#i know there are other codes floating around but i just got mine sent to me today and wanted to share it here so others can use it!

[andoutofharm]

If anyone wants to purchase an esim to provide internet access to Palestinians but haven't yet, you can use my Nomad referral code LYDI79TR for $3 off your first purchase! With this code esims are as low as $6, and this is a way you can immediately help someone in Gaza who might otherwise not be able to make contact with their loved ones.

More detailed information on esims is available here, and a tutorial walking through how to purchase and send an esim through Nomad is available here.

edit to add: if this code isn’t working for you, try codes NOMADCNG or BACKPACKNOMAD !

[shades-of-stony]

Post CA:CW Fix It Stony Fanfics

Making Amends by TheseStoriesAreWrittenOnMyHeart

Summary: Everything about them happened in seconds. Their first meeting was quick, with Tony landing next to the Captain, each man giving a curt nod and name in greeting. Their argument on the hellicarrier took mere seconds to escalate. Until Steve was goading Tony into putting on the suit and going a few rounds and Tony not so subtly reminding Steve that he wasn’t afraid to hit an old man. It was only seconds of staring at Tony on that New York City Street, his arc reactor dark, no rise and fall of his chest, for Steve to know that inside the tin can, was a good man. Then Ultron happened, and it took seconds for their world to change, seconds for Steve to throw his shield at Tony and for the billionaire to send a repulsor blast back. They went from laughing and relaxing to standing on an edge thousands of feet above solid ground. And now…now everything’s changed. And all it took was a combination of seconds; of decisions made, actions performed and words spoken that they couldn’t get back. Just a few ticks of the clock for their world to shatter.

It’ll take more than that to make things right.

Note: This one deals with amending the accords. It is about how the avengers pick up after the civil war and how they learn to be friends again. It is an incredibly detailed and well written piece! Also, NO TEAM CAP OR TEAM IRON MAN BASHING. I was only supposed to re-read a few chapters to recall the story and give a few-word review but I ended up re-reading the whole goddamn thing. It’s a masterpiece. 

maybe love is the reason why (we're seeing it eye to eye) by parkrstark

Summary: "I'm sorry. Repeat that again." Tony leaned forward in his seat from across the table. He even stuck a finger in his ear as if he was cleaning it out. "I don't think I heard you right."

Fury rolled his eyes-- or well, eye. "You and Rogers need to go undercover as a married couple in a community out on Long Island."

--

After Civil War, Tony and Steve are sent on an undercover mission as a couple to try and find Hydra informants. Somehow, they end up with Peter as their undercover son who decides to play matchmaker even if the two of them are doing their best to ignore their feelings after Siberia.

Note: My latest Fix It read! It just completed today. This fic is a phenomenal read, with its fake relationship, superfamily, undercover, and sexual tension elements! A definite 1000/10!

and this is the map of my heart by CydSA

Summary: The Avengers are splintered - spread out across the world.

There are many things to regret. The biggest one is what could have been.

Tony refuses to have any more regrets. Steve realizes that perhaps he made the wrong choice.

It starts from here....

Note: Here is some sweet, sweet, Civil War Fix It. It dwells deep into the Accords, how Tony fixes it, and the downfall of Ross. 

floating point exception by ooka

There is something, he knows, to see a man as mortal. To see his fault lines and jagged edges instead of the smooth surface they present. Most people don’t like the illusion, whether it be good or not. They don’t want people like him to be human.

But that’s what he is, under the suit and the smile and the sunglasses. Under the bravo and the quick grins. He’s just a man, trying to hide his broken pieces, the dents in his heart, the washed out color of his soul. He’s just a man, trying to solve problems and make the world better. That’s why he’s Ironman, just a man in a suit. Nothing extra.

The place where the arc reactor used to rest in his chest aches so fiercely for a moment that Tony can’t breathe.

He takes in a few breaths and does what Tony does best - pushes it down and goes to work.

(Tony, after the Civil War. Post CA:CW)

Note: A 150k+ fanfic that is centered on Tony, his issues, and his struggles. PREPARE TO CRY.

Not Enough Scotch for this Matchmaking Scheme by desolateice:

Summary:  After Civil War and a lot of healing the Avengers are fed up with the stubborn silence between Steve and Tony and try to take things in their own hands.

Note: A Fix It where the ‘kids’ play matchmaker to bring their fighting ‘parents’ back together! 

Never Eye To Eye by vorkosigan for mrsgingles

Summary: After the Civli War, the Avengers were back together.

How is everything going, Tony? Pepper had asked in her email. It's fine (Tony had written back). I'm fighting with Steve all the time. Everything is going to hell. I'm okay (you know I'm always okay).

(Or: How Tony and Steve learned to be a bit gentler with each other)

Note: A 26k+ fic where Steve and Tony learned how to be friends again, and more. It deals with the struggles and frustrations they had just to salvage their friendship.  

Fly One More Time (Alternately Titled--The Phoenix) by RavenLost2187

Summary: Steve couldn't see them before.

But then he woke up and there they were.

There's a small problem though.

One of his teammates doesn't have wings like he should.

And that's Tony Stark

Note: Some winged fics anyone? This has a bit of a Team as Family element and not to mention that glorious Civil War fix it theme! 

What it’s worth by masterlokisev159

Summary:  Tony's scent is off. Wanda realizes why.

Note: Here is a Hurt and Comfort fic for you with a dash ABO elements in it! 

Sunrise Over the End of the World by Sapphic_Futurist

Summary: When Dr. Strange arrives at an Accords Committee Meeting and warns of the coming of an alien megalomaniac set on destroying the world, the Rogues are pardoned and Tony finds himself exactly where he never wanted to be. Back at the Compound with Steve, who still can't take a hint and won't leave him alone.

--

In which Tony is broken and Steve finds redemption.

Note: A Bad case of Tony acting like nothing happened and doing his goddamn best to avoid Steve. It’ll work all out in the end. Well, it will get worst first before that though.. 

We stand together (or not at all) by Jana_C

Summary:  It’s so easy to hate this man, so painfully easy. He’s the embodiment of rich, white male privilege. He’s irritatingly arrogant, and he doesn’t always think before acting, and even when he does, he manages to twist his logic around and shape it into something that will always benefit him, and yet, here he is, building the guy who killed his parents an arm, without having been asked; working his way through diplomacy and politics, even though he hates it with every fiber of his being, just so he can correct the mistakes all of them made. She watches him go and sighs, small and tired, before texting a single line to Steve. Get ready to come home.

Note: Anyone up for some Tony Whump and Appreciation fanfic? 

You Don’t Only Get One Shot by janonny

Summary: In which Tony voluntarily carries a tracker around, and learns how to talk to Steve all over again in-between and during kidnapping attempts.

“Leave you alone for two months, and you have an operation all set up to track wayward Hydra cells and rescue innocent billionaires,” Tony said, his tone skating the line of annoyance and admiration.

Note: a dose of Stalkerish!Steve (but not in an entirely creepy way because he just wants to keep Tony safe dammit). 

You've Got A Sister Now by ZaraMelMercury

Summary: It's been a year since the events of the Avengers' Civil War. Tony Stark is trying to pick up the pieces of his life, while juggling his work, his remaining friendships, getting therapy sessions for Rhodey and dealing with government politics, as well as the Accords.

It is a bit rough, but he's got Pepper (always a steady rock by his side), Rhodey, Happy and the Kid- Peter Parker. Tony would never admit to it up front and center, but you could always catch a proud look on the man's face whenever the young Spiderling was mentioned!

Life seemed to be looking up...

Except for one, minor detail:

Steve Rogers.

The hope for one reconciliation, surprisingly, led to another!

A new bond that would form that Tony would ultimately always be thankful for.

"Oh, I wanna take it back!... " "No, no, no, you can't retract it!"

Who would've thought it?

Tony Stark has a sister looking out for him, after all.

Note: Here are some Tony and Nat friendship for you! This one isn’t exactly a solid fix it but one with a more of hopeful ending. 

The Bro Code by Sullen

Summary: In a world where the Winter Soldier is found years earlier and is named Tony’s godfather, Zemo plays a different R-rated video and Siberia goes a little differently.Or –Steve breaks the bro code.

Note: This is just too cute and wholesome not to include. 

WIP

Used to be Mine by Fangirlingmanaged

Tony can't even recognize himself nowadays.

Note: This one certainly deserves a place at the heavy angst category because that’s what it is. HEAVY ANGST AND HEARTBREAK.

[theredraccoon]

A Desperate Proposal - Ch 3

Jace could hear the thwack of escrima sticks on one of the heavy bags in the training room through the door, along with one of Izzy’s signature grunts, and he could feel his whole body relaxing. He had done virtually nothing but hide in his room for the two days since his explosive conversation with Alec and he was about to vibrate out of his skin. A spar with Izzy was just what he needed. 

Rolling his shoulders, Jace pushed open the heavy door and strolled over to the weapons rack, picking up two sticks of his own. Izzy was over to the side of the large room, dressed in her usual workout gear of a black crop top and skin tight black pants. In a rare concession, she was actually barefoot instead of wearing her usual heavy heeled boots. Jace felt some tension seep back in; Izzy prided herself on being able to kick anyone’s ass while wearing five inch heels. If she was barefoot it meant that she was off-kilter enough that she wanted more stability as she trained, like she didn’t trust herself to be as careful. Her insistence on heels was absolutely a pushback against some of the misogyny of the Clave but Izzy wasn’t an idiot and anything that might lead to her getting injured was something she avoided at all costs. So Jace and Alec had learned that barefoot usually meant that something was weighing on Izzy’s mind. 

Jace sighed and tapped one of his sticks on the ground. Izzy glanced over at him and raised a sculpted brow. Jace raised one back. He knew that she had clocked him the moment he came in, even if she hadn’t stopped smacking the bag for a minute. She gave a sharp nod and moved towards the center of the room, settling into a familiar stance, still silent.  

It’s gonna be like that, huh? All right then. 

Jace raised his own sticks and attacked immediately. Izzy countered and then they were off, dancing around the room, pounding at each other as hard as they could. The best part of training with Izzy was that she abhorred training with anyone that didn’t fight with their absolute all and insisted that Jace come at her with his full strength. Jace still remembered trying to pull his punches when he was a teenager and getting his entire ass handed to him while Izzy laughed. 

Izzy was laughing now, finally, losing whatever mood she’d been in before Jace had arrived. He felt himself grinning back and threw himself into a complicated maneuver that he and Alec had perfected years ago but that Izzy had never quite mastered. Sure enough, Izzy hit the mat with a thump and Jace skipped backwards, out of her reach. 

Jace caught his breath, glancing quickly at the large clock on the back wall. Somehow they’d already been sparring for fifteen minutes. His muscles were warm now and his mind was clearer and emptier than it had been for days. He put his sticks up over his shoulders and watched as Izzy flipped herself back up and finally addressed the demon in the room. The multiple demons. 

“So. Meliorn?” At least his voice was steady.

“Yep. Vampire?” So was Izzy’s. 

“Yeah.” Jace threw himself forward again and Izzy met him in the middle and they whacked at each other for another few minutes before breaking apart.

“I saw Alec’s nose. Nice job, brother.” Izzy smirked at him.

Jace grunted and they exchanged another flurry of blows. “Yeah, I was pretty pissed about the whole ‘let’s marry you off to a random vampire and by the way, all the Shadowhunters are dying and we don’t know why’ thing.”

Izzy ducked behind a column, her voice floating out around it. “Fair. I didn’t react that well either when he told me, although I didn’t go so far as to punch him in the face.”

Jace rolled his eyes and said, “Yeah, well, you get to marry the guy you’re already banging, I get a stranger.” He swallowed and forced himself to continue. “A male stranger.” 

A stick whipped toward his head and Jace had to twist to the side to avoid it, letting himself roll down and away, before coming back up with a furious spate of hits at his sister. She met him head on, shouting at him the whole time. “Just because I’m currently sleeping with Meliorn doesn’t mean I want to marry him! I like him but I’m not in love with him! I hate this as much as you do! And by the Angel, Jace, the only one who cares about you being bisexual is you. Alec and Magnus can be together but you can’t be with a guy? Come on.” 

Izzy abruptly ditched her sticks and just launched herself at him. Jace quickly dropped his as well and then it was hand-to-hand, the air filling with the sound of fists hitting leather and occasional yelps at particularly hard impacts. Finally, Jace pulled out another move that he often used with Alec, but Izzy knew this one and suddenly they were both sprawled out on the floor, panting. 

Jace slapped the mat. After a minute, Izzy slapped it back. Jace stared at the ceiling. “What are we going to do, Izzy? Are we really dying that fast? How didn’t we notice?”

He heard Izzy sigh. “I don’t know, Jace. I felt like such an idiot when Alec told me. I was angry and didn’t believe him at first. Now I’m scared. I agreed to marry Meliorn because I think Alec’s right, that an alliance with the Downworld and access to their knowledge is the only way we have a chance, but I don’t have to like it. Meliorn’s always held things back from me and you know how secretive Seelies are. I don't really know what I'm getting into, just like you. I wasn’t planning on getting married anytime soon either.” She rolled over and Jace turned his head to meet her eyes. They were tired and fearful but the same warm brown as always. “We’re in the same battle, Jace, but you know I’ve got your back, same way I know you have mine. Alec does too, even though he was definitely a dick about telling you about everything. We’ll figure it out. We’re Lightwoods: three go in, three come out.”

Jace opened his mouth to retort but a noise from the door made him sit up onto his elbows. There was a Shadowhunter hovering there, a young one, probably fresh out of Alicante. Why didn’t I notice that everyone kept getting younger? What else have I missed? Jace coughed, swallowing a lump in his throat, before saying, “Yeah? What is it?”

“You’re both needed in the main hall. Mr. Lightwood sent me to get you. The Clave representative is arriving in an hour.” The Shadowhunter’s voice was high, with a bit of reverence around ‘Mr. Lightwood.’ 

Jace huffed a small laugh and got up, reaching an arm down to haul Izzy up as well. “All right, Ms. Lightwood. Let’s go meet the Clave rep and argue about our fates. Do you think there are dowries involved in Seelie weddings?”

Izzy’s eyes flashed at him. “I dunno, Mr. Lightwood. Maybe there are in vampire weddings. I think you’re worth at least a cow or two. Let’s go find out.” She looped her arm in his and they turned as one towards the door.

---------

The main hall of the Institute was bustling, like usual, full of light and sound and activity. And yet Jace felt like he was seeing it for the first time, suddenly noticing how many stations around the room were empty. The Shadowhunters whizzing by him and Izzy as they entered were just as young as their escort, painfully fresh faced and eager. 

Now that Alec had ripped off the veil, Jace couldn’t help but see the signs everywhere. Something was deeply wrong and it looked like it was up to them to figure out the problem and to fix it. His jaw clenched and he tightened his grip on Izzy’s arm. She squeezed back before letting go and walking briskly over to the raised dais in the middle of the room, where Alec was standing with his back to them. 

Jace followed more slowly, focusing on the main map of the city displayed on the table. It was a real time look at current demonic activity and the Shadowhunter response, color coded and dynamic. The red blinking lights were everywhere, the white ones fewer and more spread out, showing the patrols that were on the streets. Jace recognized his main patrol route and felt a small flash of pride as it was still entirely dark, showing no demons in the area, followed immediately by the realization that this too might have contributed to his blindness— his skills as a Shadowhunter, the ones that kept him Second in Command of the Institute, meant that he was far less likely to be targeted by whatever was picking them off. He wasn’t an easy mark. He’d gotten complacent. 

Staring harder at the map, Jace started thinking about how to rearrange patrols, pairing older Shadowhunters with the new ones, and how to increase pairs training so that no one would be out on their own while still maintaining coverage of the whole area.  Plans unfolded in his mind rapidly, long buried strategy sessions with his father rising up to the surface. 

“Jace.” Alec’s voice was the usual mixture of bored and irritated. Jace twitched and looked up at his parabatai. The bruising from Alec’s broken nose had deepened, spreading across his face like stripes, and the resemblance to a raccoon was hilariously striking. “Thanks for joining us. What do you see?”

He spared a moment to be grateful for his brother’s uncanny knack of recognizing when Jace was working through something and how quickly he would defer to Jace’s expertise. Jace leaned over the table, pulling up different displays with a few deft movements, gathering bits of information that kept slotting into the puzzle forming in his head. He got lost in it for a while, the awareness of his brother and sister fading away. Was this part of the magic Alec had mentioned? Why hadn’t he been called in to study the clear demonic patterns? Why was this the first time he’d been consulted? It was so obvious when you looked closer. 

Jace finally shook his head to clear it, drew a deep breath, and started to talk. He pulled up the original map of the city and then typed in a command that lit up the pathways the Nephilim used night and day. “Our patrols are set up in a way that means our Shadowhunters rarely cross paths— the borders align to cover the whole city but they never really overlap. It means that for long hours we are essentially on our own when we respond to demon sightings. Before, um, now, that obviously wasn’t a problem as the areas were smaller and it was easy to call for backup and have someone respond quickly. But with fewer Shadowhunters, the patrol areas are bigger and the time it takes reinforcements to arrive… Well, we haven’t been making it in time. The demon attacks seem calculated to occur at the heart of each patrol area, when it would take the longest for help to come.” He switched displays to show where the last three Shadowhunter deaths had taken place, the flashing gold Remembrance runes stark reminders of what they had lost. Each one was set deep within the boundaries of the patrol territory. 

Jace continued, “Someone - or something - knows our patterns and is picking us off. The problem just keeps getting worse with each loss and each expansion of patrol boundaries. We either need to think about the way we patrol and redistribute our people or we simply need more people.”

The three of them stood in silence, the gravity of the situation once again sinking in. Jace glanced up and met Alec’s eyes, which were full of dark shadows; he suddenly looked old. His brother always took his responsibilities so seriously. “Downworlders could help. If they’re willing.” 

“I guess that’s where I come in.” 

The voice was strong and feminine and not one that Jace recognized. He turned quickly, adrenaline spiking. A petite blond woman stood about five feet back from the dais, immaculately dressed in a trim suit with her hair pulled back in an elaborate braid. Her blue eyes were clear and razor sharp and she radiated authority, to the point that it took Jace a minute to realize that she was flanked by two other Shadowhunters, tall men wearing the insignia of the Clave. 

“My name is Lydia Branwell and I am here as the Clave representative overseeing the Clave- Downworld Alliance. The marriage contracts that we present to the Downworld need to be ironclad and protective of Clave interests, which will include better protection for the New York Institute. I assume you are the Lightwoods?” Jace watched with wide eyes as the woman held her hand out without looking away from them and a thick folder was instantly placed there from one of the lackeys behind hl

“I am Alexander Lightwood,  Head of the New York Institute.” Alec’s natural saltiness with strangers was evident in his tone. “This is Jace Lightwood, my Second and Battle Master, and this is Isabelle Lightwood, Third, in charge of Forensics. I was told that you wouldn’t be arriving for another half hour.” 

“I like being early. You always see and hear such interesting things.” Jace watched her eyes flicker over the extensive bruising on Alec’s face before sweeping up and down Jace and Izzy’s workout clothes. He shifted slightly, before straightening and arching an eyebrow in her direction. He was slightly surprised when she quirked one back with the barest hint of a smile and then her gaze was redirected to Alec. “Is there a conference room available? I would never presume to ask for your office on such short notice but we have a lot to discuss and we might as well be comfortable.”

“My office will be fine. Jace, Izzy, why don’t you pick up some sandwiches and drinks and we’ll see you there soon. I’m sure Lydia and I can start without you.” With that, Alec hopped off the dais and strode away at a fast clip, long legs eating up the distance, forcing Lydia and her followers to scramble and catch up. Jace let out a short laugh and exchanged a glance with Izzy, who giggled back at him. Their brother had never taken kindly to being put on the spot and could be wonderfully petty at times.

Stepping down himself, Jace turned towards the long hallway that led to the living quarters, knowing that Alec’s directions had also given both him and Izzy time and space to put themselves back together. If they were going to have to sit and argue about what was going into the contracts that would bind them for the rest of their lives, they should at least be showered and presentable.  

