#i love them dearly and i’ll visit them and i have lots of their numbers to keep in contact

[starrsbby]

screaming and crying and throwing up bc today was my last day working at my job and bro. i miss them already, like those bitches raised me fr. i’ve been there since i was 17 are u joking-

[technowoah]

Wait imagine a fic where Jack and the reader are long distance or something and when Tubbo and Tommy are doing the man hunt irl the reader surprises Jack.

That would be cute I think 🤔

Just One Livestream

You surprise Jack with a spontaneous visit to the UK, little did you know that they were livestreaming.

- Jack Manifold x gen neutral!reader

- Anon Requested!

⚠︎ swearing, fluff!, not proofread

an// I hope yall enjoy! Much love! And sorry it came out so late I have no inspiration rn but imma get it done! Also I used the difference of American hours to London hours so sorry of

Navigation!

"Love, why are you up early?" Jack asked through the phone.

You two were facetiming eachother as he propped his phone up on his dashboard while he started to drive. It was around 1 am for you and 6 am for Jack. Sadly you two were in a long distance relationship. You had met Jack when you were on a college trip to London to study abroad for 3 weeks. You were sad that you had to leave your home country, but this was a opportunity you couldn't oppose.

During this trip you had found a cafe that you would go to often. The first time you sat at the cafe alone you always noticed it was only you and this other man in the cafe. He was always on his computer and sat by a window, he always came early too, even earlier than you. As the days went on you continued to see him around more and he seemed to notice you as well. You made a note to yourself to always try and show up a tad bit earlier to the cafe to stay around the same time as he did.

You two got to know eachother throughout the three weeks you had to stay in London. The small nods became hellos, and the hellos turned into full on conversation by the window. He had told you his name was Jack Manifold and was kind of surprised when you didn't immediately know who he was. To him it was refreshing not to be immediately noticed based on his appearance. You both had exchanged numbers one day and after each morning you two would text non stop even during your classes. Luckily trying to get to know Jack changed your sleep schedule and because of that you always made it to class on time.

Jack was such an amazing guy to you, but during the first week you had developed a small crush on the man, and he had developed a crush on you too. The second week you two had ventured out onto different territory than the cafe. Jack started to call those small outings after class, dates and you weren't opposed to the dates at all you loved them. The second and third week were mostly dates and the night before you left he asked to be your boyfriend and of course you accepted not knowing the pain of a long distance relationship.

You had to answer his question on why you were up so early. "Yeah- Um, Im up because of you." You chuckled. "You changed my sleep schedule ever since I met you."

"Well you're welcome, because before me I heard you were missing classes." Jack payed attention to the road but still talked to you.

"Because I told you! And I am grateful, but there is nothing to do at one am here." You sighed while you started to walk around your room as you lied to him.

Jack was talking to you while you did a clean sweep around your house to check if you had everything for your trip.

Two weeks ago you had decided to pack your bags and take a trip back to London. Right now your flight will be leaving early in the morning and that's why you are up so early.

You wanted to surprise Jack instead of straight up telling him that you will be in the country. You missed him dearly, and this will be a great way to spend time together instead of seeing eachother across a screen. One of you had to make that sacrafice and that would be you.

While Jack continued to talk you checked everywhere to make sure you arent leaving anything behind.

"What are you doing, darling?" Jack asked and that snapped you out of your trance. "Are you even listening to me? Im hurt." Jack faked being hurt.

You smiled at him and shook your head. "Im sorry I wasn't listening. What were you saying?"

"I was saying, when you were ignoring me, that I'm going to the cafe right now and that we should plan a trip soon. I miss you." Jack confessed and you awed.

"I miss you too Jack! I hopw we can see each other soon." You tried to contain your smile as you hid your surprise.

"Me too."

Your plane finally landed as you let out a sigh of relief. You had collected all of your shit fast so you could finally get off of that horrible plane. Every stereotypical airplane scene happened to you in the hours you were on that plane. You had a child crying behind you with a mother who couldn't keep that child calm, you were sat next to a man who snored the whole ride here and you just felt cramped.

Sadly you couldn't return any of Jack's messages or calls that you saw when you were in the airplane terminal. You tried calling him twice but they both went to voicemail while you rolled your bag through the huge building. Finding yourself outside you ordered an Uber and once you did that your phone began to ring showing Jack's name and picture of you two together on the screen.

You quickly answered the phone. "Hey!"

"Hi!" Jack chuckled. "I called like, 17 times!"

"I know! Im sorry. I was busy." You weren't lying getting a plane and basically leaving early in the morning and arriving in the afternoon in London. "So, what are you doing today?"

"I am hanging out with Tommy and Tubbo at the park! Im picking them up now!" Jack responded and you heard him close his car door.

"Which park?" You asked quickly as you saw your Uber arrive.

Jack started to laugh. "Uh I'll text you the park I guess. Why would you want to know?"

"No reason! I just want to make sure you are safe. Dont make me call 999." You tried to joke around and take the attention off of your question.

"I cant believe you still remember 999." Jack laughed.

"I still do!" You said as you got inside your Uber and gave the driver the directions to your hotel forgetting that Jack was on the other line.

"Wait hotel?" Jack questioned through the phone.

"Hotel? What are you talking about?" You acted oblivious.

"I- I thought you were talking about a hotel." Jack hesitated.

"No!" You tried to cover up your mistake.

"Well Im going to pick up Tommy soon. I'll talk to you later okay? Answer my calls this time!" Jack chuckled.

"I definitely will!"

You had recived the name of the park you were surprising Jack at. You began to walk around the parking lot after you got dropped off and noticed his car sitting there. There were tons of people at the park today and you didn't know where he would be. As you walked on the dirt trails of the park your thoughts took over, what if you made a mistake and should've told Jack that you were here in London and wanted to meet up at the cafe?

You looked at people as they passed by you ok the trail wishing that you had that energy that you had before, thinking that you would find Jack easily when in reality you were in a busy part of the park and he could be anywhere.

When you thought all hope was lost you heard some loud voices on the trail to your right. You were already walking aimlessly through the park and your first instinct was to go left and walk away from the loud voices, but then you heard something.

"Tommy this was a bad idea!"

"I dont think it was!"

You stood in the "intersection" of the dirt trails thinking that you heard those voices right. You rounded the corner and followed right to see Tommy and Jack doubled over, out of breath while Tubbo was still standing up breathing heavily. There were far away from you, but not far away that you couldn't see them clearly.

You began to call out to them. "Tommy! Jack! Tub-"

They quickly turned around and took off running. Confused on why they were doing that you took off running after them trying to tell them to stop. They were yelling and you were yelling and getting weird glances from stangers, and you dont blame them. You're chasing after your boyfriend and his two friends in a quiet public park. You continued to hear their groans of tiredness and their speed started to slow down.

"Jack! Tommy! Wait up!" You yelled out of breath as you slowed down as well.

"We give up! We give up!" Tubbo yelled and came to a complete stop while trying to catch his breath. He turned around to finally face you. "Y/N?!"

"Wait what?!"

"You're here?!" Jack ran up to you and gave you a bone crushing hug, rocking you two back and forth.

"I am! And Im our of breath thanks to you three." You said while still hugging Jack.

"M'sorry I thought you were a fan and I took off and they followed suit I guess." Tommy rubbed his forehead.

"A fan?" You questioned and Tommy and Tubbo lifted their phones up gesturing that they were recording.

"We're doing manhunt in real life, darling." Jack kissed your temple and wrapped his arn around your waist, holding you tight.

"Next time look before you run okay." You smiled still out of breath while kissing Jack's cheek.

"Enough with the PDA!" Tubbo yelled still recording you two.

"We havent even started!" Jack yelled back giving you a huge hug. Jack closed the distance between you two and gave you a passionate kiss on the lips while the two boys groaned in disgust.

"I think that's enough streaming for today boys." Tommy sighed.

"Sorry again, love. That won't happen again."

You and Jack walked hand in hand down the streets of London. People had to walk around you two because you were basically taking up the whole sidewalk and you weren't letting go of his hand anytime soon.

"It better not! I dont want to run after you again." You smiled as you bumped shoulders.

"And you wont have to!" He smiled back at you as you two continued to walk and people dodged the two of you.

"Have you ever thought of moving here?" Jack asked out of nowhere.

"I have actually! On the plane ride here I thought of leaving and moving to London." You thought about it constantly. It was nice being close to Jack and it was a major risk.

"Well wherever you're ready, I'll be here for you." Jack kissed your cheek. "And I wont run away when you come here!"

You two finally made it to your destination which was the cafe you two met at. It was busy at this time because it was the middle of the day and not the beginning. You two entered and took your seats by the window where you two usually sat.

"I love you. I missed this." Jack said.

"I love you too! And of course I missed this. Maybe you can show me more places around London and convince me to stay longer." You gave him a proposal.

"Longer than what?" Jack asked.

"Four weeks." You grinned.

Jack grabbed both of your hands and kissed the back of them. "Hell yeah. I get you for more than four weeks?!"

"That's if you show me places to stay longer." You teased.

"Okay babe. You like ferris wheels?"

[sfb123]

I just read your drunk Liam fic and I just HAD to send you some prompts!!! From the prompt list you hyperlinked 9, 16, and 17 maybe? (Preferably liamxriley) pretty plz?* insert puppy dog eyes🥺*

Well… since you inserted puppy dog eyes…

I wanted to try to incorporate all three of these into one story, which actually worked out really well. Then, the issue came of how to make that apply to Liam and Riley. Luckily, my current binge obsession is the 90′s sitcom Mad About You, and there was an episode the other night that set a lightbulb off in my head, so this fic is loosely based on that episode. 

Prompts:

“We should grab coffee together sometime.”

“I’ll walk you home.”

“You need a lift?”

(Prompt pulled from this list. Feel free to send me more!)

Word Count: 1,431

Warnings: Adult language, mild innuendo

A/N: Thank you @phoenixrising308 for pre-reading. Your kindness and support are unparalleled, and I love you dearly. 

Also a thank you to @txemrn​ for dealing with my unnecessary back and forth about this moodboard. I ended up going with it, even though we were both so wishy washy about it. 

A/N 2: This is my third prompt story this week, I’m going to take a break and quietly write by myself for a while. I’ll continue to work on the asks I have received, and please please feel free to send more. I’m having so much fun! I just don’t want to bombard you all, so I’m going to start pacing my posting. When I finish a piece, I just get so excited when I finish something that I want to show you all so badly! 

***

Liam and Riley sat across from each other at the table, sharing the piece of cake that sat between them. They were in New York visiting Riley’s family for a few days, and her mother had insisted that Eleanor spend the night, so the royal couple was taking full advantage of their child-free night, wrapping up the evening with dinner at one of Riley’s favorite restaurants. 

“Hey, check that out.” Riley tipped her head toward the bar, where a man was approaching a woman who was sitting alone at the bar. “He’s going to shoot his shot and try to pick her up.”

“How do you know?” Liam asked, watching as the woman nodded, the man immediately sitting down beside her. 

“I worked in a bar long enough, I can read the body language and tell you exactly what’s going to happen.”

He turned to his wife, a skeptical expression on his face. “Prove it.”

“Wow, you don’t even believe your own wife. I’m wounded.” She placed her hand over her heart in mock devastation. “Fine, I hope you saved room after that cake, because you’re about to eat your words.”

Riley went on to explain what each was saying to the other, and accurately predicted each move that was made. Liam was so impressed that part of him felt like she may have hired these people specifically to act out this scene. 

“Now watch, he’s going to pull out his phone and try to get her to put her number in.” She said, as the man reached into his back pocket. 

“Is he going to get it?” Liam couldn’t help but be invested in the story that his wife was narrating for him. 

“She’s going to give him a number, but see how she’s already almost standing up?” Liam nodded, waiting with baited breath for her to continue, “She’s going to give him a fake number, and then leave immediately. She doesn’t want to reject him to his face.”

“That’s cold.”

“It’s life, we’ve all done it.” Riley replied nonchalantly. 

Liam’s gaze snapped to face her. “You’ve given men fake numbers before?” 

She nodded and shrugged. “Lucky for you. You never know, I could have ended up suckered into marrying one of those creeps. Or like locked in their basement or something.”

He reached across the table and took her hand in his. “I consider myself very lucky for that.” He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it softly. 

“Oh oh, here we go, look!” Riley brought his attention back to the bar where the woman was shaking the man’s hand. “Ooooh, not even a courtesy hug. Game over, dude.” They watched the woman exit the restaurant, as the man started typing on his phone. “He’s sending a text to the number she gave. It either won’t be delivered, or he’ll get a reply from someone who is most definitely not that woman.”

“That poor man. He just wanted to find love.”

Riley sighed, shaking her head. “Ahh my sweet, romantic king, your naiveté is so heartwarming. That man is just looking to get laid.” She laughed, “For all the normal experiences you missed out on, aren’t you glad that you never had to pick up women at bars?” She paused for a second. “Present company excluded, of course.” 

Liam laughed, his expression quickly turning serious. “Actually, I kind of wish I could have had the opportunity. I think I would have been good at it.” Riley arched a brow at him. “I mean it, I got you to quit your life and fly all the way to Europe because of one night, didn’t I?” 

“Touché.” She drummed her fingers against the table in a brief moment of thought, “But can lightning strike twice?” 

“What do you mean?”

“Pick me up. I’ll go sit at the bar, you come over and shoot your shot. No social season, no friends, no boxy work uniform. Just a regular guy picking up a regular girl.”

Liam smirked at the proposition. “You’re on.”

Riley left the table and took a seat at the far end of the bar. Once she was seated he put down some money to cover their dinner, and made his way to the bar. “Excuse me miss, is this seat taken?”

She looked up, smiling politely and shaking her head, motioning with her hand for him to have a seat. 

“I’m Liam.” He extended his hand. 

“Riley. Nice to meet you Liam.” She placed her hand in his, and he brought it to his lips. “A hand kiss instead of a shake, bold move. You’re not from around here, are you?”

“No, I actually just moved to the states from Europe.” 

The bartender approached and took their orders. Liam instructed him to open a tab to cover himself and Riley. He took Liam’s card and stepped away to make their drinks. 

“So, why is a beautiful woman like yourself sitting here all alone?” He asked once they were alone again. 

Riley tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and looked down at the bar, playing up her role. “You’re sweet. I uh… I was supposed to be meeting someone, but I think they stood me up.”

“Well, their loss is my gain.” As the bartender set down their drinks, Liam lifted his glass in Riley’s direction. “A toast,” He waited for Riley to raise her glass before he continued, “To the missteps of old friends, which allow the opportunity to make new ones.”

“So we’re friends now?” Riley asked as she tapped her glass against Liam’s. “That’s awfully presumptuous.”

“Well, we’ve only just met. I’m hoping that perhaps we could get to know each other and see where the evening takes us.”

Riley agreed, and they began with some small talk. Riley stuck to her pre-Cordonia life, while Liam had done a pretty good job of coming up with a non-Royal backstory. They sat there talking, and drinking and ‘getting to know’ each other. Riley was impressed with Liam’s subtle flirting skills and decided that he was right, he would have been pretty good at this had he been given the chance. 

The lights came up, and Liam’s bill was dropped on the bar in front of him. “It looks like they’re closing up.” He said as he reviewed the receipt, signing his name at the bottom. “This was a lot of fun Riley, I would like to see you again. We should grab coffee together sometime.”

“I actually don’t drink coffee, I think it’s gross.”

“Oh.” Riley smiled to herself at the disappointment in his voice.

“I would like to see you again, though.” She reassured him. 

He looked up at her and smiled. “Could I take you to dinner, maybe?” 

“Dinner would be nice.”

“Great!” He noticed the annoyed expression on the bartender's face, they were officially the last customers in the bar. “We should probably go. I’ll walk you home.”

“I actually have a car waiting for me outside.” He dropped his head, again disappointed by the rejection. “You need a lift?”

He smiled widely, standing from his seat. “I’d like nothing more.” 

He offered his arm, she slid off the stool and linked hers through his. They exited the restaurant, and were greeted by Bastien, standing in front of their SUV. Before the guard could reach the door handle, Liam released Riley’s arm and jogged ahead, opening Riley’s door for her. 

“Such a gentleman.” She smiled coyly as she slid into the backseat. He smiled and got in after her. 

“Back to the hotel, your majesties?” Bastien asked as he entered the driver’s side. 

“Yes please.” Riley answered. 

Liam looked at her curiously. “Assuming I’m going to come home with you, bold move.”

She laughed. “You don’t have to come, but I promise you’ll have fun if you do.” Riley said in a sultry tone, closing the distance between the two of them.

“Riley…” Liam’s voice was just above a whisper as she leaned in, finally pressing her lips to his. They pulled back breathless from their kiss, their eyes remained closed as they rested their foreheads together. “I guess lighting can strike twice.”

“What do you mean?”

“This is the second time I picked you up in a bar, and the second time you kissed me first.” He grinned triumphantly. 

Riley leaned back, laughing as her eyes met Liam’s. “I guess that means you win?”

“Great, let’s go back to the hotel so I can collect my prize.” He brought his hand to her cheek and pulled her in, kissing her again. 

Permatag:

@anjanettexcordonia @athena-penrose @bbrandy2002 @chemist-ana @choiceskatie @cordonia-gothqueen @cordoniaqueensworld @emersynwrites @emkay512 @gabesmommie1130 @gkittylove99 @hopelessromanticmonie @iaminlovewithtrr @kat-tia801 @khoicesbyk @kingliam2019 @lucy-268 @marshmallowsaremyfavorite @mile9213 @mom2000aggie @nestledonthaveone @phoenixrising308 @pixie88 @queen-arabella-of-cordonia @queenrileyrose @secretaryunpaid @shewillreadyou @sincerelyella @sweatyrysconnoisseur @tessa-liam @theroyalheirshadowhunter @twinkleallnight @txemrn

Liam x Riley:

@jared2612 @neotericthemis

Liam:

@amandablink @ao719 @yourmajesty09

One Shots:

@bebepac @darley1101

[chidoroki]

TPN - “Dreams Come True”

What better way to cheer up the TPN fandom after the second season’s final episode than with the special exhibition chapter finally being fully translated. I caught glimpses of a few pages here and there over the past couple months but seeing all the children live happily together in the human world in their own little village that they made close to Emma and Alex warms my heart. Of course I would’ve loved if we got to see more of the GP Resistance (because the anime denied us of them) but following the GF kids around the world as they experience their dreams is fair enough. We started the series alongside them so might as well finish strong with them too. I really loved seeing everyone grow up but no matter how old they get or how much time passes, I’ll probably never get used to seeing Emma without her iconic “63194.” It’s a bittersweet feeling for me, but her smiles bring me so much joy and I’m beyond happy that she accepted everyone into her life as they accepted her without her memories.

I haven’t a clue on how much time passed since everyone found Emma in ch181 to now, but seeing her call out everyone’s names is a little detail that I love so much considering she had no idea who anyone was at first. Trying to remember 60+ names doesn’t seem like an easy task to me. No doubt I was just as shocked as our girl upon learning these mere children bought a goddamn plane! We learn in a couple pages that it’s because of Norman’s company that they can afford it, but still, he’s like 15 or 16 now? He’s still a child! And I’m impressed! Not only at him, but that Oliver and Violet became pilots as well! It’s especially cute when you remember that Lucas gave Oliver a little toy plane during their time at Goldy Pond.

Speaking of GP, is it just me or does Emma’s current outfit resemble her GP one just a little bit? Sure we have no idea what color scheme this one has but come on, the short jacket, the dark shirt and jeans.. just imagine it! Jemima, Yvette, Alicia and Mark remade Gillian’s original GP outfit sometime before the Grace Field Raid arc (ch137 extra page) so I don’t doubt they could’ve done the same for Emma. Of course that’s just me being completely hopeful and missing the Goldy Pond arc to death but yeah! I’m also so happy to see Chris up and moving again! Seeing him wake up briefly in ch181 was nice but this is so much better. I imagine he and Emma have a lot to catch up on in terms of stories, with him being unconscious since ch105 and Emma not remembering anything.

But here we go, the original 15 escapees plus Norman, Phil, Sherry, I believe I saw Carol somewhere and a couple other random kiddos ready to see the entire world. They get to accomplish so much.. and in a single day too I believe? At least that’s what Phil and Alicia say a bit later about everyone’s wishes, but aahh what a lucky bunch. Hell, I’ll say we’re lucky readers too to be able to see such a great story. Can’t thank Shirai and Demizu enough y’all. I wish we got to see more of Alex though. He’s such a kind soul but I’m sure he’ll be just fine staying behind with everyone else.

This entire page where we learn about Norman as a CEO is gold. I still can’t believe this child successfully built up an entire multipurpose company not only to help their search for Emma but also because he didn’t want to live off the Ratri clan. I wish I knew about this last week when writing out Norman’s birthday post because hell yeah this deserves some praise! AND he managed to graduate school as well during all that! Well, by skipping grades which totally makes sense. I mean, if he managed to pass all the Grace Field and Lambda tests effortlessly I’m sure normal human world school was a piece of cake for him. Holy shit dude, keep on impressing me why don’t ya. Not only him but Nigel and Sonya too! I’m not surprised that Vincent helped out but I’m glad those two got a tiny moment to shine as well! Ray is another obvious choice when it comes to helping Norman, as they’re best friends and he’s always been good with machines.. but boy, I can’t take you seriously when you’re just sitting there unamused and eating chips! Hahah I love him so much! And the fact he replies to Norman’s idea with just a simple “kay” is an eternal mood.

Okay boys aside, can we talk about our fabulous girls now? Because oh my god, they’re so darn beautiful! They’re more fashionable than I’ll ever be and it’s so cute how they drag Emma along to take advantage of the 3-for-1 deal. But our girl pulls off that sporty look so well! (r.i.p. goldy pond outfit ver2.0). I’m not at all surprised that Nat wanted to go see the opera. That's perfect for him and I’d like to think the anime did something similar with that one shot we see of him in the human world. We don’t see him in a theater like this but to me it looks like he’s on the streets of Broadway? At least that’s the vibe I get from it. I’m sure there was something music related on one of those signs.

I can’t get over how adorable all the children look and how happy they are fulfilling their wishes, even if some of them aren’t as extravagant as others. Like eating a fluffy pancake and a ton of ice cream? We can do that whenever we want. But for these kids, it means everything and they absolutely deserve to experience such simple joys like that after all the harsh nonsense they’ve been through. I also love how Ray continues to be such a great older brother by still looking out for them too. The fact he remains completely unfazed by the haunted house is perfect. This boy has been haunted by his own nightmares and demons his entire life, there’s no way a couple of lousy jump scares are gonna spook him. Though I do find it funny that Alicia and Rossi still manage to get scared while Yvette is having the time of her life. I can’t help but laugh at Thoma’s “Shirai face” as well.

I find it interesting that out of all the different kinds of exhibits they could’ve shown us while Rossi visits a museum, they give us dinosaurs.. like that seems so silly to me. Y’all have seen several demons in your young lives already and yet dinosaurs manage to amaze you too? God these kids are precious. And then our boy Phil finally gets to see and ride a train! Just look how happy he is! The poor kid can’t even sit still he’s so darn excited and I can’t help but smile with him! Thankfully the anime showed us this too.

We eventually get to Ray’s wish and guys.. oh my fucking god. Tell me that this is not the absolute best and prettiest smile we get to see from him!! It honestly leaves me speechless okay? Ray never imagined he would ever get to see the outside world, let alone live past the age of 12, and yet here he is, seeing such a beautiful sight such as this, right in front of him instead of from inside a book. You can’t believe how happy and proud of him I am right now. Did you see how ecstatic I was when the anime kept Isabella alive? Multiply that feeling by ten and there ya go. That’s my level of happiness upon seeing my favorite boy smile like THAT! AAHHH!! That panel is gonna live rent free in my head until the end of time. I can’t get over how damn perfect it is. His smile is so pure and how he looks like he’s in complete awe is beautiful. He’s about to burst into tears and I swear I might do the same because I’m making myself emotional over this fantastic boy. Someone hold me.

No seriously, hold me because we’re about to get into some angst as we move onto to Emma’s wish. We all know that ever since 2039 her one dream was to ride a giraffe once they got outside, so here we are, about ten years later and the animals in question are within reach. Our girl should be totally excited, right? Ha, not quite.

That wish was something the old Emma wanted, but since demon god had to be such a bastard, this Emma doesn’t know what to think, let alone what to even feel. She hasn’t experienced the same hardships as her family. She hasn’t gone through hell and back while holding onto that one wish that would make all the suffering worth it. The amount of joy everyone else felt upon living out their dreams, she wonders if she would be able to feel it too.

They brought her here to make her happy, but is this truly want she wants as well? This is old Emma’s wish after all. What about her and what she wants? Could this wish make her just as happy as her old self? She knows her family is only trying to help, but seeing her doubt herself does a number on my heart. Even without her memories, she’s still the same Emma deep down, as she doesn’t want to disappoint her family. She spends so much time worrying about living up to her family’s expectations, to try and be that Emma they all love so dearly.

Little does she know that she acts the exact same as usual, almost as if nothing has changed when she finally expresses how much she wants to ride a giraffe. And that’s great considering when they first arrived at the giraffes, no on had even mentioned riding them. She came across that feeling all on her own and everyone else can’t help but laugh and feel relieved. Her mind may have forgotten but her heart remembers everything. There is no “old Emma” and “new Emma” to her family, just “Emma” and words can’t express how wholesome that is because they love her regardless. All that matters to them is Emma’s happiness because if anyone deserves to feel and experience that, it’s her.

I just made myself tear up, damn it. I started this series with season one okay? I heard about this precious girl’s dream within the first minute of the first episode and here I am, a little bit over two years later, finally reading about it coming true and seeing that bright as hell smile on her face. Do you know how amazing it is to come full circle like that? My heart feels so full right now. I’m beyond proud of her and love her to death. Say what you want but I believe this to be the true manga ending in my eyes.

(damn this series for always getting me emotional)

[ragingbookdragon]

Black Jeans & Daphne Blue Still Make Me Think Of You

Jason Todd x M!Reader One-Shot

Word Count: 2.4K Warnings: Mentions of Torture and Death, Explicit Language

Author's Note: Daphne Blue by The Band CAMINO has been my new favorite song. Enjoy! -Thorne

He knelt in front of the guy he had tied to the chair. Poor bastard. He thought. Always gotta make things so difficult. Reaching up, he slapped him across the face a couple times.

“Oi, wakey, wakey.” The guy startled awake, immediately whimpering behind the gag. “Oh, good morning sleeping beauty. Have a nice nap?” The guy groaned and he chuckled, yanking down the strip of fabric. “Sorry, what was that?”

“I don’t know anything, Sentinel, I swear to God.”

Sentinel eyed him behind the mask. “You really wanna do this whole dance all over again?” he poked at one of the guy’s broken fingers. “You don’t have any more fingers to break. The next option is your toes.” He started to pull of the guy’s shoes.

“Wait! Wait!” he cried, trying to yank away. “Please don’t!”

“Tell me what I wanna know and your piggies can still go to the market,” he lazily retorted, letting go of his foot.

“But he’ll kill me!” he cried.

Sentinel stared at him. “I’m still wondering what makes you think I’m not gonna kill you too.” he deadpanned, pulling out a silver dagger.

The blade itself was fairly simply, not engraved or marked with extensive decorations of gold or ivory. No, frivolous things such as that were only meant for special and expensive weapons. This dagger had been created by someone with a decent amount of money. Meant to withstand against weathering and usage—it merely served a purpose.

“Look, I’ll make you a deal. You tell me where I can find Two-Face and I’ll kill you quickly. That’ll certainly save you a lot of pain and fear from having your boss dump you in a pool of acid,” he reasoned.

The thug choked on a sob and let his head loll back. “Alright! I’ll talk!”

“Wonderful,” Sentinel smiled. “Where’s Two-Face hiding out.”

“The old courthouse in Arkham City. It’s in the center of the city, you can’t miss it.”

“How many thugs does he have with him at all times?”

The guy’s face pinched. “I don’t know, he’s got a personal guard and the normal group too.”

“No shit,” Sentinel griped. “Numbers, jackass.”

“No more than ten for his personal, but he’s got about thirty normal.”

“Weapons?”

“Anything you can think of,” the thug answered. “Guns, knives, lead pipes, everything.”

Sentinel leaned back on his haunches, thinking for a moment. “Who’s Two-Face allied with at the moment?”

“I—” The guy’s mouth opened, then he snapped it shut.

“Oh, come on, do you need me to cut off a finger?”

“No, it’s—it’s just…”

“Just what?” Sentinel demanded.

“There was supposed to be a meeting tonight about discussing new gang territories,” the thug answered.

He paused and glared at him. “Why didn’t you say that in the first place?”

“You wanted to know about Two-Face only?”

“Where’s the meeting?”

“Penguin’s Iceberg Lounge.”

“Thanks.” Sentinel quipped and thrust the knife into the thug’s throat. His gasp turned into a gurgle as crimson poured down his neck and into his shirt before he ultimately slumped forward. He yanked the dagger out and wiped it on the guy’s pants before sheathing it and standing.

“Lovely,” he grunted. “Now I have to change plans.”

“You know,” someone said from above him. “Batman’s not going to be very happy about you coming into town and killing his punching bags.”

Sentinel whirled around and looked up, catching sight of a familiar Red Hood sitting rather comfortably on a metal beam, his head tipped in a cocky fashion.

He pressed a hand to his chest and dramatized, “Oh no, it’s the Red Hood!” He shut his eyes and groaned, “I admit it, I killed him. And I’ll consent to a full body search at your perusal, Red Hood.” When he didn’t hear a reply, he cracked an eye open and huffed, “You’re no fun, Nightwing usually plays along.”

