had happened? After everything they were going through!

“Y-you’re keeping things from me,” Mairin whispered. “Again. My b-baby is dying and you’re just hiding behind lies again.”

“No, Mairin, no– I didn’t mean for it to sound that way, I just–”

She rolled over to face him, cringing in pain as she jerked her injured form. Amber eyes glowered up at him, tears of sorrow and frustration staining her cheeks. She struggled to find the words she wanted to say, a part of her only seeing Alain as safety, while another side of her pulsed with anger.

“If you’re not keeping things from me,” Mairin whispered. “Th-then tell me the truth. Tell me what happened to Bébé and Ch-charizard that night, what h-happened to everyone that night– what happened to me.”

“...Mairin...” Alain looked pained, and his gaze slipped away from hers. That was all she needed to see, a spur of bitterness rushing through her.

“You don’t trust me,” Mairin muttered, tears running down her face. She scooted towards the edge of the bed, throwing the blanket off of her, Chespie reaching for her as she rolled to her feet. “Everyone says you love me, b-but yet you don’t even trust me.”

Her injuries flared in pain as Chespie helped her stand, but she didn’t care. Alain didn’t say anything to her, and out of the corner of her eye she could see him struggling for words, hurt and confusion on his face. She turned away, stumbling towards the door, pushing Chespie’s hand away as he tried to help her.

“Mairin–”

“I... I think I will go downstairs,” Mairin whispered. “A-alone.”

She didn’t stop to hear any reply, throwing the door open and stumbling out into the hallway. She faintly remembered one of her first nights without her memories, when Alex had nearly attacked her mere steps outside of Alain’s room. How Alain had found her, carrying her inside...

She shook the memories from her mind, focusing on merely stumbling forward. She half expected Alain to come running after her, but she heard nothing as she made her way down the stairs. She winced with each step, her stitches feeling more fragile than ever. That wasn’t the only thing hurting either– the twisting white marks on her arms ached, and the center of her back pulsed in pain.

And of course, her heart was hurting the most.

“Why...?” Mairin asked in a weak voice. “Why is this happening to m-me...? What did I d-do...?”

More tears were pouring down her face, leaking from her eyes despite her efforts to keep them in. She just couldn’t understand why everything in her life– everything remotely good– was being torn from her. Pokemon and friends... her family... her bond with Alain– both the one she remembered and the one she didn’t. Then of course, perhaps worst of all, her baby. Her innocent child who had yet to even see this world...

The only form of a reply she got was a rumbling stomach– her body begging for some form of food to be given to her. She struggled to hold back a bitter laugh– oh the irony... before she had even known of the life within her she could barely keep down a meal... but now that she had grown to love this child, now that she knew she was loosing her... now her body begged to eat. As if that could save her from the emptiness in her heart.

But yet Mairin found herself shakily stumbling towards the kitchen, not really caring what happened next. The future looked so dark, so clouded, that she didn’t even pause to think what could be thrown at her next. Nothing could be worse than this.

“Mairin?” A soft voice asked, sounding slightly surprised. Mairin was startled, and found that she wasn’t the only one in the kitchen.

Max stood next to the fridge, a container of berries in his hands. She stared at him for a moment, a powerful looking Sceptile standing in front of him. The lizard shot one glance at Mairin, before nudging Max, begging for some more berries. Max handed the Leppa berries over to the lizard, who happily began chomping the fruit right from the packaging. A gleaming green gem was set around the Pokemon’s wrist– a mega stone.

“...Hi Max...” Mairin whispered, feeling she had to say something to fill the silence.

“I... I hope we’re not disturbing you,” Max said, his voice still soft, gentle. “Um, me and Sceptile can go into the other room if you want to be alone or–”

“No, you can stay if you want,” Mairin said, not making eye contact. “You won’t patronize me, I think.”

“Are you hungry?” Max asked. “I could get you something to eat, if you’d like.”

She glanced at the container of Leppa berries Max’s Sceptile had nearly finished off. “Are there any Tamato berries in there? I think I could eat a few of those... and maybe some milk...”