Twenty minutes later, Jace was scrubbed down and re-dressed in his patrol leathers. He was a fighter, first and foremost, and this was definitely a battle he wanted to win. Or at least not lose. On the way to Alec’s office, he swung by the mess and picked up a variety of sandwiches and some of his sister’s favorite salads. Izzy met him right outside of the office’s ornate door, carrying a basket full of drinks, mostly water and juices. When he made a face at her, she tilted it slightly and he spotted a small bottle of vodka hidden at the bottom. He grinned and she winked.

Jace didn’t bother knocking and just pushed at the heavy mahogany, holding it open for Izzy to go before him. They entered into a room full of shouting. Alec and Lydia were standing on opposite sides of the mammoth desk, with the two Clave lackeys sitting meekly off to one side. Jace didn’t hesitate and rounded the table to Alec’s right side, watching Izzy do the same on the left. 

Jace dropped the heavy tray of sandwiches onto the desk with a clatter, followed by the heavy thump of Izzy’s basket, and the shouting abruptly cut off. Jace was halfway convinced that neither one had even heard them approach. “So,” he said loudly, “how are the marriage contracts coming? Have you sold Izzy off to Meliorn for two goats and some flowers yet?”

Alec shot him an amused glance over Izzy’s sputter of outrage. “No, not yet, but I’ll see if we can work it in.” Alec’s focus moved back to Lydia as he continued, “We’re currently… talking about where to even hold the weddings in the first place. Lydia wants to insist that we have them all in the Institute but restrict the attendees to just the Downworlders getting married. I keep telling her that this is supposed to be an alliance and that if we have to have the marriages here then at least we need to accommodate any other Downworlders that want to attend. I can’t imagine that the Seelie Queen will let her Knight get married in the Institute without being there. Honestly I think if we don’t make several concessions to the Seelie Court, we don’t have a prayer of this actually succeeding.” By the end Alec was almost shouting again.

“And I was informing Alec that the Clave will not tolerate having the Seelie Queen anywhere near one of the Institutes. The weddings should still be held here for security reasons, with only the participants inside the building. We still know nothing about what is hunting us and it’s way too risky to go anywhere else right now, especially in any sort of large numbers. The Downworlders need this Alliance too or they wouldn’t have agreed. We can hold some sort of symbolic ceremony or whatever they want afterwards but the marriages should be performed here.”

“Do you know anything about vampire weddings? Or warlock weddings? Werewolves? Not even the Angel really knows what goes on in Seelie weddings. We have no idea if they are going to accept any of that. Their own rituals and ceremonies must be honored or they will not be duty-bound to honor the Alliance. If we do it here, and I’m not saying that we should, then they need to be here as well. You seem to think that we have more power here. We don’t.” 

Lydia was now sorting through the folders on the desk, pulling sheaves of paper out, muttering to herself. Alec’s arms were in parade rest, his legs planted firmly, his brow set and mouth a thin line. Jace sighed. They weren’t going anywhere for the foreseeable future. He looked around and found his favorite chair, the one with the best armrests, and brought it up to the desk, watching Izzy do the same. He grabbed a sandwich and settled in for the long haul.

[theres-no-protocol-for-this]

Necessary Repairs

Part III. I don’t even know if you have to read any of the other parts. SecUnit should probably have slept through most of its own healing, but that’s not this machine’s luck.

Part I | Part II

At some indeterminate point later, I woke up.

I was receiving minimal sensory data, and none of it was sight-related. A diagnostic subroutine spun up and casually began sending me bursts of error messages I couldn't even begin to translate.

Oh, and the world was pitch black.

It took me more than five seconds to determine that the darkness was self-inflicted and open my eyes. Longer still for the random noise to resolve into sounds I could understand -- the hum of an air circulation system, at least two distinct voices, and an automated warning system. My connection to the feed stabilized, but the walls that normally guarded my mind against its onslaught were conspicuously absent.

Something else was shielding me, something big and surprisingly gentle.

Friend?

I could feel cold metal under my back and head, probably the medical suite platform. My internal temperature refused to rise, so I was shivering and couldn't stop. It felt like I was still leaking, and the pain ebbed and flowed with each passing moment.

“Would you like me to turn up the heat?” Transport asked.

Yes. Where the hell am I?

I felt a mild shock as the governor kicked in. It hadn't liked my tone, apparently, or the phrasing of my answer, and wasn't shy about letting me know. The standard code read, "you're outside of protocol and need to adjust your attitude."

Silently, I cursed the damn thing. I was getting used to life without it.

A moment later, Transport answered, "SecUnit, you're still in medical, and your performance rating, while stable, remains abysmally low."

The ship paused and sent me a couple of data packets that succinctly described all the things still wrong -- which was most of them. I should've probably remained in stasis, but the medical unit was calibrated for humans. So, it hadn't given me nearly enough sedative to knock out the organic parts of a construct for any appreciable amount of time.

I was awake, kind of.

"I'm waiting for your vital signs to improve," Transport added. "Until then, would you like to watch an episode of that one show you liked?"

Yes, please.

The ship's calm tone reassured me, even though everything else looked like shit. My diagnostics were coming back with nonsense, still. The governor couldn't find a SecSystem to connect with. The Traveler didn't have or need one of those; it had a skeleton HubSystem instead managed security, life support, and logistics. My inflexible governor couldn't figure out how to interface with it.

Surprise, surprise...

It fell back on some preprogrammed garbage, complete with a minimal set of actions and responses. "Yes, please" and "No, thank you" was probably the best I could manage at the moment without incurring its wrath. I'd try poking at it later when my performance no longer looked quite so dramatically sad.

Captain Owens pulled up a chair and sat down where she could see me. Transport shared the view from one of its cameras, so now I could see her, too. It also queued up an episode of a long-running serial and waited for the captain before it started playing. I wanted to ask about the hostiles but couldn't -- thanks governor -- and Transport didn't seem inclined to enlighten me.

I suppose it was only fair; it was doing its best to keep me calm.

MedSystem sorted out the sleeping issue in the meantime and had injected more sedatives into my resupply channel, so sleep was happening shortly, whether I liked it or not. I could practically feel my diagnostics slowing down to a crawl since they relied on data from my organic parts, which were affected by the drugs.

"Good afternoon, SecUnit. I'm glad to see you're awake." The captain nodded in my direction and then turned toward someone I couldn't see. "As I mentioned, thanks to SecUnit, we came out of the boarding attempt in one piece. I'm sorry to hear your ship wasn't as lucky."

A stranger in formal wear came into camera view as he approached Owens. I figured he was the owner of that second voice I hadn't been able to identify earlier. The logo on his tunic looked familiar, but I couldn't place it. Parts of my memory felt like tangled network cables.

"Indeed, but this is still better than nothing. I don't suppose you've already contacted your bonding company?"

The captain's face scrunched up in confusion. "We're insured outside of the Corporation Rim," she explained. "I've sent a message, but I'm here pretty much on my own."

Outside of the Rim, everything appeared to work in ways that were incompatible with corporation control.  A lot of the propaganda around freehold planets implied they were a complete shitshow. Except, clearly, the Traveler was doing just fine.

I had a sudden burst of "bad feeling" in my organic neural tissue. Something about the newcomer didn't sit right with me. I thought it might be unwise for the captain to tell him anything about herself or her ship.

"No, thank you." It sounded like my voice, but I didn't remember speaking. Hi buffer, I thought I'd never see you again.

The newcomer gave me a puzzled glance. "So, where'd you get your unit then?"

Owens shrugged and schooled her expression. I'd seen that face before when she'd spoken to her daughter before our first jump. "I rented it from a friend, as a security consultant. It's doing a great job."

I was?

I mean, the human was alive, and the Traveler had an intact hull, so I guess things weren't terrible. I could practically hear the Transport laughing on a private channel. If I could roll my eyes, I probably would have, but the governor frowned on that sort of thing, and my eyes had closed minutes ago.

"I see. Well, if you wouldn't mind giving us a hand with repairs, we can both be on our way." The man watched the captain like a hawk. "I would also recommend getting your unit checked out at a licensed repair station when you get a chance. With this level of damage, there's no telling what other problems are hiding under the surface."

As far as statements go, it was polite enough, but I didn't like it. It sounded to me like a threat.

Performance rating dropping. Initiating emergency shutdown.

I really would prefer you didn't.

***

Memory fragment:

The mining installation doesn't inspire confidence. There are eight of us and two combat models. Ten security units should be enough to keep a workforce of 153 miners and a dozen more supervisors in line. Everything looks worn and rundown, including the humans.

Protocol dictates that we take shifts. A human has created a schedule to which we adhere. The two combat units are mixed in with the rest of us.

It's my patrol shift. I walk through one of the mining shafts and stop at the far end. I can hear a supervisor arguing with two of her employees—something about the rocks they've uncovered. I turn around, ready to head back to the primary installation, when one of the combat units walks up to the three humans.

It has been summoned by the supervisor.

The supervisor tells it to fire on the workers. It does, without question. Bodies crumple to the floor. Then, the supervisor notices me.

***

Transport popped into my feed. "Wake up, SecUnit. How're you feeling?"

"Like I got shot."

The words were out before I could consider the consequences, and I braced for an electric shock -- or worse. Nothing happened. Performance reliability was at 87% and rising steadily. My diagnostics routines had run several times, and the results looked promising. I was also no longer leaking, and most of my organic parts had grown back.

I had two arms again. That was nice.

Transport shared a smiling sigil. Reason unknown. "You did get shot, silly. MedSystem patched you up pretty well. If you're up to it, my captain and I could use your help." It paused and added, "Captain suggested that you might want payment in exchange for services rendered. That's how it works in CR, right?"

I had my doubts about anything actually working in the Corporation Rim. Still, arguing with a clearly sentient ship about theoretical economics didn't sound appealing. I'd rather get shocked again.

"OK," I said aloud and sat up. "Priority question: who was here earlier?"

"Dr. Alexander Soren is the current captain of an ArialHydra exploration vessel. They are stranded in this sector after a pirate attack. Captain Owens speculates that it may be the same group of pirates. We were lucky to have you on board."

Lucky. Right.

I shoved off the platform and crumpled to the floor in a pile of arms and legs. Hi there, limbs. A few minutes later, I managed to get up and stumble around under my own power. I admit to sitting on the floor and trying out my new arm. It didn't have a cannon -- MedSystem didn't have the required parts -- but it was fully functional, otherwise.

"I've seen Dr. Soren before." I couldn't remember where. That bothered me.

"Perhaps you were deployed on one of his survey missions?"

"I don't know."

One of the ship's drones floated into the room, carrying spare clothing, which it dropped directly on my head. I grabbed at the falling fabric and started getting dressed. It was the Traveler's standard-issue uniform, beige and blue and generally not hideous. I missed the protective qualities of armor, but it would've been weird to wander through the ship's pristine, carpeted halls with it on.

Captain Owens walked into the medical room and waved at me and the drone. "I see you're both here and scheming."

"We're not scheming, and technically, I'm everywhere," Transport informed us.

"I don't think you should trust Dr. Soren," I blurted out.

Owens narrowed her eyes. "Do you know anything you'd care to share?"

I shook my head. Constructs don't get gut feelings -- we don't even have a gut to have them with -- and my memories of any encounters with the doctor had been removed. Memory wipes aren't typical, but occasionally, a bonding company or a manufacturer/repair company decides they're necessary. I've had at least one that I know about. I also had no idea how to explain that my organic neurons probably remembered things the rest of me didn't.

"Well, in that case, has Trav told you what we need?" At my puzzled expression, the captain said, "We gave the other ship supplies, and they're almost ready to depart. And they're making a fuss about..." She sighed. "Something. I really don't care. They'll be coming back aboard in a few hours to discuss whatever it is. And I would feel much better if you were there. Just in case. And only if you're feeling up to it."

Protecting humans was literally the only thing I liked about my job. "OK."

"Great. Do you want a weapon?"

"Depends on how threatening you want me to look." Any weapon I wielded would be for show unless the human was in danger. And if she was, I had a miniature cannon hidden inside an arm.

The captain pondered this for a moment. Her face went through a range of expressions that Transport interpreted for me as "Captain Owens thinks the other ship's posturing is stupid and would like to be on her way, but it would be impolite to leave, so here we are." I agreed with the captain's assessment.

Finally, she said, "Let's try without any extra threats and see what happens. The quicker we get this over with, the better."

Transport suggested we spend the time between now and the upcoming meeting watching more of its favorite shows. I agreed.

[tsarisfanfiction]

Desert Sands: Part 1

Fandom: Thunderbirds Rating: Teen Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Family Characters: Scott, John, Alan, Virgil, Gordon, Kayo, EOS

I decided to keep throwing this fic out in chunks.  Partly because it’s too long for a single tumblr post, and partly because I thought it was nearly finished but I’m beginning to suspect it’s not as nearly finished as I thought.

<<<Prologue

“John, contact has been lost with Thunderbird One.”

EOS’s words didn’t register. Alan had just found another stealth mine amongst his junk and was taking a lovely little space walk over to a ticking bomb to deactivate it.  Finding the kill code for this particular mine would at least be nothing like the first time – following ‘proper procedures’, International Rescue via Lady Penelope had got hold of the paperwork for every single stealth mine and it was a quick case of John scanning the database for the right one – but it wasn’t something John wanted to be distracted from.  Not while his youngest brother was sitting by a live bomb.

Needless to say, John was very careful to make sure he read out the correct numbers, and watched Alan’s holographic figure for any indication that something was wrong, only relaxing once the young astronaut was back in Thunderbird Three and the mine registered as deactivated on both Thunderbirds’ scanners.

“John.”

“Sorry, EOS,” he sighed, leaning back from the database and letting Zero-G cradle him.  “Could you repeat that?”

“Contact has been lost with Thunderbird One.”

“What?”

All relaxation in Zero-G was promptly forgotten as John yanked himself back upright and towards the large holographic model of Earth.  The green, yellow and grey icons of Thunderbirds Two, Four and Shadow flashed up alongside the pointer labelled ‘IR’, indicating that they were still on Tracy Island, as they should be.  Away in England, FAB1’s pink icon stayed steady in London.

The blue icon of Thunderbird One was nowhere to be seen.  John switched the display from Thunderbirds to operatives, and his heart sank when Scott’s remained absent.  Suit telemetry readings were offline, and attempts to call either Thunderbird One or Scott’s communicator both ended in a red no signal symbol that didn’t belong anywhere near Thunderbird Five’s powerful network.

“Alan, go home,” he said, cutting through meaningless chatter from the teenager as he coasted along, picking up more random junk.

“John?”

“I need to concentrate on something else right now so I can’t help you disarm the mines,” he explained as he attempted to boost the signal, hoping that Alan would accept the excuse and call an end to his junk gathering.

“Is there a rescue?” Alan was a fantastic operative, but he was also a teenager.

“No,” John told him. “At least I hope not,” he muttered under his breath as his attempts to boost the signal failed and all connections to Thunderbird One or her pilot remained firmly offline.

“Then why?”

“Just… go home, Alan,” he sighed.  “Please.”

Alan didn’t respond, and John hoped that meant he was obeying.  He couldn’t check – doing that meant turning away from his Earth map, and right now Scott’s position was more important.

“EOS, show me Thunderbird One’s last known position, and the last data received from both Thunderbird One and Scott’s telemetry.”

Instantly a blue line appeared, tracking Thunderbird One from the danger zone in the Swiss Alps down across to the Sahara Desert, where it promptly vanished.  Scott’s telemetry told him nothing.  His big brother had been relaxed, no sign of raised blood pressure or other indicators of stress.  There was absolutely no cause for alarm, except for the fact that both flight suit and Thunderbird had cut off at the same time.

The airlock hissed unexpectedly, and John’s head jerked to look over at it.  Alan floated over to him, and a glance out of the gravity ring showed Thunderbird Three docked to her sister.

“What’s wrong, John?” his brother asked, gracefully coming to a halt next to him and frowning at the data. “Is this Scott’s flight path?” Big blue eyes filled with concern, and John really wished Alan had done as he was told.  Being the reassuring big brother was much easier via hologram. “Has something happened?”

“I don’t know,” John admitted.  “EOS lost Thunderbird One’s signal suddenly, and Scott’s telemetry went offline at the same time.”

“Could they have entered a dead spot?” Alan asked, peering at the data suspiciously.  “Scott’s suit data suggests he’s fine.”

John shook his head.

“Thunderbird Five doesn’t have dead spots, Alan,” he reminded him.  “I boosted the signal just in case, but there’s still nothing.”

“What about satellite footage?”  John shook his head.

“We don’t have visual on this part of the Sahara Desert.  It’s not populated enough to justify an IR satellite, and even the GDF don’t look too closely at the middle of deserts.”

“So what are we going to do?  I can take Three-”

“The only place you’re taking Three is back home,” John interrupted firmly. “She isn’t designed for sustained atmospheric flight and I am absolutely not sending you into the middle of the Sahara in her.”

Alan deflated, and John sighed, wrapping an arm around his shoulders awkwardly for a moment.

“But what if something happened?” the blond asked, staring at the unhelpful map in front of them.

“We don’t know that anything has,” John pointed out.  “But I’ll get Kayo to check it out.  Alan, you and EOS keep an eye out for any signs of Scott while I make the call.”

“F.A.B.”  Alan didn’t sound happy, but then again John wasn’t happy, either.  Thunderbirds and brothers weren’t supposed to just vanish from Thunderbird Five’s sensors.

Ordinarily, if he just wanted Kayo, he’d catch her on her private channel and she’d slip away from his brothers, leaving them none the wiser.  However, telling Kayo and not the rest of his family now would leave him with two very unhappy younger brothers when they found out, and neither Virgil nor Gordon were high on his list of people to offend. With a sigh, he reached for the link to the den.

Virgil was there, tickling ivories in a mish-mash fashion John recognised as his brother in a composing mood.  Guilt at interrupting him during that had long since faded – disasters did not wait for Virgil’s muse to finish what it was doing, just like they never waited for John to reach a convenient point in a book or piece of coding – but something unpleasant coiled in his stomach this time.  Then again, this wasn’t a normal interruption.

Kayo was curled up like a cat in her launch seat, flicking through a book, and it was her John focused on.

“We’ve got a situation,” he said, skipping his usual pleasantries when he made contact for non-rescue conversation.  Then again, this might be a rescue.

Instantly the piano silenced, Virgil abandoning the instrument to approach the den.

“Do we need Gordon?” he asked, and John nodded.  Before he could say anything else, Virgil was heading for the stairs, and John let him go.  He needed Kayo first – Thunderbird Two couldn’t do anything until they located Scott, and hopefully wouldn’t be needed at all.

“Give me the brief in the sky,” his sister said, reaching to activate her launch chute.

“Wait,” he interrupted.  “It’s not a rescue, I hope.”  Bright eyes narrowed, and he felt the force of her curiosity even through the hologram. “I’ve lost contact with Scott and Thunderbird One.  Thunderbird Five can’t pick up either of their signals.”

“I’m on it,” she said, sinking into the floor.  “Send me his last known position and I’ll track him down.”

“There’s a possibility that it’s just a blip in the system and that nothing’s wrong,” he felt compelled to inform her, setting up a secondary relay to her wrist comm even as the flight data was sent straight to Thunderbird Shadow. “There’s no sign anything was wrong until we lost his signal.”

“I still don’t like it,” she said, and he heard the hum of the motorcycle indicating she was in her cockpit.  “Thunderbird Shadow out.”

He let her sign off, well aware that he needed to have a conversation with his brothers.  That didn’t mean he closed her transmission from his end, however.  The moment she found something – it was Kayo, he trusted her to find something – he wanted to know.

“Has Kayo gone on ahead?”  John’s attention returned to the den; Virgil had returned and was accompanied by a damp Gordon.  There was no point dancing around.

“I’ve lost Scott,” he said.  “Kayo’s going to his last known position now.”

“What you mean, you’ve lost Scott?” Virgil asked.  He was rigid, a mass of tense muscles that John knew meant fear, not anger.

“Exactly that,” he admitted.  “Scott and Thunderbird One’s telemetries both vanished at the same time.”  He pulled them up, letting the same sight in front of Alan materialise from the table in the centre of the den.  “Scott was over the Sahara Desert, not experiencing any issues, and then the signals disappeared.”

“Satellite imagery?” Gordon asked, and he shook his head.

“It’s a satellite blind spot.  I don’t have access to a detailed scan of the area.”