Red Hood shifted and dropped to the ground, landing with a heavy thud. “What are you doing back in Gotham, Sentinel?”

“Are you asking me because you’re curious or because Batman told you?”

“I’m doing my job.”

“So, it’s because Batman told you.” he chuckled. “Since when did you become Batman’s errand boy? I thought you didn’t like him.”

“Just answer the question,” Red Hood sighed.

“Fine, fine,” Sentinel relented as he waved a hand. “Two-Face and I had a deal and he backed out of it, so now I’m trying to find him.”

The vigilante crossed his arms over his chest. “What was the deal?”

“Oh, you know, tamper with a few legal proceedings. The usual.”

“And what were you supposed to get in return?”

Sentinel scowled. “An obscene amount of money that he failed to deliver.” He started off towards the doors. “And I plan on getting what I’m owed.”

He could hear Red Hood following him. “Where are you going?”

“Our dearly deceased friend said Two-Face was attending a meeting at the Iceberg Lounge.” He cast a glance over his shoulder. “If they’re discussing territory, I need to do reconnaissance in order to learn where Two-Face is gonna set back up.”

“Want some help?” Sentinel paused and turned back around, practically coming chest to chest with the much taller vigilante.

“What kind of help?” he questioned, testing the waters by toying with the zipper on Red Hood’s jacket. When the vigilante didn’t move, he tugged a little. “Your skill? Or another kindof help?”

“I’m willing to part with both,” Red Hood murmured, reaching up to hold Sentinel’s wrist. “So long as you promise not to kill Two-Face.”

He chuckled and pulled his arm away, turning to leave. “And on that note, I’ll do this on my own.”

“You’re gonna show up to the Iceberg Lounge like that?”

Sentinel turned around as he opened the door. “Of course not.” He winked. “I’m gonna go undercover.” And he was gone.

***

He smoothed the front of his black leather jacket and blue shirt as he stepped into the chilly nightclub; he was glad he actually decided to go with something warm. Lazily scanning the room, he caught sight of the full tables as well as the upper level where people were sitting and smoking expensive cigars. One particular set of doors caught his eye and upon closer inspection, he saw two armed guards standing outside, one wearing Penguin’s gang colors, the other wearing Two-Face’s.

Bingo. He thought and in order to not raise suspicion, he made his way around one of the pillars that gave him the ability to hide, but also to see the double doors as well. One of the thugs had a walkie-talkie on him and he hummed, pulling out a small device from his pocket. He played with it for a moment and when the static cleared, he grinned and raised it to his mouth.

“Aye, you still outside the office?” he asked, watching as Two-Face’s thug grabbed the radio on his thigh.

“Yeah, boss is still in there with Penguin.” He glanced at the other gang member. “Why?”

“Somebody said they saw Batman poking around the area. Go check it out.”

“But we got orders to stay put.”

He frowned. “Orders ain’t gonna mean shit if Batman gets in there and throws the boss back in GCPD, shithead. Get crackin’.”

The two thugs looked at one another then to the door before shrugging and splitting up and leaving the doors wide open. He turned his back and waited for the guard to pass him before he slipped back and walked up to the doors. Quickly, he pressed his ear to it and listened, hearing someone that sounded like Penguin talking on the inside. He smiled and slipped a small device, no bigger than a thumbtack inside the keyhole, pressing it as he pulled his hand away.

“Hey!” someone shouted behind him. He spun and was met with the two thugs, both with angry and suspicious looks on their faces. “What are you doing here?”

He smiled. “I was looking for the restroom.”

“That ain’t it pal,” Penguin’s thug said.

“Right, sorry,” he excused, feigning an apologetic tone. “If you can point me in the direction, I’ll be out of your hair, promise.”

Two-Face’s thug tipped his head to the opposite side of the room. “Back that way.” He took a step forward and thrust the rifle into his face. “Don’t come back around here.”

He nodded resolutely. “You got it, sir.” He quickly fled before they changed their minds and disappeared into the crowd. When he was sure they no longer had eyes on him, he took a seat at the bar and pulled out an earpiece, discreetly slipping it in; he clicked the button on the outside of the piece and the conversation from inside the door flooded his ear.

“Word is that Sentinel is in town, Two-Face. You wouldn’t have anything to do with that now, would you?”

“What? Afraid that he’ll visit you?”

“Hardly. But the rumor mill says that he’s looking for you. Don’t tell me you pulled out on a deal?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I didn’t do—

“Is this seat taken?”

The low drawl made him jump slightly and he looked to the side, seeing a man smirking down at him. His eyes momentarily darted to the door before going back to the man’s face.

“Uh, no,” he replied. “It’s open.”

He hummed and sat down. “Thanks. Can I get you a drink?”

He inconspicuously slipped the earpiece from his ear and dropped it into his pocket. “I don’t know. What’s going to impress you? Something fruity? Or something…hard?” he flirted, propping his chin on his palm.

The stranger chuckled. “How about both?”

Grinning, he looked at the bartender. “Sex In The Driveway, please. For both of us.” The server turned and started making their drinks, and he shifted his attention back to the man beside him. “Got a name, handsome?”

“Jason. What’s yours?”

“(Y/N),” he replied, taking a moment to ogle the man. And boy was he pretty. Sharp jawline, killer set of teal eyes, midnight black hair, and oddly enough, a white streak. He had to be ripped under that red shirt and leather jacket he wore, and (Y/N) really wanted to find out. Their drinks were set in front of them, and he reached over, taking a sip of his.

“What brings you to this dingy nightclub? Don’t tell me it’s the scenery.”

Jason grinned. “I don’t know, the scenery right now is pretty nice.” He took the straw into his mouth and sipped, then set the drink down. “Wanted to see if there was anyone I could take home for the night.”

(Y/N) huffed a laugh. “Well, aren’t you just upfront about what you want.” He winked. “I like that in a man.” Twirling the straw with his finger, he asked, “You work in Gotham?”

He shrugged. “Mostly, but my job takes me where the money is.” Jason looked at him. “I bet you know what that’s like.”

“As a matter of fact, I do. I’m originally from Central City.”

“What’s someone from a safe place like Central doing here in Gotham?”

He hummed and turned in his seat so that he was facing Jason. “Just visiting a friend.”

“A boyfriend?” Jason wondered and (Y/N) snorted.

“Nope. No boyfriend for me.” He eyed him. “Yet…what about you? Have anybody waiting at home?”

“If I did, I wouldn’t be here.”

“You’re loyal? Isn’t that a charming quality.”

“What can I say? I’m a charming guy to be around.”

(Y/N) drug his foot up the side of Jason’s calf. “Charming indeed.”

Jason’s mouth opened, but (Y/N)’s attention was drawn away by the doors in the back opening, and Two-Face stepping out, followed by Penguin. His mood soured and evidently it showed on his face because he heard,

“Are you okay?” He directed his attention back to Jason who was looking at him with a cocked brow.

“Yeah,” he answered, then pulled his foot away and stood up. “But it’s getting late, and I have to get going.”

“Going back to see your friend?”

(Y/N) laughed. “Something like that.” He paused and gazed at Jason, then asked, “Gotta pen?”

He dug around in his pocket then pulled out a black sharpie and handed it over. “Here.” (Y/N) took Jason’s hand in his own and quickly wrote a set of numbers on the back.

Jason looked at it. “This your cell?”

He rolled his eyes. “No, it’s the number to my favorite Chinese joint down the street.” Grinning, he leaned over and planted a kiss on Jason’s cheek, murmuring, “I’ll be in town another couple days. Gimme a call sometime if you’d like to hangout.”

As he pulled away, he caught those teal eyes narrowed in amusement. “I definitely will, (Y/N).”

When he stepped through the exit, he sighed, knowing that he was going to have to spend hours going over the conversation in order to get a plan figured out. But hey, at least I scored a date. He thought with a grin.

***

“Have fun in lockup, Dent!” He called from the ledge as he watched the gang leader get loaded into the squad car. As they drove off, he checked his phone and smiled as the transactions followed through.

“Another night, another million,” he quipped and just as he was putting his phone away, it pinged. He looked back at it, eyes widening as he read,

So that’s what Sentinel looks like out of uniform? Black jeans and Daphne Blue? I hope you know I’m never not going to think of you when I see that combo now 😊.

(Y/N) froze and stared at his screen, millions of thoughts scrambling around his mind until he settled on, Who is this?

The little birdy you met in the lounge the other night.

He blinked and typed, Jason?

That’d be the little birdy.

How do you know who I am?

On your left, Sentinel.

He immediately looked up and his jaw went slack at the sight of Red Hood standing there, phone in his hand.

“You’re shitting me,” (Y/N) blurted out. His phone pinged.

Told you I was gonna call you.

Red Hood—Jason stowed his phone and walked up to him. “Wanna go get that Chinese you mentioned?”

(Y/N) gaped at him, then he let out a laugh, shaking his head. “Yeah, why not? I could eat.”

[milk--loaf]

original script of The 10th Kingdom: A Forgotten Fantasy MASTERPIECE. check out the video

So, I want to grant you the gift of a perfect fantasy movie series I can almost guarantee none of you have ever heard of. In fact, this series is probably older than a few of you, which blows my mind, and frankly I don’t want to think about that too long. 

When I consider the various film epics we’ve come to love dearly, the iconic fantasy series which we consider cultural touchstones, what comes to mind are the obvious—Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Star Wars, and dare I say it, even the Twilight franchise.

But what if I told you that there exists a perfectly-formulated five-movie fantasy franchise based around the secret world of fairytales? Does that interest you at all? Then let me tell you about The 10th Kingdom.

The 10th Kingdom, categorically speaking, is actually considered a mini-series rather than a franchise or saga, but each episode rounds out to be approximately an hour and a half long, and they all contain their own separate story beats united under a complex overarching plot, not unlike, say, Star Wars.

As a side tangent, I remember the first time I watched Lord of the Ring’s Fellowship of the Ring, I was under the impression that Frodo and his friends would reach Mordor by the end of that first movie, and the rest of the series would explore other plots not focused on this ring business. 

But no, obviously it’s a task that requires an entire trilogy to complete, and The 10th Kingdom has a similar expansive goal in the sense that our main characters are trying to get from point A to point B, except there are all of these detours which impede their progress along the way.

After the first leg of the series, or the first movie, our cast of characters from New York are thrust into a fantasy world made up of nine kingdoms, all of which used to be run by the famous women in Grimm’s stories—Rapunzel, Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, etc.,

After stepping into this world, every enemy they face and every town they visit are all in an effort to find a magical traveling mirror, which will, in so few words, allow them to return to New York City, where the people are normal and they’re not trying to be killed off by trolls and evil queens. But I’m jumping ahead of myself.

To pull back, The 10th Kingdom first aired on NBC in February of the year 2000, and I remember my mom actually had the box set of this series on VHS. After a few years I managed to get my grubby little hands on the tapes, and when I was a kid all the way into my teen years, I’d play them on my shitty little cube of a TV, the kind with the built-in VHS player and the thick backside. I wore those tapes out.

I think my mom also had the companion novelization of the film, but I never put in the effort to read it, and still haven’t. From what Wikipedia tells me, when the film was airing, during commercial breaks they would advertise a toll-free number where you could order the package deal of the movies, the book, and the CD all as one. I don’t recall our family having the CD, but we had everything else.

I haven’t asked her about it, but I can just imagine my mom—hi mom—calling in and ordering it as soon as the series concluded, or maybe she got it as a gift, I don’t know. She’s super into fantasy series and either scenario makes total sense in my eyes. Regardless, I love that I now know about this series, because it’s secretly like forty percent of my personality.

So! When it comes to how I’ll be structuring this video, I do want to challenge myself to not spoil every plot detail from beginning to end. However, in order to have a coherent discussion about the series at all, I do need to lay a basic groundwork for the characters and the premise. 

For this reason, the very first point of discussion on my fancy numbered list will be a review of the first two hours of the series. You might say, two hours? That’s a lot! But rest assured, I’m still glossing over a lot of material within those two hours, and in the grand scheme of the series, that’s only about a quarter of the watch-time.

Even still, I’ll be providing various checkpoints for you to pause this video in case you haven’t seen the show and you find yourself intrigued. As a big positive, this series is available on YouTube for free, so there’s literally nothing stopping you from typing it in the search bar above me right now. 

So without further adieu, let’s jump into point number one, which I have lovingly titled:

#1: WHY THE HELL IS EVERYONE RUNNING AROUND?

So I’m moving around a few details, but the plot really kicks off when we see a shot of a fancy carriage traveling across an ambiguous but idyllic landscape. Inside this carriage is the first of this movie’s four main characters, and arguably the least relevant when considering character development and focus. However, without him, though, the entire plot would never have started rolling in the first place, so he’s still pretty pivotal.

I’ll dive into the mysterious fantasy world we are witnessing in just a moment, but for now, what you need to know is that this is Prince Wendell. In so few words, he is the grandson of Snow White herself, who, after the happy ending of her fairytale as we know it, lived on to rule her own kingdom, which will plainly be called “the fourth kingdom.”

Of what we’re told by Wendell’s assistant, he is traveling to an outer province of his kingdom, a small village called as Beantown, to meet his people and collect the gift of a throne for his upcoming coronation. See, not only is Snow White long dead, but Prince Wendell’s parents—the king and queen—have also been dead for, I think, seven years. 

Where Snow White died after a long and successful reign, Wendell’s parents were poisoned and killed by a very important woman in the story who us viewers will simply know as “the Queen.” I’m not sure how the Queen gained that title—at one point Wendell does call her “stepmother,” but we never hear about the drama of their family ties. It’s not the point of this story.

But we know the Queen killed the actual king and queen, and she’d planned to poison Wendell as well so she could wrest control of the fourth kingdom. Luckily, she was caught in time and imprisoned indefinitely. 

As it so happens, Wendell and his assistant, before visiting Beantown, are set to make a detour to the Snow White Memorial Prison to pay the Queen a visit and deny her plea for parole. 

But things aren’t so honky-dory in the prison right now. Not long before the prince’s arrival, we meet an ugly creature known as the Troll King. The Troll King, as far as I know, isn’t aware that Prince Wendell is also on his way into the prison, it mostly seems like a very lucky coincidence. See, the Troll King is sneaking his way into the prison in order to rescue his three idiot children.

I’m gonna talk about the troll children later, because they’re positively the funniest part of the entire series—or at least, they have the most obvious jokes and gimmicks in the series. They’ll have their time in the sun when I talk about him later. 

Also, second side note, the Troll King uses a series of very fun magic accessories and items to sneak into the prison unannounced. The nine kingdoms is absolutely riddled with random mystical energy, and spells, and magical objects, to the point that me trying to give shape to the complex magic system, sort of like a Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings, is absolutely useless.

In short, he has two tool at his side: one being troll dust, which is this magic pink dust that can knock people out in a pinch for days, and the second being a pair of magic shoes which can make him invisible for a limited amount of time. Surprisingly, despite his brutishness, the Troll King does not strong-arm his way into the prison. 

The Troll King does in fact run an entire kingdom on his own, and has an entire army to back him up, but I don’t know, I guess he wanted to keep this low-key. So, having successfully rescued his children and knocked out the entire staff with troll dust, you’d think they’d leave, but no.

The Queen, who is locked away in a very high-security wing of the prison, magically calls out through the ether to the Troll King, and essentially bewitches him to her. In so few words, he lets her out of her cell and strikes up a deal that, if she follows through with a plan she wants to carry out, she can offer him half of Prince Wendell’s kingdom. Big stuff, I know.

So back to Wendell, he enters the prison to find himself captured by the evil Queen and the Troll family. Now, here’s one of the most integral pieces of magics to play into the story line:

For whatever reason, I guess years prior, the Queen requested to have a pet dog, and don’t. ask me why the prison would allow her to have one, but they do. It’s this really pretty golden retriever, and you see him very consistently throughout the series, and oh my god, he is such a good boy.

When everyone is in a room together and the Trolls are holding Prince still, the Queen sics her dogs at him, and when they make contact, they switch bodies. So from part one to part five, Prince Wendell is just running around with our gang of misfits as happy puppy who very slowly loses his marbles.

The Queen’s plan is to then kill the prince-turned-dog and keep the dog-turned-prince as a puppet which she can rule behind—or at least, at first. I always found this particular scene very strange because the Queen knows she wants to kill Wendell immediately in dog form, but as she’s teasing him, she like, turns away completely? And that allows Wendell to flee the scene.

So the queen sends the Troll Children to chase the dog, but the dog, running into the basement, knocks over another very important piece of magic—a magic mirror. You’ll notice, by the way, most forms of magic in this universe don’t typically have special names, so we’re gonna hear a lot about magic rings and magic combs and magic fish, without much differentiation. The word magic is going to get old real quick.

So Prince Wendell knows the trolls are quickly on his tail, and when he knocks over this mirror, he opens a portal to what we see is New York City, specifically Central Park. The Prince has no other option in front of him, so he jumps inside, and here ensues a very magical, very fun teleporting graphic.

Are you with me still? Okay. Well, here is where we meet our main character: Virginia Lewis, a disillusioned young girl in her mid-twenties, who lives on the edge of the park with her dad in a shitty apartment, working as a waitress to make ends meet. 

Virginia is easily the most complex character in the series, and I have a lot of, like, “end game” analysis I really want to get to regarding her character growth and the challenges she faces, but you’ll have to stick with me to the end of the video to really hear my thoughts on character.

But for now, what you should know about Virginia is she believes she’s going to live a boring life. She considers that she might have a husband some day, and dare I say it, move out from her dad’s place, but all things considered, Virginia has resigned herself to mediocrity. Some of her first dialogue is in narrative form, and she states plainly, 

“I guess you get to a certain age and you realize nothing exciting is ever going to happen to you. And maybe that’s just the way it is. You know, maybe some people just have quiet lives.” 

And right as she thinks that to the audience, Prince jumps through the portal and collides with Virginia’s bike path, making them both crash to the ground. For better or for worse, Prince has now made a detour to the tenth kingdom, New York City.

It turns out, Virginia was actually biking to her waitress gig, and because she can’t miss her shift, she walks her bent bike to the restaurant with Prince following behind her. She tries to get rid of him, but he won’t leave her alone. For now, I’m going to put a pin on the Virginia story thread, because we need to go back and introduce one more absolutely key character.

So if we’re thinking back to the evil guys, the Queen and the Troll King have forged an alliance, where the Troll King puts his trust in the Queen to cause some shenanigans and take over the fourth kingdom. But in order to succeed, she needs to have the Troll children follow her orders, and as faithful to the Queen as they may be, she knows she needs someone more substantially on her side. Someone who isn’t faithful to the Troll king.

So even though the Troll children are on the prince’s tail, pun intended, the Queen releases another prisoner—a character who we will know by the name of Wolf—to also follow the Prince.

And oh my god, I love Wolf. For many reasons, I love Wolf. He’s just a spunky, mischievous little guy. If the name didn’t give it away, Wolf is actually part werewolf, though the most we see of a wolf-form from the guy is a fluffy tail, yellow eyes, and riled-up hair.

If you’re wondering what his real name is, it is actually Wolf. Which is a little confusing, because Wolf isn’t the only werewolf in their world, so it sorta feels like when someone names their son Guy. At one point in part three he does use the fake name Warren Wolfson, so it’s like, is his name Warren? No.

But Wolf is easily the second most complex character in the series. In the very beginning, having been imprisoned for who-knows-how-long, Wolf is positively pent up with energy. And by energy, I mean he’s incredibly hungry for a good meal and he’s incredibly… frisky, to put it best. Later, when he’s more mellow, he explains to Virginia that, quote, 

"Putting a wolf into a prison cell with nowhere to bound, only able to stare at the sky through bars, now that's inhuman."

What Wolf deals with throughout the entire series is the compromise between his wolfish tendencies and his human ones. He never seeks to overrule or mask one half of himself, it’s more a matter of striking the appropriate balance, because denying his wolfish side would be to deny half of his existence. And he’s all the better for it, because he’s an absolute goofball. I’d go so far as to say that Wolf holds many of the traits of a himbo—he’s handsome, he can be dumb at times, and he’s very kind.

To give away a bit of Wolf’s character which we’ll get to in a moment, yes, he’s tailing Prince Wendell, and by circumstance, Virginia too, but the moment he sets sights on Virginia, he’s fallen head over heels in love with her, and forgets about the Queen’s instruction completely. 

He doesn’t know how to handle his love for her, and in fact goes about it in very inappropriate ways in the first episode, and this is a testament to the fact that he can’t control his wolfish side. But I want to set it into stone now—Wolf’s motivation throughout the entirety of the series is: do right by Virginia.  

Love her, care for her, accommodate to her. Virginia markedly doesn’t love him in the first half of the story, so he takes it upon himself to show Virginia what kind of man he can be, and prove they’re soulmates. This means striking that balance between wolf and human, and calm down those raging energies being in jail left him with. See how it all comes full circle?

So the Queen releases him from prison. But before he leaves her sight, she places upon him this invisible magic: the magic of the Queen’s evil will. Whenever the Queen is in one of these sinister modes, you’re always going to here very haunting female vocals and like, a glittery noise. 

Submitting to the Queen’s will, in short, essentially means she can call upon him from afar, invading his mind so she can communicate with him and enforce her desires. Because he’s so one-track minded in the beginning, and frankly, a bit stupid, he says yes and goes on his merry way, following Prince and the Troll children through the magic portal in the basement.

The last of the four main characters, and the one I probably need to give the least bit of explanation to, is Tony. Tony is Virginia’s father, the one she lives with, and he’s a janitor for the building they live in touching Central Park, which is the only reason they’re able to afford their apartment.

Tony, to spare myself the need to monologue about him, is the bumbling buffoon of the series, but that’s perhaps giving him too little credit. He’s the Zeppo—he’s the one who constantly has bad things happen to him, whether it’s his own doing or the world itself punching down on him. 

In trying to describe Tony, I’d say he’s fairly conservative-minded. Not politically conservative, I mean— the series isn’t remotely political, but I mean he’s conservative in the sense that he doesn’t think outside the box a lot. He has good ideas on occasion and plays a mean hand of Old Maid, but his faults often overshadow his positive qualities, and unfairly so.

A few things we know about Tony: he’s long divorced, he’s overworked and underpaid, he ruined a once-thriving business he upstarted through a bad investment, and when prompted to make a few magical wishes, he makes selfish and poor decisions. There’s a fair few other disasters that Tony initiates later in the series, but this is what we know going in.

But the thing about Tony is that he’s sincerely undervalued, especially by Virginia, but also in part by the other main characters as they travel through the nine kingdoms. And when they realize that at the end of the series, Tony as well, it’s only then that Tony receives his flowers. Otherwise, Tony’s character growth is pretty static from start to finish.

Now, indulge me for a bit while I recount some of the shenanigans that go on in the tenth kingdom. The rest of the story after what I’m introducing to you, you can reliably count on the fact that all four of our heroes stick together and are attempting to a reach a semi-agreeable goal. And if they’re apart, they’re still trotting along in the same general direction.

But part one sticks out because it does all the heavy lifting in terms of defining the characters—they scramble around on their own without an exact goal in mind, simply goofing off or trying to solve smaller problems. The latter is very true for Virginia, who doesn’t know what to do with this dog she found, and is getting harassed all around the city. Let me explain.

When Virginia finally gets to work, she keeps Prince in the storage room. Also, this scene—where she first shows up to work, I have no idea why nobody protests or scoffs that someone walked a dog into a room where they’re preparing food. 

But it’s fine, I guess. When he’s eventually in the storage room, nobody goes back there, and only Virginia has the key to the door for some reason. She tries to do her job, but hears Prince barking back there, and has to pause work to go make him quiet.

But look at this—when she walks in, Prince has left a message for her. She thinks it’s a prank, but through testing out Prince’s intelligence, she freaks out when she realizes the dog is responding to her with one bark yes, two barks no. By indicating she’s in danger, Wendell convinces Virginia that they must leave, and she travels back home.

Meanwhile, the troll lchildren are around, but they aren’t making much progress. Like I said before, they’re idiots, like, verified doofuses, so even though they possess the physical strength to apprehend and kill a dog, they have absolutely none of the wits. 

One of the best bits in the series is that, while they’re hunting in central park, they pointlessly assault a couple sitting on a bench and steal their stereo, believing it to possess some kind of magic simply because it plays “Night Fever” by the Bee Gees. They take this stereo back with them when they return home, and when the stereo eventually dies, they’re relegated to singing of this magical folklore instead. It lasts even into part five.

But Wolf, on the other hand, is on the hunt. At first, he’s so hungry that he completely forgets about Prince Wendell entirely, and when he’s in New York, he’s overwhelmed by the smell of meat and follows his nose to, very coincidentally, Virginia’s workplace at the edge of the park. But then, good news:

“I smell dog! Would you believe it? Work and pleasure combined.”

So when he’s sitting down as a guest of the restaurant, he talks with one of Virginia’s coworkers and remembers to ask about the dog. She spills the beans that Virginia is holding onto a golden retriever, and believing Virginia to still be at work, the coworker leads Wolf to the kitchen.

And this scene confuses me, because when she realizes Virginia’s gone, Wolf is like, give me her address, and then she’s like “no,” and then things get weirdly sexual? Nothing is shown of the restaurant or the girl after this scene, but it is confirmed later that Wolf obtained Virginia’s address, so I’m like… how did he accomplish that? Did he eat the blonde girl? 

Wolf, after all, is known to conflate hunger with sex or sexuality simply because of his wolfish nature, and the last shot we see of the two of them is when they’re standing very suggestively close to one another, in the private back room. Even weirder, the next scene Wolf is in, he’s calmed down remarkably. 

His lucidity and charismatic persona always appear more present and refined when his hunger is sated, and after this story beat, that hunger is less insistent. He’s still obsessive over food and love, but it’s not messing with his head so dramatically.

If you’re wondering, by the way, Wolf was not imprisoned for eating people. He later describes his crime was, quote, “sheep worrying,” so he caused nothing more than mischief. Overall, wolves in this series are alluded to having eat humans at some point in history, but wolves also face serious discrimination within the nine kingdoms in the present day, so it’s possible this is just some disparaging folklore. 

In that same breath, I believe in part three, Wolf describes his parents to be especially ravenous, and that this was the cause of their persecution on a burning pyre. Whether their crimes were legitimate or not, remains unexplained. Which is all to say, I really don’t know if he ate that girl. But he had to have sated his hunger somehow.

Virginia returns home with Wendell, but when they arrive, Virginia discovers that her place—infact, her entire apartment floor—has been ransacked, and various neighbors of hers are knocked out on the floor covered in troll dust. Tony, even, is conked out ina  recliner when she walks through her front door.

Yeah, the trolls found her apartment. But only through brute force—in the beginning, they managed to find Virginia’s missing wallet and a patch of dog fur on the bike path, which eventually led them to her door after threatening a New Yorker to commute them.

As much as I like them, they’re mostly a distraction, so I’ll leave this scene by saying that the trolls try to catch Virginia and Wendell, but she manages to trick them by trapping them in a broken elevator and fleeing with Wendell to her grandmother’s house. She leaves Tony behind, because even though he’s unconscious, he’s relatively safe.

And here is probably my favorite sequence of events that occurs in the first episode, and part of the reason why I went through the effort of chronicling everything thus far. Virginia stays at her grandmother’s decked-out apartment overnight, and the next morning, having learned of where Virginia is staying, Wolf makes a visit.

He poses as Virginia’s rich suitor and fiancé so that grandma lets him in the door, and after that… [video no audio of grandma being seasoned] well, he gets a bit distracted. But when Virginia wakes up, Wolf does what any sane fairytale wolf would do and dresses up as grandmother and hides in her bed.

At this point, you don’t really know what he’s trying to do? Like, you know he’s infatuated with Virginia, because prior to this scene, he visited Tony’s apartment and obtained an image of Virginia, who he now finds to be the most beautiful woman in all the kingdoms. Whether that means he wants to start a happy family with her or turn her into dinner, remains to be clarified

But he doesn’t even try to capture Prince.  Instead, well… [what big teeth you have, etc.]

Instead, when Virginia realizes it’s a strange man in her grandmother’s bed, she naturally treats him like an intruder and tries to fight him off. Meanwhile, Wolf is waxing very manic poetic about his feeling for her, which really, at this point, is just very exaggerated infatuation.

“Now that I’ve seen you, eating you is out of the question! Not even on the menu! Now, I know this is going to come out of the blue, but—how about a date?”

Luckily, Virginia manages to toss him out of, like, her grandmother’s second story window. The way Wolf feels about her remains very conflicted even after their first confrontation, because not long after, in a very inconsequential scene with a French therapist, he laments about his feelings—

“Doc, I met this terrific girl and I really, really, really like her, but the thing is that… I’m not sure whether I want to love her or eat her.”

Moving on, though, I can skip a lot of the subplots in this episode, specifically involving Tony, because, functionally speaking, yes they help build his character, but plot-wise it’s very inconsequential. In short, Tony has harnessed the power of six wishes, all of which he completely wastes on selfish, questionably immoral things. And they all come back to bite him in the ass.

The crux of this episode is when Virginia leaves her grandmother’s house with Wendell, she takes him back to central park and tries to leave him where she found him, because she’s tired of being chased by weird trolls and sexually ravenous home intruders.

Just to pause, when I first wrote that line, “sexually ravenous home intruder,” it sounded awful. I’m describing Wolf, and I can’t say that I’m describing him incorrectly, but a thing about Wolf is that, while yes, he’s very riled up, he also feels very innocent. 