Max smiled softly, before nodding at the table. She slowly made her way over, sitting down, trying her best not to flinch. Max opened the fridge, combing through the drawers and shelves. He was silent, not attempting to make any further conversation as he pulled out the spiky red berries and a gallon of milk. His Sceptile slunk up next to him on all fours, sniffing at the Tamato berries, but his trainer gave him a sharp look.

A minute later a bowl of berries and a glass of milk was set in front of her, while Max took a seat across from her. Had circumstances been different she might of smiled, but all she could manage was a small nod. She began nibbling on the berries, despite her body wanting her to wolf it down, not even blinking at its spicy flavor. Silence filled the room except for Sceptile, who placed his chin on Mairin’s shoulder, whimpering.

“You don’t need to worry about him,” Max said quietly as she held out a Tamato berry to the grass type. “He’s had plenty to eat.”

“I don’t mind,” Mairin whispered, and the Sceptile snapped the berry out of her hands. He smiled happily as he swallowed– and then his eyes widened.

“Tile!” He cried at the spiciness, eyes widening. He bolted away from Mairin’s side, scrambling to the sink and turning the water on, stuffing his head under the stream of water, guzzling down the cool liquid.

“He’ll be okay,” Max said when he saw the look of concern in Mairin’s eyes. “He kind of deserves it actually– he would have tried to steal your food if you hadn’t offered him any.”

“He’s sweet...” Mairin replied, trailing off as the Sceptile finally pulled away from the water, gasping for air. She continued eating the berries without much thought, only pausing to get a drink of milk. As she reached for the last berry Max sat up slightly, taking in a deep breath.

“If there’s anything else I can do for you, Mairin, then please let me know,” Max said. “I don’t want to push you or anything, I know you need your space right now... but I’m here if you need anything.”

Mairin paused, eyeing Max. “A-anything?”

“Anything,” He promised.

She bit into the last berry, swallowing, thoughts bouncing around her mind. She watched Max, who shifted uncertainly. There was actually something Max could do for her, something that no one else would. But despite this, she was slightly afraid to bring it up, he had said it was painful for him to talk about... he had lost his Mightyena that night, but still...

But still she needed to know.

Mairin took in a deep breath. “Tell me about what happened in the desert– please.”

His gaze went from gentle to suprised– before finally melting away into worry. He inched back slightly in his chair, eyes sweeping the room. “Mairin...”

“Don’t tell me it’s Alain’s story to tell,” Mairin whispered. “He won’t tell me– he refuses, Max. I... I have a right to know, I shouldn’t be kept in the dark like this.”

“I know that, Mairin... and I understand that you want to know,” He swallowed. “But I don’t think it should be now, not when... when all this is happening.”

“I’m losing everything, Max!” Mairin cried– louder than she intended, and fresh tears stung her eyes. “My memories, my Pokemon, every familiar thing in my life– my child! I– I don’t care how bad it was! Nothing can be worse than what I feel right now!”

“I...”

“Please! Max, please!” Mairin begged, vision blurring. “I can’t live like this, I can’t live in this darkness. These are my memories, my past– don’t keep that from me!”

Her tears fell freely, silent sobs coming from her. It hurt, everything truly hurt. Her body, her heart, her mind– it had been pushed to its limits. Pulled and tugged in every direction, ripped nearly in two. She didn’t know what else she could do, she didn’t know where she could go. She had reached her limits, and she was afraid one more step would push her beyond them.

“...I’ll let you know what happened...” Max said softly, causing Mairin to freeze up, whipping her gaze towards him. “But only on two conditions.”

“Anything,” Mairin whispered.

“...I don’t feel like this is something you need to hear right now,” He muttered quietly. “But... but you’re right. We shouldn’t be keeping this from you. So you have to promise me that you are ready to hear this.”

“I am–”

“This isn’t just some little event or story,” Max said, closing his eyes. “It’s... it’s painful memories, Mairin. That night still gives me nightmares. You have to be sure you’re ready for this, not just desperate for it.”