“Why don’t I take Thunderbird Three overhead to get one?” Alan butted in, and John turned his head to see his younger brother had floated over to join him. “If I fly low enough I’ll be able to get a high res image.”

“I thought I told you to keep an eye out for Scott reappearing,” he scolded, and Alan shrugged.

“EOS is doing that.  I have Thunderbird Three here, let me do something!”  John sighed.

“I told you, the only place you’re taking Thunderbird Three is home,” he reminded him.  “We don’t know what happened and I’m not sending you into the area.”

“You sent Kayo,” Alan sulked.

“Thunderbird Shadow is better equipped for the situation,” John pointed out. “At the altitude you’d need to fly at to get a high enough resolution, you’d be sub-orbital and Thunderbird Three isn’t designed for sustained sub-orbital flight.”

“What about Thunderbird Five?” Virgil asked, drawing his attention back to the holograms.  “Can you position overhead to scan yourself?”

John shook his head, gritting his teeth.

“There’s another space station in geostationary orbit between here and where I’d need to move to.  Thunderbird Five doesn’t have the manoeuvrability needed.”  He loved his Thunderbird, but when the pair of them were useless he cursed the limitations she had.

“Can’t you boost Thunderbird Three’s scanners so I wouldn’t need to go sub-orbital?” Alan asked, like a dog with a bone at the idea of scanning overhead. If he wasn’t already missing one brother with no explanation, John would probably have let him go, but as it was he was determined not to send another brother into danger until he at least knew what the danger was.

“I could do that,” EOS said, and John sent a tired glare at her nearest camera. It was the logical thing to do, of course.  Scott had been out of contact for too long – at the speed he was travelling before the telemetry was lost, he should have been just about arriving home.  Kayo was flying the exact course Scott was projected to have been taking, and if he’d been on that course she’d have called it in by now.  The steady dark grey of both Thunderbird Shadow and Kayo’s telemetry reassured him that she hadn’t also gone inexplicably dark.

It was almost certain at this point that Scott had got into trouble.  No satellite imagery had shown up the silver rocket, either, and there wasn’t much of the Earth that wasn’t covered by high resolution imagery.  Logic dictated that Thunderbird One had probably gone down, and with no working communications Scott wouldn’t be able to call for help.

If he survived, the cool detached voice in the back of his head pointed out.  At the speed Thunderbird One was going, a crash would have been fatal.

John ignored the voice.

“Stay in orbit,” he said out loud, unable to find a reason why Alan shouldn’t go with EOS helping him to scan.

“Thunderbird Two is launching as well,” Virgil said, and the twin looks of brown eyes from the two earth-bound brothers told John there was no point even trying to dissuade them.  “We’ll rendezvous with Kayo and Thunderbird Shadow.  Send me Scott’s last known position.”

John barely had to think to send the information to Thunderbird Two’s computer, half of his attention on Alan slipping out of the airlock, a drive in his hands that no doubt contained EOS.  No EOS meant he had to monitor everything by himself again, but John barely paid that a thought.  Thunderbird Three disengaged from Five, and John manipulated the data so that he had her route overlaying the map of Earth.

Below the red icon, although quickly left behind as Alan tore through space, was the green icon of Thunderbird Two, just leaving Tracy Island. Thunderbird Four was left alone, no use for a submarine in the middle of a desert, and just approaching the south-east Sahara was Thunderbird Shadow.

And then Thunderbird Shadow was gone.

Part 2>>>

[clarkimagines]

Prank War

Request:  Hi! If your requests are still open, here's mine: I would love a drabble with Cisco Ramon from CW's the Flash. Can I have him paired with a telekinetic reader who loves pulling pranks? For reference, she's got curly reddish brown hair and wears a blue and white suit with a matching mask. Thanks so much!

Word Count: 461

A/N: this was a lot of fun to write, I hope you like it!!

From your vantage point behind a shelf in the lab, you could see Cisco walk in. You had hidden there after he threatened to portal you to another dimension for messing with his chair. He craned his neck around. He didn’t spot you; you had to bite back a snicker. 

“You haven’t seen Y/n, have you?” 

“No, I haven’t,” Caitlyn replied coolly, the perfect imitation of someone who both didn’t know and didn’t care what he was talking about. You made a mental note to give Caitlyn a high five later. 

A bright smile lit up your face as inspiration struck. Cisco was still holding his mug of coffee, you could see the keyboards of the lab’s computers, and you just so happened to be right next to the light switches.... You brushed a stray strand of your curly hair behind your ear and took a deep breath, centering yourself.

First the computers. You reached out with your telekinesis, typing in the override code and pulling up static screens.

“What the—“

In bright red letters, you keyed out “Greetings, Caitlyn Snow and Cisco Ramon. Prepare for termination.” Caitlyn was entirely nonplussed. Cisco’s eyes widened and he unplugged the closest computer. He was clearly spooked.

With a flick of your wrist, you lifted the coffee out of his cup and sent it floating through the room. With your other hand, you began flickering the light switch.

“Caitlyn? What’s going on?!” You noticed with a twinge of satisfaction that Cisco’s voice was a little frantic.

You released the light switch and pulled the coffee back into its mug, already laughing so hard you could barely stand. Cisco didn’t think the situation was quite so funny.

“Y/N?!” He yelled.

You took that as your queue to exit.

“Y/n, could you come to the lab, please? We’ve got a bogey on our six.” 

That was Cisco’s voice. You couldn’t be certain this wasn’t a trap, revenge for your pranks. Just in case it was a real emergency, you got suited up, and pulled your hair into a ponytail.

“Y/n, my dearest beloved whom I would never even dream of harming, the Rose to my Jack, we have a serious situation out here.”

Alright then. You made your way to the lab, mentally prepping yourself for a mission. You stepped into the lab—things seemed normal enough, you didn’t notice anything out of place. But a millisecond later, you were hit with a shower of glitter. The stuff completely covered your blue-and-white suit, and you could only imagine how long it would take to clean it out of your hair.

“HEY! Not cool!”

Cisco high-fived Barry with a triumphant laugh. “Babe, I love you, but I also love revenge. And you literally walked right into that one.”

[bltngames]

Review: Lloyd the Monkey 2

Back before TSSZ News imploded, I would often do write-ups for many of the games at the Sonic Amateur Games Expo (SAGE). SAGE is an annual online expo that I started all the way back in September of 2000. I personally ran SAGE for over a year, and remained deeply hands on for at least another two years as it continued to grow. The main focus of SAGE was primarily to showcase fangames, in particular Sonic fangames, but the event never limited itself to any one type of game. It's never been uncommon to see original games appear in the lineup -- especially now, given the modern indie scene. 

One such original game was Lloyd the Monkey, a bit of a strange game, written in Javascript of all things and run through a webpage. That by itself was notable enough to stand out from most of the games at SAGE, but Lloyd was also a completely original product created by someone who possibly seemed to be young and new to game development. Making games is no easy feat, especially when they’re written in Javascript and you’re doing tons of original artwork yourself. Taken as that whole, the game impressed me, even if it was more than a little rough around the edges.

Now we have Lloyd the Monkey 2, written in Unity. The developer, Noah Meyer, sent me a Steam key in order to review the game. Up top, I just want to say how I think it’s kind of brave to go all the way in putting the game on Steam and everything. It felt like just a few years ago, newer indie developers sort of had to work up to releasing their game on Steam, usually getting a few releases under their belt first. People view games differently when they’re asked to pay for them, and critics may not be so willing to let circumstances influence their review. It can be a harsh world out there for a beginner.

Lloyd 2 is a much bigger, more ambitious game than the first. Whereas the original Lloyd didn’t even have sound effects, Lloyd 2 introduces voiced cutscenes, some of which are full-on animated cinematics. Quality is about what you would expect -- I would assume the developer sought out friends and acquaintances to voice characters in Lloyd 2, leading to wildly varying audio quality due to differences in recording hardware. Lloyd himself sounds fine, but some of the other characters are a bit quiet, while others have clear background noise. Nothing I heard was unlistenable, however. 

The story is also a little hard to follow. Not much is done to refresh our memories as to who anyone is or what’s going on, we’re just kind of thrown into the middle of things and turned loose. On one hand, it’s nice that the story doesn’t slow the pace of the gameplay down too much. On the other, you’re given a map screen with different objectives to clear but there’s very little context as to what you’re doing or why. At one point I made my way to the end of a Power Plant level only to confront what appeared to be an evil monkey. Despite a whole cutscene involving a conversation between four or five different people, this evil monkey never seemed to say a single word. He just stood there in total silence with a sinister smile. Then I killed him.

I suppose maybe I missed something, however. With greater ambitions comes a number of unfortunate bugs in Lloyd 2, one of which happened not long after our monkey and his crew landed on planet Grecia. I entered what appeared to be a castle to talk to the Queen, but I think the game expected me to take a lower route, where I was apparently meant to overhear the Queen making secret preparations before my arrival. Instead, I took the direct route straight to her chambers, and triggered the cutscene with Lloyd standing in front of her while ominous music played, even though the camera was still clearly focused on the next floor down. I apparently still had some amount of control, because midway through her dialog I touched a teleporter that sent me to the game’s map screen before she was done talking. If that cutscene was meant to give context to what I was doing, I didn’t get a chance to see it.

That was one of the more harmless bugs in my time spent playing Lloyd 2. Harder to ignore was the fact that, within the first 30 seconds of getting control, I soft locked the game. Lloyd 2 opens with a short prologue section where you play as a man with black hair. If you decide to ignore the obvious and go left instead of right, you quickly run out of solid level tiles and begin falling indefinitely. Later areas feature invisible walls presumably to prevent this exact scenario, but for whatever reason they weren’t implemented in the prologue. 

For the most part, Lloyd 2 seems to be a co-op game. Many levels see Lloyd teamed up with an alien princess named Lura, with gameplay vaguely reminiscent of Mega Man X crossed with the tag mechanic from Sonic Mania’s Encore Mode. At the touch of a button, you can switch between the Swordsman Lloyd and the more projectile-based Lura… assuming your partner is still alive, I guess. While playing alone, your partner is controlled by artificial intelligence, but it’s incredibly basic and prone to accidentally committing suicide. That wouldn’t be such a big deal (considering Tails in Sonic 2 never acted in self-preservation either), but once your partner dies, they stay dead. Your only option to bring them back is to either restart the stage or hope another cutscene triggers, since they’ll magically spring back to life in order to say their dialog (though, again, usually only seconds before they fall back into the next death pit). 

This might not be much of a problem, depending on your viewpoint. There’s not much incentive to switch between Lloyd and Lura, so once you pick whoever you think works the best, chances are, you’ll just stick with them. You do unlock special team-up attacks after beating each boss, but this just reinforces the idea that Lloyd the Monkey 2 is meant to be experienced with another person holding a second controller, as most of the team-up attacks require both characters to do something specific that the single player artificial intelligence usually can’t interpret. Regardless, the team-up attacks never seem strictly necessary to progress, so they can be safely ignored if you’re playing solo.

I understand this is a pretty negative review I’ve written here. Lloyd the Monkey 2 aims high and tries to the best of its ability to get there. I assume it was a struggle to get even this far. Making games is hard work, and like any skill, takes practice to get good at. Just because this is Lloyd the Monkey 2 doesn’t mean Noah Meyer, its developer, is automatically an expert. I'm sure he's doing his best, and, quality aside, this game has a lot of heart put into it. This isn’t something cheap, quick, or lazy. It’s really, genuinely trying, and that matters. 

I’ve said a few times here and there that I see pieces of myself in the releases of Lloyd the Monkey, and I still see them here. I remember, for an early SAGE event, I was working on a fangame project of mine called The Fated Hour. I was probably already a year or two or maybe even three deep in the game by now, and after a lot of hyping up the community, this was their first chance to play the game. I spent months and months coding this iteration of my engine, and by my standards back then, it seemed like bleeding edge technology. I felt like I was going to blow everyone's minds. 

It was a mess. Few were impressed. Even worse, the game straight up didn’t even run correctly for some people. What followed was multiple patches, and even rebuilding some entire areas from scratch. My ambitions got the better of me and I unintentionally cut corners -- not because I was trying to cheap out on doing proper development, but just because I simply didn’t know any better. I may have done the best I knew how to do, but I was running faster than my body could keep up with and I stumbled.

When I see things like the missing invisible walls in the prologue, or how easily partner characters commit suicide by accident, I think back to that demo for The Fated Hour, and how I've been in this exact place myself. There’s even a side quest in Lloyd 2 where you have to track a floating girl as she drifts through a level -- there was a nearly identical set piece in The Fated Hour, where you were chasing a robot. It’s a very strange feeling to see something like that and think, “I’ve been here before.” Like looking through a window at a younger version of yourself.

It’s true that I stumbled, but I didn’t let that stop me. I learned by doing. I kept going. Three years later, a game of mine was featured on TV, leading to more than a million downloads. The mistakes of past projects did not weigh me down and I soldiered onwards, newfound knowledge in hand. 

So where does that leave us with Lloyd the Monkey 2, then. Well, it's not exactly a game to compete with Super Mario Odyssey, but given the circumstances in which it was created, I don't think that's necessarily the point. As a learning experience clearly made for the fun of its own creation, I think it's a success. And who knows what awaits in the years to come?

[shewritestheblues]

the Elevator Bae - NINE Part Two

Erik Stevens x OC (Phoenix)

Word Count: girl...idk

A/N: Major shoutout to my Gem Sis, @liyahshaeking | THERE WILL BE A PART THREE because this is Erik’s story. Not mine. 

Warnings: VERY light smut. We gotta ease into this;)

Phoenix was exhausted. She stood in the parking garage of her building, waiting for the elevator, which was taking forever at the moment. She rubbed the back of her neck. “C’mon already.” she said to herself. After spending the last 8 hours of her life on planes, stopping in Miami and dealing with rude airport people, she just wanted to shower and melt away in her bed.

DING.

Finally, the elevator arrived. She stepped in and traveled her way up to the seventh floor. She dug in her bag for her keys and when she opened the door, she pulled her suitcase in and turned on her kitchen light. She was stopped in her tracks at the sight before her. She was frozen with her mouth ajar. Her words failing to come out. All she could do was look around.

Phoenix took a deep breath and slowly began walking toward her living room. Black balloons covered her path so she kicked them out of the way. As she got closer, she turned on another light that fully revealed the surprise waiting for her. Her living room was covered in black, gold and blue balloons. One large black balloon floated above her coffee table with the message, Happy Birthday. It was tied to a big black box with gold, cursive lettering on it. She nervously looked around her apartment as if the person responsible would jump out at any moment. But no one revealed themselves which kind of creeped her out a little. She lifted the top of the black box and was met with a large bouquet of roses. Some of the roses were wrapped in one hundred dollar bills. “Oh my God!” There was a black card sitting in the middle of the roses. She pulled it out and opened it. In gold writing, it read,

Happy Birthday! I’m sorry Baby Girl. -E

Before she could even properly think, she was storming out of her apartment. She smashed the elevator call button like her life depended on it. Her hands shook as she did. Phoenix didn’t even know what she was doing or what she was going to do. When the elevator doors opened, she typed in Erik’s penthouse code and made her way to his floor. Using the little energy that she had left, she pounded on his door. She slammed her fist over and over, until the door swung open. A calm, smirking Erik stood on the other side. She didn’t bother waiting for him to welcome her in. She just pushed his body back and made her way in, as she very loudly went off on him.

“Who do you think you are, Erik? You think you can just show your ass and talk to me all crazy. I’m not the fucking one Erik.” she mushed the side of his head. He shook it off and continued to let her cuss him out. “Some fucking nerve you have and I hope you don’t think your little trick made everything better. You ain’t about to be treating me like shit and giving me gifts to shut me up. You can pull that nigga shit with another girl, Erik.”

“Phoenix.” Erik calmly said.

“Don’t fucking interrup me! I would advise you not to try me. I will delete your ass and go on living my best life like I never knew you. It ain’t shit for me to bounce back. Try me, Erik! I fucking dare you! Try me!” she pokes his temple with the last two words.

Erik let her get away with the first push of his head. He let her go off because he knew he overreacted when he called her. He was expecting her to cuss him out at some point, but he would only let her do so much. He quickly caught her hands, pinning them down behind her back and swiftly bringing her closer to his chest. “Chill out with putting your hands on me.”

“Let me go!” she snapped.

He took slow, deliberate breaths as he looked down at her as she squirmed to get out of his grip. “Stop and I’ll let you go.”

“I’m not playing with you Erik.”

“I’m not playing with you. You need to calm down. I hear you. I understand everything you just said. I won’t blow up on you like that ever again. I promise you.”

Those last three words made Phoenix’s body still. She looked him in his eyes, searching for a sign that he’s playing her. She didn’t find one. His grip loosened around her wrist and he let her go. His gaze on her was intense and she looked away to give herself a break. For the first time since she’s been there, she noticed that the entire time, Erik has been shirtless. He’s only sporting a thin pair of basketball shorts that are hanging dangerously low. His body heat was clouding her space. She took a step back to lean on the kitchen counter. But just as she stepped back, he stepped forward, trapping her between him and the counter. Her body slowly became hot as she looked him up and down. Her thoughts ran quickly as she told herself that she should still be mad at him. She can’t let him off this easy. She’s not a punk. He can’t do this to her.

“I missed you.” his voice was deep. He clashed his lips into hers. Phoenix let out a small moan. He was doing this to her and she was letting him. Their lips smacked and his tongue took control of hers.

“Erik, I--” her words struggled to come out.

“Yes, baby?”

Him calling her baby, sent her over. She pulled away from him, trying to hide her reddening face. She pulled herself together and looked at him. “I like my balloons… and flowers.”

Eriks scoffs. “You just told me that it was nigga shit to shut you up.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I was mad and slightly triggered.”

“You don’t have to explain, but there’s definitely more where that came from.” Erik moves closer to her. His chest is pressed firmly against hers. She feels his dick jump. Mica’s voice was ringing in her mind, repeating her number one rule, ‘Be Confident.’ So, she slid her hand between them, gripping his hardening member. She strokes him, causing a small moan to escape his lips. Erik clenched his eyes shut and released a shaky breath.

“Can I ask you something, E?”

Eyes still shut, “You can ask me whatever you want.”

Phoenix could see that she had him in a vulnerable state. She continues rubbing on his dick and watches as he almost melts from her touch.“Have you been letting someone else take care of you?”

His eyes spring open, not expecting that to be her question. “No!” he says firmly.

“Hm. When was the last time you had sex?” she moves her hand inside his shorts now, stroking the base of his dick. The skin to skin sensation made Erik stutter.

“Uh, li-like a couple of months ago.” her movement speed up. She moves her thumb over his tip, trailing his precum back to his shaft. He jerks in her hand.

“You know, it’s been a really long time since I have. I’m not going to lie, I’ve been going through it. I think about you and all of the things I want you to do to me. I have dreams about you.” she laughs, “I wrote a fucking song about it.” her voice is low and full of lust. Her stroking is faster. His breathing is stuttered. Erik leans in to kiss her. He sucks on her bottom lip and takes her tongue hostage. He grips both sides of her face and he feels himself getting close to his climax.

“Fuck!” he releases in his shorts. He leans his forehead onto hers, eyes closed. Phoenix takes her hand out of shorts and holds onto his forearms, smiling.

“You see that, E? I can be everything you want but I can also be your worst nightmare.” she pulls away from him and moves from her position between him and the kitchen counter. “You promised to be good to me. You better mean it.”

“I meant it.” Erik says confused, eyebrows furrowed. His mind is still coming down from what just happened.

“Okay.” she smiles and starts walking to the door.

“Where the fuck are you going, Phoenix?”

“I’m going home.”

“You can’t just leave me like this.” he motions to the stickiness in his shorts.

“I’m really tired, Erik. I’ll see you later.” she slips out the door before he could get to her.

---------

For the last couple of days, Erk had been acting strange. He’d text Phoenix good morning but then he’d disappear for hours with no response. Then he’d pop up texting her, questioning her whereabouts and what time would she be leaving her apartment, her meetings and what time she’ll be returning home. He wanted exact times and if Phoenix couldn’t provide that, he needed the best estimate that she could give him. Phoenix was starting to think he was avoiding her after what she did in his kitchen two nights ago. She even tried to see him in between time, but he was adamant that he would be busy and wouldn’t have time to see her. Phoenix wasn’t sure how to navigate the energy between them now.