Sort of like a puppy who doesn’t know how to play correctly yet, like if you left him alone in the house for a while, you’d come home to find all your couch cushions torn open and stuffing everywhere.  You’d punish him, but you also might think, “ah, that little rascal.”

In that way, I think a viewer can rationally suspend disbelief on the questionable behavior of Wolf, simply because of his wolfish hormones.  But in the same breath, I also think that unfairly absolves him from his ogling and infatuated monologuing. 

It’s played off for laughs fairly well, I think, but at the end of the day I still think a viewer should interrogate those flaws in Wolf’s writing.

The point beyond that critique is, in attempting to drop off Wendell in the park, we experience a confluence of all the character in New York. Tony, because of his own shenanigans, is running from the cops in the park [it’s funnier if I don’t explain why], meanwhile Wolf is on their tail and the trolls have escaped from the elevator.

Tony meets up with his daughter and Wendell, and the only good wish Tony ever makes (which is also his last one) is that he wants to understand the dog. This is very important—Tony becomes the only individual in the series who can understand Wendell, who seemingly telepathically talks to Tony.

Which, thank god they never try to animate the actual dog’s mouth. Such a good visual effects decision. After that point, Wendell leads them back through the portal in central park to escape the cops. And so concludes our time in the tenth kingdom. Even though it’s the title of the series.

Rest assured, Wolf and the trolls do make their way back through the portal in their own time, and then the magic mirror portal is closed, keeping out the rest of their real world.

Remember, now, that the mirror itself is stored in the basement of the Snow White Memorial Prison, so they’re not exactly freely walking in the country. They have a bit of time before the bad guys catch up with them, so they walk through the prison and find that all the guards are still knocked out with troll dust.

Wendell takes the opportunity here to describe the nine kingdoms to them, and all the politics involved, but I’m going to wait to explore those elements in point number two, which is right around the corner. After the exposition, instead of immediately escaping, the three of them inspect the Queen’s prison cell.

Which, don’t ask me why. This ends up screwing them over because the trolls find them. And because they’re incompetent, instead of capturing the dog like they’re supposed to, they close the cell door on Tony and Prince, meanwhile they knock out Virginia and steal her, fleeing thereafter to the Troll kingdom.

[shrug] I really don’t know why they couldn’t just do their job. Blabberwart, the sister, says it’s because the troll dust on the guards will wear off any moment and they have to act fast, but it’s still an incomprehensible decision. They think Virginia’s a witch because of the elevator debacle, but that’s about all we get in terms of real motivation.

So Tony and Prince are for-real imprisoned when the guards wake up and find them, and the troll children flee to the troll kingdom with Virginia over their back. I’m not covering the prison arc. I actually think it’s quite boring and unremarkable. Like, can you imagine your first foray into a magical dimension was in a prison? Ugh.

Instead, we’re going to follow Virginia as she’s taken to the troll castle and tied up. She’s going to be tortured for information because the trolls believe she’s some big-league conspirator for what they dub the tenth kingdom, which is NYC itself, and want to know who its king is.

But here’s the rub: Wolf comes in and saves her, using the troll’s stupidity against them. The troll king is out on the town and planning shit out with the evil Queen, so for whatever reason, he’s left his magical shoes on display in the troll’s shoe collection. It’s this big weird feet joke, it’s really not that important.

What is important is, on her way out, Virginia nabs the shoes without Wolf knowing. By the way, she absolutely does not trust Wolf and plans to escape his side as soon as she’s able by wearing the shoes, but she never gets far because Wolf knows her scent and can follow her anywhere. It’s very romantic.

The shoes are very weird—as they’re escaping through Jack’s beanstalk forest of all places, Virginia is constantly enthralled by the shoes, practically drunk on their power, or potential power. But the shoes, unlike most magics, has a battery life, and must recharge for hours on end, so in large part if she’s not wearing them, Virginia is fawning over them.

There’s a really nice character beat for Wolf here, because it’s brief switch in their lucidity—Wolf is now in his element in the nine kingdoms, and maintains a fairly level head, meanwhile Virginia, when Wolf is holding the shoes, tries to seduce Wolf while under their enthrall, trying to get them back.

One of the reasons I really like Wolf is that he doesn’t play into Virginia’s weird sexual advances because he knows they’re hollow. Instead he continuously rebuffs her until she finally drops the act and returns to her usual self.

And here’s the first scene where the two of them really actually bond for the first time. I’d say this is important because, if they were not allowed this moment to hide from the troll’s hunting party, they likely wouldn’t have stuck together through the rest of the story.

Virginia, understandably, finally asks Wolf why he was involved in the chase, and intuits that he, too, was a prisoner set free, but doesn’t actually ask who set him free. That’s left out of their conversation. He explains what put him in jail, but then the conversation shifts to something very vulnerable—Wolf’s tail.

The thing is, this scene has some very present sexual innuendo attached to. In parts three and five, this innuendo is played up again in different ways, so it’s not exactly an accident on the writer’s part. Wolf’s tail, in so few words, is regarded as a fairly intimate erogenous zone, which Wolf himself roughly equates to breasts in terms of… acceptability of exposure, I guess?

And I don’t know, I guess it’s testament to the fact that I first watched this series as a kid, but I never considered this scene very sexual, despite the writer’s heavily leaning into it. What I see in this scene is that Wolf’s tail is a very corporeal representation of Wolf’s immediate decision to be open and vulnerable for Virginia.

Once he’s able to calm down significantly and join Virginia’s side, he really does come to terms with the fact that he loves her and wants to be with her, and he never shies away from showing her every aspect of who he is, both the good and bad.

Knowing that wolf-kind are actively discriminated against, persecuted, and in many cases killed in the fourth kingdom, including his parents, Wolf allowing Virginia to even see his tail, let alone give it a pet, shows he’s not trying to hide from her, even if it’s dangerous.

We’re nearly at the end of my opening review. The plan at this point is to return to the prison, use the shoes to sneak in and release both Tony and Wendell, and then find the mirror to go home.

But the prison’s been up to some shenanigans. After the guards wake up, they determine that the basement was disturbed or ransacked while they were sleeping, and thus cast suspicion on all the antiques stored down there. So they set up a trash boat outside the prison walls and throw all the junk on it to later be moved away. This includes the mirror.

On his own, Tony discovers that his prison-mates have painstakingly been carving away a tunnel to the outside for years, and he convinces then to let them escape as well. Luckily, Wolf and Virginia find Wendell and escape as well, so now the entire cast is unified as a group, finally.

Unfortunately, Acorn, one of Tony’s prison mates (that’s played by Warwick Davis of all people), takes the trash barge with the mirror and travels off to god-knows-where while Tony isn’t looking. And so initiates the much less complicated journey our characters will embark on to find the mirror and go home, and in the same breath, so ends this introductory review

I’ve alluded to it already, but nearly every character in this foursome, besides Virginia and Tony, have different goals in terms of what they seek to accomplish. Of course Virginia and Tony want to go home, but Wolf’s single desire is to make Virginia fall in love with him, or rather, make Virginia realize she’s already in love with him. 

There’s no literal point A and point B for Wolf, but if assisting with Virginia’s adventures means he can get closer to her, then he’s on board.

Meanwhile, Prince Wendell’s prerogative is entirely different. He, of course, wants to be turned human again so he can resume his coronation, become king, and probably get revenge on the evil Queen. To do so, he forcibly enlists Tony, who is the only person can understand him, to be his manservant, much to Tony’s disagreement.

He’s not seeking the mirror, and in fact regularly complains that Tony shouldn’t be looking for the mirror because he should be helping Wendell instead. I like that Prince has entirely separate motivations, but I also feel like the writers didn’t take these conflicting motivations far enough.

Seemingly against Prince’s personal goal, Wendell will often assist in Virginia and the team’s schemes to find and obtain the magic mirror, even though he has virtually no incentive to do so. I think I would’ve liked to see a bit more conflict in that regard, but Wendell, for the most part, is relegated to having the least complex character arc among the main cast, so his use as a pawn largely goes unchallenged.

With all the characters and the main adventure set up, let’s finally move onto point number two:

#2: WHERE THE HELL ARE WE? 

So, I’ve described that the tenth kingdom is New York City, and I’ve talked about the fact that the fourth kingdom is run by the lineage of Snow White, so what else do we know? Well, in part one, when our characters have just entered through the portal and all the guards in the prison are still asleep, we see a map of the nine kingdoms.

Prince Wendell describes to Tony that the stories we learned of Snow White, Cinderella, and all the other great fairytales occurred about 200 years prior, and the audience can reasonably deduce through this explanation and the map that the other great women went on to run their own kingdoms. This gets later validated when Wolf explains the lore of the five great women who changed history—

“She became a great queen. One of the five women who changed history.” 

Virginia: “Five women?” 

“Snow White, Cinderella, Queen Riding Hood, Gretel the Great, and the Lady Rapunzel. They formed the first five kingdoms, brought peace to all the lands. But they’re all dead now. Some say Cinderella’s still alive, but no one’s seen her in public in nearly forty years. She would be nearly 200 years old. The days of ‘happy ever after’ are gone. These are dark times.”

Also apparently Sleeping Beauty is still around, but if you look at [this really blurry map] of the nine kingdoms, she wasn’t even a great ruler, she actually appears to just be a citizen of Cinderella’s kingdom, so that’s sucks, she got demoted, and for what? We don’t know.

So you might be thinking, “this is so exciting! We get to explore the nine kingdoms, I can’t wait to see a little bit of everything!” Well I hate to break it you, but we don’t. Like, we see nearly none of them. We stay in the fourth kingdom for virtually the entire series except for two story beats. 

One of these deviations is near the beginning, with the Troll Kingdom, also known as the Third Kingdom, and the second instance is in the fourth movie, when our characters unwittingly trespass into the mines of the ninth kingdom. But this kingdom doesn’t even have a great queen! It’s just run by dwarves who make magic mirrors in an underground cave system.

They appear to be some derivative lineage of dwarves from Snow White’s story, and this proves to be more legitimate of an idea because Snow White’s grave is magically hidden in one of the fancier caves, but other than that, there’s absolutely no glamor or intrigue. It’s an important pit stop, but in the grand scheme of things, a very disappointing end.

However, the final chapter does give us a glimpse of what all the various royal lines look like. We see the descendants of Red Riding Hood, we see some elves and ice queens, and there’s even a special cameo from the only living great queen, Cinderella, so it’s a fair enough consolation prize. I just think it was a completely wasted opportunity

That said, the fourth kingdom does have a diverse series of towns, bogs, and castles for our main characters to travel through. Among the various sets our characters visit, we have Little Lamb Village, Kissing Town, the Palace of White, the Disenchanted Forest. Evenly dispersed along the way, we also encounter various iconic locations from Snow White’s story. 

The fourth kingdom itself, to refer to that map again, is situated in the very center of the fairytale world, with most of the other nations bordering it. Its location is highly coveted by the other kingdoms because of that strategic central location, and while it’s not commented on more than once, the other kingdoms are essentially nipping at the fourth kingdom’s heels to gain its territory.

Beyond that, not much is known about the other kingdoms. In reading the wiki a little bit, there are actually some interesting descriptions about the other kingdoms, and I’m assuming these come straight from the book, but they also read like it could be complete fanfiction.

As a regular peruser of these “wikia” pages across various fandoms and titles, I’m aware of the fact there’s very little fact checking and revision which goes into them. 

I would say, correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m rebuking that. Yes, big franchises will probably have highly scrutinized wikia pages, but the same can’t be said for any title that even remotely falls into obscurity... Wikia is the real wild west Wikipedia we were warned about in high school. 

And that about sums it up for my second point! Yeah, these other points, we’re probably going to run through them much faster.

So, to move onto point number three!

#3: MAGICAL OBJECTS, SPELLS, AND OTHER RANDOM CRAP

So, as we’ve already partially observed, the nine kingdoms are absolutely riddled with various magics, mystical energies, and generally fantastical creatures that can help or hurt Virginia and the team on their quest.

As I was viewing the series I made sure to take note of every consequential piece of magic which affects the plot, regardless of whether it’s incredibly important, such as the magic traveling mirror, or it’s the mere aura of magic, lightly nudging a character along.

I knew, going into this, that I could simply review the magic like I do everything else, but because I’ve done that enough with the plot itself, what I want to do, instead, is a tier list.

[Off-the-cuff, unscripted tier list of magic objects, spells, etc. I did not transcribe this.]

Moving onto point number four:

#4: ALL THE BIG BADS

I really just wanted to spotlight them, and give them their flowers before moving onto the rest of the video. 

Let’s start with the trolls. The troll king is arguably the most boring antagonist the heroes have to face, and that’s saying something because the way he’s just really cruel and nasty is still kinda fun to watch. And the more I think about, I’m pretty sure the heroes never actually have to face him. The Troll king essentially sells out his children to the queen, yes, and the children are a nuisance to Virginia nad her crew, but the troll king serves an entirely separate purpose in the story.

So he lets the queen out of her prison cell, right?  They make a tentative alliance to keep the circumstances of the queen’s escape secret (AKA the whole dog prince thing) so she can take over the fourth kingdom. For helping her escape, as well as the use of his kids, she tells the Troll king she’ll give him half of the fourth kingdom, just not the half with the castle.

But the troll king is impatient, and as we obviously know, the troll children fail to find and kill Prince Wendell, much less capture him, so there’s some rising ill will between both parties. In addition to that, in order for the fake dog prince to take the throne during his coronation, the Queen herself must train him to stop acting like a dog.

I’d say those scenes are some of the weakest in the series because the plights of this poor dog turned into man are very sad, and they use a little bit of gross humor, which I’m not a fan of. At one point you see him lift his leg to pee against a pillar, and then you see the pee on the ground, as if that wasn’t enough.

And then there’s another even more dramatic scene with the poor dog when he’s so tired of behaving like a human that he threatens to hang himself in front of the queen. The dog’s hanging attempt is laughably foiled, but it leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Maybe that’s the point, but it takes all the whimsy out of what could’ve been an interesting half of the story.

Anyway, the training of the new prince s taking far too long for the troll king’s liking, so in the meantime, instead of laying low and letting the queen enact her plan, he useless starts pillaging and terrorizing some of the outer provinces, such as Beantown. 

He does this because he knows the real prince is incapacitated, and let’s just say this sets up a big hurdle for the queen. In many ways, the troll king is an antagonist and a substantial distraction for her and not Virginia. She has to be doing something interesting before the climax of the series, after all, and this makes enough sense.

Then there are the troll children, and honestly, I really love these guys. They’re the comedic release of the series, which is saying something, because it’s not exactly a super tense series the whole way through. There are plenty of other light and funny moments. 

Blabberwart, Burly, and Bluebell are basically bumbling idiots throughout the series, and on rare occasion, whenever the characters get too comfortable, the Troll children will pop up and terrify them, and spur them onto the next big set piece.

The only criticism I have for the trolls is that, one, they’re the ones who name New York City the tenth kingdom, and they make some feeble attempts to maybe raid the tenth kingdom with a troll army, I guess, but by the end of the series, that motivation’s been completely nuked.

The other is that there is no conclusion for the trolls. I feel comfortable saying that because the final conflict between the trolls and our heroes is a very simple fight before the climax, and they lose, and are knocked out. And that’s the last we see or hear from them.

Which I understand on some level, because they were just entertaining time filler, but in a series that otherwise feels very tightly knit, they’re a loose thread, in my opinion.

The last enemy I’ll talk about is, essentially, a weapon working under the Queen. Unlike Wolf, who the Queen tries to vest control over, the huntsman works willingly. Where the trolls have some levity to them, and their threat is downplayed significantly, the huntsman represents a very legitimate mortal threat.

We learn of him in part three, and I’d say I really like his entrance because he’s an important figure between the Queen and Virginia. Virginia is often made parallel to Snow White through her behavior, and like the original story, Virginia at one point faces the huntsmen individually.

The huntsmen serves as the perfect middle man from the Snow White fairytale. In that story, at least the Disney iteration, we know the huntsmen to serve the evil Queen, and she sends him out to kill Snow White because she’s the fairest of them all. But as he raises his axe over her, he falters and instead lets her flee into the forest, keeping it a secret from the queen.

The interesting difference with this huntsmen, however, is that he’s become disillusioned, and it’s made fairly obvious when Virginia first meets him that he’s not one to turn over a new leaf. A large theme in the world of the nine kingdoms is that, understanding we are 200 years out from those iconic tales, the world has sobered up.

Wolf, at one point even, says that “happily ever after” didn’t last as long as we’d hoped, and the huntsmen represents the downward descent of their world into villainy. We talked about it briefly in the tier list, but the huntsmen possesses this magical crossbow, which, when fired, cannot stop until it hits the heart of the living being.

Don’t ask me how the logic works, but when the huntsmen was still a normal dude cutting trees in the forest, the evil queen comes by and offers him this crossbow, but only if he shoots it in a direction he chooses. He takes up that offer, takes position, and shoots off the arrow.

The thing is, the arrow hit his son, presumably hundreds of feet away, and kills him instantly. When the axeman pulls the arrow from his son’s chest, somehow that confirms that he is now the queen’s personal huntsmen, and he accepts the role willingly. End of story

Don’t ask me how that works, it obviously sounds like backwards logic to me. But in the same breath, I kinda like how backward it is, because it reminds me of those old fairytales where characters make very bad but very symbolic decisions. 

Fairytales, historically, aren’t inherently moralistic stories, because we know that they weren’t initially targeted towards children, much less teaching them a lesson. But obviously with newer iterations and the shifting of the fairytale paradigm into our modern-day understanding, leaving out a moral is virtually impossible. Heroes now make rational decisions because they represent models of good character, which children are meant to aspire to.

But the huntsmen’s tale, despite how briefly it enters the story, represents some of those more ambiguous stories without a proper lesson. The huntsmen’s story is about destiny, sure, but a kind of destiny that’s incomprehensible to our main characters because he isn’t following human logic. He’s following the contrary conventions of the oral tale. When Virginia hears that story, she calls him crazy because he doesn’t understand it.

And finally, there is the queen. She is the main antagonist in the series, and as things develop, she becomes Virginia’s opposite, even though they don’t meet until the finale.

And here is where I have a major, major spoiler for the final chapter of the series, which you may have already guessed if you watched the movies up to the point, but I don’ know, I just recommend pausing for a while if you’re still watching the movies. 

In light of telling the story’s big twist, I think this is a good time as any to say that I’m going to analyze some of Virginia and Wolf’s big character arcs later down the line. This means character conflicts, story beats, and the conclusion at the end of the series, all of which are massive spoilers.

So… [pause]

Okay, are we all back? Are we one board for spoilers?

Alright, so the grand reveal we get near the end of part four is that the Queen, who we’ve only vaguely known as the queen, is Virginia’s long-lost mother. I know.

It was impossible to really talk about the queen because, if we’re looking at her origins, it’s directly tied to her history in New York. In the first wave of being enlightened in part five, we understand the Queen, who once went by Christine, fled her home for some unknown reason.

Virginia doesn’t know, Tony hasn’t said anything, but she’s fled in distress to Central Park. From what I can glean, she had some sort of emotional break, but I don’t feel comfortable assigning any other kind of mentality to her. It just doesn’t seem appropriate. We just know she’s not well in the head

So as she’s fleeing in distress, she receives a call from a distant voice, an elderly woman’s voice, and suddenly we see a floating, amorphous portal, with an old hag on the other side, coaxing her in. This is the original witch, the original stepmother to Snow White herself.

In the nine kingdoms, the iteration of the story they go with is that Snow White wins out of the queen, and she marries the king and they live a happy life. But t he evil queen, as punishment, was forced to wear white-hot iron slippers on Snow White’s wedding day and dance for them.

I find this interesting, because when Virginia is first captured by the troll’s children in part two, before Wolf saves her, they prepare the same kind of white-hot slippers to torture her. In terms of parallels, this is interesting, given that Virginia is parallel to Snow White and not her mother. 

Maybe it’s a retrospective comment on lineage and shared traits, or maybe it’s just a clever way for the writer’s to insert the imagery much earlier into the story. Whatever the case, after “dancing” for Snow White, the queen is able to drag herself out to a bog, and she calls upon Christine from the other dimension to pick up the mantle of being evil.

The old queen essentially teaches the new queen all of her evil magicks, and bestows all her magic mirrors upon her in the hopes that Christine will destroy the house of White in revenge. Hence the later killing of Wendell’s parents.

In the grand scheme of things, this coincidence of lineage entering the nine kingdoms must be fate, right? Everything that occurs happens because destiny calls for it. I do like the idea of destiny in this story, as it sort of validates the truth that Virginia has something to offer the world around her, lifting her out of the mediocrity she feels relegated to. We’ll get to that comment later.

But it also feels restricting in that same way, in how it takes away one’s personal choice, and the idea of miraculous circumstances taking place due to the whimsy of story, rather than it being ordained by fate. I want Virginia to feel like she has something to offer the world—not because of a magically-enforced coincidence, but because she takes it by storm.

Back to the queen, after the issue with the troll king has been resolved and she’s able to focus more on the dog-turned-prince, I do start to wonder why exactly she turns her sights on Virginia’s crowd. She’s never able to see Virginia or Tony through her spying mirrors because Snow White has placed a magical veil over them both,

what we do know is she becomes informed of these two through the huntsmen, who previously captured and lost Virginia, and through Wolf, who  never so much as claims Virginia is out to stop the Queen. In fact, the Queen is barely on the team’s radar for the first half of the series, if not longer.

The only reason the Queen and Virginia are even forced to be in proximity to one another is because Virginia learns Christine has one of the traveling mirrors which can lead her back home. At some point along the way, Christine just designates Virginia as a threat without much explanation or reasoning.

I think as an audience member we can rationally assume that Christine has gained some foresight on Virginia without knowing the details. She learned of Snow White’s veil magic and assumes this strange girl must be a key threat to her, she just doesn’t know how or why.

Near the end of the story, the troll children do, in fact, capture Wendell the dog and bring him to the Queen, but at the point she’s like, “I don’t need this guy anymore, I need that girl, and I need her dead.” And it’s like, do you even know why yet?

Beyond that, there are some traumatic experiences which unfold between Christine and Virginia, both from the past and in the present, but I’ll get to those in the moment.

In light of nearing some of my more thorough analyses on Virginia and Wolf, I want to make a pit stop at point number five:

#5: THE TENTH KINGDOM: OUT OF CONTEXT

Instead of just describing all the random bits and quotes that I love to you, I put together this compilation for you guys to enjoy and perhaps convince you to watch the show, so please enjoy.

[compilation of favorite funny clips]

That was nice, wasn’t it? So moving onto point number six,

#6: A RETURN TO OUR MAIN CHARACTERS

We’re nearing the end of the video, and now that we’ve gotten past the point where I had to skirt around spoilers, I really wanted to dive into who Virginia is, and who Wolf is. I don’t think I properly gave them their dues when introducing the series, and that’s because you can only say so much without giving everything away.

To start slightly smaller, I want to give focus to Wolf, who uniquely straddles the line between good and… well, it’s difficult to call him bad, because even at the one point where you think he may make a downward descent into evil, it’s never because he actively wants to become evil. 

On all other accounts, Wolf is just “some guy: who just happens to be tagging along with the gang because he wants to. As I described previously in the video, Wolf’s motivation in the series isn’t to find the mirror and help Virginia home.

Rather, his ultimate desire is to make Virginia realize he’s the one for her, and make her see that she loves him. Wolf begins the series in this manic state, so when he first encounters Virginia, he’s very wild, and he confuses his attraction for her with his desire to capture prey. He’s mostly just hungry, in every sense of the word. He wants to be sated and comforted, and to feel full—both with food and love.

It's only after he’s been out of jail for a while and he’s able to loose all this manic energy that he starts to think more rationally. It’s here that you may wonder as an audience member, is Wolf going to forget about his infatuation with Virginia and do something more in line with the Queen’s will?

After all, she was the reason he’d been released. He effectively owes a magical debt to her, and in the meantime, he has to pay the price of that debt by getting harassed by the Queen as her face shows up in the moon, or sticks out of a water trough. It’s weird.

But no, he doesn’t abandon Virginia. And I think what’s so bizarre and interesting about Wolf is that, once he sets his sights on Virginia, even while he was trying to eat her grandmother, he recognized something real and powerful within himself: love. 

Wolves in the nine kingdoms have an innate sensitivity. Mostly this is just to make them aware of scents nearby or when someone’s feeling a certain way. But I think it also gives them a very powerful sense of intuition, to trust in one’s instincts and their aspiring will. In effect, this makes Wolf the master of his own emotions.

But we also learn that Wolf has never been in love. It seems like hat’s the norm for people of wolfkind—that once they meet their first lover, that’s it for them. They become mates for life and live happily ever after, or as he describes, they die of terrible causes. 

The thing is, with Wolf, he lays all his feelings out on the table, even when those feelings aren’t fully developed. It allows for honest and open communication, like when you’re excited after a first date and can’t help but text the other person like five times in a row. 

Wolf sees what he wants, and he isn’t afraid of revealing that fact, even if it makes him vulnerable, and he shrugs at what other people might feel ashamed in admitting so plainly.

While this may be called honesty, I’d also call this naivete, which may partially be because he’s never connected to a girl like this before. And this holds fairly strong repercussions for Wolf and Virginia down the line, when these emotions become more serious and Wolf receives the first sign of mutual affection.

So let’s enter the story around the time our heroes enters Kissing Town. By this time Wolf and Virginia have bonded platonically together on various occasions, and Virginia has allowed herself to trust Wolf. Wolf, on the other hand, is continuing to express his desires for Virginia romantically, but this behavior slowly becomes more restrained as they travel along.

I would say entering Kissing Town is something of an unfair advantage for Wolf when it comes to his and Virginia’s budding relationship. Kissing Town seems to pump this aphrodisiac of love through the air to all of its citizens and tourists, and what we know is that no two people can start falling for each other in this town unless seeds of romance are already in place.

But I’d say that visiting Kissing Town runs the risk of advancing affections way too quickly. In a way, as a viewer I’m a bit uncomfortable at the idea that I could swoon under circumstances I wouldn’t usually swoon. So I want to say, yes, the way Virginia is treating Wolf is genuine. But her responses and affections seem provoked in a way that, in retrospect, makes me side eye the entire town.

I also want to give Wolf the benefit of the doubt, because while he leans into these exaggerating emotions, I don’t think he’s pushing Virginia along intentionally. This is just the way their world works, and both of them are aware of the magic in the air, so they effectively consent. But when Wolf can see a potentially romantic happily-ever-after on the horizon, things go awry.

So let’s back up again. Virginia’s big goal in this series is to get home, no matter what. Wolf’s, however, is that he simply wants to “win” the girl of his dreams. Previous to this section of the plot, their motivations coincide because Wolf can simply assist Virginia in her plans.

Consider also: there’s this running gag during their travels that Wolf is reading a seemingly endless pile of self-help books he stole from a book fair in New York City, all which focus on self-improvement and winning the girl of his dreams.

Their entrance into Kissing Town perfectly coincides with Wolf reading the last page of the last book, and with their guidance, he feels equipped to moderate himself, and reign in this off-putting carnal behavior to become a better man. 

Previously he’s uselessly, openly pined for Virginia, but there hasn’t been much emotional heft or maturity to it, so Virginia ignores it or looks past it. But finishing that last book propels Wolf into finally stepping up and making a move on Virginia, and this is where their motivations noticeably begin to split.

In short, the rift plays out in very ugly fashion once Virginia realizes Wolf is acting selfishly. Let’s bring in some context to set the scene:

The reason they are in Kissing Town in the first place is to obtain their magic mirror. However, its magic is discovered while it’s being stored at an auction house, and the mirror is appraised at 5,000 Wendells, which is the currency in the fourth kingdom. And that’s way too expensive.

In an effort to make up that money before the auction, the team divides their measly thirty Wendells amongst the three humans and they split up at a casino, aiming to hit it big. Tony and Virginia separately fail, but Wolf ends up winning ten thousand gold Wendells while no one is watching.

Instead of giving Virginia this money or even telling her about it, he dreams up a plan to woo her and convince Virginia to marry him. Following through with that plan entails spending a ludicrous amount of money on a carriage ride, a luxurious nine-course meal, and an anthropomorphized engagement ring that speaks in rhyme. This also leaves him with nothing to spend on the auction.

What you can evidently observe of Wolf’s behavior is that he fails to take into account the reality of who Virginia really is, and prioritizes the idea of loving her and living happily together rather than the reality of what she wants and values: to get home.

Self-help books and written advice can of course teach us how to improves ourselves, genuinely, but in Wolf’s case, many of these books are laughably superficial, and lack substance compared to real human connection. Devouring a book called “How to Marry the Girl of Your Dreams” isn’t going to help when Virginia’s first goal isn’t to fall in love.

So while he may be learning to hold in his panting tongue and act like a trained pup, he isn’t considering either person involved—not Virginia’s wants and needs, nor the person inside himself who needs to grow up a little rather than curb a few surface-level mannerisms.

In a situation such as this, Wolf’s understanding of love is portrayed as sickly sweet, idyllic—their arrival in Kissing Town, where gentle music is playing and heart-shaped fireworks shoot off, bolster this idea, is no coincidence. Wolf’s definition of love is confronted as false when his actions betray Virginia entirely—revealing it as superficial, hollow, and more than anything else, selfish.

He may love Virginia, but more than that, he childishly loves the idea of being in love, and that ultimately leads him to not having Virginia at all. They lose the auction, they lose the mirror, and Wolf wasted their one chance of getting home. So they break up.