She was quiet for a moment, taking this in. She knew this already, she already knew that Pokemon had died that night– Pokemon she had cared deeply for. But still, Max’s words made her hesitate with her answer. She bit her cheek... she already knew the painful results of this event, she just didn’t know what took place...

“I’m ready,” Mairin whispered.

“My second condition is that you have to promise me you won’t blame yourself.”

This made Mairin pull back, blinking at these words. Sharp brown eyes were watching her, Max’s gaze cool compared to how he had been earlier. He didn’t look angry, simply serious, watching her carefully. Her mouth was slightly dry, not quite sure what to make of this as she tried to piece together a reply.

“You have to promise me,” Max repeated as she looked away, and Mairin swallowed.

“I... I promise,” She whispered.

He sighed, but nodded. Mairin sat up a bit, an unknown emotion rushing through her as she waited for Max to say something. He reached into his pocket, apparently searching for something as she watched him. He made no effort to start a story however, not saying a word on what could have taken place as he set something on the table.

He slid a thin keycard towards her. “This will get you into my office,” He said quietly. “All the information you’d want on what happened can be found in there,” She gave him a questioning glance. “...It’s too hard for me to talk about,” Max muttered, looking away. “This is the best I can offer you.”

Mairin reached for the keycard, a slight tremble in her hands. “...Thank you, Max.”

He watched her with distant eyes, simply looking away and nodding.

[murkrees]

art style; huang renjun ft. dream

summary: “i’m not stalking you, exactly, it’s just that you accidentally put my sketchbook in your bag and i’m waiting for a good moment to steal it back before you see the drawings of you i did in it.” based on this post.

pairing: renjun x reader

genre: high school! au

Renjun thumbed through the pages of his sketchbook, flipping through various sketches of you until he arrived at a blank page. Glancing at you from the corner of his eye, he gnawed at his lip in concentration as dark streaks started to appear on the pages. His hand flowed across the page, the rough outline of you starting to take shape. He continued on, looking up from his hunched position once in a while for reference even though he had drew you so many times by this point. The morning light streaming through the classroom window was hitting you perfectly, your hair framing your face in a way that made Renjun’s heart beat just a little bit faster. His cheeks pinked slightly, wondering what it would be like to run his hands through them -

“Renjun!” He startled, breaking out of his thoughts. Renjun’s wide eyes met his teacher’s by the board, raising an eyebrow at him in a questioning manner, “Would you bother explaining the differences between an oligotrophic, mesotrophic and eutrophic lake, please?”

“U-Uh…” he straightened in his chair, shifting the notebook closer to his body as he squinted at the whiteboard, “An oligotrophic lake has low nutrient concentration and organism growth, a eutrophic lake has high nutrient concentration and organism growth while mesotrophic lakes fall in the middle?”

“Correct,” his teacher narrowed her eyes, “Even though you may understand the material, Renjun, it would be beneficial if you kept your focus during classtime. Now sit with your partners, everyone – we’ll spend the rest of the time discussing our project.”

Renjun sighed in relief. His back slumped once more before he locked eyes with you from the other side of the classroom. You had stood up, grabbing your books and bags before making your way to him. He blushed in embarrassment, remembering that he had just zoned out in front of you, his partner and longtime crush.

“Morning!” You slid into the seat next to him, a bright smile on your face despite the early hours of the day. He slammed his sketchbook shut, hiding it behind the messy pile of papers and books strewn about on his desk before giving you a shy smile back.

“You’re cheery today,” he commented, toying with the corners of his biology notebook. You shrugged.

“Woke up on the right side of bed, I guess. I have a feeling something good’s going to happen today,” you turned to face him, “So, how are we going to make this self-sustaining terrarium?”