Phoenix had an early morning meeting with Alyssa; 7am to be exact. She informed Erik that morning as she was leaving out and strangely, he didn’t respond. She knew he was up. He’s always up before 7. When she left the parking garage, his car was in his usual spot. Something was going on with him and she was going to get to the bottom of it. After her meeting and a nap, of course.

Her meeting was brief. Alyssa had to meet with her other artists. Phoenix returned home around 10am. She still hadn’t received a response from Erik. She took a mental note to call his ass later. But now, she was curled back up in her bed and going back to sleep.

---------

Phoenix’s phone was under her pillow so when it began vibrating with a text, it woke her from her nap.  She groaned as she felt under her pillow to find out who dared to disturb her. She had one text from Erik. “Oh now he wanna text me back.” she rolled her eyes, swiping the message open.

Erik: Good Afternoon. Dinner is tonight at 8:00. Be ready at 7:30 sharp. Check your door. You have a package waiting.

Phoenix jumped up from her bed so fast, that she tripped over her covers, falling to her knees. She crawled her way to her bedroom door before picking herself up and power walking. Just like the text said, there’s a pink box and black box sitting outside her door. She eagerly sat the packages on her couch and began opening them. Her mouth drops at the black dress and heels sitting before her. Erik had great and expensive taste. She tries to call him but he doesn’t answer. She just knows that he’s watching his phone ring and isn’t picking up on purpose.

----------

Erik didn’t text or call Phoenix for the rest of the day. She simply did what the text said. She was ready by 7:30 and was adding her finishing touches to her look when she hears a knock at her door. She looked at herself in the mirror. Lipgloss is popping, highlighter beaming and edges laid. She flipped her braids to the side, proud of what she was looking at in the mirror. She gave herself a wink before exiting the bathroom to answer the door.

When she opened the door, there stood Erik matching her fly, sporting an all black suit. The top two buttons of his shirt were unbuttoned, revealing two gold chains. He wore gold brim glasses, gold cufflinks and a black and gold watch. The diamonds in his ear were blinding. He stepped inside, looking her up and down. The way he licked his lips was like a man preparing to eat his dinner. “You look beautiful.”

“Thank you. You’re pretty handsome yourself.”

Erik checks his watch. 7:32 pm. “You ready?”

“Yeah.” Phoenix steps around him to grab her clutch from the couch. When she joins him again to head out, he wrapped one hand around her waist and brings his lips dangerously close to her ear.

“I can’t wait to take this off of you. Payback is going to be a bitch.” his voice rumbled through her, making the hairs on her neck stand up. He pulled away from her with a sly smirk and lead them to the door.

Phoenix had started something and she wasn’t even aware of it. She placed herself in a hole that she could not get herself out of. When she left Erik standing with his own cum dripping down his legs in his kitchen, she left the beast hungry with no food supply. The beast needed her and he was going to get her. She was going to pay for what she did. Erik was always in control even when she thought he wasn’t. Since that night, he had been planning how he would get what he needed. From the dress, the shoes, the restaurant to even planning the way he’d kiss her after. Every move from this moment forward was well thought out and Phoenix had no idea. She was walking into a den with a hungry man with meat strapped to her chest.

Erik didn’t say another word until they made it to the parking garage. Phoenix’s thoughts raced a million words a second as they rode the elevator down. She tried to look as normal as possible to not alarm Erik but he could smell the panic on her. It was obvious. As they stepped out into the garage, a chrome G-Wagon was already parked near the elevator doors. Erik opened the passenger door for Phoenix. As she waited for him to walk around the car, she mentally gave herself a pep talk. You got this, sis. You’re gonna end this night like a champ!

The driver door opened and Erik got in and they set off to dinner.

----

Tags: Tags: @liyahshaeking​ @purple-apricots​ @abeautifulmindexposed​ @lostennyc​ @tip222u​ @janelledarling​ @lushloaded​ @chaneajoyyy​ @thadelightfulone​ @raysunshine78@toniilaney @purpleskiesxhopefuldreams @elaindeereads @lyniya 

[what-even-is-thiss]

Fic, Off of Land, Out of Water, Part 1, Time.

Yeah this is part 1 of the merman fic I should’ve posted like a month ago. I’ve got the first three parts written. There will probably be six in total. It involves both humans and merpeople heavily so I hope you like it. Only the core four are here so don’t ask where the dark sides are.

Warnings: None I can think of. 1,986 words

Abstract: It’s time for something to happen. Logan and Virgil have different ideas about what it’s time for. Virgil knows more than he’s willing to admit.

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1. Time.

Logan floated along lazily, smelling the dust he occasionally sent up into the water. A turtle swam above him. Technically he probably shouldn’t be in waters this shallow but today it would be the only place to get some alone time. There would be people all over town, getting ready for the new years celebration and the graduations tomorrow. The boats above still wouldn’t see him. It wasn’t a big deal. He closed his eyes.

“Stone and stone they placed, ten thousand strong.” he mumbled to himself. “Sand compressed to glass and…”

“Practicing?” said a familiar, ominously deep voice.

Logan opened his eyes. A fanged smooth face hung several feet in the water above him, the messy black, silver, and white pattern on his tail made for camouflage in much deeper waters than these, his light freckled skin free of scales and contradicting what his tail normally would have done for him.

Logan smiled with his mouth closed, refusing to return his friend’s playful threat.

“And where have you been?” Logan asked.

The other merman turned upside down.

“Not so much as a ‘Oh, so good to see you, Virgil.’ Christ.”

“What?” Logan asked. He didn’t understand that last word.

“Nothing.” Virgil said quickly, also turning himself right side up. “I’ve been out exploring. You know me. Scared of people. Need some time away. Whatever.”

Logan turned himself upright as well. “Well did you remember where you went this time?”

“I’ve conveniently forgotten it again.” Virgil said in a series of noises and clicks.

Up until now they had been speaking in English. Logan wondered about this. Normally he and Virgil spoke English together. Virgil spoke the local human language very well. He had taught Logan when they were younger. It was like a secret code between them. He had given Logan a “human name” as he called it.

……….

“Logan sounds like logic.” thirteen year old Virgil had said.

“Okay.” thirteen year old Logan had said, counting the decaying plastic beads they had found just outside the city, arranging and rearranging them in his hand. “So humans made these?”

“Yeah they make them out of oil or whatever.” Virgil had said. “Uh, I haven’t…” he made a series of clicks to translate the word “oil”

Logan shivered at that word. He remembered a story that he was made to memorize from just before his own lifetime. A story of a human boat carrying that substance that had caused a great famine that had forced all of them to move to their current location. A location where he, and he assumed Virgil, was born.

“How could something that destructive make these?” Logan asked.

Virgil carefully picked all of the purple ones out of Logan’s hand and shrugged. He left the blue ones.

“Don’t go finding out, Logan. It’s not worth it.” he had said.

……….

In the present day Logan fingered the ruined beads held to his wrist by a braided rope. He did this purely out of habit. He also double checked to see that Virgil was wearing the purple ones purely out of habit. He was. Logan switched to the mer language, guessing that maybe Virgil wanted to practice. He did have sort of a speech impediment. For all Logan knew he had been teaching him the wrong pronunciation for the human words all of these years.

“So are you graduating too?” Logan asked.

“Tomorrow? I doubt it. I’ll probably never graduate if I’m being honest.” Virgil said.

They both started swimming against the current to go back to the city. The water opened up dark and deep below them as they left the reefs. Virgil was always a faster swimmer and never really slowed down. Logan had to strain to keep up with him. Virgil slowed as they began swimming downwards.

The city was carved into rocks and lit by the sun. Sunlight captured in glass orbs, jars, and bottles that would look like windchimes if the current didn’t blow them sideways and encourage them to float.

As they slowed down even more, Logan grabbed ahold of Virgil’s arm. Virgil didn’t protest and pulled him along, giving the weaker merman some rest.

“Hey blank face! You’re back!” someone yelled from a window.

“Who was that?” Virgil asked.

“Doesn’t matter. Ignore them.” Logan said, pulling Virgil’s head away from the source of the calling. “Can’t have you killing anyone today.”

“I don’t kill people.” Virgil said, obviously resisting the urge to look around for whoever had called him the name. “I just… get defensive.”

……….

Logan grabbed the new kid’s face and whistled in genuine interest.

“You have no scales on your face.” Logan said. He pulled his arm and looked at his back. “Or anywhere else but your tail.”

The new kid backed up quickly and looked horrified. He showed his fangs in a serious way.

“Don’t touch me!” he said, his words slurring together and sounding almost like a two year old.

Amused clicks, whistles, and laughs sounded around the classroom. Logan looked at the other teenagers kicking up sand with their tails and arms and clearly having fun at this kid’s expense. The teacher on break in the corner was carving something into the stone wall. It didn’t look like she was going to intervene.

Logan took a breath, letting the saltwater clear his head.

“Apologies.” he said, holding his hand out, palm up. “I was unaware that you don’t like to be touched. It is unusual but I’ll adjust.”

The other kid seemed to be unsure of what to do but after a moment carefully placed his palm on top of Logan’s, formally accepting the apology.

“I’m Virgil.” he said. “Watch yourself.”

“Can I ask about the scar?”

“Absolutely not.”

……….

It was routine at this point. Had been for years. They got back to Logan’s parents’ apartment, now just Logan’s apartment.

“Can I ask about the scar?”

“No.”

Always the same. Almost like an acknowledgement that they were home. A greeting. Except for this time.

“Can I ask about the scar?”

Virgil paused as he adjusted the magic bottle full of sunlight hanging in the middle of the room to be slightly brighter. He ran his fingers through his short black hair. He looked back at Logan. With the way his eyes moved it looked like he was considering the different shades of blue scales winding around his friend’s torso until they rested just above his eyes on his forehead.

“Tomorrow.” Virgil said.

Logan paused.

“What?”

“You can ask me about it tomorrow.”

“Why tomorrow? Is it because we’re coming of age? Graduation?”

“You’ll see.” Virgil said solemnly. “Or hopefully you won’t.”

Logan was immune to Virgil’s cryptic tone at this point so he shrugged it off.

“Alright. Are you staying here or going to your place?”

“Staying.”

They secured the doors and slept together. It’s not like merpeople have to hold each other while they sleep anymore. They live in a modern world. They have buildings now. The tides won’t take them away from each other. But instincts die hard. Old habits die hard. Old assumptions die hard.

So they clung to each other through the night, on the stone floor. Logan slept. Virgil just listened to him breathe, hearing the water move impossibly through a human-like respiratory system. In his dreams Logan thought he heard a voice.

“Why don’t you question why we have lungs?” It said.

……….

“You are swimming off again?” Logan asked.

Virgil stopped. His bare back and arms tensed and then relaxed when he registered who it was. He floated slightly away with the current.

“You’re my only friend here. If I’m forced to keep coming back I’ll always come back to you.” Virgil said.

“Fine, don’t tell me where you go. But if you miss our graduation I…” Logan couldn’t finish.

“Your graduation.” Virgil said, turning around. “I will never graduate from this.”

“Falsehood.” Logan said.

“I wish I’d never taught you that word.” Virgil said.

The buildings towered above Virgil’s often abandoned sand level apartment. Crabs and other bottom feeders often wandered into it by mistake only to be crushed under Virgil’s bare hands. Unlike almost every other merperon Logan knew Virgil didn’t carve pictures into his walls. They were just as blank as his upper skin. Except of course for the…

No, it was impolite to harp on that more than he already did.

“Where do you even go?” Logan asked. “We left the north seas generations ago. Nobody knows who we are in that area of the ocean. I’ve been trying to figure it out, and you won’t tell me. If I’m your only friend then it’s only logical I should know everything about you, but I know nothing. It has been almost ten new years since we met. Still I don’t know why you live alone or who your parents are.”

“My parents aren’t from here.” Virgil said.

“Then where?” Logan asked. “A twenty two year old shouldn’t be living alone unless your parents are dead like mine. I have tolerated this for far too long. Who are you?”

Virgil swam close fast and put both hands on Logan’s shoulders, a gesture that Logan had only ever seen Virgil use for a friend. A frightening gesture that usually meant dominance over a slain enemy but for some reason in Virgil’s world meant that he was about to tell you something serious. Something that requires your full attention.

“I am an adult, Logan. I am more of an adult than you. You don’t understand yet but you will. Until I come back, don’t go to the surface.”

“I was not planning on it.” Logan said. “I’ve never been there. Why would I start now?”

“Good.”

Logan tried following him. He said “But you’re not an adult. What are-“

Virgil swam away too fast for Logan to keep up. He didn’t finish his sentence. It wouldn’t be logical if Verge couldn’t hear him. Logan watched the distance until his friend was just a dark speck in the water, no bigger than a normal fish swimming about. Logan considered yelling. Letting out a long sorrowful farewell akin to the crying of a whale. But that would be too public. Not like him. Not like Virgil. It would be too primitive. He began reciting things to himself instead.

“And then the ancients learned to shape the sand and the magic henceforth remaned in…”

……….

“Did you sleep?” Logan asked.

“No.” Virgil said

“It is tomorrow. How did you get the large inverted scar on your stomach?”

“Logan, what do you know about human history?”

“Nothing.”

“Do you know what I work to memorize and why I will never graduate?”

“No. Because you will graduate even if you don’t tell me what you are memorizing.”

“What is your job again, Logan?” Virgil asked.

“To preserve the knowledge of our community. To memorize our history and the history of merpeople worldwide as much as I can. I am being tested on this today. I will have to recite all that I’ve learned since birth. I was chosen. You know this. You were chosen too. You are studying to be…”

“You don’t know enough then.” Virgil said. “Hopefully you make it to the test.”

“What’s with the scar?”

“Do you know how humans are born?”

“Like mammals?”

“Than you should know what this scar is.”

“I don’t know what you are talking about. The test will be starting soon. I knew you wouldn’t tell me.”

“I’ll tell you after the test. If we have time.”

“Oh I am so sure of that. That last statement was sardonic.”

Virgil didn’t laugh at that like he usually did  when Logan pointed out that he was being sarcastic. Instead he nervously looked around and followed Logan out the door.

“You seem nervous. We are adults now.” Logan said.

Virgil took a shaky breath.

“That’s exactly why.”Next

[breanime]

Neighbors

Requested by @slytheringranger:  Reader gets annoyed (and maybe slightly jealous) because her cat starts running away to her new neighbour who usually keeps to himself (and who happens to be the one and only Billy Russo). Some additional info - of course I have to ask for good version of Billy, who's also scarred(because I am having a lot of feelings) because he tried to help Frank; and that's why Reader doesn't see him a lot. If plot allows it I would like also some guest appearance of Karen, Frank and Curtis visiting Billy.

Thanks for the request, I hope you like it! (Fun fact: I hate the title)

*gif not mine* (I had to use this one, I loved this moment)

It had been three weeks since your new neighbor had moved in and you still hadn’t met him. Normally that wouldn’t have mattered to you—it’s not like you really cared who had moved in down the hall from you, it was just… The guy was so…mysterious. He hadn’t even come to check the place out—you knew that because you had been home nursing your cat, Basil, back to health around the time your neighbor had started inquiring about the empty apartment. Instead, he sent three uniquely gorgeous people to look at it for him. In the process of the guy deciding to take the place, you ended up meeting all three of them.

The first one you met was called Curtis. He was ridiculously charming, with warm eyes and a kind smile that had you trusting him immediately. You had run into him in the lobby when he was trying to get up toy your floor. The visitor’s access code to the elevator wasn’t working, so you just punched yours in for him. He asked you questions about the apartment: how’d you like living there, what were the tenants like, how reliable was maintenance—so you thought he was looking at the property at first.

“Oh, nah,” he had laughed, “I’m just checking it out for a friend. He couldn’t make it today, so I’m just doing the leg work.”

“Oh,” you tried to hide your disappointment—Curtis seemed like he’d make for a good neighbor, “well, it’s a great place, people mostly keep to themselves…”

“Not you, though? Right?” He smiled down at you.

You laughed back. “I mean, I’m not gonna lie and say I’m a social butterfly,” you shrugged, “but I’ve been trapped in a house with a fussy cat for the last few days, so I’m kind of craving human conversation.”

“Well, maybe don’t count on my guy for that. He’s…” Curtis gave a one-shouldered shrug, looking a little disheartened before giving you another dazzling grin. “…not nearly as charming as me.”

“I bet.” You two stepped out of the elevator at the same time. Curtis had told you that he was waiting for the leasing agent to let him into the apartment, so you made the decision to stick around and make small talk until then. “Hopefully he’ll like it; it’s a nice place to live.”

“Maybe. He’s…” Curtis chuckled. “…kind of like your cat: fussy. My guy, he’s not like me…”

“Tall, dark, and handsome?” You asked before you could stop yourself.

Your word vomit was rewarded with another deep chuckle from Curtis. “I mean, my own girlfriend thinks he’s better-looking then me, so…”

“Can I just say, even though I just met you, it sounds like your girlfriend is living her best life?”

Another laugh. He opened his mouth to say something to you, but the elevator dinged, and the leasing agent stepped out. “Looks like the show’s about to start,” he said.

“It was nice meeting you, Curtis,” you extended your hand, “I hope your friend likes the apartment.”

“Same here, Y/N,” he shook your hand, grinning as he turned to greet the agent, “The apartment’s still in question, but…I know he’s gonna like you.”

That encounter had birthed your first surge of interest in your potential new neighbor, and you ended up meeting the other two unnecessarily good-looking people a few days later.

You had been at work all day, and you knew Basil—who was feeling better—would be meowing angrily at you for the rest of the evening. He hated tardiness. The elevator had been making a weird noise for the last 48 hours, and your landlord said he’d have the mechanic take a look at it soon, but you took it anyway. You were too tired to take the stairs, and besides, it was rare that anything broke in your building. You were just about to press your floor number when a feminine voice called out “hold the elevator!”.

You pressed yourself to the wall as an unreasonably gorgeous woman with light hair floated into the elevator. She smiled, thanking you, and you made some kind of squealing noise in response. She did not look like a real person; she looked like someone who should be playing a real person on TV or something. She was wearing a simple, powder blue button-up shirt with a black skirt and she still looked too good to be true. Her companion, however, you had definitely seen on TV.

Frank Castle was a household name in New York, but this was your first time ever seeing him in person (obviously). You had followed his trial, his subsequent death, then his rebirth as the Punisher up to his recent exploits exposing a government conspiracy. This was the first time you’d seen him without blood all over him, and man… The Punisher was actually kind of cute, he reminded you of a well-trained human pitbull. He was wearing a gray baseball cap that did nothing to disguise himself, but he got an A for effort. You made an effort not to stare, and the three of you stood silently as the elevator churned and started moving… Until it made a kind of choking noise, complete with flickering lights.

“What the hell?” Frank said, his voice gruff. All three of you stared up at the ceiling of the elevator until the lights stopped flickering and died out.

“No no no no,” you sighed, “son of a bitch.”

“Does this happen often?” The woman asked you, brows furrowed.

You shook your head. “No, this is the first time since I’ve lived here.”

“You think it’s a blackout?” She asked the Punisher.

“Nah,” he answered.

“It’s the elevator,” you supplied, “it’s been making this creaking noise for the last few days, and they said the mechanic would be here to take a look at it tomorrow,” you sighed, “and now it’s stuck.”

“Have you lived here long?” The woman asked.

You nodded. “Yeah, I—I haven’t seen you before. You must be looking at the empty apartment on my floor.”

“We are,” she put a delicate hand on her chest, “I’m Karen,” she placed her hand on the Punisher’s broad shoulder, “and this is Frank.”

“Y/N,” you replied, “and—don’t get me wrong, I think it’d be badass to have the Punisher down the hall from me—but you guys know it’s just a single, right?”

Frank laughed. “Thought I was doin’ alright being incognito.”

“Yeah, you… You are not,” you gave a nervous chuckle, “would it be weird to say that I’m kind of a fan?”

“It absolutely would not,” Karen said enthusiastically.

“This place,” Frank turned to you, a small smile on his face, “you said it’s a single? Does it have a decent amount of space, though?”

“Mm hmm,” you nodded, “all the units on my floor are single. I mean, it’s enough for me and my cat-son, but it might be a little small for a couple.”

“Oh—” you could see a rush of heat go to Karen’s cheeks, even in the dark, “—no, we’re…we’re not a couple.”