This is when he looks in a mirror and the Queen tempts him to join the dark side, and he tearfully, silently accepts. So let’s put a pin in Wolf for a second and shift our discussion to Virginia.

The problem Virginia faces on a character level works twofold within the overarching narrative: first, she’s complacent in her personal world; she feels stuck, permanently relegated to mediocrity, destined to live a boring life. 

As we remember, she lives with her dad in a run-down apartment and works as a waitress. As far as we know, she has no professional or romantic prospects, and what we do see is that she faces her world with a concerningly ambivalent disposition—it leaves her no room to grow, only to dwell in what she already has, and has lost.

Expanding on this, Virginia has some compelling narration lines in part one before Prince runs into her: 

“I guess you get to a certain age and you realize nothing exciting is ever going to happen to you. And maybe that’s just the way it is. You know, maybe some people just have quiet lives.” 

It’s kind of sad. The second half of that fold is Virginia is also angry at her world for being this way, and angry about the circumstances that led her here, allegedly—the loss of her mother, affecting her potential, and the ineptitude of her father, making her feel stuck in place.

In effect, Virginia feels a loss of power, or more accurately: a complete lack of agency, and she blames it on everyone without attempting to make change. Whether that judgment is fair or accurate gets confronted in the story itself, but this is where she begins. 

Virginia feels the circumstances of her world are out of her control because they are not perfect, so she effectively resigns herself to leading this boring life to spare herself from the possibility of trying her hardest and experiencing failure, heartbreak, or loss.

Later, in Kissing Town, when she starts falling for Wolf, Virginia even admits to him this exact sentiment before kissing him, which just goes to show how much effort she put into letting down her emotional walls: 

“I have hard time trusting people. I just never wanna jump unless… I’m sure somebody’s gonna catch me.”

This ties in especially well with a line from Wolf in part three, where we see how a full moon dramatically affects his disposition, making him mean, and at certain points, brutally honest:

“You’re pretending to live, Virginia! You’re doing everything but actually living! You’re driving me crazy!”

Lastly, and I’d say the first time this anger is revealed, comes in part two, when Virginia is having her fortune told by an enchantress, and the enchantress plainly states Virginia never forgave her mother for leaving them. 

At that point, it was shocking to the viewer, because up until then, we mostly understood Virginia to be this meek character, who shies away from the harsh reality of a progressing world so she can relegate herself to mediocrity and avoid the risk of trying her damnedest. In many ways, the nine kingdoms is just an active, lived-world confrontation of her own mental baggage.

To continue that though, in a larger sense, we can consider Virginia’s goal throughout the story—to get home—is, in large part, motivated by her need to return to that boring world, to try less again, to be unchallenged.

We can safely say that this anger is a plot point which survives into the end of the series, but the complacency and lack of agency is confronted earlier, in part three, not long after Wolf angrily yells at her that she isn’t living.

I won’t dive too much into this section because it involves a very good mystery I don’t want to spoil, but at one point, in order to obtain the mirror, Virginia has to dress up like a shepherdess in order to… well, win a shepherdess competition.

Virginia initially protests and wants to say no to the idea, but knows she has to take extreme action to reach her goal. Instead of employing shady tactics like stealing the mirror under everyone’s noses, Virginia finally, confidently leans into her world’s fantastical circumstances. She approaches the competition in full shepherdess regalia and faces her opponents with a head held high.

I think this hurdle she faces is truly overcome when she sings a farm animal rendition of Queen’s “We Will Rock You,” creatively re-titled “We Will Shear You,” which for copyright reasons I have to leave out entirely. I’ll leave that whole half of the arc there.

The other half, this anger, which we know is primarily aimed at her mother, is really only confronted in the final act of the story when Virginia must be in proximity of Christine.

For context, Virginia, Tony, and Wendell are trying to locate a new traveling mirror, and learn that it resides in the Palace of White, which, coincidentally, is the same place the Queen is currently staying. Previously, the Queen has been hiding in the dog-prince’s coattails as he prepares for his coronation, and he’s just recently arrived at the castle after a long disappearance.

But where did they learn this information? You might ask. Well, Virginia learned it from Snow White. Like, actual Snow White, which the story has confirmed to be dead for quite a while. 

To spare you the details, Virginia, without the presence of her father, encounters Snow White’s final resting place, which is a snowy cave deep in the underground of the ninth kingdom. Snow White appears out of a flurry of white, to help impart some wisdom and assistance to Virginia on her journey.

Snow White really is the bad bitch that calls out Virginia on all the shit she’s been repressing since her childhood. Snow White reveals that she, in her new role as pseudo-fairy godmother, has been the one to veil the queen from the image of Virginia and Tony. But Snow White warns Virginia that now is the time to see and be seen. 

This is calling back the dregs of Virginia’s complacency and lack of agency in the world, and it’s obvious that despite her evident growth within the story, idealistically, she’s still clutching onto her old ways, hoping uselessly that the status quo can return once she reaches New York. But Snow White effectively says that’s impossible:

“That is why you must now take charge. He needs you to save his kingdom, we all do.”

Virginia: “Me? No, I think you have the wrong person.”

“I have the right person. I’ve been waiting for you, Virginia.”

And here is where Snow White imparts her own story, her very own fairytale and the embedded moral therein, to Virginia. She describes being antagonized by the queen, nearly killed by the huntsmen, and soon protected and cared for by the seven dwarves.

Then there’s the part where the wicked queen attempts to visit her and kill her, which I really don’t think I can paraphrase well without losing some of the gravity of the story, so I’ll just play the excerpt now:

“Her mirrors found me eventually. She dressed as an older peddler and climbed over the seven hills to my house. Twice she came, once with a corset to crush my ribs, and then with a poison comb to drug me. But the last time she came, she brought the most beautiful basket of apples that I ever saw. And this time she stayed to watch me die. And to be sure, she held me in her arms until I died in front of her choking on a piece of poison apple.

“And I often think, ‘Why did I let her in? Didn’t I know she was bad?’ I did. Of course I did. But I also knew that I couldn’t keep the door closed all my life, just because it was dangerous, just because there was a chance that I might get hurt.”

The way I respond to Snow White’s version of the fairy tale is complex. My first response, because I like to put faith in the good intentions of the screenwriters, is that I really like it. This does apply to Virginia’s narrative in a very integral way. 

Again, Virginia’s problem is that she thinks she’s stuck in mediocrity, and she’s fearful of what could happen if she tried to live life fully and failed at it. In that respect, Virginia’s personal growth is largely about taking charge of one’s own story, and taking those risks for the betterment of one’s self. 

Moving past complacency, for better or for worse. In this way, Snow White’s advice is really moving, because it’s general life advice.

But more practically speaking within the series’ overarching narrative, it’s only at the end of part four that we truly see how Virginia’s character development will be put to the test. When Virginia, Tony and Wendell escape the ninth kingdom’s mines, Virginia learns that the evil Queen at large is her mother, the one who ran out on her family when Virginia was a child.

So thinking back now, when watching Snow White’s scene for the first time, the lesson for Virginia in the caves understandably wouldn’t or shouldn’t be perceived as literal guidance. It exists more as an allegory which Virginia could potentially apply to her character and gradually learn from. 

But now it’s become a very one-to-one narrative between evil queen and daughter, and at that point you really have to turn back to Snow White and interrogate her story less as a floating moral and, perhaps partially, as a piece of concrete instruction.

In that sense, Snow White’s direct advice to Virginia is that she needs to face someone who once abused her, controlled her, and ultimately neglected her. Virginia doesn’t remember that she was a victim of abuse because she��s repressed those memories, but Snow White, being a magic fairy godmother, likely possesses some knowledge of Virginia and the Queen’s past. 

She’s advocating for Virginia to risk her health and safety, and even in a magical universe with fantastical circumstances, that doesn’t sit right with me.

So sure, face your metaphorical demons, learn about yourself from intense self-reflection and grab life by the horns. But my second response is that maybe this is completely out of pocket. Snow White fully died, at least temporarily, in her retelling of the fairytale, so what are the moral implications in advising Virginia to allow the same (or similar) to happen to her?  

Previous to this, I haven’t really touched on this reveal of abuse either, because I felt it was a touch early. But we have talked about how Christine ran out to Central Park in a flashback, in distress and clearly having some kind of emotional break.

And that’s because, just prior to this, Christine is giving Virginia a bath while Tony is at work. Virginia is stated to be only seven in this scene. The water appears to be near boiling, and when she’s in the bath, Christine ends up trying to drown Virginia.

The only reason Virginia even survived is because Tony came home and caught Christine in the act, and presumably feeling ashamed and erratic, Christine flees. Obviously there’s no excuse for this violence, but we never properly get an explanation for what provoked this behavior in Christine.

At the end of the day, I get it—that detail isn’t important. What’s important is Virginia, and how this affected her life moving. But it still leaves me with a lot of questions. This abuse turns out to be a reveal to Virginia because she repressed the memory, so all she’s left with is both admiration and unplaced anger for her mother.

Now, Snow White had given Virginia a small hand mirror to ask a single question, and to answer, the mirror reveals the face of the Queen, Christine, who senses someone is watching her. This is what spurs on this recollection of resentment and childhood trauma. Tony can’t hold off the truth from Virginia because they need to get to the bottom of this.

And honestly, up to this point, yes, this series is iconic for me because of its world building, its magic, its comedy and it funny characters. But seemingly out of nowhere, as a culmination of all these more series scenes, we get a genuinely compelling monologue from Virginia, where she finally opens the floodgates:

“Well I knew she'd come back 'cause she'd left all her clothes, you know, she loved her clothes more than anything in the world. And I kept going into her room and checking on them. And then after a few months you suddenly said that we had to get rid of them all, so…

“I remember folding them all very neatly, and I kept hoping that there was going to be a, you know, a secret note or something that would be written for me, you know, just to me, telling me that she loved me and explaining the secret magical reason why she had to go, you know?

“... and I miss her. And I hate her. And I miss her. And I feel like I was on a train and it crashed or something, and no one came and rescued me.”

I think the power and value of this scene extends far past the confines of the magical world the story itself works within. When I previously heard Tony describing that a younger Virginia only wanted to hear the good things about her mother, I think, “Oh, that naïve-sounding behavior seems to contradict all the anger we heard about previously,” but this monologue from Virginia really lays out all of her feelings in a complex, human way.

The thing is, real human emotion is often complex and contradictory and, in that way, can feel incomprehensible to a person, and the feelings themselves often feel irreconcilable within one’s self. How are you supposed to feel when a person who was supposed to love and care for you more than anyone else in the world up and leaves without reason? How do you negotiate feeling hatred for a person who you so desperately want love and validation and connection from? 

One of the strongest lines in this monologue, I think, is the simple repetition of, “I miss her, and I hate her, and I miss her.” These feeling work in tandem, and this brief mantra actually reveals the fact that what Virginia is feeling isn’t incomprehensible or irreconcilable. 

She hates her because she misses her, and what’s left behind is scorn and scars which affect how Virginia approaches the world. 

You can only really feel loss and betrayal and hurt when it’s about a person that really means something to you, and having to learn that lesson in such a concrete way might make you never put your trust in other people ever again. The possibility of feeling that same hurt is worse than just living your life without passion or genuine connection.

So I get why Virginia acts the way she does, and as a viewer, I’m able to rationally and empathetically reconcile how someone can come across as meek and hopeful, while also coming across as disillusioned to the world and resentful of the people in it. It’s not a reveal or a twist in the traditional sense, but part five of this story really gives you the catharsis necessary to understand and connect to the characters. 

Being honest here, if you’ve ever come from a broken home, or struggled from a sense of abandonment, following Virginia’s story and being hit with this surprisingly honest narrative really helps to put in perspective one’s own emotions, and I’m really grateful to the series—I’d say it’s one of the main reasons I keep it close to my heart.

After this point, all we really have left is our team’s travel to the Palace of White, where the coronation is set to happen on the same evening they plan to enter the building and use the mirror, sort of like a cover.

I’ll keep the rest of Wolf’s narrative vague simply because I can, but along the way to the castle, Virginia and Tony are saved by Wolf, and he rejoins their last leg of the journey. Yes, the last we saw, Wolf submitted to the Queen’s will, and you can keep that in your back pocket. 

But for all intents and purposes, Wolf is a good man. He’s taken time to reflect, and he’s matured, and he’s there for Virginia in her time of need, supporting her because he loves her, rather than thinking selfishly.

Virginia still has an impending battle she must face, but just before the climax, the two truly make a proper reunion, and having learned a lot about herself with the help of Snow White, Virginia is ready to let go of her unnecessary precautions. The two of them are able to face each other as honest equals, and they consummate their relationship in the woods outside the castle. 

In moving onto the real finale of the series, I hesitate in addressing Virginia’s actual confrontation with her mother. Virginia has effectively grown, fully, as a character, and mostly needs closure on this relationship she came to resent so much.

It’s more interesting, I think, to take the perspective Christine with the last few moments, because in finally seeing Virginia in front of her, her reactions range from cruelty to denial to, at least by the queen’s standards, a kind of empathy.

In their first meeting, it’s when our team of heroes is first caught on the palace grounds. At this point, the Queen has taken over the castle from the inside, having threatened the entire staff into silence and submission. So they’re brought to the Queen pretty quickly, and Christine receives a flashback of Virginia, of bathing her.

She starts in a place of complete denial, thinking Virginia is using some strange magic to trick her memory, but it’s interesting after that. Without even a visual indicator of revelation, once Virginia starts asking the Queen questions about their history, she immediately claims that past as her own, but twists it. 

Virginia: “Why did you leave me?”

Queen: “You were unwanted. That’s plain to see. Haven’t you always known that? Secretly? That you were the ugly duckling? The sad thing is, your little quest has given you delusions of grandeur. You started to think you’re capable of great things. You were right in the first place—you’re plain. Plain, and ugly.”

She makes herself out to be a proper one-note antagonist, rather than the complex human person she really was, and still is. She was legitimately abusive and mentally unwell, but in the same breath, there was a part of Christine that really loved Virginia. I think that’s the toughest part of the entire series, the way abuse and love are consistently interwoven.

Instead of confronting that complexity, Christine uses their past as a weapon to separate herself even further from Virginia. Living in this world and becoming the evil Queen effectively works as a mechanism for Christine to distance herself from the responsibility of her actions, from her humanity and the faults of being human. 

In many ways, Christine’s disposition mirrors previous commentary I’ve observed about Faith from the Buffy series, who takes the route of evil as a means of repression and deflection. In that same scene, Christine deludes herself so greatly that she tries to kill Virginia, but when Virginia successfully defends herself, instead of properly going on the offensive, she stays vulnerable.

This is where Virginia’s new lesson, of trying your damnedest despite the possibility of failure, really shines through. She asks her mother, very simply, “In your whole life, did you ever love me?” Knowing that she could be hurt again, knowing that she could be rebuffed.

This, in effect, triggers the flashback of a younger Christine running away in central park, and the memory effects Christine:

“Oh, that’s not me!”

She looks almost repentant, but the expression fades away when the huntsman approaches and brings her back. 

After that scene, and feeling conflicted enough, Christine doesn’t kill her. Instead, she tells the Huntsman to lock her up with Tony. That in itself is the empathy Christine shows, I think. It’s the bare minimum—letting Virginia live—but it’s nothing a truly evil Queen would’ve allowed.

I’ll spare you the political conclusion to the story with Wendell, because I think it’s fun and also, Wendell’s story of personal growth is pretty simple, so I don’t feel the need to explore it in depth. It’s better to watch and feel thrilled than hear me dryly explain it away.

But midway through that arc’s conclusion, we do receive our final scene with Virginia and with the Queen. She and Tony have escaped from the prison cell, but yet again, Virginia is caught and brought to the Queen by the Huntsmen. 

Again, instead of opting to have Virginia killed, the Queen makes an uncharacteristically sympathetic decision and decides to let Virginia go:

V: “Are you gonna kill me as well?” Q: “I was going to let you go. I don’t know why—” V: “You know why.” Q: “Go. Leave me, get out while you can.” V: “No.”

This objection from Virginia is a reflection on her character growth. To try and love despite the possibility of heartbreak. Christine can’t handle it, and tries to deny her more blatantly:

Q: “You were nothing but an accident! You should have been killed at birth.”

[Virginia takes charge and slaps her..]

V: “How dare you. How dare you speak to me like that.”

I think that final slap really shows in practe how Virginia has taken to being an active participant in the world. She’s able to express vulnerability, she has an emboldened sense of agency, and she’s able to stand up against her abuser.

I’m going to spoil the last big plot twist of the series. So take that as your warning, pause now. That means you, Cheyenne.

After she slaps Christine, they get into a tousle, and the Queen tries to strangle Virginia. But do you remember that poisonous comb we briefly mentioned in the tier list? Christine is wearing that in her hair as a fascinator, and both women know that it’s laced with a deadly poison.

In order to, you know, not die of asphyxiation, Virginia takes the single opportunity available to her and grabs the comb, and lightly scratches Christine on the cheek. But it’s enough to do damage:

[Scene where Queen walks away and collapses]

“It’s too late… don’t cry, my little girl. My little girl… I gave away my soul.”

Oh yeah, and not to disparage this scene, but I recently spotted the lace on this damn wig, and oh my god, it’s so bad. Not to ruin the mood or anything.

So yeah, Virginia kills her own mother. The evil is dead, and Christine, in the last moment of her life, is able to be the woman she once was—or at least, the good part of her, the loving part of her, no matter how small or tucked away it was.

And that’s all I wanted to analyze in terms of the plot. Feel free to sit back, take a breather, and resonate in the emotional moment of the climax. Because we’re moving onto the end pretty quickly.

So! Point number seven:

#7: MY IDEAS FOR A SEQUEL

In the denouement of the series, we see Wolf and Virginia return to New York City to live out their life in peace. Tony, in the end, did not go with them because Wendell offered him a very integral role in his royal cabinet, so our two lovebirds are on their own. Here is the very last monologue we receive from Virginia:

“But that’s not this story. This story is done. And, when you live every day with all your heart, then you can be happy ever after, even if it’s only for a short time. My name is Virginia, and I live on the edge of the forest… and this is the end of the first book of the tenth kingdom.”

Did you hear that? Did you hear that little bit about the first book of the tenth kingdom? I know I did when I was like, seven. And also when I was twelve, and fifteen, and twenty-two, and today. Basically, any time I ever watched this series. And every time, I hoped that there was some sort of sequel in the works. 

But no! It never happens! However! If you look up Simon Moore, the creator and writer of the 10th Kingdom and find his AngelFire site page, you can see he did have plans, or at least a plot synopsis, for a part two of the series. I assume it was stuck in development hell or NBC and Hallmark never really gave it a shot.

Apparently it would be called House of Wolves, and it was set to take place in the kingdom of little red riding hood, the second kingdom. Wolf and Virginia happily run a restaurant together, and they have small a wolf baby, and Virginia wants to place a charm or something on her baby to make it look human. I don’t know.

Anyway, besides that, the second kingdom has intensive prejudices against wolves, which makes sense given the original fairytale, and there’s a school for young ladies, and Virginia and Wolf are set to get married under a full moon. There’s a lot of working parts, and it all sounds very exciting, but without a proper plot breakdown from Moore, it sounds like a big jumble

But I don’t know! I have faith in the guy. I think the story he crafted the first time around is incredibly memorable.

That said, when I think about how much time has passed since the series originally launched, naturally, much of the cast may not want to take part because they’ve moved onto other projects, and the cast that remains likely looks markedly old. 

And while they could recast the main characters and continue on with this story as-is, I can’t help but excitedly dwell on the alternatives.

My fantasy sequel would be that we get the main cast back, but given it’s been twenty-two years since the premier, we accept that twenty-two years have passed in-universe rather than a six-month time skip. Maybe it’s selfish, but I want to see what a fully-grown adult raised by Virginia and Wolf looks like.

To continue with this idea, maybe this son of theirs has never been able to visit the nine kingdoms since he was a child, and the entire family has effectively been cut off from the other dimension for unknown reasons. After all, the New York portal is amorphous and temporary, and is only available when engaged with on the opposite end. 

Before I move on to the rest of my idea, I did take notes throughout my original viewing of the series of loose threads or details that I find interesting and want to bring back around for a sequel.

We know that three traveling mirrors exist. The first was accidentally destroyed by Tony in Kissing Town, and the second one is now pristinely taken care of in the Palace of White. We learn through an anthropomorphic, all-knowing mirror that a third traveling mirror exists in their world, but it’s been long-lost in the great Northern Sea, sitting on a bed of barnacles.

The troll children are still alive. We don’t know what happens to them, but last we see, they are knocked out by Tony in the basement of the palace. However, there’s never any news that they’ve been apprehended, so we can safely assume all three escaped.

When Virginia is talking with Snow White in the cave, Snow White says this very vague line: “You will be a great adviser to other lost girls.” Who are those lost girls? We don’t know. That could be a throwaway line, but for our sake, that’s sequel bait.

Prince Wendell pardons all wolves in the nation. And while this is nice, this mostly seems like a hollow gesture, and something that would be difficult for their nation of people to accept. Knowing now what Simon Moore’s plans were for a sequel series, we can roughly say this is in line with his ideas.

Wendell hires Tony to singlehandedly bring upon an industrial revolution in the fourth kingdom. I’m not exactly a superfan of steampunk, but what I can get behind is steampunk with a magical twist.

So if we’re thinking back to our version of the sequel, I’m going to say that, unbeknownst to Wolf, Virginia, and their unnamed son, (let’s just call him Andrew, for simplicity’s sake) the second mirror that was pristinely kept by the palace of White has been destroyed by unknown insurgents.

Having been cut off from their world, Wolf, Virginia, and Andrew don’t receive any communication for years on end. That is, until they receive a trans-dimensional message from Tony, who indicates he is in trouble, and needs their help. But the message is fairly vague.

At the same time, Central Park inexplicably floods with oceanwater, and overlooking the scene from the now-refurbished apartment Virginia once lived in with Tony, our family understands that something miraculous has occurred: the ocean portal has been opened.

I’m not exactly a screenwriter, so I don’t have a fully fleshed-out idea on how they accomplish this yet, but I want them to travel through the portal and get shot out on the other end, finding themselves in the open ocean, trapped in the fishing net of some swashbuckling pirate trolls, along with the barnacle mirror.

Through hijinks, once they’re collected on board, I want there to be a separation of Virginia from Wolf and their son. Maybe they negotiate their freedom so long as one person stays behind, and taking responsibility, Virginia volunteers herself, much to the others’ dismay. In the aftermath, Wolf and Andrew are abandoned on the shores of the second kingdom.

Through a series of events, we learn that the second kingdom has invaded the fourth kingdom and vested control of its palace. We know the fourth king itself is very desirable land because of its strategic central location on their continent, so this isn’t a complete shock to Wolf or Andrew, who has been filled in on the old politics.

The rest of my plot a lot more loosey-goosey. I want there to be a new a character, a rogue, nymph-like girl wearing a red clock who has defected from a ladies school in favor of rebellion, and knows where Tony—along with Wendell, and a smattering of other royal cabinet members—are secretly sheltering. 

Part one, the first movie, would deal with the mystery of a flooded central park and our family’s travels through the portal, and the troubling negotiations with the pirates. Meanwhile part two begins with meeting this girl, who we’ll call Red, and traveling through the second kingdom. 

I want them to be chased and caught by second kingdom-appointed bounty hunters in league with the ladies school. I think this would also be a good place where it’s revealed that Red is the younger sister of the second kingdom’s queen, who is occupying the palace of White.

In order to continue their journey, Wolf and Andrew have to perform a heist and rescue her. Meanwhile, Virginia effectively vests control of the pirate crew by appealing to the female trolls and spouting feminist rhetoric, and talking about the advances of society in the tenth kingdom. With their help, they drop her off in the port town they last left Wolf and Andrew, and she’s accompanied by two of her troll crew.

Part three, perhaps Wolf, Andrew and Red come across Tony and the gang. My plot gets a bit vague here, because in truth, I only just came up with this as I typed up my script, so it’s really all in the air. 

There would be army of the second kingdom’s forces led by Red’ sister terrorizing the landscape, and maybe Virginia makes a detour to the troll kingdom and appeals to the three troll children from the first series. They know she didn’t kill their father, so perhaps things are fine. 

They’re still stupid, and while they don’t care for Virginia, they love chaos and war, so they back her by supplying her with an army. I don’t know. This is starting to sound like some Game of Thrones shit and I might be losing some of the magic and whimsy, so I’ll leave my ideas there.

The point is, the series is absolutely rife with sequel, or even series potential, and I’m mad at the world for letting Simon Moore and myself down. I need the content. Someone hire me for the content. I’m a writer. I have a master’s degree for it and everything.

And that leads me to the end of this video. We can call this point number eight simply for the sake of ending on a structured note:

#8: CONCLUSION

As a review of this entire video and the process of putting it together, I have to say I absolutely had a blast, especially because reviewing a smaller amount of content really gave me a lot of room to talk about the characters and the plots in more detail. I didn’t want this channel to just be a one-off: it’s something I really look forward to doing and have a lot of passion for,.

Beyond that, I’d like to thank you guys for watching, I sincerely hope you enjoyed. Please give this video a thumbs up and consider subscribing if that’s the case, because this is just the beginning. Also, comment if you’re a fan of the Tenth Kingdom, or gave it a shot because of this video, because I look forward to hearing what you guys have to say. Talk again soon.

[mommymooze]

Angelic Vision

Claude x Reader

Angelic Vision

“You look like an angel. Have you come to take me to heaven?“ Claude lies on the ground, the back of his hand across his brow.

“No, but when I pull that arrow out of you it’s going to hurt like hell.” You say as you put your knee on his chest and with both hands pull the arrow back out of Claude’s shoulder.

“Yeeowch!” Claude hollers.

You then pour healing magic into his shoulder, feeling the muscles weaving themselves back together. You stand up reaching out your hand for his other hand to help Claude up from the ground.

“Go easy on it. If you reinjure it, go find Marianne because I’m not going to fix it again.” You tell him before running off to the next injured party.

Hilda walks up to stand by the House Leader of the Golden Deer. “Why do the super smart ones always have to be so pissy?”

“Beats me, if they would loosen up or relax a little, they would have a lot more fun.” Claude shrugs.

Mail is delivered and there is a shipment of three boxes for you. Pretty darn heavy boxes. You carry them one at a time from the front gate to your room. Unlocking and opening your door you suddenly find you are not alone. Claude gives a look of shock at the number of books in your room. One entire wall is nothing but books.

“You do know they have a library here.” Claude quips

“It is useless for my research.” You grumble. “The books are old and out of date. They also do not have any ancient texts that may have useful yet forgotten applications.”

Claude is looking at the subjects and titles. “Hey mind if I borrow a few?” You raise an eyebrow at him. “I’ll think about it. “

You’ve been hanging out with Linhardt a lot lately. He’s supposed to be helping with a project you’re working on.

“When I saw them in the library, they were getting pretty cozy.” Hilda snarkily jests.

Claude decides there is a book that he must have right now from the library. He walks in to see you back to back with a very unconscious Linhardt. You’re trying to support him with your back so he doesn’t fall over completely while you are still reading your book. You look trapped?

“Having fun?” Claude grins.

“Yeah. When Lin’s on empty he just crashes. Since Caspar isn’t here, well, I don’t want him to fall and get hurt. I can’t move him.” You groan

Claude helps you get the sleeping cleric to a couch to catch his z’s.

“Thanks. Squishy magic users don’t quite have the strength for these things.”

“I’d be happy to help you out with anything.” Claude smiles. “Call me and I’ll be there!”

You spend the afternoon gathering plants and mushrooms in the nearby woods for your studies. You’ve been working on creating antitoxins and other cures for poisons. You have several bags tied to your waist with different plants in them. Just as you’re about to reach for a particularly ugly and poisonous mushroom you hear a voice calling out your name.

“Hey! Those are really poisonous. You better watch out!”

“Oh Claude, of course I know they are poisonous. How am I supposed to make a potion to neutralize them if I don’t collect them?” You roll your eyes at him.

“Since when have you been interested in poisons?” He raises an eyebrow at you.

“Since Leonie took that poison arrow last battle. We didn’t have anything to counteract it and she had to suffer for over a week until the poison made it through her system.”

“You’re right. He muses. “Maybe we can work together on them sometime?”

An envelope is sealed and addressed to you. It’s the regular update from your father. Sitting down in the dining hall you groan miserably as you read.

Hilda has to know what is troubling you. “Family feud?”

“Just kill me now.” You whine.

She pats you on the shoulder. “Can’t be that bad, can it?”

“My father. I love him dearly but he meddles so much. He agreed that I could come here to further my learning. But…” You hesitate.

She looks at you, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“He told me I have to find myself a husband, preferably a noble while here. I am extremely busy with class work, spell practice, spell development, antidote, and concoction creation. I hardly have time to sleep. Oh, and don’t forget Byleth’s special projects. The guys want someone fun and outgoing like you. You’re cute and entertaining and I’m a dowdy old bookworm.”

“Awww. I am pretty awesome, that’s true.” Hilda grins. “You just need a fake boyfriend while your father is here. I bet I can find someone to help you.”

“Not Sylvain. I will kill myself.” You frown.

“I gotcha fam. Give me the deets and I will set you up.”

“Thanks Hils I owe ya.” You curtsey to her.

“Sky watch for the next month to start, hmmmm…” She ponders.

Later that evening Hilda corners Claude. “One big fat amazing opportunity has just dropped into your lap, loverboy. You better not mess this up!”

“Do tell…” Claude winks.