The class whizzed by, the both of you caught up in talking about the project. Papers were scribbled on and discarded, ideas crossed out and jotted down. The supposedly boring class of biology became more exciting as the both of you joked around and debated, planning on times to work on the project and who was going to keep and look after it. He couldn’t stop staring at you at times, a faint pink blush on his cheeks and a stupid smile on his face. Sure, he had drawn you a few times and more than his fair share of decent conversations, but the thought of being this close with you for the rest of the semester sent his heart fluttering a tad bit faster.

Before you knew it, the bell rung. Students were already packing their bags, ignoring the teacher up front reminding them of the project’s due date. Renjun himself was in no rush to stand up, wrapping up the conversation he had with you.

“What class do you have next, (Y/N)?” He asked.

“Oh, algebra,” you shrugged, before freezing, eyes wide in shock, “Oh, algebra! The test!”

You sprang out of your seat, hurriedly shoving all your papers inside and grabbing all your books. Renjun watched with an amused eye as you waved goodbye at him, rushing out of class in order to spare a few minutes of studying. He looked down to his lap, biting his lip as he remembered the easy flow of conversation you two shared and how there were going to be more to come. One thing was for sure – biology was quickly turning to be his favorite subject.

Renjun sighed, head resting against his propped elbow. His hand cupped his cheek, right hand absentmindedly doodling a sleeping moomin on the pages of his book. His chemistry teacher ranted on about acids and bases, but it seemed like his brain had just upped and left, taking his interest in the subject with it. Jaemin sat next to him, looking at the teacher simply because he didn’t have anything else to stare at while twirling his pen absentmindedly in his hand. Struck with a sudden urge to draw you, he reached down to his bag and rifled around for the familiar leather cover of his sketchbook, failing to find it for the first time.

He straightened in his seat. Leaning fully to the side, he started searching for it with both hands. He took out all of his notebooks and large objects, staring at the now empty bag with shocked eyes and a panic-frenzied heart. No, no – this sort of thing only happens in movies, right? He groaned out loud (earning a few startled looks from his classmates) and let his body flop, banging his head against the table as he buried in in his arms. The one thing you weren’t supposed to see (ever) was now in your possession, tucked snugly in your backpack.

Something poked his arm. Renjun let out another small moan, wordlessly letting his arms drop uselessly to his sides as he turned his head to face a worried-looking Jaemin. He stopped poking the older with his pen, pulling it away from his arm and tapping it against the table unconsciously.

“You okay, bro?” Renjun closed his eyes and whined, burying his face in his arms once more before abruptly straightening and throwing his head back. He mussed his hair up in frustration.

“She has my sketchbook,” Jaemin’s brows only furrowed deeper, “The black one. She has it.”

“And?”

“You don’t understand, Jaemin,” he put both hands on the boy’s shoulders, shaking him, “She has my sketchbook. I’m going to die.”

Jaemin’s lip formed an ‘o’ of understanding. Renjun bemoaned his fate, glancing at the wall clock. Seven more minutes until class ends – it was too late to ask for a bathroom slip now. He would just have to wait until the bell rung before he had any chances of getting his precious sketchbook back. That was all Renjun had to do; wait.

Renjun couldn’t wait. He had zero patience at all, if any, which explained why it was his third time in the hallway right now when they were barely half an hour into class. His bathroom pass was slung over his neck like the picture of a model student, and he walked extremely slowly to the bathroom on the other side of the building, making sure to slow down even more when he passed by the physics classroom.

He spotted your figure, heart feeling a little lighter when he saw you diligent in your own work instead of rifling through his sketchbook. Of course, that was what you had been doing this whole time. His eyes zeroed in on your backpack, unzipped and filled to the brim with books and papers. He sighed in relief. At least with the amount of stuff piled in there, the chances of you actually noticing his sketchbook were slimmer than ever.

Instead, he focused on the way you looked up and down from the board to your work, biting your lip in concentration as you pondered over calculations. He was entranced with the way your hand scribbled across the page, listening to the teacher explain the workings of a rollercoaster intently. He was confused over how you sent his heart skipping a beat over doing normal, mundane things; tasks you probably didn’t even think twice about doing. He stopped questioning it a long time ago, instead letting his feelings flow through lead to paper.