“Just friends.” Frank said simply.

“Plus we’re not looking,” Karen explained, “we’re just checking it out for a friend. We’re the last test before he buys it.”

“Huh. This is the second time I’ve met someone doing something like that. Is that a thing now? I’m always the last one to know about things.” You said, remembering Curtis.

“No,” Karen laughed, “we’re just doing our friend a favor. Our other friend—actually, he might be the one you met—was here before us.”

“You got a cat,” Frank asked you before turning to Karen, “she might be the cat lady Curt was tellin’ us about.”

“I only have one cat! …Currently.”

Frank chuckled. “Right.” He looked up at the ceiling. “I’m gonna go check this out.” With a grunt, he jumped up and crawled out of the roof of the elevator.

Your jaw dropped open as you stared at the now open roof, but Karen was unfazed.

“So our friend,” she continued, ignoring the grunting and ripping noises that were now coming from the roof, “served with Frank and Curtis in the Marines. He played a big part in helping Frank with…with what he needed to deal with, and he got hurt.” She pushed some hair behind her ear. “He’s kind of become a recluse since then, so… If he does decide to get this place, maybe… if you don’t mind, maybe just make a point to say hi to him or something? Make him feel welcome?”

“Of course,” you agreed easily, “any friend of Curtis is a friend of mine.”

You heard Frank laugh above you, and just like that—the elevator started up again. You rode the rest of the way with Karen and Frank before it got to your floor.

“Well, I hope you guys like the place,” you said as you parted ways, “and if your friend does take it, tell him I’m right down the hall if he needs anything!”

That had been three weeks ago. Apparently, the apartment passed the test because a few days later, Curtis stopped by your place to tell/warn you his friend had bought the property. Frank and Curtis helped the guy move in, but they only came at night. Basil, nosy as ever, had been so curious about the noise that he spent half the night at the door, scratching and meowing, trying to see what was going on. You saw your neighbor’s back—once—as you were coming in late at night. You heard Curtis’ laugh from the apartment—the door was open, and Frank was trying to roll a table through it.

“Hey, Y/N!” Frank greeted you.

“Hi, Frank,” you called back, pushing Basil back with your foot, “Hey, Curtis!”

“Hey!” Curtis’ voice was a bit muffled, but still as warm as it had been the day you met.

You wanted to talk with them, but Basil was doing that cat-thing where his body stopped following the laws of physics, so you needed to close the door before he ran out. He was a frisky little bastard. But, just as you were closing the door, you turned one last time and saw a tall, thin figure in the hall next to Frank. He had a dark hoodie on with the hood up and cut a striking figure—but that was all you saw before you had to shut the door.

A few days later, you were tempted to let your curiosity get the better of you. So, in the act of being neighborly, you decided to officially welcome tall-dark-and hooded to your building. You opened the door, still formulating your welcome speech, when Basil ran past you and sped down the hall.

“Basil!” You cried out. “Get back here!”

He, naturally, ignored your request and instead ran right to your neighbor’s door where he promptly started meowing loudly and scratching at the wood.

“Shit,” you muttered, tiptoeing over, “Basil, stop that, c’mere…” You got to the door and leaned down to pick him up. Basil jumped out of your grasp and ran his nails on the door harder. “Oh my—stop being an asshole,” you clicked your tongue. Basil meowed back at you—he had never been afraid to talk back—and you reached for him again. Just then, as you were crouched down on the floor arguing with a cat, the door swung open.

You first stared at the pair of feet—clad in pristine white gym shoes—before your gaze slowly moved up. He was wearing grey sweatpants over his long legs, a white t-shirt over his tight chest (not as broad as Frank’s or Curtis’ but still inviting), and his face… He was extremely handsome. He had impossibly dark eyes, short, brown hair, and a frown on his face. There were scars—light and zigzagged—but they didn’t detract from his natural good looks, nor stop you from oogling him. Basil meowed happily, glad to have gotten his way.

Your neighbor cocked an eyebrow as he looked down at the two of you. “…Can I help you?” He had a New York accent that made you tingle just a little bit.

You reached out for Basil, eyes still on your neighbor. Basil, however, was also trying to get a better look at the man and was rubbing his face against his leg, making satisfied little noises. “I—hi. Hi,” you stammered, arms outstretched, “I’m Y/N, I live right down the hall. I was just, um,” you finally looked down and saw that Basil was walking around the man now, in and out of the doorway. “Basil!” You hissed. “Get over here!”

“Ah,” the man said, reaching down to stroke Basil’s head, “so this is the cat I’ve been hearing about,” Basil craned his neck to get more scratches, “I’m Billy.”

“Him” you said again, “Um, look, Billy, I was just going to come say hi and then Basil ran out—”

“—right. I should have…introduced myself before now.”

“No, it’s no problem,” you scooped up Basil, who meowed in protest as you stood up, “sorry to bother you.” You were suddenly flustered at seeing Billy—the hottest of his group of unnecessarily hot friends—and needed to get away as soon as possible. “Let me know if he damaged your door,” you called to Billy before you disappeared into your apartment. You slammed the door closed with your back and cursed to yourself. Of course he was hot. Of course. You hated that you had been so awkward, and you vowed, with an armful of cat, to be cool the next time you saw him.

You were never cool when you saw him. Billy worked a lot, which meant he was in and out of the apartment quite a bit. You ran into him—literally—while he was getting on the elevator and you were getting off. It wouldn’t have been so bad, except you were on your phone having a heated debate with Basil (who had learned how to video-call you using your laptop).

“I swear to God, Basil, if you chewed up my couch again, I’ll—” you were stopped short when you slammed into Billy. You would have fallen on your ass at the impact—the man had a solid chest—but Billy held you steady.

He glanced down at your phone and laughed when he saw Basil’s face in the camera. “Are you facetiming your cat?” He asked.

You had never heard his laugh before. It was melodic and deep and you liked it a lot. You felt your face heat up, but answered him anyway. “He hacks my computer and calls me sometimes,” you explained, “sorry about,” you gestured between you. His hands were still on your waist.

Billy let you go and took a step back. “No problem.”

You gave him a weak wave and ran off, keeping the memory of his laugh in your heart.

The next time you saw him was late at night. You had just taken the trash out and were coming back into your apartment as he was going out. Basil had memorized the sound of Billy’s footsteps and had gotten into the habit of trying to run out into the hall whenever he knew Billy was out there. You ended up running into Billy at least five times a week as you had to chase after Basil. However, you almost never saw Billy this late at night. You watched, hand on your doorknob, as Billy knelt down to pet Basil. Basil, who took a year to even allow himself to be in the same room as your ex, happily allowed the interaction.

“Hey,” Billy had greeted you.

“Hi,” you said back, “You know, he’s not usually this friendly.”

Billy smiled, and you found yourself grinning back. “Neither am I.” His dark eyes roamed over your body before he spoke again. “You shouldn’t go out so late at night.”

“Oh. I was just taking out the trash—”

“I can do that,” he stood up and Basil nuzzled his leg, “Just knock on my door next time you need the trash taken out. It’s not a problem,” he assured you.

“Okay,” you said slowly, unsure how to react to this random kindness. Basil had padded back over to you, meowed at you to get moving, and went back inside. “Okay, thanks…good night.”

You continued to run into Billy on and off for the next few weeks. You learned that he had been in the Marines for over eight years in the elevator and that he owned a company called Anvil. He really did start taking out your trash, so you made it a point to grab his mail from the front desk for him and personally deliver it—which is how you learned that Frank, Curtis, and Karen were like family to him in an interestingly open conversation. You found out that Billy was born and raised in New York during one of Basil’s escape attempts, and later told him about the time you almost drowned on a field trip during another one. Each time you wished that you could see him more, talk with him more, but you were usually awkwardly chasing your cat around or looking very uncool as you tried to carry a huge package to his door, so you never pushed for more. Finally, you decided that the next time you left your apartment you would look good, you would be cool…

…The next time you saw him you did not look cool at all. You looked…very uncool. You were so swamped at work that you had to take it home to finish. Which lead to you having to stay up all night buried under paperwork with chopsticks in your hair. Basil was not amused with the lack of attention you were giving him, meowing and complaining so loudly that you had to kick him out of your bedroom. At some point you remembered that you needed food to survive, so you ordered food, nearly ripped the food out of the delivery guy’s arms, scarfed it down in a rush of limbs and noodles, and got back to work. You were really making headway with your work, which was why you were in no mood for company when you heard a knock on your door.

You yanked the door open, a scowl on your face—and froze. Your neighbor Billy was standing there holding Basil in his arms. He was wearing a suit and tie while you had on your old Hamilton shirt, chopsticks keeping your messy hair up, and a pair of mismatched socks.

“Your cat broke into my place again.” Billy said, smirking at your attire.

Your eyes widened. “I am so sorry—wait, again? What? How did he even get out?”

“I think he snuck out when you answered the door earlier,” Billy said, Basil was purring in his hold, “And he breaks into my place every few days,” he shrugged, unbothered, “I think he gets in the air vents and army crawls back and forth.”

“I—I am so sorry, I had no idea! Why didn’t you tell me?”

Billy gave another shrug. “I think we work different hours, I can never catch you. I always make sure he’s fed and gets home safe, though.” Basil nudged Billy’s hand with his nose in an affectionate gesture. “He’s a cute cat.”

“I think he likes you more than he likes me,” you grumped. “Um, really, Billy, I really am sorry about this. I’m usually more perceptive than this.”

“You don’t need to be sorry. If I’m being honest, I kind of like seeing him so often.”

You gave a nervous laugh. “Wish I could say the same for you.” You watched as Billy’s eyes widened at your statement and swore Basil was smirking at your stupidity. Only you would have a cat who liked home invasions and only you would have such a case of chronic foot-in-mouth disease. “Ohmygod,” you muttered, unsure of what to say next.

“You… You want to see me more often?” Billy asked. You were certain Basil was cocking an eyebrow as he waited for your response.

“I… I… I would not be opposed to that,” you said carefully.

Billy put a large hand on Basil’s head, contemplating. “You… You want to see me?” He asked again. “Like this?”

“Like what? Tall and hot and cool when I’m the opposite of all that?” You shrugged, letting your nervous energy steer the ship. “Yeah, man.”

Billy chuckled. He stroked Basil’s head. “No, I mean,” he swallowed, “I mean like this…with the scars.”

“Oh.” You scanned his face, taking in the different scars. They really weren’t that bad, and even if they were, you liked Billy. The scars didn’t matter. “I almost forgot you have them. I don’t even notice them anymore.”

Billy blinked, looking like he was carefully processing the words you said. “Hm,” he looked down at Basil and then back up at you, “So the scars don’t bother you at all?” He asked.

“No,” you answered honestly, “I think they make you look kind of badass.”

He smiled then, ducking his head down. “Okay…So, if I asked you for your number…?”

You grinned. “You can have it.”

“How about a date?”

You nodded, and Basil meowed in his arms. “You can have that, too. Actually,” you took a step back into your apartment, “I was kind of getting cabin fever just now. Wanna take a walk with me?” You pressed home your advantage. “We can take Basil.”

“Take a cat for a walk in New York City, at night, with a beautiful woman?” Billy asked, his smile blinding. “I’d love to.”

Basil made a pleased sound and you couldn’t help but giggle. He knew exactly what he had done. “Let me just get his leash and some shoes,” you said, hurrying to grab those items. Billy waited patiently, asking about what kind of restaurant you liked best as he cradled Basil in his arms.

Man, you loved having a cat.

*********************************************************************************

TAGLIST: : @floralpeaceofmind @delicatelilyflower @doneobrien @ladyblablabla @banditthewriter @something-tofightfor  @starsfragments @blackcoffeeandgreenteaforme @hisgirlwednesdayaddams@fictionwillneverdie @maria-beretta @sadnessxvodka @ymariejp @sunnycolors @moonlightsay @its-all-o-kay @damagelove @keyeluh @itsmylife98 @funerals-with-cake @littlemermaidprobz @teacuplotus @king4thesirens @mrsjaxtellerfan @thebabblingbook @tartelette-aux-fraises @madamrogers  @charlylama @iaintnofurry​ @k-buggz2001​

This was kind of long, wasn’t it? Comments always appreciated!

[blueboxesandtrafficcones]

The Party Problem

Day 9 of 2019′s 31 Days of Ficmas

Thanks to @doctorroseprompts for the prompt list!

Prompt: party

Rating: General

Pairing: 10xRose (pre-couple)

Summary: In hopes a relaxing night out, the Doctor attempts to take Rose to a Christmas party during the 4th Great and Bountiful Human Empire.  Needless to say, plans go awry.

2019 31 Days of Ficmas masterlist

---

“So, where are we going today?” Rose skipped into the console room to find the Doctor already fiddling with the coordinates.

From the other side of the console he looked up, face breaking into a wide smile at the sight of her.  “Hello!” he said in that delighted way he had, as if they’d been apart for months instead of minutes.  It never failed to make her heart leap, to know her mere presence brought him so much happiness.  “We… are going to a Christmas party,” he said smugly, throwing the lever and sending them into flight. “And not just a Christmas party, oh no- nothing so mundane for you.  No, we are going to the 20th annual official Christmas Gala, held by the Supreme Emperor of the 4th Great and Bountiful Human Empire!”

Rose’s shoulders slumped, and she stuck her lower lip out in an exaggerated pout.  “That sounds nice,” she said wistfully, moving towards him and crossing her arms.  “Sounds beautiful, really.”

“Then what’s wrong?”  His eyebrows drew together, and she had to hide a smile at his perplexed expression.

“Well, it’s just… you’ve promised me the 4th Great and Bountiful Human Empire over… and over… and have basically doomed us that wherever we land, there’ll be trouble.”

Eyes widening his jaw dropped, and for several seconds he spluttered indignantly.  “You- I- That’s not- How could you- It’s just- Rose!”

She burst into laughter, having to hold herself around the middle to keep upright.  “Oh, your face,” Rose gasped, howling.  “Oh, that’s priceless, that is!”

“Rose!  Stop laughing,” he whined, circling the console to get to her, crossing his arms and sulking.  “It’s not nice.  I have not doomed us.”

“But you have though!  Every time, Doctor, we find trouble.  Remember Satellite Five?”

He looked particularly put out, and she almost felt bad.  “That wasn’t my fault,” he muttered, “sometimes the TARDIS takes us where we need to go rather than where we want to go.”

“I know,” she said soothingly, swallowing back the remaining giggles.  “But you have to admit, she seems particularly against taking us there.”

“Well, this time we are going, because I have an invitation.”

“The psychic paper does not count as an invitation.”

“It’s not the psychic paper!  It is a real invitation, Dame Rose, one I received many years ago in my travels and never cashed in.  Would you care to join me?”

Rose hummed, adopting a quizzical expression and studying him.  The longer she waited the more earnest he appeared, his Time Lords are superior posture fading to please let me take you somewhere nice, and she caved – not that she would ever say no.  I’ll go anywhere with you, daft alien.  For as long as you’ll have me.  Don’t you know that by now?  Then again, it was somewhat sweet and innocent of him to feel the need to ask, to not just make assumptions about what she wanted.  “I would be absolutely delighted, Sir Doctor,” she affected a posh accent, giggling once again when he rolled his eyes.  “And what, precisely, is the dress code?”

He blinked.  “Uh… fancy?”

“Right, but… oh, never mind, I’m sure the TARDIS’ll make sure I choose something appropriate,” Rose shook her head, grinning wryly.  “I’ll go get ready.”

With a parting bright smile she turned, strolling towards the wardrobe room.

“You have ten minutes!” he called after her.

She started running.

-

Twenty-seven minutes later she returned to the console room, dressed to the absolute nines.  “I love this dress,” she announced, strutting in.  “I feel like a princess or something.”  She did a little twirl, pleased when the skirts flared out around her.  “What d’you think?”

And then she stopped dead, jaw dropping slightly as she caught sight of him.

“Blimey, you cleaned up.”

It shouldn’t have been that surprising; he’d worn a suit nearly every second since he’d regenerated, and going from that to a tux wasn’t much different, but… Whoa.

“Looks all right?” he asked nervously, turning from the mirror he had propped against the rotor, his own eyes going wide at seeing her.  “Wow.”

“You look… fine,” Rose swallowed, scanning him carefully.  The tux seemed to be even more snug than his usual suit, and he was far more than just fine.  “It’s- it’s good.”  His undone bowtie caught her eye, and she didn’t waste the opportunity.  “Here, let me.” Taking her time she tied it for him, before smoothing her hands along his shoulders and down the front of the jacket.  “Perfect.”  If her voice was a little breathier than normal he didn’t seem to notice, just stared down at her with those expressive brown eyes.  As much as he tried to hide his feelings, burying them deep beneath boundless energy and childlike enthusiasm, the truth was clear as day in his eyes, finishing sentences when his mouth was incapable of doing so.

“Thanks,” he murmured, taking a step back.  “You look wonderful.”

“Thank you.”  Rose blushed, dipping her head and holding out her skirts, twirling again.  “I hope there’s dancing.”  I hope you dance with me.

“I’m sure there will be.”

An awkward silence ensued, broken only the abrupt landing.

“Oh!” Rose yelped, bursting into laughter as she swayed.  “I guess we’re here.”

“Looks like it.”  The Doctor jogged over to the monitor, peering at it intently for a moment.  “Yep, this is it.”

They made their way to the door, which swung open for them of the ship’s accord; immediately, the sounds of a party floated inside to them, reassuring Rose.

“Milady?” he offered her his elbow, and with a tongue-touched grin, she took it.

“Why thank you, kind sir.”

And they entered the party.

-

It took two hours.

“Doctor, where the hell are you?” Rose hissed, running for her life down a portrait gallery, guards chasing her – she had a momentary advantage, being able to dart and weave through secret doors they didn’t know she was aware of.  Carrying her heels and running in stockinged feet helped, though the guards were slowly gaining.  “Shit. I knew this would happen, didn’t I say so?”

She careened around a corner while glancing over her shoulder, only to be forcefully jerked sideways.  Fighting back a scream, she blinked frantically to get her vision to adjust to the dark closet she was suddenly in.

“You okay?”

Rose sagged at the familiar voice, relaxing back against the door as she realized the body framing her was none other than the Doctor’s.  “Yes. Where have you been?”

“Me?  You’re the one who- who keeps wandering off!”

“Shh!”

They fell silent as the guards ran past their hiding spot, waiting an eternity until the Doctor shifted her out of the way, cracking open the door and listening intently.  “Coast is clear,” he whispered, “and I’ve got a way out. Trust me?”

“You’re an idiot,” she hissed back, letting that linger for a moment before adding, “if you think the answer to that is anything other than ‘yes’.  Now get us out of here!”

“That was mean,” he grumbled petulantly, opening the door fully and creeping towards the left.  “Come on.”

“That’s them!”  The shout came from the other direction, and they both looked to see a second contingent of guards pointing in their direction.

“Oh… come on!  Run!”

Shaking her head in exasperation, Rose bundled her skirts in the same hand as her shoes, took the Doctor’s hand, and did as he said.

Amazing how much more fun this is with his hand in mine.

-

They made it into the TARDIS with seconds to spare, and Rose could feel the guards grasping for her dress as they tumbled through the doors.  The moment they slammed shut Rose collapsed onto the ramp, panting as she dropped her shoes and hem while the Doctor made his way to the console and sent them into flight.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered from where he hunched over the controls, and the image was so similar to just before he regenerated that Rose had a visceral reaction, jumping up and hurrying over to him.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” she soothed, internally panicked by how downtrodden he appeared.  “I know you didn’t mean for that to happen- though I’m not quite clear on what did happen.  One second I’m laughing at the Crown Prince’s joke, the next guards were chasing me.”

The Doctor finally lifted his head, an ancient, dark look in his eye that did more to remind her of who he really was, what he was, than the time machine she lived on.  “I accidentally uncovered a coup in progress,” he admitted.  “The General was planning on murdering the Emperor and seizing the throne.  He wasn’t pleased when I blurted my realization out in front of the Emperor.”

Rose couldn’t help but snort.  “Sounds like you.”  She hadn’t been able to help wondering, while darting through the Imperial Palace, if he’d started trouble because the Crown Prince had been monopolizing her time.