Tomorrow is the day your father is to arrive. You find Hilda to see if she has anything set for you. Hilda says she’s got everything under control. You’re shaking in your boots, the only thing going through your mind is that your father is going to drag you out of here kicking and screaming because you don’t have a boyfriend.

The day arrives. Standing next to the gatekeeper you watch as the carriage rolls closer and closer to the front gate. Suddenly an arm slides around your back and a familiar voice speaks, “Shouldn’t we go down and greet your father, my deer?” You look up into the sparkling emerald green eyes of Claude. Blushing terribly, you can only nod as you walk down the steps to greet your father.

Your father rushes to you with both arms open to give you a hug and spin you half way around in a circle. “My baby. It’s been so long. In these few short months I daresay you’ve grown in to a fine woman. So beautiful.” Your fathers’ cheeks are rosy and eyes are filled with love for his only daughter. “And who is this young man?” He curiously asks.

“My apologies, father.” You are gasping for breath. “This is Claude von Riegan.

Grandson to-”

Your father finishes your statement. “The Duke of the Leister Alliance!”

“And her beau.” Claude announces proudly, first bowing to your father then taking your hand and intertwines your fingers before placing a gentle kiss onto your knuckles. Your face flushes redder than a summer tomato.

Claude continues to hold your hand as he escorts the both of you to your room. The future Duke and your father are already excitedly discussing Leister business, trade and the safety of trade routes.

“I will leave you to your visit. I’ll be back in time to take you both for a grand lunch in town just across the way.” Claude smiles as he bows to your father and kisses your hand again before he leaves, his cape swishing as he turns.

You open your door to find a small table with a pitcher of ice cold water and lemons as well as two glasses and a small stack of cakes. A beautiful bouquet of daisies and roses accompanies them. Two comfortable and decorative chairs are alongside of the table. You swear you recall those chairs were in Seteth’s office not too long ago.

“Please take a seat, father.” You pour him some of the deliciously refreshing chilled water. “Tell me about your trip.” Trying to keep him focused on what has been going on at home. Every time he tries to ask about your relationship with Claude, you ask about your brothers or your aunt, anything to steer the conversation away from you. An opportune knock on the door disrupts your fathers latest attempt to discuss your relationship with the grandson of Duke Riegan.

“My apologies, we do have a reservation for lunch in town.” Claude bows deeply to the both of you. As you leave your room, Claude swiftly takes your hand. You smile nervously at him. This man is a master of deception.

Claude manages the conversation with entertaining stories of Byleth and the Golden Deer. He makes certain to include some accounts of your healing accomplishments, swearing that none of the deer would be here without your amazing abilities. You spend the entire time blushing or begging Claude to stop praising you, but he keeps going, his smile wider and wider.

At the restaurant, the waitress brings you to the table and Claude attends your chair for you. The waitress comments that it is always lovely to see you two lovebirds in here again. Does Claude have the entire town in on this? Geeez. Claude orders lunch for the both of you, as if he has done this a hundred times.

Lunch is anxious yet enjoyable. You are on the edge of your seat at all times. Claude explains how you met through the Golden Deer. You’re both supportive and loyal to the class. You found common interests in seeking cures for poisons and are very supportive of each other in battle, that you fell for his charm and good looks and that he is incredibly impressed by your intelligence and knowledge. Nothing he says is a lie, except that you two aren’t really together.

The waitress asks about dessert. Your father declines, Claude tells her the usual and your eyes get big. He squeezes your hand that he has clasped in his on the table and gives you a wink.

A small cake with two forks is placed between you. Claude quickly takes a fork and holds a piece of cake in front of your lips. You glance at him and your father. Feeding you? That’s pretty intimate. Claude smiles wider as you open slowly while he feeds you a bit of cake. You look into his eyes and tell him it is wonderful.

He cuts off another bit and takes a bite. “Delicious.��� Is that an indirect kiss?

Your father is grinning at you as the cake is finished. You slightly roll your eyes with embarrassment and that fact that you can’t believe Claude is doing this.

The men argue a minute over who will pay the tab, Claude graciously thanking your father for a delightful lunch as your father foots the bill. Your father commenting that this has been the best and most entertaining lunch he has had in a long time makes you blush harder.

The conversation is quieter as everyone his happily full walking back to the monastery. Claude happily swings your hands back and forth together as you walk. Your father asks what things you will be doing soon. Claude advises they have a mission at the end of the month, and also the two of you have a date this Saturday just before sunset.

As you head back to the grounds, your father’s carriage is ready to go. Saying your goodbyes, your father gives you a long hug and whispers “Don’t let this one go, he’s a great catch.” He steps back and gives you one long admiring look.

He shakes Claude’s hand warmly, asking him to watch out for his baby girl.

“I’ll do everything in my power to protect her, sir. You can count on that.” Claude gives him one of his classic winks.

Standing at the gate, holding hands, you both wave as your father’s carriage rolls out of sight.

Claude holds his hands out to you, “A kiss for your boyfriend?” he says as he closes his eyes and puckers his lips. You laugh as you lightly slap his shoulder.

“I cannot believe you pulled this off! I thought for sure I’d be riding back with him, but you actually had him eating out of your hand!”. You laugh as you walk away. “Maybe you should see about getting into acting or the opera. I don’t think Dorothea could have pulled off a performance like that.”

You get back to your room and thankfully Seteth’s chairs are missing. The pitcher of water is still there and the flowers. You didn’t notice before, but there was a card with them.

Every day is heaven with you, my angel ~Claude.

P.S. You keep the date on Saturday at sunset.

[uponrightful]

I've been wanting to send this one in for a while. What was going through the Wolfpacks mind and how much did Wolffe hear?

“I’d heard about him a lot from your brothers, how angry he was and that they thought he could use someplace like here. Home. But I didn’t think that he would ever show up. And, after a couple times something happened. I don’t know who really even started it.” The girl took another steadying breath, before continuing on the now spilling thoughts and feelings she’d been bottling up for months now. Completely unaware of the three men’s attention being drawn out the window where a grey and blue painted trooper walked towards the front door.

“I think about him, all the time. I hear his voice when I wake up, and I constantly dream about him. It’s like I’m constantly in this fever dream where I’ve finally been given something that I can’t deny I want.” All of the confusion crashed down in a wave of crystal-clear realization. Audience of troopers aside, the girl hadn’t thought it all through so straight.

She was brought back to Rex, sitting there drinking his caf with a look of disappointment when she’d mentioned that there wasn’t anything she wanted out of life. Other than helping the troopers. It hadn’t been the first time he’d asked, and she hadn’t realized why until now. She had the ability to have what she wanted. Regulations didn’t affect her, and neither did anyone else who didn’t have her best interests at heart. Rex hadn’t meant love specifically, or anything of the like, but what she didn’t get was why it mattered. His constant reminders spoken to the fact that without knowing… she couldn’t possibly go about getting it. Whatever “it” is. The girl’s sudden epiphany was that she finally knew -for once in her life- that there was something she wanted more than anything.

And that was Wolffe.

Her awestruck reaction and frozen posture thawed to see not a single pair of eyes focused on her. Boost, Sinker and Comet were all watching high above her head into the kitchen at something positively damning. Behind her, the heavy sound of boots thumped against the floor echoing off the silent walls of the house. Her heart, already thrumming with personal-realization began working double-time as the steps got closer.

Commentary Track for Welcome Company

Copy 500 words -or more- of any of my fics and I’ll give my thoughts/rambles on what was going through my head -or the character’s- when I wrote it!

*Send one in here*

@taz-107 You and I have some of the best discussions on literally everything Clones, and I'm so happy you sent this one in! I kinda went all-in, because I know you don't mind my word vomit 😅

I love you dearly 🤍

***

Let's start with the Wolfpack shall we?

Comet and Sinker know Pup the best, obviously. They think she's sweet, and they've always had a sense of little-sister vibes from her. It's the way she always invites them in, and never let's them leave without being adamant that they come back again... Preferably leaving less time between visits. Her home is one that the Pack really doesn't get to spend much time in, but when they do get the chance it's like they never left. Habits are created very easily, so the same dinners are almost always on the menu and there's almost a bedtime ritual they both have which never goes abandoned. Comet and Sinker are men of habit, but they never miss out on Pup's willingness to oblige them basically anything they want.

For Boost, his normal happy-go-lucky (and troublemaker) attitude is absent. This is the first time he's meeting Pup, and like most troopers he's hesitant for a number of reasons. It's illegal what they're doing, and although this girl has been nothing but a god-send for his brothers, it's nerve-racking to be in an unusual situation like sitting in a living room and talking just for the enjoyment of it. In a matter of an evening though, he's already falling into that same trap of love and affection that everyone else does when they meet Pup. She's sweet, and overly worrisome about his boots not being comfortable. (Something Boost wasn't sure he'd ever thought about before.)

The Pack's decision to make a visit wasn't a difficult one to make. Each of them had seen the changes in Wolffe's personality, whether big or small, and right away they knew that it was because he'd finally went for his own visit. It wasn't until Chapter Five that they realize there's something more going on than just what Comet and Sinker are familiar with experiencing during their stays at Home. It's the way their Commander doesn't seem to respond to them quickly -like he's off somewhere else in his mind- and the many times they've caught him taking a nap during a mission, mumbling to himself with the occasional slip-up of her name crossing his lips. The entire Wolfpack -Plo Koon included- know that their Commander has it bad. And initially, they're a little bit confused as to why Pup would ever take a liking to someone as harsh as Wolffe.

Note: Until this point, no one has seen Wolffe interact with Pup, and I made this decision very carefully. It was crucial that Wolffe come to form some sense of habit and security with her before this moment happens. It's to better display the completely different way Wolffe acts as a Commander, versus when he's with Pup. Wolffe is extremely talented at prioritizing tasks, whatever they may be. Therefore, when he's a soldier that's the only thing he normally has the mental capacity for. But when he's with Pup, he takes that romantic role just as seriously as he would directing troops on the frontlines.

The Pack know Wolffe is the one coming in the door. They also realize that they'd incidentally forced Pup's hand, and now they had no way of stopping her from talking without making everything even more awkward than it's already becoming. With every second that passes between seeing him walk past the window, Pup just keeps talking and the collective hope of the 104th is that Wolffe's change in attitude isn't just a passing fancy for Pup, and that her proclamation of love is one that their brother will see as something significant. In the background of this apprehension for Wolffe's reaction, they're actually shocked to hear Pup admit what she does about Wolffe.

They've always known Wolffe to be a little on the stiff side of rules and decorum, and even the mention of him being the least bit romantic enough to capture her attention is just another blow to these men's (hopelessly misguided) ideas about their Commander. He's not the most gentle person, and Pup is nothing short of an angel... (That's literally Sinker's nickname for her.) They make for a strange pair, and there's a bit of all three of them that have the same worry that Rex does; Can she actually handle him?

Note: I've always thought of Wolffe as a tortured soul, that never deserved the copious punishments that was handed to him in his life. And in the fic, there was a huge motivation to really play up just how worried troopers get about their brothers who end up the way Wolffe is when we see him post-cybernetics. He's angry and vicious to an extent. Not that he was a really carefree guy to begin with, but it's such a contrast that all of the men who knew Wolffe closely can see a very scary change in the Commander once he's brought back for duty. (Fives and Rex's conversation in Chapter Five is where I tried to make that fear a little more palpable and realistic of what war has done to Wolffe through the eyes of men who've seen things similar...)

They hear her words, and they're all staring at Wolffe who's got the most impassive expression they've ever seen before. It's stiffer than when he's at a parade rest, and even his posture looks like it could fucking snap at any second. But the second Pup's pause of realization hits her, Wolffe suddenly decides to join them all. Every last one of the Pack are holding their breath for this; Literally none of them have any idea of what to expect. They're all making subconscious guesses, trying to read his movements, literally anything that might help try and relax this tension. But when Wolffe just sits himself down at Pup's feet; Stretching out his leg and visibly melting back against her chair...

It's utter shock.

Note: I chose Boost for the next POV because he fit the need perfectly. Not only does he know Wolffe extremely well, but he doesn't have this predetermined idea of what Pup is like. He knows on a surface level that she's very kind and a little shy. But I needed him for this moment because it's truly perception-bending to see Wolffe take such a submissive posture towards this girl. (Her admittance that she loves him aside.) Boost has never seen Wolffe carry himself like that, and I wanted you to see it through his eyes because that's Wolffe's constant personality. Pup is the only one who's seen Wolffe soft -so this isn't new to her- but for the Pack, this is unprecedented behavior.

Now for our sweet, sweet, Commander 🤍

Wolffe was very preoccupied with his conversation with Anakin from Chapter Six and the upset over being forced to come back so late in the evening. He wouldn't dare not return after promising that he would, but the idea of making her wait up so late didn't sit right with him in the slightest. Being so caught up in his own head, he doesn't notice the Wolfpack staring at him through the open window dressings, and he's completely unaware that they'd chosen to come and see her as well. (He tries not to worry himself too much about what they do on planet-leave, and this was just one of his weaker moments.) Not that Wolffe would ever admit to being constantly worried about his brother's getting into trouble, and him not being able to get them out of it.

But all of that changes the second he walks into the house and hears Pup talking. It's not what she's saying at first; But instead just hearing her voice is enough to make Wolffe pause and listen as he pulls his bucket off his head. She's so soft, but this time there's a different edge to it; And standing in the hallway is when Wolffe finally realizes that she's talking about him. It's a miracle he didn't drop his bucket in a loud clatter to the floor in that instant.

Pup is saying things that Wolffe couldn't have dreamt about even coming from her mouth. Admitting that he’s in her dreams like she constantly takes a place in his. Detailing just how surreal it is to have him around her, just like it feels in his own mind. Pup is speaking exactly what Wolffe has been feeling for months and it's all Wolffe can to do try and stay quiet, just so he doesn't miss another word. Every syllable is spoken like she read it right from his heart, and Wolffe is so speechless that he's on the verge of busting through the house to find her and really show her exactly what a fever-dream he could provide for her.

But the moment he sees his brothers, all staring at his shadowed figure in the kitchen he realizes that they knew he was listening, and that now there was no turning back. Wolffe is feeling really pressured at this moment. Not because he doesn't love Pup -because he really does- but it's hard to traverse the admission with his men watching him for a reaction. They know nothing about his relationship with Pup, and he's kept it that way for fear of someone thinking it was unprofessional, and attempting to do something about it that would not only risk himself and the other men who need her, but Pup herself for providing care and warmth to men who were considered GAR property. He doesn't suspect that his men would ever do something like that, but there's this sense of fear that makes Wolffe present himself so emotionlessly. That is, until he can collect his own emotions for hearing her, and try to play it off.

Note: Wolffe is very skittish. And that's all to do with the treatment he faced after his fight with Ventress. He thinks very lowly of himself personally, but has an unbreakable expectation that he do everything exactly as it should be done without failure. This makes him a wonderful leader, but god-awful at admitting he has feelings aside from diplomatic neutrality. He's struggling to do the right thing here, when there really isn't a textbook example of how to handle expressing the emotion of know the person you love, admitting to loving you back in front of a small crowd. Wolffe doesn't understand that anything he could've chosen to do would've been acceptable here. But in the end, Wolffe's diplomacy is what guided the plot. (Once again, I only write for the characters, I hardly ever get creative liberty when coming to the conclusion of what my non-OC characters do. Even then, my OC's are very diligent in reminding me that they have their own personalities and I can't just make them do anything.)

Wolffe chooses what feels comfortable to him in this moment. At this point, everyone -including Pup- is waiting for him. And when he walks into the living room, his first instinct is to go where he feels the safest. And that's with her. (It's important that he sits at her feet and I'll tell you why in a moment.) Wolffe wants to be with her as best he can in this moment. He still feels that emotional relief and warmth of hearing her say she had the same feelings for him, but the last thing he wants to do is put either of them on the spot in front of his brothers that are appearing very worried and utterly confused at the moment. So to tone down the tension he'd accidentally created, he just does what feels right; And that's to let Pup know he's happy to see her, and give the apology he'd been meaning to all along.

"Sorry m'late."

From there, his men -sharp as ever- realize that he has wants to do this one his own, and Comet takes the initiative to take conversation somewhere else for the time being. He's silently grateful for that, and although he never says anything to them about it, Wolffe is certain that they did so on his behalf and wouldn't expect a thank you for it.

The rest of the night is easy to get lost in. His boys -always needing to show off- take turns coming into themselves again, and decide that a competition of war-stories and funny -albeit stupid- stories are in order. It feels natural like this, and Wolffe hasn't ever felt so proud having all of his brothers and his precious lady all in the same room where they can just be normal for a little while. He's extremely attentive to Pup's attempts at touching him, and he has to bite back a smile when he feels her secretive touches against his back. She's doing it on purpose to avoid his brother's notice, but Wolffe realizes she's probably just as nervous to be outright about it as well. After all, he'd not made a single comment about what she'd said, but he was kriffing surprised that it didn't change her desire to be close to him.

Note: Wolffe sat on the floor for a reason. And it wasn't my decision in the slightest. The way the living room sits, Pup has the best view of the room. Her back is to a corner, and the couch and chair that Boost, Sinker, and Comet occupy and positioned to face in her direction. It's strategic -and instinctual- that Wolffe put himself at the center of attention. That is basically a requirement that he head his squad at all times, and naturally he doesn't distinguish this scenario apart from any other. It's simply the Commanding Officer in him. But to a -wonderfully complex- part of Wolffe's character, he's doing it because that puts Pup at his back where he knows she's safe. His brother's aren't harmful in the slightest, but Wolffe knows that should there be a threat, he'll see them coming, and they'd have to go through him to get to her first. Protecting Pup is one of Wolffe's greatest motives throughout the entire fic, and this was one moment I wanted to play that theme out silently. (I don't know if anyone really picked up on it.)

This choice to sit at her feet appears very submissive to the Pack, and to Pup for that matter. But really Wolffe is subconsciously staking claim and protective charge over Pup without even realizing that he's doing so. For example; he could've picked her up and sat down in the chair with her in his lap, he could've sat down next to one of his brothers instead, or even chose to stand somewhere. But all of those choices leave Pup undefended. Wolffe doesn't see that he's doing it, and neither does anyone else in a very direct way. But if you pay attention to the way I toned the scene, you'll notice that Wolffe doesn't ever lose control of the room. Focus and power is always on him even when no one thinks wiser. It's what makes Wolffe such a commander figure all of the time. He has a natural predisposition to hold command, so even when Wolffe isn't trying have dominance, it's always present in the subtle way he moves, speaks, and presents himself to those around him.

***

Thank you for sending this in my love ☺️ I hope it wasn't too long, and you covered everything well enough! If not, let me know what I missed and I'd be glad to fill in the blank spots!

Much Love, Rightful 🤍

[majorsoapfan]

Umbrella Academy Season 3 Wish list

This is a long one so buckle up:

Let Klaus and Allison take centre-stage this season in leading the plot. Both are incredible characters and deserve the chance to shine. And I can think of several reasons why they deserve the chance to take centre-stage: out of the whole Academy their powers are some of the most fascinating and in Klaus’ case he has so many that haven’t been revealed yet. They’ve both suffered and lost a lot as well, particularly in season 2 and their hardships tend to get ignored by others. Their relationship together is already really interesting and supportive and they would be an awesome team up. There’s more but I’ll be here forever if I tried to list them.

No Apocalypse. The world ending in eight days was a great plot driver in season 1 and again in season 2 with the reveal that the end of the world actually followed the Umbrella’s back in time. But if the same thing gets repeated over and over then I’m worried that the show will lose it’s edge as a result. In order for the characters to develop new crisis's need to take its place.

Let Five have a rest. Even if it’s just for an episode or two so he can get a solid eight hours sleep if nothing else. For the last two seasons Five has been running around non-stop trying to stop the end of the world and save his family. Without that Five can grow as a person and get a literal break that he really hasn’t gotten in 45 years.

Oh course that doesn’t mean I want Five out of the drama entirely and I do expect to see Reginald and Five scenes in season 3. Five is the only one of his original children that the bastard seemed to tolerate and he did seem to have some form of twisted respect for Five as well. And I wouldn’t put it past the monocle monster to have some twisted plans in store for the eldest member of the Umbrella Academy. He’s had fifty years to plan for the Umbrella’s return after all.

The Sparrows. I just saw the line up of the Sparrows for season three and I am honestly so interested. I can’t wait to see what their powers are like and I already have some ideas. They have so much potential and hopefully they’ll be done well. And so far they seem to be written as the Umbrella’s foils. Marcus is a natural leader who loves his family, while Luther forces himself into the role and alienated his family as a result. Both Ben and Diego long to be the leader but while Diego is more emotional, Ben’s more strategic. Five is driven by his love and desire to protect his family, while Sloane feels held back by hers. Vanya was treated as an outcast and betrayed her siblings trust while Christopher, a literal Cube, is said to be loyal and is treated as a loved family member 

That being said though, I don’t want the Sparrows to be the main focus this season or have the attention split between them and the Umbrella’s. Because while I do want to see the Sparrows and their family dynamic and how they interact with the Umbrella’s, I would prefer to see how the Umbrella Hargreeves’ cope with their existent and how this impacts them and how they move forward with this. Or a team up between Sparrows and Umbrella’s would be fine. Or multiple team ups, I’m not picky.

There is a really good fan theory out there about Klaus and Five being twins and while I know that in the comics it’s Luther and Five, the fan theory in season 3 would be so much better in my opinion. And in all honesty it makes so much more sense. Physically they are strikingly similar, especially as children. Their powers both concentrate in their hands and emit a blue glow when they use them. Their powers themselves are literally time and death, which are linked and they have additive personalities, which can be inherited between family members. And I can’t help but feel that this moment:

lends a new level to their relationship then what we see with them as adults. Look at how alike they are! And that fond smile that Five is giving Klaus? Making them twins opens up a wide range of possibilities for Klaus and Five both character and plot wise.

Give Luther a proper love interest. And I can’t believe that this even has to be said but his sister does not count! Literally all of siblings have have romantic interests, all of them so important in the Umbrella’s life in some way or another. It would be nice too to see Luther form a healthy romantic connection for the first time in his life.

While I’m on the subject of Luther and healthy relationships, it also brings me back to the Sparrows and how their number one Marcus seems to be Luther’s foil. And it would be interesting for the show to explore just how seeing the Sparrows and someone so similar to Luther might just affect him. He did spend thirty years of his life after all being Reginald’s little solider and believing that his position as Number One made him the family leader only to find out it was all for nothing. Only Marcus seems to be respected in his position as leader and loves his family dearly, while Luther was mocked and seems to have driven all of his siblings bar Allison away from him because of it. This has incredible potential for Luther’s character arc this season especially if it makes him acknowledge his behaviour to his siblings as they were growing up; particularly to Klaus and Vanya who probably got the worst of it. Allison after all was his closest companion, Diego was his rival (more or less), Ben seemingly got on with everyone and Five would have bitten Luther’s head off if he tried anything. But Reginald’s disappointments Klaus and Vanya? Luther, wanting to impress their dad and follow his orders probably didn’t treat them the best. And I want Luther to admit that and apologise and make the next step in becoming a better person and brother. He’s made incredible progress in season 2, but I don’t want his past treatment of his siblings to be swept under the rug. It needs to be acknowledged and Luther needs to admit it was wrong so he can grow. 

Can we get Diego’s season one hair back too? I wondered just how it got that long considering that he was only in the sixties for around three months. Klaus makes sense as he was in the sixties for years. Plenty of time for him to grow it out, not really for Diego. But I really prefer his season one hair so can it make a comeback please?

What I want to see for Vanya this season is for her to realize that she doesn’t need powers to be special. I kinda noticed that she seems to have defined her worth on her powers and that’s not healthy. So a potential scenario: Reginald seems to have made the power-suppressing drug himself, so he may still have it in season 3. Imagine Vanya getting a dose of it that knocks her powers out for a good chunk of time and in the meantime some of her siblings are in danger (I’m picturing Luther and Diego here the himbos) and she ends up saving them. Not with her powers but because of her intelligence and other skills that she has and she realizes that she doesn’t need her powers to be special or to save the day. A logical step in character growth.

Getting some closure on season 2 character like Sissy, Ray, Grace, the Cult (which I really didn’t like) and the Swede and what happened to them once the Umbrella’s left the sixties. And maybe finding out what happened to season one’s characters since the Umbrella’s didn’t exist in this timeline: Agnes, Patch, Leonard, Pogo, Claire.

For Klaus and Umbrella Ben to talk about their issues and make up. I know that our Ben is now up there with the little girl in the sky but that has not stopped Klaus from visiting heaven before. And I think that if Klaus and Ben do not get at least one final conversation to talk through their issues next season then I will sue. They both did crappy things to each other in season two but they both love each other dearly and they deserve the chance to get the closure they both need. I think that Klaus will definitely need it in order to move on completely.

I know I said no Apocalypse but I’m still going to be expecting some major crisis to happen during the last few episodes. An alien invasion or Sparrows trying to kill the Umbrella's maybe? But no matter what the problem is, I really want Klaus to get his moment to shine by being the one to save the day. Reginald said himself that Klaus has untapped potential and we know thanks to the comics what other powers he has. And thanks to Ben’s antics at the family dinner the old bastard has probably written him off as useless and not a threat when making plans to deal with the Umbrella’s. Which means nobody is going to be looking at Klaus or considering him a potential threat to their plans, leaving Klaus relatively safe to start exploring and enhancing his powers. He was supposed to be the one to have done it in season one with the moon and his abilities were brushed to the side completely in season two or used for Ben’s benefit so I think he’s long overdue his moment to shine. And maybe then will the rest of his siblings stop seeing Klaus as a joke.

Lila. I don’t think we’ve seen the last of her, her story felt unfinished and she does have a briefcase. She could pop at any moment in the story. She has so much potential and I did love her actress. Imagine her and Five forcing to team up or something? Or maybe her and Allison?

Another character I’d like to see return is Hazel. He’s someone who really grew on me. And there is a chance that he could return and maybe team up with the Umbrella’s this season. Potential scenarios: Five on the hunt for allies to help him restore the timeline hunts down Hazel who in this timeline is working with the Commission and because the Umbrellas don’t exist hasn’t met Agnes yet. Maybe something happened to her because of the Sparrows?

Finally Dave. I’m a huge Dave fan but I really don’t want him to show up in season three. Or if he does then for the smallest amount of time possible just to give Klaus some ‘closure’. Time travel is in the Umbrella Academy universe after all and it’s possible that by Klaus warning Dave about his faith and causing him to enlist earlier and in a different branch as a result he’s saved Dave and opened up the possibility of seeing Commission!Dave later. Which is the perfect storyline for season 4. Season three is only 10 episodes long and there’ll be a lot going on already so shoving Dave into what will already be a pretty packed season won’t give Dave the attention he deserves and will take away from the other focus. Not only that but Klaus’ motivation for the last two seasons is doing something for either Dave or Ben. I want to see Klaus train his powers either for himself or to help someone else. Also, Dave deserves the chance to grow as a character as well and making him a part of season 3 would take away from the main focus of the Umbrella’s and Sparrows. Making him a main focus in season four instead if we get one will give a great opportunity story-wise to develop both him and Klaus as individuals and as a couple.

[cryptidofthekeys]

The Beginnings of Obsession

@tiny-yan-anon​ You said you’d like to be tagged in the Jek n Hyde story so there ya go, this was fun to write but gosh d a m n was it long as hell- Uh TWs would probs be for like Drugging, Violence (Someone gets beat with a cane to be specific), Blood is mentioned but there’s nothing graphically gory, Obsessive Behavior, and Yandere-Ish themes

You were out for a walk in the park, it was evening time so it was nice and cool outside, you didn’t have to worry so much about overheating at this stage of the day, it was nice and peaceful out as well… Nothing and nobody could bother you… You could relax on the bench and watch the sunset, you had hoped you weren’t too late to catch the view you always loved so dearly, you took your seat on the bench and sighed, you could see the sun perfectly from here, nothing obstructing it at all as it slowly began its descent, and then it was letting the moon have its turn up in the sky. You watched as the moon slowly began rising and sighed in bliss, this was so nice… It was so nice whenever you got the chance to come to the park, this place had always calmed your nerves. The moon was just as peaceful as the sun, granted, it was dangerous around these parts at night which is why you couldn’t stay for too long, after the moon ascended further you got up and quickly made your way out of the park, glancing off at it as you continued walking, the stars shone brightly in the sky, and not a cloud in sight tonight… And as you continued your walk you bumped into someone and fell backwards, you winced a little in pain before quickly apologizing, the person held a hand out and you could get a good look at him now.

He was a man around five foot seven, wearing a blue turtleneck underneath a white lab coat, blue pants and even shoes that matched his outfit, he also wore circle glasses as well, he had a well groomed beard and sideburns, his hair was dark brown with some gray on the sides and it was a bit of a messy curly undercut, aside from all that those eyes were the most striking thing about him, they were a baby blue color and his face held such a friendliness to it, he held his hand out to you “No no, it’s quite alright, here, let me help you up” You nodded and slowly reached out for the extended hand, he quickly tugged you up to your feet and helped you dust yourself off a bit “There we go… Are you alright? I hope I didn’t startle you!” His tone was very polite and you smiled albeit a bit awkwardly “Not really… I just, wasn’t paying attention to where I was going was all” The stranger nodded “Ah, I see… I do not want to lecture you but you should know, it can be awfully dangerous at night time here, you never know what kind of depraved individuals you’ll run into at these hours…” You nodded “Of course, I’ll keep that in mind…” The stranger smiled before he realized “Oh, where are my manners? I haven’t even introduced myself yet…! My name is Henry! Henry Jekyll” You took a moment before you then had a realization.