You looked up from your book, eyes catching his in a heartbeat. You lit up, sending him a small, discreet wave. He stiffened, cheeks flushing like a deer caught in headlights. Shyly, he brought his own hand up in greeting, his awkwardness earning him a small laugh from you.

He saw you stop abruptly, looking up before bowing your head in shame and readjusting yourself in your seat. Confused, he looked up himself to see the angry face of the physics teacher, glaring daggers at him through the glass window of the door. Renjun gulped, taking a step back before spinning on his heel and turning tail out of there before the teacher could storm out and give him the scolding of his life.

His cheeks were still tinted a deep red by the time he reached his language arts class, both from the embarrassment of being caught by the teacher and the giddiness of being noticed by you. He bowed to the teacher mindlessly as he entered, putting his bathroom pass on the door handle. She eyed him with a concerned look on her face.

“You took long, Renjun – If you have diarrhea, don’t hesitate to go to the nurse’s office, okay?”

From the back of the class, he swore he heard Donghyuck cackle.

“Woah! You have a Snorlax!” Jisung snatched Chenle’s 3DS from his hands, the older whining in protest. The maknae tinkered around with it, hunching to the side and ignoring the arms of the 2001 liner around his body in an attempt to grab it back, “That’s so cool!”

“Yah, Jisung Park, give that back,” Chenle complained. Jisung ignored him, far too invested in the pokemon.

Renjun ignored their antics, pushing his food around with his fork. His knee hopped up and down restlessly, appetite gone as he pictured you flipping through the pages of his sketchbook and the drawings of you that decorated them. The rest of the Dreamies were fooling around; Mark was ignoring the small pellets of food Donghyuck sent flying from his tray, Jeno and Jaemin were conversing about their biology project while Chenle and Jisung were shoving each other playfully in their fight to obtain the 3DS. He craned his neck slightly and looked around the cafeteria, hoping to spot you eating or in line for food instead of looking through his precious sketchbook. You were nowhere to be found, though. He huffed out an irritated sigh.

“You okay, Renjun?” Mark glanced at him, brows furrowing with worry, “You’ve been acting kind of… weird. Jittery. Nervous. You get my point.”

Donghyuck snorted, “He has diarrhea.”

“Is that true?” The eldest’s eyes widened, “You should head back to the dorms, dude. Taeyong hyung just stocked up on our medicine-“

“I don’t have diarrhea,” Renjun cut in, sending a dirty glance at the troublemaker, “And I’m not heading back. I have some important stuff to do.”

“Like stalking (Y/N)?”

Mark’s head whipped around to face the younger, bewildered, “You’ve been stalking (Y/N)? Renjun-”

“I haven’t been stalking anybody! Mark, why are you believing everything Donghyuck says?” He let his body flop onto Jeno’s side, “She took my sketchbook and I need to get it back! This is a tragedy - I’m never going to live this down.”

“The one with all your drawings of her in it?” Chenle questioned, managing to wrangle his 3DS from the bluenette’s hands. Renjun rubbed a hand over his face, wanting nothing more than to melt into a puddle.

“That one.”

The eldest winced, “That’s harsh, dude. What are you going to do about it?”

“Just ask for it back, Junnie,” Jaemin commented, swiping a french fry from Jeno’s tray and popping it in his mouth, “Easy peasy.”

“Because everyone’s good at confrontation like you, Jaemin,” he stated, “I can barely hold a decent conversation without wanting the earth to swallow me up whole.”

“The solution’s pretty simple, then,” Jisung cut in, “Snag it the moment she leaves her bag alone.”

“That could work,” Jeno supplied, frowning all the while, “But I’m not sure-“

“That could work! Jisung, you’re an angel!” With that, Renjun stood up and grabbed his tray, “I’m going to be home late. Go back to the dorms first without me.”

He was about to turn around and leave, but the sound of Mark calling out his name stopped him.

“Yes?”