“I just wanted to take you somewhere nice,” he lamented, turning to lean back against the console and raking his eyes over her.  “Let you get dressed up and let your hair down.  We’ve been running nonstop for weeks now.”

She shrugged her shoulders, stepping closer and patting his bicep.  “I don’t care.  I love it.  All of it.  Running from trouble, or to trouble, or just… having breakfast in the galley.  I appreciate the effort, but… any time with you is time well spent.”

His eyes met hers, and she fought to not blink, trying to keep herself still.  She was tired, and sore, and in desperate need of a shower, but she let him see the truth of her words, how she really felt, things speakable and unspeakable alike.

After a minute his mouth tightened and he nodded.

“Movie night, then?”

“After a shower,” she agreed, giving an over-exaggerated sniff before grinning.  “Twenty minutes?”

He nodded again, and she turned towards the corridor that led to her room.

“By the way…” she stopped in the doorway, glancing over her shoulder to find he hadn’t moved, “we can have a fancy dress party just the two of us without leaving the ship, you know.  Next time you want to see me kitted out like this. Just so you know.”

And she disappeared down the hall, humming to herself as she went.

[massieh]

Transfigure ( rewrite ; first draft ), Chapter 1. word count: 3,270.

The full moon illuminated the river, casting the world around us in black and white. The river, a sheet of obsidian glass beneath the glow, wrapped around my feet and begged that I join in with the current. 

Just let it all go; be free.

Something hit my hand, hard and cold. At first, the feeling sent a chill down my spine, and reflex demanded that I throw it. Though useful in the field, that instinct was well out-of-place here. Carefully, calmly, I raised the object into the candlelight.

It was one of the bottles that Kane repurposed for a candle holder, an idea he had when we first found the place months before. The wax stick jammed into the top had already burned down so far into the neck that it stained the glass around it black. Even the wax seal could not hold back the smell. Whatever was inside, its stale scent gave the impression that it could only be useful for cleaning wounds.

I tried to push it back. How did he roll a square bottle? 

“Nah,” he demanded, kicking it back over the short distance I had managed. “We had a deal.”

“Yeah, and I’ll hold up my end with or without yours.” In truth, I was sick of feeling stupid. It sounded fun to face the impossible, but that was before I found out that even trivial things could hold that title.

“Both ends are my end. Now go.”

“Fine,” I mumbled under my breath and raised the bottle again. I tried to ignore all the other details. The shape, the scent, the weight—anything that would be important under any real circumstances was useless now. 

Words. I had to figure out the words.

With the old world gone and the city ripped apart, readers weren’t all that common. This place was built by a group of strangers, after all. Each was stripped from their home and dropped here to make a new life alongside the others. Some kept their families in tow; most came alone. This lack of community, alongside the shared goal of survival, led to an illiteracy rate that I didn’t notice until Kane moved in.

As a neighbor once told me, if the old world’s skills were so useful, we wouldn’t be where we are today. It didn’t make that much sense, but everyone else thought so. Who was I to argue?

Kane was one of the lucky ones. He came here knowing how to read. Though we were left wanting for books, he still managed to keep that talent sharp.

Both of my parents could read. My mother all but spoke in code, and it was holy texts that made up my father’s foundation. Both tried to show me their worlds; both kind of succeeded. Reading, however, was never included.

There were a few words scattered throughout the city that had been burned into my mind through recognizance. “Voodoo” and “girls” made the top of that list. Try to make sense of the Bible on that alone.

Three days after Kane figured it out, he came up with his greatest plan yet: he would be the one to teach me the sacred art of literature. His words, not mine. Boredom replaced his brilliant curiosity with a rabid need for purpose a long time ago. So, as any idiot would, I eagerly agreed. He dedicated our first week to the alphabet. I was to say it forward and back fifteen times every few hours to make sure it stuck. 

Simple enough. 

Then, we moved on to the next logical step: “Sound it out.”

Despite the roll of my eyes, I did as I was told. “J-aysk”

“No, no. Where are you getting the’s’?”

“What do you mean?” And after he hissed the sound back at me, “Right there.”

“That’ s—no, that one makes the same sound as the ‘k’.”

I changed my mind. This sucked. “That makes no sense.”

“The ‘a’ makes the sound like ‘at’, too.’”

“Jac-k?”

“Don’t pronounce them both.”

“Both what? It’s four—”

“Just, ‘Jack’.” He chopped at the air with one hand, but the motion’s meaning was lost on me.

My response was the forced sigh of, “Okay. Jack,” followed by another, meeker attempt. “D… e… nials?” 

Kane snorted behind me. 

As I shifted back to lean on my elbows, the bottle turned over in my hand, allowing me one last whiff of the foul liquid inside. “So, what. This Jack guy was so ashamed of this stuff, he had to say it on the label?” The bottle sang out an eerie scrape as I returned it to the slab of concrete at Kane’s feet, and its ring somehow made more sense than the next word from his mouth.

“Daniels.”

“What?”

He sputtered again. This time, it sounded like a laugh. “It’s Jack Daniels. It was whiskey. Alcohol, but not the kind you use on cuts.” And because I clearly didn’t get it, he added, “A drink for, uh… entertainment.” 

It was exhausting how much he knew about the old world. Some would say too much. Though it was easy to agree, it was almost impossible not to be fascinated by it. At the compound, there were rooms dedicated to artifacts and treasures worth more than any ten men together could afford. It would not surprise me to know all of that, in addition to what was left of the natural wonders, paled in comparison to Kane’s collections. 

“You’re stupid good at a lot of things,” I told him after an agonizing moment of self-debate. The added spice of his own slang would hopefully soften the blow. “But you might be the worst teacher I’ve ever had.”

This time, his laugh was flimsy. “Well, I’m not a Minister or a Control Chief, so that’s a weird corner to throw me in.” 

Oh, good. No harm done.

Kane was always this easy. I could be a little bit mean, and he’d just be happy to hear himself talk in-between. The banter served as a low-effort veil between us and the void of boredom, sure. When things got deep, though, it was the true void that stared back. His teaching needed work, but Kane filled the silence with more knowledge and life in a single minute than any amount of time with my parents ever did—official, familial, or otherwise.

A second bottle clinked against the stone at my left, this one with some of the original contents still inside. I waited for the same set of instructions. Instead, what he gave back read something like, try it. One sip, and I spit it out instantly. “Oh, that’s disgusting.”

“It is what it is. You’re doing fine.” His shift in tone was so swift that I nearly forgot about the acidic film on my tongue. “It’s just been a couple of weeks. It took me like a month, I bet.”

“You’d also be six.”

“And you’re seventeen—“

“Eighteen.”

“The arguments make themselves.” I looked back, and his smile was as smug as his tone. “Like I said. You’re doing just fine.”

If the right response existed, it was lost beneath an awkward laugh and the gentle sound of the flowing river.

Even without many character references to place around him, Kane was odd in a way that even his sacred art of literature would have trouble capturing. Though he only stood a few inches taller than me, no room could contain his personality. His body was more weapon than temple. From appearance to mind to words—everything but his eyes, he kept sharp.

One of the bottles floated out from the cove and into the river without either of us noticing. The water tugged it one way and another. It was the flickering of the light that caught my attention. The flame rose and fell in the hot air, twisting as the bottle bobbed from side to side, and finally went out altogether when it tipped over and washed out.

The light was now too low to read, but both ends were Kane’s, right?

“Let’s go,” I mostly grunted just before scooting from the pavement’s edge and into the river. Wading beyond reach of the shore to where the cool stream rose high enough to combat the humidity, I turned back to face him.

Kane maintained both still and silence surprisingly well.

“I promise it’ll be less fun if we do this by force.”

Only the still broke. He slid from the jutting knees of a cypress onto the slab below to remove his boots, socks, and the sidearm he kept strapped to his thigh. After sliding those over to join my things, he moved on to rolling his tattered jeans until they threatened his circulation. Stalling was routine, same as the distance in his eyes and the occasional sighing.

In a lazy attempt to match his performance, my hand moved in slow, dramatic circles in a gesture to hurry up. By the time he touched the water, my arm was a quick snap away from falling off my shoulder and drifting out to sea. 

It was by no small feat that he was able to reach me. Though the water gathered only at his hips, if even that far, he could only do so with his eyes clenched shut. It was impressive.

“Alright, I’m ready,” he told me once his hands were safely in mine. His stance was so tight that his grip almost hurt. Determined, he may have been, but Kane looked anything but ready.

“I won’t make you do anything yet,” I said. “Just stand there. Get used to the flow. Try to open your eyes, maybe?” They tightened at that. “Hey. If anything happens, I’m right here.”

The sentiment did little to calm him. At the very least, it did encourage the hint of a grin, fleeting though it was. When it was apparent that he couldn’t control his own breathing, mine became slowed and pronounced for him to mirror. After what felt like an hour of coaching, but must have only been a few minutes, his breathing began to fall smoothly in time with the steady sound of waves crashing in the distance. 

Sometimes, when the fog cleared enough to see the endless expanse of the southern sea, and the river rose just a little higher than usual, he would mention his home sector. Not much more was given than what he wanted to remember. I knew it must have been somewhere west because he always mentioned how the morning sun blinded him on the move over. The way he marveled at our trees for the first three years said it must have been pretty dry. 

When Kane spoke about it, he did so in hushed tones, as though home could be all that scary. Maybe it was. In some ways, I was less surprised by his aquaphobia than his decision to tell me about it.

Kane dropped my hands and took another deep breath through his nose, rereleasing it from his mouth in a tight stream of air. Not that his first thought would be the position of his face in relation to mine. A warning just would have been nice. 

“Alright,” he repeated. With just enough bravery sucked in with a second, more generous inhale, he coaxed his eyes open. 

Had I not been watching, I would have missed the literal instant regret set in. “What a face. Think you’ll live?”

His mouth pressed into a firm line.

“Dude. You have to breathe.” Maybe he wasn’t feeling talkative, but at least he was present enough to listen. “You’re doing way better than last time.”

Last time was a wrestling match just to get this far. It ended with Kane falling in and scrambling his way back before we could make any more progress. Victoria thanked me that day for forcing her son to bathe. This time, though fear was still evident in the way his eyes darted between the water below and the sky above, Kane was able to restrain himself.

It was a noble effort—one lost the moment he looked to the branches of the looming trees. “They’re gathering late tonight,” he noted, referring to the growing amassment of crows.

“You think it’s dogs?”

“Probably.” The commotion of subsong and wings replaced our voices for a moment before Kane turned his eyes on me again. He tried to grab my hands again and added a desperate, “I’ll walk with you.” 

My hands were held up for him to see while I backed away. “Hold on, hold on. We have time.” Already, the soil of the riverbed pulled me down, seeping between my toes with each step. I’d seen panic drown too many in this river to join them. So I allowed the distance between us to expand instead.

We were only a couple of meters from the waters’ edge. Still, when I finally reached the wall of trees and turned to face him, he felt oceans away. 

The collection of candles had melted over the bottles’ necks, their labels now impossible to decipher beneath the wax coating. It was as good a time as any to turn in. I raised the last, still burning, high for him to see.

“When it goes out.”

“You know, one pack took out an entire team last week.” His voice was soft, nearly inaudible over the water.

“So I heard.”

“I should really get you home.”

“They got a whole team. Having one extra body won’t keep me any safer. You worry about you.”

A distracted laugh, both forced and cautious, slipped past Kane’s worry just to free-fall into silence. No longer were the cicadas singing, the birds paused in quiet wonder, and for a moment, even the water fell into an uncomfortable still. 

The sector grew quieter by the day, it seemed. Together, we survived war, famine, disease. I’m sure you can piece together what happened to the rest. My uncle always liked to say that book of Revelation didn’t prepare us for an after. Nine years old may have been too young for that lesson, but I understood all the same. 

Over the past week, more stories from the Cage made it to the dinner table. My mother told us that one of the things inside had a wingspan twice as long as its own body. She said it tried to take to the skies, but its wings were too heavy. Instead of lifting itself from the ground, it destroyed three buildings and killed two people before being captured. Suits spoke in hushed tones throughout the Complex about how the webbed pinions left an ashen residue on their uniforms.

The rest was a matter of who told the story.

Kane tugged me from the thought by prompting from his position in the water, “Hey, Andy. Can we tuck in yet? No rush, but I’m starting to freak out.”

To get back to the road meant scaling the city’s deteriorated retaining wall and the roots that had nearly devoured it. Kane beat me to the top and triumphantly threw both fists in the air as if the effort were for glory rather than escape. It was the pair of boots, hanging together from one clenched hand as I remained at the water’s edge to lace my own, that gave him away.

The trees served as a veil between the southern wilderness and what was deemed before my conception as “civilization”. Once we passed through, our usual banter had to be capped. We stepped lightly, even slowing our breathing to a shallow and cautionary flow. The smallest sound could bounce through the empty streets and lead something much worse than the river’s wrath to us.

From the gaping mouth of an old storefront, the sun-bleached cast of a massive, toothy lizard smiled at us. Could you believe it was a real thing? Not the smiling part, but the creature itself. Kane told me all about it when his family first joined the sector.

They were big, sometimes twice as long as he was tall and three times his weight, he said. I asked if he knew all that because he had to kill one. Kane only gave me a strange look and said everyone knew what an alligator was. But that wasn’t true. I didn’t. For all I knew, they were no more real than his Mothman. 

A time did exist where the buildings along our hike were beautiful. Time and the elements faded their colors, shattered their windows, and darkened their doors. Here and there, shop signs still clung to their rusted mounts. Due only to their current state, which was battered too far beyond recognition for even Kane to read, was I brave enough to look at them for more than a glance.

The path was so familiar that I could have walked it backwards with my eyes covered. Every step was as much a part of me as my own two hands. The shape of the street names, I had memorized before Kane joined the sector.

St. Peter.

Bourbon.

Bienville.

And at the end of Bienville was home. Well, it was my home. Kane’s family relocated so often that I stopped keeping track. At first, the frequent moves were quirky. Then, they were frustrating. While the other kids moved on to new friends, I knew there was a different solution. I just had to get good at finding him.

Home was a single cross-section of road, separated from the ruin and wilderness by tireless grooming. Even as we crossed over the threshold between broken asphalt and the intact pavement that bound the structures together, Maintenance took stock of tomorrow’s workload. 

As always, they paid us no mind. 

The Complex stood three stories high and only an echo of its former glory. Like the rest of the city, it battled weathering of its own. The Northwest corner and an entire block of the cemetery were swallowed by the earth four days after my twelfth birthday. Before was the contagion. And after? That was the Summer of Lights, which burned down more than half the city. 

Yeah, it wasn’t that fun.

Kane led me to one of the clone doors and shoved his hands into his jacket pockets. “Tomorrow’s a big one,” he told me.

“You ready for it?”

“Never am. Don’t sleep in.”

And I responded, “Get good sleep.”

He disappeared beyond the dim glow of our stoop light, leaving me to drown at the hands of anxiety. The Course—like I could forget. If I failed, then what? There was always the Ministry, but if I couldn’t read and failed a glorified physical exam, even they would have no use for me. 

As my mind swarmed with thoughts of tomorrow, the still dark of the entry felt like a gift. It meant that my feet could make the weary climb to the second floor without the help of a conscious mind. Mine was too busy repeating the phrase, “Do you accept?” To the question, it shouted the oath.

Outside my window, the moon still shone over the city, either oblivious to its state of distress or indifferent. It lit the single-block cemetery there, and I could swear there was more life in those mausoleums than remained throughout the whole sector. I could see Kane perched on one of the roofs, thumbing through the pages he stashed inside an oven crypt. 

Past him, past the concrete structures, past the contorted knot of crumbling highway, I could see the six points of the Cage reaching into the night sky. 

This was home.

[kaikhaos]

The Hurricane Sandy Saga Continues…

So here’s the story of my life since October 28, 2012 and all the chaos that has come with it. This is not a happy story, so far, but I’m hoping you guys can help make it one, or at least help prevent a bad end. This is a story of corrupt banks, government bullsh*t, and a 25 year old disabled trans queer who just wants to go home. Over the next five thousand words, I hope you realize the extent of how life has repeatedly NOPED at any sense of logic. At the end of my story, I’m going to ask you to help me out if you can and to spread the word either way.

The tl;dr version is that my family is facing homelessness for the fourth time in eighteen months and I really need you guys’ help to get us back into a stable situation so this never happens again. The mortgage company has screwed us yet again and is holding on to $250,000 that is supposed to be ours. So while we own one house and one newly demolished lot, we have nowhere to live. If you can at all help out, please do. My paypal link is here: http://paypal.me/mihaelkai .

My name is Aleks. This is my story.

First, let’s get one thing out of the way: I’m disabled. I have been legally recognized as disabled since I was 18. I have a combination of mental health issues and physical health issues that make it so my capacity on any given day varies greatly from “I made it through a day at a con thanks to lots of painkillers!” to “I brushed my teeth today and didn’t cry doing it!” But I try. Anxiety, depression, C-PTSD, & ADD are just a few of the things I’ve been diagnosed with by my therapist and psychiatrist, paired with diagnoses from my doctors of migraines, fibromyalgia, and a degenerative connective tissue disorder known as Ehlers-Danlos that all combine to leave me in fairly constant pain basically everywhere. My brain and my body attack me constantly but I still try to do what I can. Unfortunately, it means I can’t just go out and get a 9-5 or retail job to help fix my situation. I can only do what I can do and I have to know my limits.

I live with my mother and my QPP Luca who are both also disabled.

You may know in 2012 we were hit by Hurricane Sandy. If you don’t know that, you’re about to find out. We had six feet of water in our house and my grandfather’s house next door (AKA: my inheritance) floated off of its foundation and was straight up condemned. Ever since then, life has been, in a word, chaos. It’s gotten to be a theme in our house that if it can go wrong, it will go wrong. Even my therapist has given up on making any kind of treatment plan and is basically just focusing on damage control. And honestly, at this point, I just wanna go home.

But Aleks, it’s been seven years, why aren’t you home yet? Oh boy, I am SO glad you asked. Let’s get into this history.

First, a prequel. I’m not rich, my family isn’t rich, but we get by. Our house wasn’t big, but it was beautiful. In 2006, my mother bought two tiny houses next door to each other from an old man who wanted to sell them to a family the way he’d grown up in the smaller house while his parents lived in the other house. The one house was a six hundred square foot bungalow that would become my grandfather’s and its neighbor was a seven hundred square foot house that would become mine and my mother’s.

Our house was gorgeous and cute. Built in the early 1900s by a tinsmith with scraps from all of his jobs, all of the walls were tin instead of sheetrock or plaster, the floors were gorgeous hardwood, and the three bedrooms were each under a hundred square feet. It was tiny but it was ours.

On August 28th, 2011, that house was hit by Tropical Storm Irene. Our house was flooded by two feet of water on the first floor. The Atlantic Ocean took out our floors, cabinets, appliances, electrical outlets, the bathroom tile, and the furniture, not to mention rusting the heck out of the bottom of the tin walls. It took six months to get the final eighty thousand dollar settlement out of the insurance company.

The check was deposited by the mortgage company who said they would hold onto it and dole it out as we hired contractors or finished repairs. But here’s the thing: The settlement barely covered enough for the supplies, so we maxed out credit cards and depleted personal savings and finished our repairs a few months later with the help of very few contractors and a lot of DIY.

We installed our kitchen appliances as the last step and called the mortgage company that day to ask them to come and inspect and verify the repairs were done so they could release the other seventy thousand dollars that they were holding onto. They said they were backed up and that they would come and inspect in a month.

Our new stove was 22 days old when Hurricane Sandy hit us.

Where Irene was manageable, Sandy was devastating. My grandfather’s house floated on the storm surge and landed three feet away from its foundation. The legs of our lawn table were bent and sticking out from under the house like the damn wicked witch or something. Our house on the other hand shifted by an inch. Not much, you’d think, but enough to break every pipe in the house and damage the entire structural stability of the house.

The town building department condemned my grandfather’s house and wrote ours up as “more than 50% damaged”.

Needless to say, both houses were left completely and totally uninhabitable.

The mortgage company inspector came and said because everything was wet and ruined that they “couldn’t certify the repairs were completed” even when we were standing there with a stack of receipts and before and after pictures, clearly proving everything had been replaced since most of the materials had been changed. So they decided they wouldn’t release the $70,000 they were holding onto from Irene until the new SANDY repairs were done. Even though we’d already spent that money on repairs and run up debt because of it, they decided they were just going to hold onto it for longer.