“Oh! You’re that Doctor I’ve heard so much about aren’t you?” Henry nodded, chuckling a little “My reputation exceeds me I suppose… Yes, I am the local Doctor everyone talks about so dearly” He looked a little embarrassed but nonetheless you smiled and extended your hand “My name is (Y/N), it’s nice to meet you Doctor Jekyll” The man laughed a little, accepting the handshake “Please, you may just call me Henry… Would you like me to escort you back home? After all, wandering these streets alone at night as I’ve said, can be quite dangerous, and it would be a shame if something bad happened” You shook your head “Oh no, I don’t want to trouble you or put you outta your way…” Jekyll only smiled “Nonsense, I can assure you… It’s quite alright, I wasn’t too busy for tonight anyways” You sighed but smiled nonetheless “If you insist, then I guess it’s alright…” Jekyll let go of your hand, realizing it was awkward that he was still holding onto it and then you and him were on your way, you told him your address so he could actually lead you back there.

“So, what were you doing out here anyways? Er, if you don’t mind me asking that is” Henry asked to which you quickly responded “I just… I really love watching the sunset when I get the chance, and seeing the moon and stars… It’s all a very pretty sight when you can find time of course…” Jekyll nodded “Hm, I do suppose the sunset can be quite charming… And there are no clouds obstructing the views tonight either, a perfect evening for a stroll, I rarely go out anymore, I suppose I have gotten all wrapped up in my work as of recently” You nodded “So, your a doctor, what is it you do exactly?” Jekyll cleared his throat before speaking “Well, I used to have an ongoing experiment but uh…” And then he sighed “I would rather not go into details of that old experiment... After all, it uh, it is in the past… I will say my field is mostly in scientific studies, alchemy to be more specific, I spend quite a lot of time in my lab back at my mansion, if you’re ever interesting in learning about such things then I would be more than happy to teach you” You nodded “I’ll keep that in mind” And there was a pause before he spoke up “What is it that you do exactly?” You shrugged “Eh, I just do little things here and there… Nothing much, just… Enough to keep food on the table and pay the bills I guess…” Jekyll nodded “I see…” And there was another pause, this one a bit longer than before.

“Well, er… I know we just met but if you ever need any help with any of that, then please, don’t be afraid to contact me, after all I do love helping others out in times of need” And then he pulled out a little card with his info and number on it, you took it but then shook your head “I appreciate that offer immensely, but, I’d never wanna trouble you like that…” Jekyll merely smiled “Oh but it isn’t any trouble at all, like I said, my job is to help the people around! And even if that means paying for their bills or buying them something to eat or drink then so be it” You smiled at that “...You’re very kind… Not a lot of folks, especially not the richer ones would offer something like that” Henry nodded and sighed “Oh believe me, I know how you feel on that matter… Even if I am rich, I have always refused to act so snobby and selfish, being selfish and snobby gets you nowhere in life…!” ...Well, maybe he lied a little on the selfish part … But they didn’t need to know such details, the two of you continued your conversation, getting to know each other before finally he had led you back to the address you told him “There we are…! I’m surprised we didn’t run into any sorts of hooligans… I suppose it’s our lucky night, huh?” You nodded “Yeah… Oh uh, thanks by the way… I appreciate you taking the time to walk me home”

Henry had a bright smile on his face “It wasn’t a problem!” The people around here really didn’t tell a single lie about Henry Jekyll, he was as friendly as could be, so sweet and polite as could be, especially to offer such things to a person he barely even knew, as you were heading inside you turned back to him for a moment “I uh, I’m sure I’ll see you around some time, yeah?” Henry then shrugged and adjusted his glasses a little “Perhaps! I DO spend most of my time in the lab but, if you ever want you are free to stop by my home! My address is on the card I gave you” And then you nodded and he waved goodbye to you as he headed back to his own home, you got inside and closed the door behind yourself, you looked down at the card in your hand and read it more properly now ...Maybe, maybe you would pay him a visit one day, for now though you wanted to get some sleep, you walked over and placed the card down on the counter and headed off to the bathroom to brush your teeth, as you were getting ready for bed.

You couldn’t help but keep thinking of the doctor, you were a bit curious about him you wouldn’t deny, and it seemed he was curious of you too given all he had said, offered, and asked.

                                          M e a n w h i l e. . .

Jekyll had returned to his home and sighed deeply, he greeted Poole first since he was standing right there, must’ve been waiting actually… As he began walking toward his lab he greeted the maids as he walked past, they offered him some tea or something to eat to which he refused, he wasn’t feeling too hungry or thirsty right now, besides, he had some things to think about as he made it to the door, he quickly shut it behind himself and locked it, he then walked over and sat down in his chair and ran his hands through his hair, the entire walk home he had only thought of the person he had met earlier, he had only thought of you the entire time… It was so strange, the moment he first saw you he started feeling… Something, he thought about it some more, and it seemed like… Love? There was no way! Love at first sight was only ever in those fantasy stories, he had never really believed in love at first sight, it wasn’t the way he was wired, sure if some believed in that, who was he to judge then? But for him to feel such a strange feeling so suddenly… He heard a voice laughing at him and of course, right on cue to be a bother… Jekyll sighed “What do you want, Hyde?” He sounded a little snappy but then again, who could blame him? He watched as the exact being he didn’t want to see manifested right in front of him.

Hyde gave him a smirk as he paraded around the other “Someone’s got a crush~!” He kept exclaiming, cackling as Jekyll blushed and tried to defend himself “I do not! There is no way I can have a crush on someone I just met! I don’t even believe in love at first sight!” Hyde only grinned, displaying those sharp unpleasant teeth, somehow, even after all the years Jekyll’s spent with him, that display still managed to unnerve him “Oh come on! It’s SO clear~! You looove them~ But tell me something, do you even know if they have a significant other? Do you even think they’d like you back? I mean, who’d ever wanna get with a pathetic weakling such as yourself?” Hyde seemed to take notice of Jekyll tensing, and that look in the other’s eyes… Now, Hyde has seen many expressions on the other’s face before but this one looked… Different, he couldn’t quite place his finger on it just yet but it piqued his curiosity nonetheless. “Ugh, why don’t you just disappear for a while, hm? Just leave me alone for once” He was avoiding those questions which Hyde quickly caught onto, he walked over and got uncomfortably close to Jekyll, studying his expression carefully “...Hmm… You wish for me to leave you be?” There was a pause before he grinned, even though he was just like a ghost practically, those teeth being this close unnerved Jekyll immensely more than before.

“Fine then, I shall leave you be ...For now~” And just like that Hyde vanished which surprised Jekyll entirely, there was no way the other just up and left like that… It was up to something, he was planning something and Jekyll didn’t like that one bit, he knew asking would be pointless, Hyde would never admit to anything anyways… He sighed and ran his hands through his hair again, great, now he’d have to worry about whatever the other was up to…

...This was going to be a long week… After a day had passed you decided you’d visit Jekyll, you were curious about his work and maybe you could get to know him a little better in the process, it wasn’t too hard a place to find too which was good, you knocked on the door and a Butler answered the door “Ah you must be (Y/N)... The Master has told me about you, please do come in” You nodded at this. You then made your way inside and wow… It sure was fancy, a lot fancier than you were used to for sure, then again, what else were you even expecting with such a famous doctor? The Butler cleared his throat “My name is Poole... The Master is in his Laboratory right now, if you will wait here a moment I will go and fetch him” You nodded and waited as he entered through the door, you took this moment to properly look around the place, it was huge and had a lot of fancy decorations, lots of fancy pictures, overall it was just… Super fancy, of course, even though you didn’t know much of this man, there was one thing for sure, all of this house definitely seemed fitting for him, after a few more moments of waiting you heard the door open and turned to see a smiling Henry “Ah! (Y/N), I didn’t, um, actually expect you to visit so soon…! There isn’t anything wrong, is there?”

You shook your head and smiled “No, just thought I’d come by and see you, this... Isn’t a bad time is it?” Henry quickly shook his head “No no! Not at all! Would you like something to drink while you are here?” You nodded “Some tea would be nice…” Henry nodded and told Poole to fetch him and you some tea, he nodded and got straight to work, meanwhile the doctor led you to the couch and you both sat down “So, how have you been doing today?” You shrugged “The day’s been alright so far, I had some free time today hence why I got to drop by here… How about you?”

Henry smiled “Yes, it’s been… Good so far, I have just been working around in the Laboratory for the time being as per usual” You nodded “Made any new discoveries yet, orrr anything interesting in particular happen?” Henry then shook his head “Not quite yet… I am still working on a few things here and there but those are just simply works in progress for now… Alchemy can be so fascinating and interesting once you get involved in it!” You nodded “I see… I dunno if I could ever understand honestly” There was a pause before he spoke up “If you would like, I can show you some of my works in progress” You looked at him in a surprised manner, and even he looked surprised, he was never usually the type to let many if ANYONE down there in his Laboratory… And then Poole was delivering the tea to the both of you, Jekyll thanking him quickly and then Poole promptly left out of the room to give you two more privacy, after that you looked at the doctor “I mean… If you wanna show me, then I wouldn’t mind…” You gave him a smile which honestly made his heart flutter every time he saw that bright smile of yours, granted he knew it shouldn’t, this was far too soon for any nonsense like that.

It was strange even because the more Henry looked into your eyes the more he felt his heart rate spike, those eyes held something he couldn’t describe, and whenever those eyes landed on him he swore he could almost feel a blush threatening to appear, he needed to stop being so ridiculous, he needed to get a hold of himself! He quickly grabbed his cup of tea and began drinking, you did the same and for a few moments it was silent until you spoke up “Your house is very beautiful” You honestly didn’t know of anything to really say but something was better than nothing, this made the other smile “Ah thank you” ...Jeez, okay, you needed… To just, relax, you didn’t know why you were being so uptight with him, and honestly he seemed a little nervous as well.

You took a deep breath after taking a sip of tea and then you sat it down on the table “So uh, if you want… You can, go ahead and show me the projects you're working on…” Jekyll seemed to notice you finally relaxed and he was relieved of that, he almost felt himself relax a little as well “Oh, of course…!” He stood up after sitting his tea down “Come on, follow me!” He exclaimed, he was excited in all honesty to show someone his work, especially you.

...Ahem- (I’ll be honest, writing peeps first meeting n getting to know each other  is not my strong suit but just bear with me) You followed him down to the stairs and you gasped upon seeing his Laboratory, the room was huge and it was filled with, okay, well you didn’t know what all it was exactly but from what you could see there were lots of bottles and beakers filled with various substances, there were also lots of notes here and there, files, and honestly a lot of stuff cluttered around “I uh, have been meaning to organize things a bit better in here but I got caught up in my work…” He could hear a voice in the back of his mind that said liar, you just got lazy… But he merely shooed that away, he prayed that Hyde wouldn’t bother him right now… You looked around the Lab in awe “It looks so cool…! If you uh, want I can help you clean up the papers” Jekyll shook his head “I appreciate your offer but I will clean it up myself, later on…” You then noticed some weird ingredients in some jars on the table, you walked over and knelt down to get a better look at them “What’s this…?” Jekyll looked over to the jars and smiled brightly “Ah! Those were two ingredients I had been planning to mix together recently, I got sidetracked with other things however…”

He then walked over and pointed to the jar that held some green looking leaves “This would be Scented Bay Leaves…!” He grabbed the jar and carefully opened it, holding it up to your face, you sniffed at it and the leaves definitely had a strong floral scent to them, he then closed them back up and sat them down, he grabbed the other jar and the material inside looked… Well, very strange if you were going to be honest with yourself… “And this is, well it’s some of one of my own formulas I have made before” The liquid inside the jar was a bit cloudy and gray looking and it looked gross, he then opened the jar and sat it back down on the table, he grabbed the bay leaves jar and opened it back up, he grabbed a pair of tweezers and set them down near the jars and then he grabbed a beaker, he also put some thick looking gloves on (be safe when your fucking experimenting and toiling in gods domain sometimes ok?) He told you stand back just a bit and you did so, you could still what he was doing as he picked up the tweezers and grabbed one of the scented bay leaves with it, he hovered it over to the jar with the weird liquid inside and after a few moments he lowered it and dropped the leaf into the substance.

After a few moments of nothing happening, the substance began to bubble up, it was foaming and okay… It was overflowing a little onto a tray he had quickly set it into, luckily it didn’t seem like it was going to overflow out of the tray, you looked on in awe as you watched the liquid bubble and foam and then slowly begin turning into a Dark Purple color and you were amazed but Jekyll seemed a little… Disappointed “Ah… ...T-That was… Supposed to turn Black… N-Not a Dark Purple like this” He saw Hyde manifest in the corner of the room and he could see the other laughing at him, laughing at his failure, he tried to just ignore the other which was always easier said than done, he took the gloves off and cast them to the side and sighed, you walked up to him and placed a hand on his shoulder which he did flinch a little at, but he quickly relaxed upon seeing a smile upon your face “Well… I uh, I don’t know how it went wrong or what exactly went wrong… But that… That was still cool…!” Henry looked surprised, he expected you to laugh at him as well, he expected you to comment about his failure and give him a bit of scrutiny even, this definitely caused a blush to appear on his face and Hyde was even stunned by this, jeez… You REALLY weren’t like the others, they would have laughed directly in his face!

This quieted the ghostly being in the corner down immediately, he watched Jekyll’s facial expressions carefully, given how long Hyde had been with Jekyll, he knew the man inside and out, literally… He could hear those thoughts, those thoughts the other kept trying to bury deep down, trying not to think like that, this was… Definitely interesting, he wanted to see just how this little story played out… Henry quickly cleared his throat and there was a smile on his face “...Thank you… I… I appreciate that…” You nodded

“Yeah… I’m sure you’ll get it next time…! Just uh, be careful… I dunno much about Alchemy but I don’t want you getting hurt” Jekyll nodded “But of course… I always try my best to be careful…” You looked up at the clock and it was getting late “Oh jeez…! I should really get going, thank you for the tea and for showing me your lab, this was cool! I had a lotta fun!” Henry suppressed a sigh, he hated that you had to go so soon, he wished you could stay here, with him… Forever… ...What was he thinking?!? He quickly spoke up “Oh of course, sorry to have kept you so long haha… Do you want me to walk you home tonight?” You shook your head “I appreciate that offer again but I’ll be fine…! I gotta hurry, I’ve got a lot to do tomorrow but the next day I’ll be free, seeya then?” Jekyll took a moment before nodding “If you want, remember you are free to stop by anytime you would like!”

You nodded and waved him goodbye, he waved goodbye to you as well and watched as you walked back up the stairs. He quickly took a seat in his chair and sighed in bliss, you were so wonderful… You didn’t judge him once or think his fascination and love for Alchemy was nonsense or ridiculous, you didn’t even give him any scrutiny for his little experiment failing in such a way… Which okay, he was still a little embarrassed about, next time he’d need to make sure things wouldn’t fail, he wanted to properly impress you… He wanted you to stay with him forever… His eyes widened a little at that thought, that thought had been creeping in a lot, jeez, he needed to get a grip on himself, that was not the type of thought to be thinking, especially not since you two were still getting to know each other...

He then glanced over to Hyde who was still standing in the corner, the two locking eyes and then Hyde was approaching without a word, this worried the doctor for a moment “...H-Hyde?” The ghostly figure never once breaking his gaze with the doctor as he stopped right in front of him, his expression was neutral as he studied Henry’s nervous one… After a few moments he suddenly smirked “You really a r e in love already… You want them, you want them s o badly… You are willing to do a n y t h i n g and e v e r y t h i n g to have them by your side…”

Jekyll was about to object to that statement but Hyde held up a clawed hand “I’m N O T finished yet… Jekyll, I can r e a d your thoughts, even the ones you’ve been so desperately hiding, the one you’ve been burying ever since you first laid eyes on them… I’d say this goes f a r beyond just love… It’s…” Hyde grinned before continuing “O b s e s s i o n…” He rasped out, this made Jekyll shake his head and he shot up out of his seat “I- No, that is not-” He felt himself get pushed back into his seat.

He was surprised at that, but Hyde got f a r too close for comfort, he could practically feel the other grab at his shirt collar “Henny… Don’t you d a r e lie to me…! I k n o w you from the inside and o u t… You can’t hide anything from me~ You are obsessed with them…! I never thought you would ever be obsessed over anything b u t your little experiments but here we are…~” He chuckled, stepping back a little as the doctor shook his head “...I… I don’t know what you are referring to, Hyde, now kindly leave me alone…” The figure laughed at Henry “Oh but you d o… Henny… C’mon~ If you’ll allow me, I can take care of this~! I can go get them for you!” Jekyll immediately stood and Hyde was surprised at the glare in the other’s eyes “Don’t you DARE! I will NOT let you hurt them! I will-” Hyde cut him off immediately “I don’t mean to hurt them, dumbass… What I mean is… I can fetch them for you! You want to keep them, you want them by your side…! I can go fetch (Y/N) for you! All you must do is give me the chance! I’ll deliver your precious (Y/N) unto you~” Henry shook his head “No way Hyde, there is no way I am going to let you out to do anything of the sort! I am NOT obsessed like you seem to think I am…! You are just trying to trick me like you always here, so I will let you have some inkling of control but I am NOT going to do that!” Hyde scoffed and crossed his arms “...Think about it, Jekyll… I’ll give you some time” And just like that, Hyde was gone.

Henry huffed in pure frustration, taking his glasses off to momentarily clean them before putting them back on his face, he sat back and slumped down in the chair, running his hands through his hair “...I am NOT obsessed with them… I just think they are quite charming and nice and I… I just… Want to get to k-know them a little better, that’s all…” Jekyll tried not to think of Hyde’s words, tried not to think of any of that but during the night, even as he tried to sleep… He could not take his mind off of you, even into the next day, ever since he first met you he had been thinking about you non-stop, he had been thinking about you being by his side, you being his in general… His beloved… The further into the day it got the more those thoughts intensified, at first he had thought maybe Hyde was somehow influencing this but that wouldn’t be right, Hyde wouldn’t care for such a thing surely… Jekyll never knew Hyde to express attraction or any kind of love to anyone before, as much as he could try, blaming it on Hyde wouldn’t work this time… Because this wasn’t that monster’s doing, this wasn’t his mentality, it was all of Jekyll’s own accord, all his own thoughts… He sighed, he tried to work on his experiments throughout this day since you wouldn’t be coming over, and he wanted to try taking his mind away from you.

Try as he might, nothing seemed to work, usually working with his experiments took his mind off of anything else, but not you… You were still in his head, you were still his primary thought, he tried to read, write some stuff down even, but no matter what happened, no matter what he did, he kept thinking of you… This day finally passed and yet another night of him dreaming of you, dreaming of you standing by his side, dreaming of you two holding hands together, the two of you even sharing a kiss one day perhaps… The next day you had come by just as you said you would, you greeted the doctor happily and even gave him a little hug, he froze at this at first but then he had the brightest and warmest smile on his face as he placed one arm around you, he… Wasn’t used to being hugged but he’d be lying if he said he didn’t enjoy one from you… So soft, so warm… Like the day you first visited him, the two of you sat down and had some tea together and got to know each other a good bit better, asking each other various questions and the more you talked about yourself, the things you liked, just…

Anything and everything about yourself made Jekyll’s heart swoon, you were so passionate about your hobbies and the things that interested you, he even felt like you matched his own passion for things of that sort… It only made him adore you all the more… He listened to you go on and on and let you talk mostly, usually he loved to talk about his accomplishments and he’d lead conversations but he was more than happy to let you have the stage here… Eventually it was evening and time for you to leave again, he was sad to see you go but he knew you’d be back the next day, and it continued like that for the next FEW days actually, you kept coming to visit him, the two of you would talk about how your days have went, any new discoveries Jekyll had, etc- Like always by the evenings, you’d have to leave and get back home, this would leave Henry to think about you during the evening and the rest of the nights, slowly but surely he realized, he couldn’t fight this feeling off much longer, he still was not obsessed no matter what Hyde had tried to tell him, it was probably just another tactic of his to gain control or to upset him or something… Another day had come by, you knocked on the door and were greeted once more by Poole who looked delighted to see you “Ah, (Y/N), please do come in, The Master is waiting for you…”

Now, unbeknownst to Jekyll, during those few days, Poole had pulled you aside along with the other maids and told you about Henry seeming so much more happier since you came along, Poole mentioned how the doctor seemed to like you a lot actually, any time you said you were coming over he’d practically beam and the more Poole told you, you… Really needed to tell the doctor something this day, he knew it was something important from what you had said over the phone before coming here, he was sitting on the couch and smiling like usual, he waved you over “Ah, hello (Y/N)!” You smiled back albeit much more nervously “H-Hi Henry…” You came over and sat down, at first Jekyll had asked for some tea for the both of you but you quickly spoke up “Um, I-I don’t want any tea right now, I’m not… Thirsty…” Jekyll seemed to take notice of your nervousness “...(Y/N)? I...Is there something wrong? You did say you had something important to discuss with me before coming over here… You aren’t sick or anything are you?” Jekyll simply motioned for Poole to leave for now which he quickly did, you then shook your head “No no… I-I uh, I’m not sick… I have… I have something to ask you…” Henry raised a brow “And what would that be? If you need money for something, I can gladly-” You cut him off “N-No, nothing like that…!”

You took a deep breath, already you were beginning to tremble… “...I… I… Jekyll… Do… Do you…” And then you paused, you were sweating a little, jeez… This was going to be harder than you first thought… He waited patiently however as you tried to steel yourself, you took some deep breaths and after a few moments you finally blurted out “...Do you like me?” Henry blinked in surprise as he looked into your eyes, he then quickly looked away, a blush forming on his cheeks “...I… Erm… W-Well… I uh…” There was a pause from him, he kept his gaze down to the floor as he spoke “...Well, to be quite honest with you (Y/N)... Yes, yes I do…” ...And that’s what you were afraid of… Oh boy… Jekyll studied your expression, one of sadness… He was confused, but he waited since it looked as if you were about to speak, you stood up as you did so “...While that is… Flattering… I-I… I’m sorry… I… I al-I al...alre…” You felt a lump in your throat, you were so worried he was going to be angry or react poorly “...I...I already have a partner…”

There was a long pause, it was awkward and so silent you could hear a pin drop in this very room… You slowly looked toward Henry who seemed to be processing this for a moment, he then stood which worried you but then you saw a smile on his face. It wasn’t a bright or happy one but still “I understand, (Y/N)... I want to ease your mind, I am not going to overreact, I am not going to get angry or upset over it… That would be so childish of me” You looked surprised, even though he was clearly a little hurt, you stood yourself “...Th-Thanks for understanding… We can still be f-friends if you want though…! I-I mean unless y-you think poorly of me now… O-Or if t-this made it too awkward…”

Henry shook his head “No no, not at all… I am not going to think poorly of you, I should apologize though, I hope I did not make you feel uncomfortable in all this either… If you don’t mind or find it too awkward, I would love to still be friends with you” He held out a hand, offering a handshake which you smiled and took “Of course… Th-Thank you… Thank you s-so… So much for understanding… I-I’m sorry if I l-” After shaking hands he then held his up “No no, none of that now… I promise you, it’s fine, you do not have to apologize” You nodded “Alright… I-I’ll still come and visit you… If you’ll allow me” Jekyll nodded “You are welcome here anytime, you and your partner both if they wish to come along!” You nodded and gave him a hug which he hugged back, and then you were on your way, waving goodbye to him and he did the same to you.

Once you were out the door and out of sight, he let his hand fall to his side, and then it balled into a fist, he glared daggers at the door, he heard Poole enter the room and he spoke up “...Poole, I am going to be in my Laboratory for awhile… I want NO disturbances from ANYONE, is that understood?” Poole quickly nodded as he heard his Master’s tone “Yes sir… Of course…” Jekyll then stormed over to his lab door, slamming it shut and locking it behind himself, Poole looked at the front door, he had overheard a bit of the conversation from the other room, he did not intend on eavesdropping but still, he sighed “...I hope he will be alright…” He then rushed off to go tell the maids and others not to bother the doctor any tonight, to let him cool off…

Meanwhile Henry had stormed down to his lab, right over to the table and he placed his hands upon it, for a moment he simply stood there, before he shoved everything right off the table and into the floor, the crashing and smashing of jars echoing off the wall, he then pounded his fist directly into the table, he screamed out in frustration as he punched the table over and over to the point where his knuckles were red… The thoughts going through his head right now weren’t pleasant, after all this time, all the days they spent talking together, after him trying to gain confidence to ask you out, it turned out you already had a significant other!

The thought of anyone else besides him holding you close made him want to wretch, it made him sick to his stomach to think that someone out there had stolen his love away, they stole Y/N from him… They stole them away, that wretched disgusting excuse of a living creature had stolen his precious Y/N away from him! He felt so many things… He felt anger first and foremost, then he felt sorrow and heartache, and then he felt sick to the point where he was almost sure he would vomit… Every time he thought of your partner, every time he thought of them kissing you, holding you close, saying those three little words that HE should be saying, NOT them… HE should be the one holding you close, HE should be the one kissing you, HE should be the one you love! NOT them! Not ANYONE else! HE was the ONLY one you should have ever fallen for!

And yet here some dirty filthy scumbag had gotten to you before he could? ...No… No NO NO! He was NOT going to simply stand by and allow this! After all the days and nights he spent thinking of you, after all he had secretly written down about you, the love letters he had even written but was too afraid to send, oh no… He was NOT going to let you go that easily… No, you WERE going to be his, you WILL be his…! He stood there, fists clenching in anger, a darkness in his gaze for once, something he usually only saw in Hyde… And then it hit him… He had denied this for so long, he denied having feelings for you in the first place, denied so many things…

...He was done denying, even if he had to admit this was an obsession… Then so be it, he was done holding back, he was far too desperate… Far too desperate to have you here, with him, by his side, he was so desperate to hear you say you loved him instead of that disgrace of a human being, the more he thought about them… He felt pure disgust wash over him, there was no way they were fitting for someone as perfect as you, no way they were fit to have such a lovely being as yourself standing by their side, no one so lowly deserved you… You were his… You… You would be his… And then he slowly raised his head up, he noticed he had been crying a little as well in the process of this.

He wiped his tears away and then slowly he turned his head to the bottle on one of his tables, it was a dark brown bottle… “...Tr-Tri… Trichloromethane…” He muttered to himself, that bottle of sweet smelling liquid… Usually called Chloroform… He stared at the brown bottle before looking back down to the table, his hands grasped at the table and he continued to stare for a moment before he took a deep breath and then spoke aloud… “...Hyde…?” Right on cue, the being manifested right behind him, even though Hyde hadn’t manifested into his ghostly form before, he heard and saw the entire thing unfold… He had a smug smirk on his face “Yes, J e k y l l…?” There was a long moment of silence as the doctor slowly stood upright, he walked over to the other table, the monster following right behind him, Jekyll’s hands balled into fists at first before he grabbed a beaker of green liquid, there was a long pause, a tense aura filling the room before Henry finally spoke up “...Go fetch them for me… ...Please…” The desperation in the doctor’s voice was almost too intoxicating for the monster that stood behind him, there was a moment of silence before he grinned, displaying razor sharp teeth “...But of course, d o c t o r~” Another pause before he chuckled “...Do you want me to dispose of their partner as well…?”

“...Do what you wish, just do not hurt (Y/N) no matter what, quite frankly I do not care what happens to their partner, whether they live ...Or they die…” Hyde’s grin widened immensely at that “Ooh~” His voice getting a bit raspier, he was getting more excited by the second… Henry quickly consumed the substance from the beaker and he clutched at himself, it had been so long since he let himself drink this vile thing… Since he had let Hyde take control, but that was the least of his worries, he didn’t care about Hyde having control right now, he just wanted Y/N… That’s the only thing in his mind right now, that’s all he wanted… He did let out a loud cry of pain as he slowly began transforming into the very monster he had been fighting for so long to keep restrained, even if Hyde got out sometimes on occasion, Jekyll was still mostly in control… He could feel his body morphing and changing, first was his height, he grew to be about six foot six at least, then those razor sharp teeth were poking through, pointed ears and claws growing into place, and those multiple tongues lashed out into the air as he let out a heavy breath.

After a few moments of his body morphing and changing and making so many god awful noises, this was it… Hyde was FINALLY in control again! He looked down at his large clawed hands as he moved his fingers individually, he let out a very raspy and shaky breath, he had pure ecstasy coursing through his veins right now “...O h… To be f r e e  a g a i n…” He quickly looked up and walked over toward the mirror, looking over himself “Ahh…” He breathed out, this was REALLY happening, he was FINALLY in control! (for personal reasons, Hyde takes control and the fuckin outfit comes with him fdjkslrjfgdks its also funny as fuck to imagine just Hen transforming and Hyde comes out along with his clothing) “Oh my d e a r… You have n o clue what you’ve just done…” Hyde laughed, his laugh raspy and horrible just as it always was, he turned his attention to the bottle of chloroform and walked over, grabbing it and a rag “This should come in handy…” Hyde glanced over as he saw Jekyll manifest into ghost form “Hyde, do you have an actual plan?” The monster cackled at that question “What do you take me for, some kinda idiot?” “...Yes actually” And there was a snarl from Hyde, he looked angry at that and he stopped dead in his tracks.