“You don’t really have diarrhea, right?”

Donghyuck let out another loud cackle.

Renjun hid in the staircase beside the art room, waiting until the moment you would pass by. He knew you spent your time after school in that room, so he specifically chose to camp outside it and wait until you would go outside before taking his sketchbook. He’d been tailing you the entire day, walking behind you in the small, five-minute margins between classes to make sure you didn’t see any of his drawings. He also made sure to pass by your classes, only to see you diligent in your work most of the time.

Granted, there were a couple of close calls, but he made sure to hide between lockers or behind some pillars. It was a miracle you hadn’t even caught on yet – and he thought he was slow. Nervously, he pressed his phone’s home button, the digital analog showing the numbers 16:21. You would be here soon, probably. Unseemly thoughts swirled in his head; what if you needed to go home early? What if you didn’t go to the bathroom at all today? What if you had already rifled through his sketchbook and decided to head home to ponder how to reject him as harshly as possible or wonder about how much of a creep he was?

All of the thoughts in his head dispersed once he spotted you walking down the stairs, talking animatedly to one of your friends. He ducked down to avoid being seen by you, but kept it raised just enough to watch your moves. You waved goodbye to your friend, parting ways with a cheery goodbye. Renjun ducked his head down further. You were in high spirits; mouth upturned in a pleasant smile, steps light as you entered the art room. Carefully, Renjun made his way down the staircase and situated himself beside the lockers. His fingers gripped the small ledge of the wall, pulling himself up to peer through the windows.

You had put your backpack down on the table, stretching with your arms high above your head. You pulled your phone out of your pocket, spending a good minute standing beside the table staring at your screen. Just as he felt like you weren’t going to leave the room at all, you turned around and made your way to the door, all the while typing something.

Renjun turned around and pressed his body flat against the wall, trying to stay hidden. You passed by him without a cinch. He waited until you turned the hallway and an extra 5 seconds after that before slipping inside the art room, shutting the door behind him as quietly as possible. After another check out of the window to make sure you weren’t returning soon, he made his way to the table you set your backpack atop of.

With a quick glance left and right, Renjun gingerly opened your bag and snuck his hand in. His hand bumped around your papers and books, wincing every time he heard the crinkling of your papers. He tried to feel the leather cover of his sketchbook, growing more frustrated with each passing second. After a few heartbeats, he pulled the flap up and peered inside. His hand grazed over a familiar texture, and with an internal leap of joy, he grasped the top of his sketchbook.

“Renjun? What are you doing?”

He froze. He dreaded turning around; you had caught him red-handed, hand still in your bag. You didn’t sound accusatory or hurt, though. Instead, your voice was laced with confusion.  Face turned up in a wince, he imagined your expression right now.

“(Y/N)! F-Fancy seeing you here, haha,” he whirled around, laughing awkwardly as he pulled his sketchbook out of your bag and held it up beside his head, “I was – I was just, uh, this?”

You nodded slowly by the doorway, eyes locked on the sketchbook, “Will that also explain why you’ve been stalking me for the whole day?”

His cheeks flushed red in embarrassment, “I-I wasn’t stalking you, exactly, it’s just that you accidentally put my sketchbook in your bag and I was waiting for a good moment to steal it back?”

“O-Oh,” you cleared your throat, blushing, “Sorry about that. Just tell me about it next time, okay?”

“Noted,” he looked down before looking back up at you, “Now that I’ve got this, I’ll just, um, go now?”

“Yeah, yeah, of course,” you stepped to your side as he exited, watching as he turned around and waved at you.

“Thanks for this,” he gestured to his sketchbook, smiling bashfully at you, “See you tomorrow, (Y/N).”

“Get home safely,” you added. He nodded, whirling on his heel to walk down the hallway. Before he could get too far, however, you called out his name once more, “Renjun!”

He looked back at you. You smiled at him, eyes glinting with mirth, “I love your art style, by the way!”

Renjun really wanted the Earth to swallow him up whole now.

cr. gif not mine unless stated!