And honestly? Fuck those guys. They are the root of some of the most evil parts of this, as you’ll see.

So back to the Sandy damages. First, the insurance company offered us a FIFTEEN THOUSAND DOLLAR damage assessment. Fifteen thousand bucks when we had six feet of water in our house. For perspective, fourteen months before Hurricane Sandy, Tropical Storm Irene sent 24 inches of water into our house and the insurance company gave us eighty thousand dollars to make those repairs. So yeah, fifteen thousand wasn’t gonna do it. The construction estimates for the repairs were coming in around two hundred and fifty thousand.

So, of course, we appealed. Our engineer said parts of the house were outright dangerous from the damage and had to be torn down and replaced. We told the insurance company this and they told us they would send their own engineer. And… well… they sent SOMEBODY. Was that guy a licensed engineer? Nope. Did they tell us he was? Yup.

So then we appealed to FEMA. The judge from FEMA told them outright to send a LICENSED engineer in his decision and left it at that. So then they did. This guy now said he thought fifty thousand was gonna do it. The insurance company looked at his report and went “mmm… so how about thirty thousand?”

So… no. So then we had to hire a lawyer and took them to court. We weren’t the only ones, thousands of people had to file these lawsuits. The lawyer told us not to let the mortgage company cash the $30,000 of checks we’d been given for the storm so far because it could be argued to be us agreeing to that number. He said we just had to WAIT. So the checks got too old to cash.

The Visiting Nurse Service started sending a therapist to our house once a week for each of the three of us to help with “Hurricane-Related PTSD”. Yup. Cool. On top of my regular C-PTSD. Awesome. But the guy was nice and having therapists to talk to twice a week (my regular one and this guy) was helpful. And he gave me some worksheets that helped me kind of have more of a tool kit. Everything still sucked but hey, we all trudged on.

Pretty sure this was around when the first roofing shingles started falling off of our rental house. We told the landlord that this was a problem and that the property was going to start getting leaks in the roof. We pointed out that it said in our lease that he was supposed to fix this little ‘issue’.

Repeatedly.

Including in writing and by sending him photos of the slowly growing stack of shingles that were not on the roof anymore and the leaky window.

And he still did diddly squat about it.

For five years.

Meanwhile during this whole… process, New York State started the New York Rising program to help rebuild the houses who were tied up in lawsuits like ours or who didn’t have insurance like my grandfather’s. We applied right away. It seemed like an answer!

…So then uh… New York Rising LOST our file.

…Uh… Twice.

And when they finally DID decide to properly process our application, they gave us a grand total of $88,000 and put us in the ‘Build a whole new house’ category. Our house is, as I said, under 900 square feet in size. You literally cannot build a house in our area for that price at that size. Especially when it’s a property that needs 14 foot deep helical pilings and a nine foot high foundation to comply with current code. The foundation alone is $50,000. The lowest estimate we found from any construction company after no less than TEN bids was $180,000 NOT counting the architect who’s another $15,000. NY Rising expected us to be able to rebuild for a fraction of that. So we started looking into finding other financing possibilities while waiting on the lawsuit to continue going through.

We decided to hire our neighbour’s architect because he was something resembling almost affordable. We gave him a deposit. …A few weeks later, he had a heart attack while leaving the building department’s office. …A few weeks after that, he started being investigated for embezzling money from his clients.

At this point, we’d been out of our house for years. And more and more shingles kept falling off of the roof of the rental. Then a siding tile fell off too because the landlord’s son’s landscaping company crashed a lawnmower into it.

We started looking at houses to buy so that at least we would own something.

Then my grandfather (who had been a major contributor to our household finances) had a severe stroke. Six months later, he died. Suddenly we were $3,000 tighter per month. The possibility of buying a house went out the window. But we made do as best as we could.

FEMA was paying for the rental house we were living in while going through all of the appeal and lawsuit procedures and, when we hit their funding cap, New York Rising’s IMA program stepped in to pay “whichever is less, your rent or mortgage”. It still meant higher costs as the rent around here is more than our mortgage, but it made it so we could get by.

The one silver lining was that once my grandfather was out of the picture (since he’d been living with us in a shared rental since Sandy), I was able to start on testosterone injections. January 28, 2015, I was able to start my injections and officially begin the medical side of my transition.

Then New York Rising hit a cap on IMA funding. Which… sucked pretty fucking hard because then there was a few thousand a month more money we had to find to shell out. But then the program was extended and that was awesome.

Then our cat, Pickles, developed severe kidney problems. She was my best friend since the day she showed up on our doorstep a week after we bought our house in 2006 and wandered into the kitchen demanding petting. She moved into our lives and never left. I couldn’t give her up without a fight. So I spent all of my savings on her medical bills and started giving her saline injections twice a day every day to help her kidneys flush the toxins they couldn’t handle themselves.

Then the IMA ran out again. So back to the land of suck. They told us we would be eligible for a little more funding. But only if we demolished the existing house.

In order to legally demolish the house, we had to pay for a construction company to do it under their license. New York Rising expected us to be able to demo the house for $5,000. The lowest bid we received was for $9,000. When we told them this, their reaction was essentially “yeah, yeah, we know, just make it work”. Make it work is a cool and funny phrase when spoken by an aging fashion consultant on television. It’s not so cool or funny when it’s being told to you by the people who are supposed to help you fix your house. It is stressful as hell.

Then Pickles got sicker. And sicker. And her at-home dialysis wasn’t enough to keep her going anymore. Pickles passed in May 2016.

In 2017, we finally won our lawsuit. The judge ruled the insurance company had to release a full payment to the policy maximum of $250,000! Those jerks tried giving us $15,000 and the judge was like “Uh… no, this is $250,000 of damage”. Victory! But we were still out our legal fees because, unlike homeowner’s insurance where the insurance company pays the fees, flood insurance is federally underwritten so you’re not allowed to get the legal fees paid for. Some flood insurance companies realized they’d fucked up and as a result agreed to pay for the legal fees. Our flood insurance company… wasn’t so generous. But a check was still generated by the flood insurance company thanks to the judge. Huzzah, light at the end of the tunnel!

…Then the lawyer refused to sign the check.

Apparently our lawyer has had dealings with our mortgage company before and run into the same problem as we had with their “we’ll release your funding at the end” theory. Except for him that meant “we won’t pay out your legal fees until the house is finished” and he didn’t like that. So they wanted him to sign the check over to them and he wanted them to sign the check over to him. They spent years arguing over a piece of paper with some dollar signs on it while we got needlessly further into debt.

Then one of my ferrets, Wasabi, my emotional support animal, got really sick really suddenly.

By the time the vet scrambled to find out what was wrong, it was too late and he was gone. It turned out that he had a rare autoimmune condition caused by heavy metal exposure from the water. His sister survived, but now Lemon was alone and she and I were both devastated. Watching the way she would get excited and then sad any time we brought out a toy with Wasabi’s scent on it broke my heart so I replaced her toys.

A month later, people came knocking on our door offering free water filters if they would let us track the toxic plume of decades old industrial chemicals and waste spreading unhindered through the groundwater supply that had apparently reached us and was contaminating our pipes.

Eventually, during all this, New York Rising started to realize that their $160 per square foot amount just wasn’t enough when it came to houses like ours. So they started a program called the Recon 100 program. The goal of this program was supposed to be that New York Rising would take over the build process, they would hire contractors and architects in bulk, essentially hiring them for ‘bundles’ of 10 or 20 properties at a time to get them to accept a lower profit per house because they would be guaranteed months of solid work. We were signed up into the program.

Now, as a condition of this program, we had to stop doing any work on our own, we’d have to return whatever hadn’t been spent on repairs already, and we’d have to give them any insurance checks. But New York Rising was bragging about how they had programs that would allow you to repay the funding over several years because they knew everyone was using a little bit here or there to make ends meet. And that was all well and dandy because once the repairs were done, the mortgage company would release what they were holding one way or another. They would have to. …Right?

Meanwhile, our rental assistance hit the next cap. New York Rising told us not to worry because once this paperwork was approved, we’d be eligible for a higher cap of extended rental assistance. It was just a matter of waiting for the paperwork to get approved, they said.

Then our caseworker at New York Rising decided she was going to deny our receipts for the funds already spent. And that she wasn’t going to file the appeals to that denial that we explicitly asked her in writing to file.

Then on top of that, we discovered that at some point our NYR caseworker had decided to NOT sign us up for the extended timeline repayment thing because… fuck knows why, honestly? And that now she wasn’t going to apply us for it because “oh it’s full now”. So NY Rising decided that, before they’d do anything, they wanted us to give THEM the money that was still sitting in those pre-lawsuit paper checks that went old immediately. The government decided that we either had to magic the money of an un-cashed check out of thin air or else it was up to us to: 1, get them reissued, 2, get them deposited by the mortgage company, and 3, somehow get the mortgage company to issue that money to New York Rising.

And they wanted all this done in less than a week because they decided this in the last phase of our approval process and there were other deadlines really close. …Needless to say, the mortgage company was like “lol um nah” even to the theoretical idea of giving the money to NY Rising for the repairs, nevermind the hassle of getting the checks reissued by the flood insurance company with an active lawsuit ongoing.

New York Rising only said “too bad, figure it out yourself and PS because you’re not in this program anymore, we won’t give you the continued rental assistance, why aren’t you done rebuilding your house yet?” Meanwhile, we were waiting on them for months because they told us it was just waiting for the paperwork to go through.

Meanwhile, we had a new jerk of a builder/flipper neighbour. He’d bought the house next door to us when the family with the new baby decided it wasn’t worth waiting so many years to have their own house fixed. Let’s call him Fish Head. He decided to have his building supplies delivered to our neighbour’s yard WITHOUT her permission because there wasn’t enough room on his property. Straight up, he had a whole pallet of building supplies just dumped on her yard. She complained, obviously, and her husband threatened to call the cops. So he moved his shit to to OUR yard because we happened to not be there that day. It took WEEKS to get him to move the shit, even WITH calling the cops.

Turns out, cops don’t give a shit if someone puts hundreds of pounds of building materials on your yard. They’ll tell you you’re well within your rights to move it yourself but if you don’t have a forklift or a whole team of burly humans to assist you in the move then too bad so sad.

Thanks, Fish Head.

But back to the housing. We were months overdue on the rent because we were “just waiting for the paperwork to finish processing”. They told us we’d get all the back stuff in one lump payment. They lied and now we were up shit’s creek.

Our scummy landlord finally sent a notice saying “I’ve waited long enough, get out”. So that was… cool. We were able to keep him from coming after the back rent by pointing out that he was a slum lord and that we’d notified him in writing about being a slumlord, but it still meant we had to move out immediately and in a rush. Thankfully, it was May.

So on June 1st 2018, we moved into our RV parked at a local campsite. Three adults, a cat, and a ferret, crammed into an RV that was anything but recreational.

We installed cameras on our house around this point because Fish Head kept having his workers trample all over our property and they kept breaking things and leaving garbage everywhere.

Then the engineer said he thought he could figure out a way to save the main body of our house and raise it, that we’d only have to demolish off the back room and possibly the bathroom in order to raise it. It was another light at the end of a repeatedly lengthening tunnel. So we changed tracks completely and had him start drafting stuff up for us to raise the existing house, rebuilding only the porch.

Now, here’s the thing about the local campsites, we don’t have many of them and they sell out pretty quickly. Especially for the height of the summer. So they didn’t have any of their ‘full hook-up’ sites, AKA the ones that get you electricity and everything, but we had water and a bathroom and a shower facility and the barbecue to cook food, and it was… survivable. Not exactly comfortable but survivable.

We started doing the work to repair the house instead of following the line of thinking of rebuilding it. We cashed in everything we could and scraped together every scrap of money we possibly could, we sold things, we asked for help where we could, we got a very understanding contractor to give us the lowest prices we could. We managed to get the mortgage company to pay out some of the Tropical Storm Irene money directly to the contractors. Remember that guy, wayyyy back in 2011? And the mortgage inspector who missed a pre-Sandy inspection by a week? Yeah. They still had that money. So even though it was technically Sandy damages as we’d already done the work from Irene, we managed to get them to pay that out. But WHATEVER. It got it paid.

We had a looming deadline from New York Rising that they wanted the house raised by December 31st. Or at least that they wanted it lifted and pending the new foundation. They call this ‘cribbing’ and it basically means your house goes up on Jenga Towers and that you can’t live in it for a while until the foundation is done and it goes back down. So we had to somehow make that happen. But first things first, the campground was closing for the season and we had to have a place to live.

On November 1st 2018, we were able to move back into our house.

Temporarily, at least, while permits and construction drawings and everything went through for getting the house raised.

So we applied to the mortgage company to get the remaining $40,000 that they had from Tropical Storm Irene, the full final payout. And, amazingly, we got it. In it came and went right back out it went to the contractors who were supposed to be working on raising the house because that December 31st deadline was still looming.

Then Fish Head who we keep running into issues with, FINALLY got a stop work order on his house for not having the right permits. Serves you right, Fish Head. But, in retaliation, he decided to lie to the building department that we were living there without utilities? Somehow? When we literally had all our utilities? And had gotten the “90% complete” inspection from our mortgage company? So THAT was a whole mess to try to straighten out. When we met with the head of the building department, he literally turned to the guy next to him and said “See, remember I told you about this guy? This is the retaliation I was telling you about” because he was the guy who had personally signed the stop work order on Fish Head.

So the next big concern was that December 31st deadline. Everyone kept debating whether or not New York Rising would extend it at the last minute again (as they’d done that once before), and we started scrambling to try to find somewhere to live while the house was raised. Ideally, we were looking for somewhere that WASN’T the cold tiny RV in the middle of a New York winter. We applied to a few apartments but because we were paying the mortgage and everything our debt to income ratio didn’t qualify.

On December 24th, 2018, we got the $250,000 check from the flood insurance company with our name and the mortgage company’s name. It seemed like a Christmas Miracle. So we immediately sent it over to the mortgage company so they could cash it and we could apply to have those funds released, remember, our house was FINISHED and HABITABLE, except for needing to be raised per the new flood zoning stuff. At the very least, we had the 90% inspection, and on our next inspection we got a 99%.

So we immediately started applying for the final permits for getting the house raised and my grandfather’s house demolished. The lady at the building department is… nice but not very organized. So we had to deal with the town jerking us around with the permits taking forever to get done, well past the time estimates they tell you on the phone when you call and ask about time estimates.

We rushed to have our disconnects done. Water, electric, sewer. The house was all wrapped up in a pretty bow ready to be raised. We moved into a hotel. All we needed was the final elevation permit and the money from the mortgage company.

So back to the mortgage company and that $250,000. The mortgage company denied the payout 3 times saying, “Oh we don’t have… this paper or that paper” for papers we had confirmation they had. The guy on the phone one time when we were like “….We submitted that one on x date while speaking to Z employee”, he tried saying, “Oh this fax isn’t legible…” and we were just like “…FAX… you mean the scanned in PDF we submitted via your web upload?” And he was like “…Oh. hold please…” and suddenly he could read the form. Magic. So basically they were just LYING to us. Why? Fuck knows.

Then it was, “Everything is fine and it’ll be issued in 3 days” on the 23rd. And we got the elevation permit! And the demo permit on my grandfather’s house! Everything was rolling along and it was all going to be fine! Right?

Not so fast.

On the 31st we still had no check. We called and it was, “Oh it has to go to this other department because it’s over $70,000, but everything is approved and they’ll issue the check in 5 to 7 days, HONEST”.

We called back on the 5th and THAT lie had turned into “Oh well… we sold your loan effective the 4th, you’ll have to ask the new guys”. The mortgage company SOLD OUR LOAN to another company WHILE our payout was “APPROVED AND SENT TO THE CHECK ISSUING DEPARTMENT”.

We called the new guys who told us, “Oh we don’t even have a ID NUMBER assigned for your loan yet, call back in a week to get your loan number and then it’s another week until we can even see your funds and start your payout claim oh and we probably need to schedule our own inspection.”

So it’ll be easily a month OR MORE before we get the money.

We are trying to expedite this whole process as best as we can. We managed to get the ID number in only 4 days. They seem to be arguing with themselves about whether or not they need a whole new inspection or not.

Meanwhile, we only really had the money for the hotel for the lift time but all the disconnects have been done (there is no heat, water, or electricity) so it’s not like we can just go BACK HOME during the delay either.

We have $250,000 on the way and we’re about to be homeless. Again. For the third time in 18 months.

If we can just get $5,000, we can pay to have the house RECONNECTED AGAIN to everything so we can wait these fuckers out and get the payout.

Every little bit helps.

Please.

The other option is living in the RV again just to have a roof over our heads. But unlike last time when it was warm, it is February and we are in NY. It snowed yesterday. RVs aren’t designed to keep warm when there’s snow out.

Please help me and my family stay in a house.

My paypal link is here: http://paypal.me/mihaelkai .

I am also taking a limited number of 1000 word or less commissions! That’s about the limit of what I can handle committing to right now! DM me for details!

(Mutuals/Friends: If you can’t donate but you can loan us some for two months or so, we can pay you back as soon as we get that check? Please let me know if it is a donation or if you would like to be paid back so I can keep a record.)

[beyondthestarsandplanets]

I'm going to lose him. I'm...I was going to tell him. I wasn't sure what or how to tell him but.... I've lost him now. He's gone...

Keep it together Overlord, don't do it. You must not go back to your old self. You made a promise. You must not do it. Just don't do it.

*sighs*

I was an avid fan of the gladiator events. Went to ever single one. I was also a gladiator myself. But Megatron? I was a big fan. Before I fought him, we was both undefeatable. Until I fought him. I lost. I figured it was a one time deal. Until it became daily. The more I lost, the more I feared it in his servos. He did that to me. It was just...a game to him. His way of keeping control over me. But I still chose to join. Not because of the cause but I saw it a way to take out fight outside the areas. But I never care about the command. Had no desire to lead. I didn't care about the ends, only the means. I tatics did develop to what I'm known for now. It felt so right! But Megatron? He thought I secretly wanted to take over, hint his efforts to control me. For 3 million years, we would spar. But every time, I lost. No matter how close I was. I kept losing. But he chose me and 3 other to be Phase Sixer. I saw this as an opportunity to defeat him, so I allowed it. I killed Rossum and tried to do the same to Megatron. But I couldn't harm him at all. No matter how hard I tried. He defeated me again. But I learned that Soundwave was captured and brought to the New Institution for brainwashing. I saw it as an opportunity to remove the shackles, to remove that blind spot. So I attacked. I made sure to make Megatron think I was rescuing Soundwave. But I also took a mnemosurgen, Trepan. I wanted to learn so I can get what I needed from Shockwave. The lessons was going well. But as I learn, I begin to feel, different. The more I learn from Trepan, I begin to question. I was falling for him. I haven't felt calm since my first lost. I'm sure of that. When I did kill, it was because a few bot tried to hurt him. But they because an experiment. For me to master the skill on. But, before I could achieve that in my own, Megatron somehow found out and had him killed. That lost, it was worst then my first lost to Megatron. I later went to Battle for Hell's Point. But after that, I was on Caldoon 4, doing my own thing when Megatron called. He told me that I was chosen along with Sixshot and Black Shadow to be reclassified as Phase Sixer, being called in to alien planet and wipe then clean for cyberformimg. I told him I was busy and he gave me 2 option. Do what I was told or be hunted by him. I made my choice and ended the call. I killed all but one called Kup. Told him to send a message to Megatron. I chose option two. I left to prepare for his arrival. I decided to pick a fight with a empire because their technology surpassed mine but I was out patched. So I had Gorelock help me out. The battle set the empire back by 250,000 years. So I left and arrived to Garrus 9 in the middle of the Decepicon siege. I told Skyquake to hand over the command but he refused. Don't need to worry about him anymore. I took over and soon busted in. I freed all Decepicon and gave them freedom and had them stay with me. I turned into my very own gladiator arena and had my fun with Fortress Maximus. A year passed and I I freed Shockwave and let him leave in return that he remove the Achilles virus. 2 more year passed and the Autobot responded by sending in the Wreckers. I was expecting Megatron army. I told then to surrender but they refused and tried to attack. They couldn't harm me so they escaped. When I found them again, they had regroup with the help of a Decepicon. They kept attacking, all had no affect on me until one told me I was injected with the deterrence chips. The explosion didn't kill me but I was now just a frame. I was mad as I lost it. I saw the human and demanded to know how I would defeat Megatron in that state. That when she delivered a shocking news, Megatron was dead. I then realized I wasted my time for nothing. I told the. To kill me but one refused. Some time later, I was rebuilt and place in a slow cell. I didn't care, I wanted to be dead. It all I wanted. Until Cromedome begin to go through my memories. I didn't care until he mentioned that Megatron is alive. I came to life and used a little trick I learned to take over. I went through Cromedome memories and found the code. I freed myself and let myself out, trapping him in. I then went to have my fun on the ship. I killed one, attacked another. Soon, the whole ship was on me. I even killed Ultra Magnus, should of kept his mouth shut. I the asked the captain if he had the last word. But when he said Til all are one, I lost it. They used that advantage to push me back. Then Fortress Maximus showed up. But the sword I had jammed the door and Cromedome conjunx came in to push the sword. I had a huge grin just before I had my fun. But a missile hit and I was floating in space, bearly alive. I was then found by the Galactic Council and they begin to repair me, which took a while. They then sent me to Nectroworld to kill Megatron. Tarn was there giving Megatron a good beating. I told him that I would kill him. He decided to fight me and I showed him who had a true tank. But Megatron managed to escape. Since we both wanted to kill him, we decided to work together. Of course I have my fun and watch him kill one of his own. Then sundown came and we attacked. I chose to seek out Cromedome to mock him. But when he punted me, I realized they had something to give them a boost. But it didn't last long and that when Megatron showed up. I felt disgusted by the sight. He was weak and a coward. It was too easy to kill him right there. So I told Tarn I didn't need Megatron and left. I spent a few years wondering around, being bored until I came into contact with Tarantulas. I agreed to be part of his experiment and I gained a 3rd altmode, human mode. With that mode, I was able to gain interested with the human government and got funding and supplies for Tarantulas experiments. Until Springer attacked. He ruined my look but I easily beat them. And that when I saw her, the girl who broke my spark. I decided to take her when I head back. When I arrive, Tarantulas told me that he created the Time maze and can send me back in time again and again. The Verity Carlos tried to reason with Tarantulas but I told him that I no longer needed him. And I shot him in the back of his helm. But before I could go though, Springer showed up. We fought and Impactor gave himself up so Springer could get ahead. I was able to catch up but I was forced into my 2 altmode thanks to the Carnivac. Springer and Verity took the advantage as I couldn't move and toss me into 2 different time period. Tank into the past and Jet into the future.