“Hmph… I guess you really don’t want (Y/N) as bad as I thought…” Henry quickly spoke up “No! NO! Hyde, please…” There was a pause, even with the ghostly form Jekyll took, Hyde could see the pure desperation in the other’s eyes “I apologize… Just, please, I want them… I n e e d them by my side…” The monster smiled wide, “That’s more like it… Mm, don’t you worry… By the end of the night, they’ll be by your side alright… You know, I’m q u i t e interested in meeting them myself, for such a being to exist to cause t h i s sort of reaction from you… For it to go as far as you finally letting me have control, WILLINGLY at that, I need to know m o r e…” And then he set off, he of course took the back entrance, not wanting Poole nor any of the others to see him, he crept off into the night, it was wonderfully dark out, even with the nightlights on, the moon was covered in clouds, oh this was so incredibly perfect… He could easily track the both of you down and go undetected! This was perfection! And it felt so good to have the breeze brush through his hair, to smell the disgusting air of the city, it was revolting and yet he loved it so! He ran through the darker parts of the street, only running into and knocking over a few people which he didn’t stop for in the slightest, he only chuckled as he darted past, he had a mission to do!

He paused for a moment to sniff at the air before quickly running again (fuckin- animalistic predator lookin ass) after a bit he arrived near your home, he hid in the shadows as quickly as he could as he watched you and your partner walking up to the door, hand in hand, he sneered at this display, they wouldn’t be holding hands for too much longer, while Hyde didn’t see anything in particular about you, he knew there was something special about you, he even heard and definitely felt Jekyll’s heartbeat pick up, the doctor manifesting himself beside Hyde, he watched as you conversed with your partner, and then they gave you a quick peck on the lips, that made Henry ball his hands into fists “...So they are the one who stole my (Y/N) away from me… I… I…” There was a pause as Hyde turned to look at Jekyll, he saw a look he had never seen before in the weak and usually timid doctor, he was so shy usually but the look he saw, and the words the other spoke… “I h a t e them…” He hissed before continuing “I want them OUT of the picture…! (Y/N) is mine and mine alone…!” Hyde snickered “With all the time I’ve spent with you, I have n e v e r seen t h i s from you before…”

“You are usually such a righteous man, the thoughts you're thinking right now… Such violence…~ Are you going to blame that on me this time, or will you finally accept that you're not as righteous as you claim?” Jekyll sighed “...I… I… Hyde, please just, focus… I am fed up with waiting… I need them, I want to hold them close in my embrace… I want to give them the proper love that they need” The monstrous figure rolled his eyes “Yeah yeah, I get it… You want them, you looove them… Blegh… I don’t see it…” And then Jekyll vanished, leaving Hyde to watch you enter your home with your partner, he’d strike but not yet… He wanted to wait just a bit longer, given the time of night that it was, you two would surely be going to bed very soon… Even though love wasn’t something Hyde particularly cared about, he was still curious about you himself, he could feel it deep down himself, perhaps being a part of Jekyll, if he gains an obsession over someone, perhaps it affects him as well then… ...He’d find out soon enough, he was sure of it, he waited for a bit and then he saw the lights all turn off and he grinned “Oh… Sweetness… You’ll be ours soon enough, it’s fate…” He waited a few moments longer before slowly creeping from the shadows, it was time…

Meanwhile… You had fallen asleep cuddled up right next to your partner, it had been a long night out, they took you out to get some ice cream so you wouldn’t feel as bad as you did for earlier, you knew it had hurt Jekyll and even with him reacting as well as he did, you still couldn’t help but feel guilty, so your partner decided to take you out tonight and take your mind off it, and it did help a lot, going out and enjoying the night… It felt good, boy were you exhausted when you had arrived home however, it had felt good to get into bed, you fell asleep fairly quickly along with them after you two had gotten ready and then turned the lights off… You were sound asleep, snoring softly, blissfully unaware of the danger that was slowly creeping in through an open window in your home, it was prowling around in your kitchen at first, eating some of the food you owned which Jekyll scolded it for, the monstrous figure only rolled his eyes at the ghostly manifestation, shooing him away with a clawed hand, Hyde might have been on a mission currently but there was no way it was going to pass up an opportunity to cause a little mischief here and there, he looked around the place and it was rather basic, far too boring of a place for his standards.

He wandered around, trying not to knock anything over, although being silent for a being as wide and large as him was easier said than done, he crept through the house, looking for the bedroom in particular, after he found it and saw you sleeping so soundly, he grinned, he almost couldn’t contain himself as he crept to the foot of your bed, he stared at you for a moment, how could such a being drive Jekyll to this point… He was so curious of you, not many things nowadays caught Hyde’s attention but you? You definitely piqued his interest… Maybe not in the way you did with Jekyll but he still held a certain interest in you… He stood at the foot of your bed, staring at you and then his attention turned to your partner who slept just as soundly, he grinned at them, so this was the one keeping you away and driving Jekyll to the point of pure anger, driving him to let this monstrous beast take control? ...Hm, this would be much simpler than Hyde thought, and then he saw you stir, his attention immediately snapping back to you as you raised up, rubbing your eyes slightly and looking around the room, you then laid back down for a few moments before…

You immediately shot back up and glanced toward Hyde, your eyes as wide as could be as you stared at the tall figure, he was covered in the shadows but you could see those eyes staring back at you, those glowing red eyes, and then you could see a wicked grin, full of too many teeth in the dark, you looked toward your partner and began shaking them to wake them up, it took a few moments before they grumbled “Wh-What is it, hun…?” You quickly spoke “T-Th-The...There’s a person…! THERE’S A PERSON STARING AT US!” You quickly shrieked, this made your partner shoot right up to look in front of them, however when you looked back toward the spot, that figure was gone… Your partner had turned on the lamp to illuminate the room a little and there was definitely nobody there now “B-But… I-I KNOW I saw someone…! It… It had red glowing eyes and… And… T-Those teeth…” Your partner looked at you, they were definitely a bit skeptical of that but... “Do you want me to check it out, (Y/N)?” You bit your lip and nodded, they got out of bed, and grabbed a flashlight from the drawer “You wanna come with me?” You shook your head “I-I think I’ll just stay r-right here…” Your partner nodded “If someone tries anything, whack ‘em with the lamp, there’s plenty of shit in here to use…!” You nodded at that and watched as they first shined the flashlight toward the shadow-y spot.

They then checked the entire bedroom before leaving to go check the rest of the house, you heard them fumbling around in the other rooms as you took a look around the bedroom, not really getting out of the bed since the room was illuminated enough and they had checked it out beforehand, you had no idea what you saw but you knew it was something or someone staring back at you from the darkness… You knew that wasn’t just a dream or hallucination surely, there was no way… You were awake right now as well! After a bit you realized you couldn’t hear your partner anymore, no noises indicating them searching things “A-Are you okay?” You called out loud enough so they’d be able to hear and no response…

You tried calling out their name and nothing and that’s when you immediately got out of bed and walked toward the bedroom door, you peered out and saw nobody so you called out again, still no response, you were starting to get worried now… You made your way down the hall and right as you got to the bathroom you let out a scream as something jumped in front of you, after you had stumbled back only then had you recognized it was your partner who was laughing, you immediately stood and glared at them “T-That wasn’t funny! What the HELL is wrong with you?!” You gave them a punch in the shoulder, nothing too hard of course, it was merely a playful punch even if you were actually a little angry with them.

They laughed and rubbed at their shoulder “Oh man! You shoulda seen the look on your face (Y/N)! Holy shit, that got you w a y more than I expected!” They continued to laugh as you huffed and crossed your arms “That wasn’t funny at all… I thought something bad happened to you…!” Finally their laughter died down a little “I’m sorry, c’mon… It was just a lil joke…” You let out a hmph “It wasn’t a very good or funny one…!” They bit their lip to refrain from any more laughter “Alright, alright… (Y/N), c’mon… I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist, ya know it was too good an opportunity to pass up!” They wrapped their arms around you in a hug “Coommeee oonnn… Honey, please don’t be mad…!” They were beginning to look like a hurt puppy “I’m sorry, I won’t do it again!” You laughed at that “Yeah right…! You’d absolutely do it again if you got the chance!” And then they snickered “...Well yeah maybe~” You huffed but proceeded to hug them back “You’re very mean…” They chuckled “I know~” They then pulled back and held your hand.

“In all seriousness though, we should get back to bed, I checked everywhere in the house, no signs of anyone or anything, no signs of someone breaking in, nothing…” You sighed, a bit relieved, maybe it was a mere hallucination “...M-Maybe I was just seeing things…” Your partner nodded “I think we’re both still exhausted… It’s been a long day, come on dear, let’s get back to bed and rest… And tomorrow we’ll… w-we’ll…” Your partner began trailing off and you could feel their hand beginning to tremble, you looked toward them and saw their eyes were wide “H-Honey…? [Partner’s Name]? ...W-What’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost…! Tch, are you seriously trying to scare me again?!” (I’ll let y’all name your own partner, it's a useless thing but ya know have some fun)

They didn’t respond, they were frozen for a moment before they pulled their hand away from yours and shakily pointed behind you, you huffed “I swear… If this is another one of your scare tactics, you’ll be sleeping on the couch tonight…!” You turned around and then your eyes widened just like theirs… “...H-Holy shit…” You muttered, you were staring up at a large figure, he was dressed from head to toe in a black and red, his eyes were also red, and then you noticed his grin, those were ra… Razor sharp teeth… T-This was the thing that had been staring at you in the bedroom!

“Ah…” He rasped out, his breath ghosting over you and okay… His breath reeked, it almost made both you and your partner gag right there “Good evening you two…~” His voice was bone-chilling and as raspy as one could get, you were staring into his eyes for a moment, frozen with fear before your partner had grasped onto your arm and immediately pulled you back “Run!” They shouted, quickly tugging you along with them, you sprinted alongside them and the figure only snarled as it charged forward “You cannot escape me, my love!” It called out, he seemed surprised he uttered that in particular, ah… Perhaps fascination would soon turn into obsession, either way he wasn’t going to focus on that right now, he had a job to do…! As you both almost made it to the front door, the figure had pulled out a cane and whacked your partner in the back of the head, they collapsed to the ground as you screamed out, you could see some blood running down and onto the floor, you knelt down beside them and your hands were trembling, you had almost forgot about the massive being standing just over them for a second before he lifted his cane up again, you quickly shoved him back away and stood in front of them.

“I won’t let you hurt them again! If you wanna kill them you gotta go through me!” The figure only snarled and lowered his cane “You are a defiant little one, aren’t you?” He then paused before chuckling “I couldn’t care less about them! It’s y o u who I’m after my dear…~ Since I’m in an oh so generous mood tonight… I’ll give you a choice, you can make this much easier for yourself if you’ll come along quietly with me or you can choose the hard way and run and well… You won’t like what happens then~ And don’t forget, if you run now, I’ll have an opportunity to swing at your precious little partner~ And if they aren’t dead already, then they will be with this next hit!” You bit your lip, he was right… If you tried to run he could easily swing again and if they weren’t dead already, there’s no way they could take another hit… Before you answered him you looked down at your partner, they weren’t moving, you had hoped they were only unconscious, not much blood had come out, not enough to cause death surely… Then again you didn’t know but either way, you couldn’t risk them getting hit again, you wouldn’t risk it… You looked toward the figure and nodded “F-Fi...Fine… I-I’ll go with you…”

The figure grinned widely “Excellent choice my dear…” And then it grabbed your arm, a bit too harshly and was dragging you out the door, you took one look back at your partner, they still weren’t moving but you could only hope they would be alright, after all, had you tried anything he’d surely go back for them, and that was the last thing you wanted… You didn’t want them to die, maybe… Maybe someone would even call for help, the figure tugged you closely to his side and snarled “Keep up…! You might as well forget they ever existed, because you’re never going to see ‘em again…!” You glared up at the figure “Wh-Who even are you anyways…?” There was a pause before he grumbled “...You may call me Edward Hyde…” So it did have a name… “Wh-Where are yo-you even taking me…?” He rolled his eyes “Tch, so noisy… You’ll see when we get there my dear~” This was FAR easier than Hyde had expected, he didn’t even have to use the chloroform he had grabbed earlier! He kept dragging you down the street and as much as you did try to resist, the man had a v i c e grip on your arm practically, you continued walking with him until you got way farther from your home before you suddenly held a leg out in front of him, sure this winded up tripping both him and you up but you were faster than he would be.

You quickly got up before he did and as he tried to grab your ankle you quickly kicked him in the face and dashed away as he yelled out your name, you were not going back to your home, no way were you going to endanger your partner like that, and there was no way he was going to go all the way back to your house just to finish them off either, he wouldn’t go out of his way like that surely, you dashed down a different street, you had no idea where it led but you didn’t care as long as you got away from that thing… You kept running into the night, it was very late and there wasn’t a soul in sight, everyone was most likely in bed by this hour, this street had a bunch of large homes, mansions in fact… This must’ve been a place where very rich people lived, and you didn’t figure they’d help someone like you out, you looked around, not knowing where to go next, and then it hit you…

Maybe you could go back to Jekyll’s place! If he’s there he’d surely protect you! You looked at one of the street signs as you were coming up to it, Jekyll’s home was a street over from this one! Luckily there seemed to be access from the street you were currently on, you made a mad dash for that street in particular, you hadn’t heard Hyde in awhile, you hadn’t seen him either, you hoped maybe he had just given up entirely, maybe it got bored of the chase, either way, you wouldn’t stop running until you got to Jekyll’s home.

Eventually, you had managed to get there, your legs had almost given out on you during the run, you were breathing heavily, chest heaving with heavy ragged breaths as you rung the doorbell, after a few moments nothing happened, but you rang the doorbell again and then a light came on, you waited for a few moments and then you were greeted by Poole who looked surprised “(Y/N)? What on earth are you doing here at this hour? And… ...Oh my… Is everything alright? You look frightened…!” You took a moment to breathe in and out before explaining to Poole the entire situation, from the monster attacking your partner, to trying to take you, to you tripping him up and then finally to you running here for some safety… Poole quickly stepped aside and let you come in, knowing that his Master would be q u i t e upset with him if he were to refuse that, and even then, he didn’t necessarily want to see you hurt either, after you dashed inside, he quickly closed the door and locked it before looking back at you “Would you like for me to call the Police?” You thought about it before you realized, while the police could probably help you out, you remembered your partner, laying there on the floor…

“Not f-for me… Please… He… That thing attacked my partner… I-I want the police to go there, and… Get an ambulance f-for them…” Poole nodded, you told him your address really quickly and then he called the Police, he explained a bit of the situation to them, that a terrible incident had occurred and they needed to send some help over to your home, somebody was hurt or potentially worse, after all was explained and done, he hung up the phone “The Police will arrive at your home as soon as they possibly can… If you would like, and I do believe it… IS for the best… You should stay the night, after all… The Master would give me s u c h a scolding if I let you get injured or worse…” You nodded “Y-Yeah… I… I wanna… s-stay here…” After all this, you had almost been on the verge of tears, from thinking of your partner being potentially already dead, to just this insane situation in general, your hands were as shaky as could be… “Wh...Where is… Jekyll a-an...anyways…?” Poole pointed toward the Lab door “The Master has been in his Laboratory all night… I am, admittedly, a bit worried about him… I doubt he would mind it if you went in and checked on him, and besides… You should be the one to inform him of your situation” You nodded, you walked toward the Lab door and carefully turned the knob, to your surprise and especially Poole’s surprise, the door slowly opened, that’s odd… Poole could have s w o r n the doctor locked that door earlier… ...Oh well, either way, he watched you enter the Lab and shut the door behind yourself.

You carefully walked down the steps until you finally reached the Lab itself, you called out so you wouldn’t hopefully frighten the doctor “H-Hey…? Henry…? Are… Are you down here?” You didn’t see him yet but just in case he was in here, you had started to talk about your situation, the danger you could be in and your partner, and that’s what had you on the verge of tears again, you quickly tried to wipe them away, however when you got no response to that… You looked confused “...J-Jekyll…? Poole s-said… You’ve been in here all night… ...A-Are you alright?” Again, nothing but silence and now you were walking around the Lab, it was a fairly big one… But even then you didn’t see him at all, you tried calling out to him again and you were growing more worried by the second, you searched around but saw no sign of him, maybe he had gone out for the night? But then… Oh no… What if he was in danger as well?! You needed to go tell Poole, you turned back around and ran right into something… Something large… You stumbled a little bit but then you looked at the thing you had run into and your heart sank… Your eyes widened as you looked up into the other’s… Those red eyes were all too familiar, and then the figure grinned “My my… It seems I found you again, my love~” He purred, and stepped forward, and then you stepped back, it repeated like this until your back hit a wall which you softly gasped at.

Hyde leaned forward, he was far too close to your face and you could see those sharp teeth that could easily rip you apart if it so desired, his breath ghosted over your skin, it made goosebumps form across your skin and the hairs on your arms stand up, his breathing was purposefully heavy, you could hear rasping and some growls even as he opened his mouth further, a set of tongues lolling out of his mouth, you stared at them, eyes wide with terror as the tongues reached up, caressing your face in a sickeningly gentle manner, you whimpered, tears cascading down your face as you shivered in pure disgust, after that he pulled away and chuckled at you “You really… A r e something special… Aren’t you~?” You glared at him “...What did you do with Doctor Jekyll, you sick fuck…?” Hyde took a moment before…

He burst out with laughter, that laugh sending chills down your spine as it echoed off of the Laboratory walls, after that he looked back at you, a smug smile on his face “Oh… Don’t worry about Doctor Jekyll… He’s perfectly fine my love…~” You looked around for some kind of opening to try and run, it was going to be tough, extremely tough given how large Hyde was, but it wasn’t completely impossible by any means… Hyde wouldn’t deny this either, he was starting to feel… Something himself, maybe it was just as he said earlier, maybe this little obsession was getting to him as well, when he looked into your eyes he felt something… The only thing different being, Jekyll didn't like seeing the tears on your face or seeing you so scared and distraught. Meanwhile Hyde seemed to enjoy it f a r too much to the point where Jekyll had even spoken up “H-Hyde… That’s… That’s enough, don’t scare them anymore than you already have…!” However Hyde merely ignored Jekyll this time around, almost like he didn’t even hear the other in the first place, he brought a clawed hand up and gripped at your chin, forcing you to look him in the eyes, he took his other hand and wiped your tears away, his claw getting dangerously close to nicking you in the eye.

“Shh~ Now now, there’s no need for the waterworks, my dear…~” You tried pulling away from him but his grip was still vice-like and okay, it was beginning to hurt your chin a little bit, you reached up and grasped at his arm “J-Just… What do y-you even w-want from me anyways…?” Hyde chuckled, his grip loosening from your chin finally, you brought your hand up to rub at the spot, that was going to be sore later… “Mm… What I want is v e r y simple… I have told you already or perhaps you’ve forgotten it?” You looked at him, confused, this was your only chance to run because you saw him reaching behind himself into a pocket “...I want…” He rasped out, his hand slowly pulling out a brown bottle, shit… You had a feeling you knew what that brown bottle was “...Y O U!” And with that you slipped past the opening you had seen earlier, it was a tight squeeze to slip past him but you managed to do so, you made a beeline for the stairs, you heard Hyde snarl and okay now he sounded really pissed… As you reached the top step, Hyde jumped up onto something and then over the railing, slamming down on the ground below, it's a good thing this staircase wasn’t made out of wood otherwise Hyde would have had the entire thing come crashing down, he instantly grabbed you and hooked an arm tightly around your waist.

“NOT… This time my love…” He growled out, clear anger in his tone, you still tried to struggle away from him, trying to call out for help in hopes that maybe Poole would hear or someone, as you did this however, his grip only tightened even more to the point where you wheezed, jeez if he tightened his grip anymore he would probably crack a rib, even though this was an awkward kind of position, he managed to open the chloroform, he then threw you to the ground rather harshly and stood over you, he grabbed a handkerchief from his pocket and poured some of the substance onto it, trying not to stain himself nor his clothing, he then tossed the bottle to the far side, meanwhile you were trying desperately to crawl away from him, he crouched down and sat atop you, pressing the handkerchief over your mouth and nose rather harshly, your hands shot up and you tried to fight him off, not that it really did much good, this thing was far stronger than you could ever hope to be, either way you still weren’t going to go down without a fight! You screams were muffled by the rag but you prayed that someone upstairs would hear you, even before when you had screamed, you had hoped someone up there heard those!

You didn’t hear anyone approaching the door or any sounds of someone talking however, and after a few moments and him keeping the rag pushed directly onto your face, your struggles began to slow, and you could feel yourself fading, your vision starting to blur here and there… Even then you struggled until your body wouldn’t allow you to anymore, the last thing you saw was that smug bastard grinning at you before your vision faded and the darkness overcame you… Eventually you shot up out of a bed with a gasp, you were still a bit disoriented from what had happened earlier, you tried to immediately get up out of the bed only to stumble here and there and when someone put their hand on your shoulder you screamed and swatted it away “(Y/N)...! C-Calm down, it’s only me…!” You blinked in surprise, your vision still blurring a bit but you could at least make out who it was, even by voice alone “H-Henry…?” You rubbed at your eyes and that helped your vision a bit, it was enough to see the figure standing in front of you… “Yes, that’s right… It’s me, it’s Henry…” You looked around the Laboratory for any signs of that monster from last night “Wh-Where is… Hyde…?” Jekyll sighed and shook his head “No need to worry yourself with that man, my dear friend… I am assuming you mean the man I saw hovering over you last night of course… Ahem... Let me explain a bit further, if you’ll allow?” You nodded and as you almost stumbled over, Jekyll helped you back onto the bed.

“You see… It must have been after you passed out, because as I walked in the door, I saw h i m… That monster of a being standing over you… You say his name was, erm… Hyde, yes?” You nodded at this and so he continued “I quickly grabbed my cane and ran him off and out of the lab, I… I just… (Y/N)... What was that man even after in the first place? Did he hurt you at all?” You had to take a few moments, you rubbed your face a little and then looked up at Henry “I-I… I don’t know… I don’t… H-He said… He said something about… Me? Wanting… Me…? I don’t understand… I just… He attacked me and my partner… O-Oh god… [Partner’s Name]...” Tears welled up in your eyes and you pulled Jekyll into a hug, he carefully wrapped his arms around you “...I’m sorry (Y/N)... I’m so sorry you had to go through all that… I heard from Poole actually, a bit about that… He said he had called the police for your significant other… I myself, do not know of their condition… But, I heard they got sent to Doctor Lanyon’s Hospital… He is a fine doctor and a friend of mine! If anyone can help your partner, it would be him…” While you couldn’t see his face, Jekyll was smiling, almost smirking even as the hug went on, oh it was so lovely to get to hold you close like this… You felt so warm to him… Sure, one side of him did feel a bit bad for lying to you and for what Hyde had put you through but you were here now and that was all that mattered, he would have to… Thank Hyde for that later, somehow anyways.

Because even despite causing trouble here and there he DID deliver you to the doctor as promised, he did exactly what he said he would do… And even after he was finished, Jekyll could see Hyde over in the corner, just staring at the two of them, his gaze flickering back to you in the end, there was no denying it from the both of them at this point, love and obsession had stricken the both of them, and it was pretty safe to say with one glance, the two of them were definitely in agreement on this one, they would never be letting you go… “...Jekyll? Did you hear what I said?” The doctor blinked before looking back at you “O-Oh…! My apologies, what did you say?” You repeated yourself again “I said… Thank you… For saving me, i-in the end at least… I don’t wanna think about what else… That thing would have done…” Henry nodded and smiled “I… I do wish I could have been here a lot sooner, before he got to you in the first place”

“But… At the very least, I still managed to get to you before he dragged you off to God knows where… And I am just… Glad you're safe…” And then the both of you realized, you were still hugging each other, you pulled away first and chuckled awkwardly, wiping some of the excess tears off your face “Yeah… I’m grateful… For that…” And then Henry looked around the Lab “You know, since such a dangerous man is at large… Perhaps it would be best if you stayed here, with me, Poole, and the others for a while? I, of course, will not force you… But, I would rather you stay with someone at the very least and not risk being alone…” You thought about it for a moment and shuddered “...Y-Yeah… After… What happened… I-I really don’t… Wanna be alone…” And then Jekyll was smiling brightly “Wonderful, you may stay here for as long as you’d like my dear… ...Friend!” He needed to be careful with his wording for now… After all, this was only the beginning, he didn’t want to rush things and risk any suspicion, in due time… You would fall for him, you would fall for the both of them, and even though he is normally a patient man, he can barely w a i t for that day to come, to think of hugging you, kissing you, dancing with you, it filled him with a euphoric sense but for now… 

                            This was only The Beginning…

(Thats the ending, Im making it sound like a chapter thing but I s w e a r its not, I mean unless people would really wanna see it develop n shit go down or whatever but for now, very VERY subtle Yandere undertones from the good righteous man himself, keep in mind btw, these are MY versions of the lads, not- from anything else,, so ye- This was fun and exhausting to write but I’m EXTREMELY proud of this one, sometimes subtly in yandere stories can be fun to write

This literally started off with o n e concept of Jekyll falling for the reader and then it turning into basically an obsession/yandere deal and getting DESPERATE enough to let Hyde take control and go after them and that was it, that one thing spawned this entire story- I didn’t intend for it to be this long either but I figured I might as well see it through to the end otherwise I wouldn’t have been proud, anyways- im just rambling now, I hope y’all enjoyed this <3)

[papers4me]

Fruits Basket, SE03, Ep3

This ep is exactly like se02, ep 24, meaning it was divided clearly into two parts. While the graduation theme unties the two parts, you can point things out exactly like ep,24:

1st part : Machi’s story= the important part.

2nd part: scattered parts here & there that concern yuki, ep, 24 his interactions with akito, here his interactions with Motoko).

plus, an ep cliff hanger: (e, 24 the dvd given to kureno, here, Isuzu’s mysterious fate).

it is exactly the same even a small kyo/tohru moment!. School graduation instead of the zodiac’s new year gathering. 

Really awkward pacing, but that’s furuba, we celebrate when they DO connect dots for once! lets talk abt the REAL ep: MACHI.

-Machi’s awkward presence:  

Although I love Machi, I’ve voiced my concerns abt her character in Furuba:

It seemed that Machi was solely created to be a step in yuki’s success journey more than a character on her own right. After getting motherly love (tohru) leaving the nest, Yuki needed friendship (kakeru), then as an independent man, he needs romantic love: (Machi). This is all fine initially but I was yearning for more individuality for Machi as a character. All furuba characters were given space to be unique including minor characters like Motoko who narrated her own story each time she’s on screen & we lived it with her within two seasons & a number of eps.

 However, Machi’s background was introduced thro her brother’s exposition in se02 & that moment was a yuki/ kakeru bonding moment.

Thro kakeru’s exposition  we learned how similar yuki & machi are (the parental neglect, high expectations, cold sibling relationship, Big brother saves himself by himself, big brother pushing for redemption & the younger sibling’s still trapped silently ). While that makes for romantic appeal between the two which makes the writer’s job easier, it steals from Machi individuality.

Then her part in ep, 24 was shown & I was given hope for Machi’s individuality as her own inner voice spoke volumes abt her as a person away from yuki (romantic interest) or Kakeru (big brother). Having a lot of screen time, while can make a character more believable to the audience, is never a factor in character’s depth nor individual worth. Heck! kyo (part of the main trio & the main character’s love interest) has only ONE ep in se02 to explore his issues & by far it is my fave ep in se02 as it established kyo’s trauma, psyche, mental issues & emotional baggage better than I could ever imagine! You can DO WONDERS with little time if you knew what to do. That’s what happened with Machi this ep (half ep).

-Machi’s shines! (trauma & romance):

I was so relieved to learn that altho both Machi & yuki despised perfection as it suffocated them, the writer (thankfully) went abt a different approach with Machi. Unlike Yuki who went silent cuz he felt his voice didn’t matter as he was used as a tool, Machi went silent cuz she was was NOT needed, & not only discarded but painted as WRONG. If you admit that raising me this way is wrong, then what does this make me? What should I do with myself? I’m wrong! boring, a failure, & a presumed killer!! all while I was absolutely doing my best! all while I was having good intentions! It is devastating but It makes Machi real. A character on her own right with her own trauma, struggle, pain & outlook on life. Although, the writer made the whole yuki/Machi meeting orchestrated by Kakeru to quickly make the two siblings one step closer, it worked cuz kakeru chose to not interfere after setting the scene. He played a subtle mach maker & tried to find happiness for his sister silently. Kakeruy is yuki’s best buddy & Machi becoming the girlfriend, the trio will have to hang out more which will slowly but surely warm Machi towards Kakeru. While the flat visit is the part where Machi open the lid to Yuki with a spark of romance at the end, the chalk scene is the romantic part! Not only did Yuki noticed her panic & saved her by breaking a piece of chalk, she secretly remembered his promise! “ lets make footprints on the snow”. The snow that was another source of anxiety attack, is now sth she looks forward to & prays for! Truly romantic!!! Well-done writer.

Side Notes:

I know furuba is shoujo & it’s abt love, but C’mon! where did Nao/ Motoko come from??!! XDD Who is left without love interest? Kyo’s rejected fangirl loved by one of kyo’s buddies? The maids in love with Akito? Momiji? Who does Kimi love besides money? XD

Yuki once observed that kyo makes tohru happy with small things, Today he did the same! A broken piece of chalk.

Yuki/ Machi romantic scenes contrast Yuki/ tohru forced romantic scene at the earlier seasons. There is no lame cringy lines like “ I’ll kidnap you & go to a vacation” or kissing a ribbon. There is NO acting or pretentious lines. Here a piece of chalk did the trick, an understanding of her tears & a head pat, a promise to walk on snow together! Congratulations Yuki, You made it into romantic boyfriends category! XD. also, good writing!

The Bra scene is the real comedy in the ep.