*sighs*

I don’t know how long it have been, but I’ve been thinking about my life. Every bit of it. Being separated for so long, I lost something, somewhere. When i took Trepan, I started to feel different. The more i was with him, the more I wanted to change. I was falling for him. I wanted to protect him. But i failed on the day he was killed. That hurt more then my First lost with Megaton. Megatron have created a weapon he couldn’t control.

i was lost until I saw him. He looked just like Trepan. I will admit, my first interaction with him was not the best. and I did hurt myself for that. I wanted to die, I would get drunk often. But I didn’t expect to see him in the bar. When he begin to cry, I felt like it was my fault. Since then, I changed for him. To keep him happy. I was going to tell him this, but now? I’m telling myself this.

I’m alone again. But I’m trying not to go back to my old self. I promised myself i wouldn’t. but it so hard not to. the urge is there. Maybe I should give in, Monster like me are unredeemable. Maybe I should go back to who I use to be.

[riacannafon-writer]

F.E.A.R.

Chapter One

The rain fell in heavy, icy sheets that night. My navy cloak did poorly little to stop the rain from soaking into my skin. Puddles splashed around my feet as I ran. I turned through narrow streets and alleys this way and that, trying to lose the guards on my tail.

    Despite the howling winds and roaring torrents, I could clearly hear them behind me shouting both to each other and to me. I was running out of options as I continued around corners left and right, slipping every now and again. I risked a quick glance over my shoulder to see at least a dozen men in silver armour, all wielding swords and spears and bows with a quiver of arrows. I made a sharp right turn and found myself trapped at a dead end.

    The guards blocked the alleyway entrance, all breathing heavily. Heart pounding and breath shallow, I quickly thought about my options: fight? Too many guards. Surrender? Out of the question. I stepped backwards until my back touched the wet cobbled brick. Fleeing seemed to be my only chance. I slowly reached inside my cloak and unsheathed a small throwing knife.

    Without thinking much about what  I was aiming at, I threw the knife at the guards full force and started up the walls. I climbed the first few feet using odd bricks as grip, then leapt to one of the adjacent walls. I kept going, back and forth between this wall and the one opposite, getting closer and closer to the rooftops. I paused when a spear struck the brick below my feet. It failed to hold and simply fell to the floor. I didn't stop moving now. Not even when I felt an arrow head slide deeply across my left arm.

    I eventually reached my goal. And as I looked back over my shoulder once more, another arrow whizzed by my face, this one slicing a fine gash over my cheek and nose. Clutching my bleeding arm, I ran on through the town. Jumping from roof to roof, always conscious of the growing group of guards following my every direction. I soon ran out of ground and slid down the tiled slope of a tavern. I found myself on a fairly high-up bridge and found guards waiting at either end. Looking left and right at the advancing enemy, I decided flight was once again the best option here. The river wasn't a hugely far drop away, no more than ninety feet. I stood up on the edge as they drew nearer.

    "Stay where you are! Not another step!" A guard with the kingdom's crest moulded into his breastplate came forward. Kingdom's crest, I thought. Must be a Captain. Another man put his hand on his shoulder and spoke in a low voice.

    "Why should we care if the criminal jumps? Goodness knows that nobody can survive a jump like that!" He he turned and looked me in the eyes. "Besides, I highly doubt anyone would miss you, should you die. In fact, the town would celebrate; wouldn't you agree, criminal?"

    My arm stung more than ever now, but I kept my head held high as I shuffled back. Now only the balls of my feet were on the ledge. The first guard sheathed his longsword and held out a hand to me uncertainly. His voice was a little softer this time.

    "Don't jump. Take my hand, you can get down from there. We'll have to take you to the jailhouse, but I assure you you won't be harmed." I scanned the crowd of guards and let my sight rest on the one in front of me for a few moments. I looked at the one behind him.

    "I highly doubt anyone would miss you..."

    I did my best to speak clearly through the pain and the roaring winds. "Your friend here has a point," I said. "Nobody'd really miss me." That, of course, was a lie. My brother would miss me; Athen can hardly take care of himself, he needs me to look out for him.

    I could taste the blood from the second arrow's damage. I was starting to feel the ground sway and I gripped my arm tighter. It was clear which path I'd take. I took a small step towards the guard's outstretched hand and saw him clearly relax a little. Without a second thought, I whipped around and jumped. The wind around my ears was almost deafening. I could have sworn I heard the guard yell something; speaking of whom, through my blood-and-hair-streaked vision I could make out him and the other guard leaning over the ledge. A small smile spread over my face as I collided with the river.

    The current immediately began to sweep me away much faster than I originally anticipated. The shock and freezing temperatures turned my body numb, I hardly felt it when I was slammed shoulder-first into a rock. My lungs screamed for air but I had to ignore it for now. I wasn't far enough away from the view of the bridge.

    I found myself soon slowing down in the water, having come to a calmer part of the river. Lungs burning and vision starting to lose focus, I had to risk a few breaths. Feigning a death-like state, I let myself float to the surface. I took some a few deep breaths and opened my eyes to be greeted by a thick fog. I righted myself so I was treading water. Slowly turning, I looked around me for anything familiar; anything that could lead me home.

    Finally, I found a small patch of poppies. Next to it, a few wintergreen shrubs. More familiar herbs surrounded them and I knew this was my garden. I guided myself towards the bank and crawled up onto the mud. Fatigued and bleeding, I staggered to the narrow path and up to my cottage. Athen must have still been awake, because there was smoke coming out of the chimney and the faint glow of candlelight could be seen through a window.

    I heaved open the little wooden door and almost fell to the floor. Athen came running into the door, took one look at the blood on my face and arm, and and started panicking. He scooped me up and carried me into the lounge where he put me on the floor in front of the fire, and promptly rushed off. He came back soon after with bandages, needles and thread, and a few ointments clumsily bundled in his arms.

    He was visibly shaking as he tried to clean the wound on my arm before even letting me take off my cloak. I placed my hand on his to get him to look at me. In the fire's light, I could see tears streaking down his cheeks, cutting through the stains of where he must have been crying earlier. I gently cupped his face in my hands, but he still didn't meet my eyes.

    "Athen," I whispered. "Athen, look at me." He slowly lifted his gaze to meet mine. The pain and fear in my little brother's eyes completely broke my heart, but I had to stay steady for his sake. "It's just a scratch, nothing to worry about." As I said this, I accidentally inhaled a little blood that sent my pretty much coughing my lungs up.

    "Oh, Gods above. Ari! Are you okay!?" Athen practically screeched with panic. I brushed him off at turned to look at him with a soft smile.

    "Do me a favour," I turned back to him. "Don't go breathing in blood, it's gross." We both giggled, and I was glad to see my brother smile a little. I had to savour the moment, though, as his smile faded back to that lost expression. Before I could say anything, he threw his arms around my neck and buried his head onto my shoulder. I carefully put my arms around him and held him close as sobs racked his body.

    "You didn't come back. I was so worried. I thought you were dead." He cried harder, seeming to be letting out everything he had.

    "Someone ratted me out, I got held back. I'm so, so sorry I made you worry like this." Athen let go and sat back as he was. He nodded silently and again picked up the cloth, this time waiting for me to take off my cloak first.

    I took the cloth from him and tenderly pressed it to the wound on my arm while he went to get a bowl of warm water and a few other supplies. When he once again returned, we worked on washing, treating, stitching and bandaging up my arm. After a few more expletives from me, Athen then began to repeat the process with the gash on my face - my swearing also following the routine.

    In the next room, I heard the old grandfather clock strike three. Athen ushered me upstairs to bed (by that, I mean he practically had to carry me up to my bedroom). Leaving me to my privacy, he went off to his own bedroom. I stripped off my gear and threw on whatever clothes I could find before collapsing onto my bed. In hindsight, that was a very bad idea. Pain shot up my arm the moment I landed on the mattress.

    "Shit! You son of a bitch," I hissed. A few doors down, I heard Athen shout a muffled "Language".

   With an exhausted sigh, I rolled over to my other side - wrapping myself up in the blanket as I went - and listened to the rain against my window trying to fall asleep. Definitely took me a while, but I eventually drifted off.

* * *

    Meanwhile, back with the guards on the bridge, the Captain was still hunched over the ledge, staring at the spot where the girl was as if she would just pop back up to the surface. His comrade was saying something to him, but he wasn't listening.

    She jumped... she actually jumped...

    Shock had rendered him delayed in comprehending the situation and events leading up to it.

    Dizzy with conflicting thoughts and emotions, he pushed himself back upright and turned to address the others.

    "Find her," he said, fighting to keep his voice from shaking. "Search along the river until you find her, or any trace. You are not to attack on sight, understood?" (The crowd nodded). "You are to bring her to the jailhouse, nothing else. Dismissed."

    They all dispersed, except for Lieutenant Mitchell Hynde. He strode over to the Captain and slapped him half-heartedly on the shoulder.

    "Why so glum?" He asked in a lively tone.

    "You should understand why, Lieutenant."

    "Come now, Darren! There's no way she'd actually survive that fall. I mean, she must have lost a lot of blood from that cut in her arm, so there's no way she could have had the energy to live after that!"

    "That's Captain Haust to you, Hynde. And it's our job as the Town Guard to help people."

   "But," a hint of desperation leaked into Hynde's voice. "But she's a criminal! A murderer!"

    "I stand by my moral code, unlike you. Regardless of her past actions." With that, he turned away to join the search.

[whydontwejustblog]

unusual asks

@anon that said “1-100,” i’m no chicKEN—

spotify, soundcloud, or pandora? spotify all the way.

is your room messy or clean? messy i like to think it’s neat.

what color are your eyes? a boring dark brown.

do you like your name? why? i hate it. i wish it was esteban julio ricardo montoya dela rosa ramirez.

what is your relationship status? what’s a relaytionsheep?

describe your personality in 3 words or less. boring.

what hair color do you have? still a boring dark brown.

what kind of car do you drive? color? …i’m not old enough to drive, but if i was, you better bet i’d have a rainbow car because #yolo. (lmao stop your influence @heartsavery.)

where do you shop? at the candy store. *instantly thinks of heathers*

how would you describe your style? non-existent.

favorite social media account? if i say tumblr, will it start working for me?

what size bed do you have? a queen-sized one. (no, that wasn’t a pun or anything.)

any siblings? i like to think she doesn’t exist.

if you can live anywhere in the world where would it be? why? i’ve heard of this place called niue, which apparently has pikachu coins as part of their currency, so sign me up. (japan is also another option, because i love the atmosphere in kyoto. except for that one time i got lost at night near a creepy abandoned church.)

favorite snapchat filter? i don’t use filters much since i don’t take pictures of myself, but i’ll have to say the classic dog filter.

favorite makeup brand(s)? i don’t wear makeup.

how many times a week do you shower? i shower around once or twice a day. weird, i know, but it’s normal around here in a country that’s hot all year round. (except, of course, when there are typhoons, because it’s one extreme or another.)

favorite tv show? danger dings (read: stranger things.) i even have a side blog for it. *cough* @anevenstrangerblog *cough* i know the question only asked for one but can i throw in asoue too? i love both the books and the netflix show. malina’s so pretty i cri. ooh, andi mack is another show that i absolutELY LOVE AND—

shoe size? 6.5 in us women’s.

how tall are you? not tall at all. next question.

sandals or sneakers? sneakers are all i own.

do you go to the gym? no.

describe your dream date. with nikolai lantsov. but since he’s “fictional,” i’ll settle for the person giving me a fortune, then leaving me alone for the rest of my life. (but if the person was finn wolfhard / malina weissman / sadie sink, they can *in mulan’s grandma’s voice* stAy fOrevEr.)

how much money do you have in your wallet at the moment? about 2500 pesos and 2000 yen.

what color socks are you wearing? they’re pikachu socks.

how many pillows do you sleep with? one or none because quite frankly, i only like hugging pillows. sleeping on them is uncomfortable for me.

do you have a job? what do you do? i don’t have a job, but my class runs a business (with a beneficiary who all the proceeds go to), and i manage its marketing and finance. i also design a couple stuff for my mom’s clinic thing, which i guess is considered a job since i get paid.

how many friends do you have? if you don’t count online friends, zero ahaha.

what’s the worst thing you have ever done? lmao idk, exist?

what’s your favorite candle scent? i dunno. most probably woodsy or floral scents.

3 favorite boy names? names don’t have genders.

3 favorite girl names? names don’t have genders.

favorite actor? noah schnapp, my precious son.

favorite actress? millie bobby brown because why not.

who is your celebrity crush? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

favorite movie? the bee movie ahAHAHAHA the original spongebob movie.

do you read a lot? what’s your favorite book? i read waaay too much, and just like any of my other favorite things, i can’t pick just one favorite book, but i love six of crows by leigh bardugo.

money or brains? can i have both?

do you have a nickname? what is it? i’m called stupid a lot, does that count? ahaha :’) micah’s actually one of my nicknames.

how many times have you been to the hospital? too many times to count.

top 10 favorite songs? i have too many songs i like, so i’ll list some i remember right now (and limit myself to one song per artist.) crazy=genius by p!atd, bellyache by billie eilish, migraine by tøp, c’est la vie by maurice moore, glorious by macklemore, for him by troye sivan, my songs know what you did in the dark by fob, non-stop from the hamilton cast recording, teacher by prettymuch, and we the party by why don’t we.

do you take any medication daily? just vitamins, not medication.

what is your skin type? idk dude.

what is your biggest fear? the unknown.

how many kids do you want? zero.

what’s your go-to hair style? just my hair down since i’m lazy.

what type of house do you live in? (big, small, etc.) i don’t know how to describe the size of my house lmao.

who is your role model? thomas the tank engine.

what was the last compliment you received? i’m not sure if it was meant as a compliment, but that one anon who asked advice from me said they were awed by my independence so there’s that.

what was the last text you sent? i sent “i’m hungry” to one of my housekeepers.

how old were you when you found out santa wasn’t real? he IS real. i don’t know what the quackidy quack you’re talking about.

what is your dream car? lightning mcqueen. ka-chow!

opinion on smoking? i’m asthmatic, so personally, i don’t smoke, and i don’t encourage it either. if you’re talking about cigarettes, it harms the lungs of not only the smoker, but the people around them. it also affects air pollution (its effect is 10 times stronger than those of diesel car exhausts), and i’m very against all types of pollution to the environment. (i’m looking at you, glitter, which, if you didn’t already know, contributes to the pollution of waterways.)

do you go to college? i will in 2 years. (i’ll be a wee child all alone in another country :’( @whydontwejustbesomethingdiffrent i’m dragging you along if it’s the last thing i do.)

what is your dream job? i don’t really know lmao.

would you rather live in rural areas or the suburbs? suburbs.

do you take shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels? who doesn’t?

do you have freckles? no.

do you smile for pictures? i don’t like having pictures of me taken, but i occasionally smile awkwardly.

how many pictures do you have on your phone? i recently cleared out my photo library so now i’m left with only 3033 pictures.

have you ever peed in the woods? no.

do you still watch cartoons? duh.

do you prefer chicken nuggets from Wendy’s or McDonald’s? there are no branches of wendy’s where i live so i’ll go with mcdonald’s.

favorite dipping sauce? does gravy count?

what do you wear to bed? pajamas.

have you ever won a spelling bee? i’ve never participated in one aside from the mini ones we used to hold in class before, which i won because the competition wasn’t exactly tough.

what are your hobbies? photography, bullet journaling, brush lettering, eating, reading, scrolling endlessly through my phone, dying, and other fun stuff. coding and robotics are cool too.

can you draw? @thefangirlingmaster i still stand by my opinion that i can’t.

do you play an instrument? the only instrument i can fluently play is the violin, since i was taught how to play it at 6 years old, but i own a guitar and keyboard which i can sorta play.

what was the last concert you saw? a pentatonix one.

tea or coffee? water.

starbucks or dunkin’ donuts? starbucks.

do you want to get married? not really.

what is your crush’s first and last initial? f.w. (hint: it rhymes with pinn rolfhard.)

are you going to change your last name when you get married? i dunno man.

what color looks best on you? still dunno man.

do you miss anyone right now? no.

do you sleep with your door open or closed? closed.

do you believe in ghosts? uh…

what is your biggest pet peeve? my neighbors slow walkers

last person you called? my dad.

favorite ice cream flavor? cookies and cream.

regular oreos or golden oreos? i only eat mini-sized regular oreos.

chocolate or rainbow sprinkles? choCOLATE *insert gif of that one fish from spongebob*

what shirt are you wearing? a panda shirt i got from singapore a couple years ago.

what is your phone background? it’s a zoomed in face of the ice cream octopus from dora. my parents say it’s creepy, but i think it’s calming. (i couldn’t post it on here because tumblr says i reached a limit, but if you wanna see it, tell me to send it to you.)

are you outgoing or shy? depends on the people i’m with.

do you like it when people play with your hair? it tickles.

do you like your neighbors? i’d prefer it if they moved far far away (haha shrek reference) and took their horrible karaoke with them.

do you wash your face? at night? in the morning? i wash my face everytime i shower.

have you ever been high? nope.

have you ever been drunk? nope. (i was gonna come up with some punny joke but i’m too hungry to think right now. which reminds me, i have to go eat something real quick, be right back—)

last thing you ate? oh wow, perfect timing. i just ate mango float.

favorite lyrics right now? it’s from my son troye’s song, suburbia. “swallow nostalgia, chase it with lime. better than dwelling, and chasing time. missing occasions, i can’t rewind. can’t help but feel i’ve lost what’s mine.”

summer or winter? it’s basically summer all year round here so—

day or night? night.

dark, milk, or white chocolate? milk chocolate.

favorite month? december.

what is your zodiac sign? sagittarius.

who was the last person you cried in front of? my dad.