Arisa’s “ kyon, we won’t forgive you if you hurt tohru” is gold cuz kyo WILL. When it’s time to confess he knew kyoko & she HATES him & doesn’t forgive him, tohru would be hurt! Even if she wasn’t in love with kyo!!! Knowing your beloved’s last words were hateful is painful!! Add to this that tohru loves kyo & would be struggling between forgiving him or not!! Add to this that kyo might NOT want to be forgiven!!

“ I won’t forgive you”. kyo’s haunting reminder that he’s unforgivable is now shared by kyoko, yuki, Hana & Arisa!! 

look, you might argue that furuba’s romantic writing might be a bit awkward with all sorts of romantic couples, age gaps, the need for everybody to be in love one way or the other & so on, but the traumatic behavioral writing is the best!!!!! I was never disappointed with how Takaya write abused traumatized children’s behavior. One of my fave scenes is yuki/ kyo in the stairs in se02 where kyo lashed out on yuki & yuki was over it. While that scene was rightfully celebrated for yuki’s triumphant attitude as he got over his trauma, I love it for the realistic trauma filled attitude of kyo, all charged with kyoko’s flashback! He’s in deep & he’s all by himself! Kyo will hurt tohru cuz he loves her just like how kazuma hurt him by forcefully taking his bracelet cuz he loves him. Kyo will be thinking it is for the best, who would want to be with someone that kyoko of all ppl hates!

 I’ll tolerate all the weird love couples in furuba, but the moment trauma is written weakly I’ll drop the show. There is NO way, kyo will confess kyoko’s lines then go “sorry abt that tohru, we’re good?” 

Back to Machi, I really hope that her trauma isn’t merely wrapped up cuz yuki loved her. Furuba was never abt love heals, it is abt love helps. We might not see more of her trauma for reasons of space, or not related to the current plot lines, but I really hope we hear her talk abt herself with yuki even few lines. Although, I feel that the focus now will be on setting her for yuki’s next stage in character development: honesty in the love confession. He’ll tell her abt the curse as the trailer hinted at. That’s their first love life struggle. But if I were to take a guess, it will be dealt with quickly like her trauma. She loves yuki dearly & as long as he walks with her in snow (human or rat, lol), it’s all good. <3

Hior’s mom is love.

Kagura’s new style is love! she isn’t dressed overly cutely anymore, but had a more comfortably style & I love her hair! also her friendship with Isuzu! <3. I wish Isuzu would really know there are ppl worried abt her in her life. Haru isn’t the only one.

Akito put Isuzu in the cat room, didn’t she? The place she left is similar to the place young Kazum wandered to in se01, ep25. & those scissors....

I never thought that the mere sight of shigure’s face will disgust me. XD. I still find him so intriguing, but yeah need time to get over the fact that he slept with Ren & counted it even with Akito, then slept with Akito afterwards! EWWW! so disgusting & I’m here to see this drama escalate!

Yuki / Machi moment was interrupted! XD It’s not fun when it happened to you, yuki? XD.

[cromwellharvests]

@regnantlight​​ said:

🎶

send  🎶 for a musical number for our muses

[rubs my little racoon hands together] good. splendid. alright—

Being Alive from Company (especially as performed by Voctave)

Someone to hold you too close Someone to hurt you too deep Someone to sit in your chair And ruin your sleep To make you aware Of being alive...

Someone to need you too much Someone to know you too well...

Someone you have to let in Someone whose feelings you spare Someone who, like it or not Will want you to share A little, a lot Is being alive...

Someone to crowd you with love Someone to force you to care Someone to make you come through Who'll always be there As frightened as you Of being alive

and, of course, the pleading reprise at the end, as the perspective shifts:

Somebody crowd me with love Somebody force me to care Somebody let me come through I'll always be there As frightened as you To help us survive Being alive

honestly I feel like it bears little need for elaboration, the proof’s in the pudding (and performance)— but I’ll go on and give some, anyhow: that they’re both so practiced at showing only parts of themselves to others, and finding ways to keep even the people they love very dearly at arm’s length; for fear of being a burden, of not meeting expectations, of not being exactly what they each believe they should be, every moment of every day... I’ll admit, I think it’s even more difficult for Zelda to begin to open up and ease those barriers than it is for Easy to do the same, but they certainly both struggle with it.

But that only compounds the need for someone to break through. To hold you too close; someone you have to let in... each of them coming to terms with how, as they do finally give leighway for the other to see the parts of themself they try to keep down, it lets them feel freer, fuller, and— indeed— more alive than they have in a long while.

It’s scary. Of course it is— life is. But it’s better together. 

I think the realization at the end errs more from Zelda’s perspective, maybe after a pre-determined length of partnership ends which had brought them together, or maybe as she gears up to enter into a loveless political marriage, and realizes, oh! actually! that doesn’t sound nearly as tolerable as it did before because I’ve experiened what being alive (for myself) is actually about!

honorable mentions: Come What May from Moulin Rouge, Sunrise from In the Heights, (and of course: You Matter to Me)

honorable honorable mention: Legally Blonde from... Legally Blonde: the Musical... something, something, “someone in Hyrule’s court attempts to take advantage of / otherwise snubs the ambassador in a way which makes her feel foolish and small for ever believing she was good enough for such a high position, decides to pack it all up and head back to the small town where she ‘belongs’, much to the dismay of her highness’—

E: Thanks for your help and for all you've done Thank you for treating me decently Z: What's wrong? E: Maybe someday you can visit me Give me a call, say hello– Z: Wait, where are you going?

E: Sorry, I'm letting down everyone Z: What brought on this? E: You gave your best with a hopeless case Z: That's ludicrous Both: You are the best thing about this place Z: Emily, you should know-...

[prettybirdy979]

Fic Aziraphale/Crowley: ‘I’ll see you soon, I promise.’

Prompt is #28 from this list - feel free to send me any other prompts from it or any of the ones in this tag. Thanks to the Ace Omens server for picking the number!

The first warning is the bang. 

A deafening noise serving it purpose as a warning, even as it rattles shatter proof windows and sends the children screaming to the ground, hands covering their ears. Aziraphale is on his feet in a moment, Crowley a step behind as they rush to their cottage’s door, senses thrown out to try and see what just got knocked back by their wards.

‘Not angelic,’ Aziraphale says.

Crowley grimaces. ‘Hastur. And lot of henchdemons but he’s providing the main bit of power.’ 

BANG

This time Aziraphale and Crowley flinch too. ‘Couple more hits and he’ll take the wards,’ Crowley says with a frown. Unspoken is the reality that once they do, anyone in the home will be unprotected from any demons in the area.

‘Yes rather.’ Aziraphale looks behind him where the Them, here to visit Warlock, are staring. ‘Well that settles it then.’

Crowley starts shaking his head, clearly already three steps ahead of Aziraphale as usual. ‘Our side Angel, I’m not leaving, your plan has always been stupid.’

‘Your plan did not factor in innocents,’ Aziraphale snarls even as the kids start to protest, to argue they can help. He waves at them to be quiet, ignoring their words. Children have no place in a battle, not even ones who saved the world.

‘You swore then that you’d never watch children die again if you could help it,’ he adds, a knife strike to the heart he loves so dearly.

‘You bastard,’ Crowley says softly as he closes his tear filled eyes. ‘I’ll get them to Anathema’s and then come right back. Hear me? Right back!’

Aziraphale blinks away his own tears and puts a hand to Crowley’s cheek. ‘I know my dear. I’ll hold the fort until you return. Together we can do this.’

Crowley surges forward and kisses him. ‘Promise me,’ he begs. ‘Promise me you’ll be here when I get back.’

‘I’ll see you soon, I promise,’ Aziraphale lies and shoos them out the back door, down a secret tunnel he’d called ridiculous back when Crowley put it in. Now it just seems clever. It leads right to Anathema’s place, just the other side of town. Crowley will be back in a jiffy, ready to face the hordes of Hell.

Aziraphale just has to stay alive until then. 

He takes a deep breath, summons the sword he’s not used in six thousand years, and gets ready to bring War to Hell.

[bluesylveon2]

My My, I Could Never Let You Go

Summary: Sasha Zoe just wants her dad to walk her down the aisle. There is only one problem: she doesn't know who her dad is! Sasha invites 3 men in hopes of finding out which one is her father. What could possibly go wrong?

Pairings: Levi x Hange, Sasha x Niccolo, and other background relationships

Disclaimer: This is a Levihan Mamma Mia au. This fanfic is inspired by Mamma Mia which is directed by Phyllida Loyd, written by Catherine Johnson, and uses music from the pop group ABBA. Attack on Titan is a manga/anime series written by Hajime Isayama and published by Kondasha

Author’s Note: I’m glad you guys are liking this series. Tbh I was ready for it to sink the moment haha. Anyways, I am uploading another side story because...Feb 22 is MY BDAY!! 🎉 I hope you guys like it!

Need to catch up? Catch up here!

Ch 3: Money, Money, Money

Levi stood on a different part of the yacht watching the waves go by as it headed to Kalokairi. He originally sat next to Erwin until the other man, Mike, started sniffing him randomly. Levi did not like how close Mike was to him, so he decided to sit in a different part of the yacht. Levi and Eren had already helped Mike and Gelgar fix the sails. Now the three men were sitting around and watching the waves pass by while Gelgar was busy sailing the ship. 

(Mike claims Levi smells like detergent)

Erwin was staring at the invitation he received months ago. Mike, who was curious, took a small peek and recognized the invite anywhere.

“Bride or groom?” Mike asks

“Bride” Erwin answers and puts the invitation away. He slightly turns his head towards Mike  “although I actually never met her.” This interests Levi. 

Erwin turns to fully face Mike “I know who you are, you’re Mike Zacharias, aren’t you” Erwin recognized the man from 21 years ago when he saw Mike with Hange. Of course, he did not mention that part out loud. Who knew one of Erwin’s favorite authors would be him? It must be a small world after all.

“Uh-huh,” Mike looked at Erwin and agreed. Mike sniffs Erwin discretely. 

(Erwin smells like cologne) 

“You know,” Erwin began “your books have really helped me get through the dull business trips. I may look like I am living out my life in some fantasy. In reality, I am surveying across some corner of the planet’ 

“You should try it for real sometime” Mike suggests

Erwin chuckles “Certainly. I’ll never be the spontaneous adventurer. Not with my current job at the firm. 

Levi, overhearing the conversation, turns to Erwin and Mike “You’re a close friend of Hange?” It’s a good thing Levi wore shades or else the men would see the glare he was giving them. Levi wanted to know how she knew these men and what their relationship is to her. 

Mike shook his head and looked up at Levi “No, I haven’t heard from her in 20 years-”

This raised Levi’s suspicion “Really?" It's a good thing the two men didn't see the shock in Levi's eyes. 

Mike continued on “-then she sends this invite out of the blue.”

Now it was Erwin’s turn to be confused. He assumed Mike was still close to Hange. “You know, that’s a coincidence. Neither have I.” 

“Going about!” Gelgar yells at them from the front of the boat. 

Levi leaves his spot to help out “You got it?” he asks Erwin

“Right,” Erwin says and stands up. He unties the rope from the side of the boat (AN: I don’t know anything about boats), but it manages to pull him; almost making Erwin fall in the water. Luckily, he kept his balance and saved himself from falling.

“You ok?” Mike asks and looks at Erwin worriedly

“I’m fine” Erwin calls back and pulls the rope

The sails move, and the yacht begins heading towards Kalokairi island. 

---

Hange was driving to the port in her light blue Land Rover. She is going to meet her best friends Nanaba and Rico. Nanaba Foster is Hange’s English friend and a fun-loving author. Rico Brzenska is Hange’s Polish friend who is a three-time divorcee. 

Hange met the two in New College in Oxford when Hange was studying Biological Sciences. Nanaba was studying English, and Rico was studying Music. The three were an unlikely group since they were in different parts of the college. Hange met Nanaba first in the library when Nanaba asked Hange for feedback for a story she was writing. Hange loved listening to Nanaba’s stories, and she (and Rico) were her number one supporters on her journey to become an author. Hange and Nanaba met Rico while walking through the Garden Quad on campus. Rico was surrounded by many admirers who would not leave her alone. Hange and Nanaba saved Rico from her admirers and were confused when they saw how annoyed Rico was. Rico was not annoyed by the two saving her; the issue was that none of the guys were up to her high standards. Rico was looking for a man who was going to make a lot of money. It was like a 6th sense for her, but Rico could tell who is/is not compatible with her with one look. 

Nanaba and Rico have been with Hange through her highs and lows. They were present when they performed as a band in Kalokairi, comforted her after Hange’s crazy love life, and were present at Sasha’s christening. Hange cares for the two dearly. She saw them as part of her family (other than Pieck) when she felt like had no one (except for Pieck, but she has her own life to live. Hange didn’t want Pieck to worry about her too much ).

Hange parked her car just in time to see Nanaba and Rico get off the ferry. Hange runs to the edge of the dock but doesn't run to meet her friends just yet. 

"Well will you look at what the tide brought it" Hange yells

Nanaba turns and places her back towards Rico "For one night-" Nanaba yells back and holds a pretend microphone up in the air. 

"-and one night only" Rico copies Nanaba's pose except she Rico is facing the opposite direction. Rico and Nanaba stand back to back. 

"Hange and the Survey Corps!" they all yell at the same time. Hange runs up to her friends and meets them in the middle of the dock to hug them. It's been many years since they last visited, and Sasha was only 9!

Hange came up with the band name to illustrate her personality. Hange loves to discover and learn about new places. It's the main reason why she now lives in Kalokairi after hearing so much about it from Pieck. 

(Rico's suggestion was Hange and the Garrison, but it didn't have the same ring as Survey Corps). 

“Look at you,” Hange says to her friends. They look more beautiful since the last time she saw them.

“Look at you” Rico reflects back to Hange.

“You look fantastic,” Hange tells Rico as she poses and shows off her latest designer clothes.

Rico laughs and points at Hange “You look like an old hippie.” Hange has dressed in her signature outfit after all (overalls with a white shirt. She was also wearing a hat this time)

Hange put her hands in her pockets and slightly leaned back. She poses by raising her left foot up in its toes and puts her weight on her right leg. 

“She looks fabulous” Nanaba compliments Hange.

Hange noticed Rico’s new outfit. It’s different from when she last saw her, and it looks more expensive. Hange wants an outfit like that for herself.

Hange walks up to Rico and grasps her white jacket “Where did you get these?” she asks with a gleam in her eyes.

“Husband number three!” Rico laughs along with Nanaba and Hange

‘Well, I’m sure you must be excited to see Sasha again.” Hange laughs as they pull apart, and starts walking towards Hange’s car. Nanaba and Rico put their stuff in the back and hop in.

“So any men at this wedding?-” Rico asks Hange as they leave the pier and head to the hotel. 

Hange couldn't help but laugh. She had a good feeling where this might be going.

“Gorgeous Greeks of independent means?” Rico inquires and waves a hand around

“Here we go again! Husband number four!” Nanaba yells. She also had a feeling of the direction of Rico’s question was going. 

Rico laughs at Nanaba’s statement “Not for me. For her.” She gestures to Nanaba. 

Rico knows how successful Nanaba has been since becoming an author. She thinks Nanaba needed a handsome (and rich. It’s a plus) to marry. She knows about Nanaba’s previous crush on Mike from 21 years ago. Sure he is caring, a flirt, and owns a boat, but Rico knows Nanaba can find a man who is 20x better for her. The last time she heard of Mike was from Hange, and it was from their nightly boat trips. Rico and Nanaba left a few days after meeting Mike. Nowadays, Hange does not talk much about him anymore.

“He’s coming!” Nanaba yells while ignoring Rico. She knows she does not need a man right now)))

Rico continues to go on anyway “Now that Nanaba’s book is a bestseller and she has the whole world stuffing-”

“Stuffing of what? Vegetables? Meat?” Nanaba laughs

“Don’t give Sasha any ideas, Nanaba.” Hange teases

“I just think it’s time to find Mr. Right,” Rico tells Nanaba with a lace of concern in her voice. 

Nanaba dismisses Rico’s suggestion instead “Oh please! Boring!”

“You two are great role models for Sasha. A serial bride and lone wolf.” Hange laughs 

“That’s me!” Nanaba points to herself with her thumb and grins “I’m a lone wolf”

Nanaba begins howling like a wolf as Hange drives up towards the hotel. Hange laughs. That’s the Nanaba she knows and loves. Meanwhile, Rico looks dejected after another failed attempt at getting Nanaba a husband.

Nanaba stops howling and looks over at Hange “So when are the two love birds flying the nest?” She is aware of Sasha’s friends leaving the island, except for Sasha herself. Good thing Niccolo is financially stable and is ok with staying in Kalokairi to be with her. 

“Oh, God! Who knows?” Hange exclaims as she parks her land rover  “I don’t know what is going on in Sasha’s head sometimes. She wants a big, white wedding-” Hange throws her hands up in the air to emphasize how big Sasha wanted her wedding to be. “-and she and Niccolo are making big plans for the hotel. Sometimes I don’t know if she will ever leave!” 

“Yeah, but do you really want her to leave?” Nanaba asks questioningly. Hange could see it in Nanaba’s eyes despite Nanaba wearing shades. 

“Well, I just want what is best for her'' Hange says and looks out to the distance. She then turns to her friends. “Of course not!” The three women laugh and exit the car. 

Hange looks up to find Niccolo and all of Sasha’s guy friends heading in her direction.

“Niccolo! Come meet my backup girls. Guys, come catch up with Rico and Nanaba!” she yells.

“Backup girls, my ass!” Nanaba and Rico yell at the same time. They weren’t going to let Hange have all of the spotlight.

“He’s the leading man for tomorrow’s shindig,” Hange says as Niccolo walks over to Nanaba.

“The lucky man” Niccolo laughs. He extends his arms out towards Nanaba but does not hug her yet.

“You must be-” he pauses a bit to think about the names of Hange’s friends Sasha mentioned to him before their arrival.

“Nanaba” 

Nanaba nods in approval. “I am” Nanaba smiles. 

“How are you?” Niccolo asks as he leans forward to hug Nanaba

“Very well” Nanaba laughs. She likes this man already.

Niccolo lets go of Nanaba so she can catch up with Sasha’s friends. Niccolo heads over to Rico as she leaves the car.

“And you must be Rico. I’ve heard so much about you” Now it’s Rico’s turn to hug Niccolo.

“All bad, I hope” Rico laughs.

Niccolo smiles. He’s heard a lot about her from Hange “Yes” he nods.

“And all true!” Hange yells from the trunk. Niccolo noticed the big suitcase Hange tries to pull out from the trunk. He quickly walks over to Hange to help.

“Hange. Let me get them for you.” Niccolo says and grabs the suitcase for her. Nanaba and Rico look over after talking to the rest of Sasha’s friends. They watch the interaction with a smile on their faces. They definitely like Niccolo. 

---

“Why did I wear stilettos?” Rico complains as she climbs up the steps to the hotel.

“Oxygen. Sweet oxygen” Nanaba gasps after finally finding a place to sit. Niccolo and the other guys bring Nanaba and Rico’s luggage to their hotel room. 

Hange was amused by her friends reactions. It’s been many years since they last visited. Meanwhile, Hange was unfazed with climbing up all those steps. Heck, she could most likely run up a flight of stairs and sing a musical number at the same time! 

Sasha hears the sounds of her aunt’s voice and runs out to her balcony. It seems like they aren’t used to climbing up so many stairs after all. Sasha laughs. It’s been years since she’s last seen them. 

“Aunt Nanaba!” She yells and smiles gleefully before running down to meet her aunts

“Heeeyyy,” Nanaba calls back. She is still exhausted from the climb up.

Rico turns to Hange “Look at Sasha. She is so beautiful!” 

“I know” Hange replies gleefully. She is proud of how her little girl grew up to be a beautiful woman.

Sasha pauses briefly when she makes it to the door. Nanaba notices Sasha nearby and the big smile on her face. She can’t believe how much Sasha has grown.

“Come here, Sasha!” Nanaba says and opens her arms for a hug. Sasha runs over to her with excitement in her body.

Nanaba pulls away from Sasha to see how much she has grown in person.

“Sasha Zoe, you are more gorgeous-” Nanaba places her palms on Sasha’s cheeks and lightly shakes her head “-every time I see you. You really do.” She compliments her. Sasha couldn’t hide her happiness after Nanaba complimented her.

Rico looks over to Sasha from her spot next to Hange “I bet you don’t remember me.”

“Not with all that makeup and plastic surgery” Nanaba teases with a smirk and Hange laughs.

Sasha runs up to Rico to hug her. “Of course I do, Auntie Rico. You haven’t changed at all.” 

“I’m so happy for you,” Rico tells Sasha during their hug.

“Look at my baby,” Hange says proudly and gently pulls Sasha away from Rico to hug her herself.

“Her whole life ahead of her” Hange coos and leans towards her daughter

Sasha laughs at her mother’s antics “Oh please, I’m getting married, Mom. I’m not joining a convent!” she says while wriggling away from her mother’s grasp. Sasha starts heading towards the hotel.

“She’s feisty. I like that” Rico compliments. 

Nanaba walks up to Hange and puts an arm around her shoulder “She’s a chip off the old block” she laughs.

Hange dismisses the thought as she and her friends climbed up the steps to the hotel. “If she were like me, then she wouldn’t get married at 20”

“Or married at all” Rico chimes in. Hange laughs

Hange keeps walking and realizes something. She forgot to put the laundry down! Hange groans internally and turns back towards her best friends

“Sorry! I meant to take the laundry down before you came. I would have asked Moblit, but he was busy fixing some things.” Hange pushes some of the sheets off to the side to make space to walk through

“You think with all this new technology, they would make one make the beds” Hange grabs the nearest sheet in front of her and rolls it up as she walks. Sasha notches her mom carrying the sheet and begins walking towards her. 

“If only you had majored in Engineering instead of Biology” Rico jokes

“If they did, you’d be going along behind it making them again. I know you, Mom” Sasha laughs as she grabs the sheet off of Hange’s hands and kisses her on the cheek. Meanwhile, Niccolo walks up to Rico and Nanaba with glasses of water. They were exhausted from the climb up.

“But I am gonna modern it!” Hange calls back. She turns around and notices Niccolo.

“Tell them about your idea” Hange walks off to do a few errands while Niccolo presents his plan.

“The guys and I are designing a website. I think this place has so much potential, and no one knows we’re here. The only way you could know is from locals. I was one of the lucky few who got to experience the island for myself.-” Sasha walks towards Niccolo and stands by his side. 

“-All of Sasha’s friends want to pitch in their specialties too. If we market it really well, then people would come flooding in.”

Rico and Nanaba couldn’t stop smiling after hearing the idea. They too got to experience Kalokairi’s beauty. It is a shame very few people got to see it after they first visited. 

“We just want this to be the ultimate romantic destination” Sasha pipes in “This was once the site of Aphrodite's Fountain. You know, the goddess of love. If you drank the water-” she turns and faces Niccolo with a loving smile on her face.

“-You’re supposed to find true love and perfect happiness” Niccolo couldn’t stop smiling at his fiancee. He goes in to kiss her.  

Hange is already walking back by the time Sasha finishes explaining her plan for the island. 

“I’ll take a glass of that” Rico tells Hange and wraps an arm around her shoulder.

“I’ll take a whole bucket,” Nanaba says and drinks some of her water.

“Aphrodite's Spa?” Rico questions Hange as they head inside the hotel. They didn’t need to stand there while Sasha and Niccolo were spending some quality time together. That would be awkward for all of them.

“I thought you didn’t want a boatload of tourists?” Nanaba adds

Hange turns her head to face them while she walks ‘Oh no. Not boatloads. No.” She says firmly

“But you know, a few more would be nice” Hange playfully rolls her eyes and laughs. 

Hange walks into the bathroom and remembers the toilet situation. She turns back to her friends and becomes serious.

“Now, the thing about the toilet. If it does not flush, then go get Moblit. If he is unavailable, then go-” Hange moves her hands in a go motion “-and just walk away. Come back after a while and it should..” Hange trails off 

She puts her hand near her ear nervously before walking off. “Nothing works around here except for me and Moblit.” 

Rico and Nanaba look at Hange worryingly as Hange walks towards the main room.

Hange stops near the window. The glass pans were open, but the shutters were closed. Hange turns to her friends “I’ve been running this hotel for 15 years, and I never had a day off. I constantly work though I have an assistant!”

Rico and Nanaba look at each other nervously. Hange sounds like she was ready to blow with her “I’m fine, but I’m not really fine” tone in her voice. Hange noticed their exchange.

“But it’s fine. I’m fine” Hange tries to reassure them and leans on the window shutter causing it to fall to the ground nearly hitting Moblit and a few other workers.

Hange grabs the window sill and looks down at who she possibly hit. “Oh my god! I’m so sorry Moblit!”

“I’m ok Ms. Hange. I didn’t get hurt!” He calls back hoping to ease the situation. He leans down to pick up the broken shutter. Looks like another thing to add to the list. 

Hange sighs before complaining to her friends “I work hard every day to pay the bills, and there’s not enough left for me.”

Nanaba saw a nearby chair and was sitting down to be comfortable while listening to Hange’s story. She knew the moment Hange starts talking then there is no stopping her. 

“Don’t sit down there. It’s broken” Hange says before walking off. Luckily, Nanaba caught herself on time.

Hange walks over to the balcony and looks out to the sea. Rico and Nanba follow behind her.

“You know, I have plans, and it would work if I married a wealthy man. Think about all the things I can do!” Hange exclaims 

The trio heads towards the surprisingly empty kitchen. Hange leans back on a counter. Rico stands on her right, and Nanaba stands on her left

“Wealthy men are hard to find” Rico states.

“I can’t get him off my mind. Even if he were free, he wouldn’t want me!” Hange exclaims and walks to another part of the hotel.

Nanaba and Rico share a look before following. They knew someone who did fit the criteria. Too bad he broke Hange’s heart to marry someone else. 

“Might as well go to Las Vegas or Monaco!” Hange complains by the time Rico and Nanaba catch up to her in the hotel plaza

Hange could see it already. The boat rides, the places she could visit, discover flora and fauna. The possibilities are endless! Sadly for her, it’s a rich man’s world. 

Hange was not paying much attention when a sudden crack appeared in the plaza. She and the others moved away on time to avoid stepping on it

“What happened here?” Rico gasps 

“The earth moved! We’re falling apart!” Hange says while fascinated by the sudden shift in the ground 

“Really?” Nanaba asks skeptically. Hange waves it off with one hand.

“Don’t think much about it” She laughs and grabs her friend’s arms. “Come on. Let’s go have fun!” 

It’s time to drink wine and have some girl time! 

---

Meanwhile, on another part of the island, Levi, Erwin, and Mike had arrived in Kalokairi. All three men were heading towards the hotel. 

©: This is where I insert all rights reserved stuff. This story belongs to me. Do not modify or republish

Author’s notes:

I was going to use another name for Hange’s band, but Survey Corps has the same number of syllables as Dynamos.

Nanaba does not have a last name, so I picked Foster like banana foster haha (a dessert made from bananas and vanilla ice cream, with a sauce made from butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, dark rum, and banana liqueur.) It was better than Pudding or Bread

[benedictsvestcollection]

Ever Ever After- A Whiskey x reader Modern Cinderella Fic

Rating: T for now!

Warnings: Ummmm.... Some swearing. Whiskey being a sweetheart. 

Word count: 1.7k 

A/N: Basically I love Cinderella and Whiskey so here we are. Secret Agent Whiskey is investigating your stepmom’s company and there’s a spark there. This will be a multi chapter fic so more to come!

Chapter 1

Whiskey looked up from his large, oak desk in his Manhattan high rise office. “Well hello Ginger, to what do I owe the pleasure of an in person visit?” He grinned at her. 

“Champ sent me to help on this next mission. Wanted you to have an extra pair of hands.” She smiled back at him and sat in one of the empty chairs across from his desk. 

“He didn’t say anythin’ about a mission to me.” He frowned at this news, not that he minded Ginger briefing him. He was simply surprised. 

“Yes well, he thought it would save time if I just debriefed you myself when I got here.” She explained as she pulled out a tablet and pulled up what she needed. 

Whiskey nodded at her. “Fair enough.” He gestured for her to go ahead. 

“This is Miranda Cox. She’s the CEO of UrbanEdge. An environmental company that specializes in making environmentally friendly clothing, houseware, you name it… They make it.”

“I’ve heard of it. A lot of controversy surrounding their company in the news lately.” He mused with a nod of his head as he waited for Ginger to continue. 

“Yes. Shareholders recently accused her company of not being as environmentally friendly. But that’s not the worst of their problems it seems. Once the shareholders brought that up, we suspected Ms. Cox of insider trading that was linked to everything from oil spills and forest fires. That her and her company only seemed to benefit from.” 

Whiskey snorted at that. “Of course. The rich get richer at the expense of others.” 

She shook her head at that. “Yup. Anyhow, the company used to belong to her husband but when he died, control went to her. Despite the biological daughter who couldn’t afford to contest the company passing over her in court.” 

“How is that relevant?” He asked her, curious. 

“Our sources say that she treats the step daughter like shit. She’s basically a personal assistant-slave to her evil step mom and her step sisters. Champ thinks she might be a possible asset for you once you get in the company.” 

“Good to know.” He nodded. “What’s my in here?” 

“Potential hands-on investor in the company. Despite the money she has, her company is bleeding money and will need an investor. You can bargain for more of a say to get an inside track and information we need.” 

“Other than gatherin’ information, is there another goal here?” He asked her. 

“As of now, no. Unless we feel she might be a dangerous threat. We’re just going to gather information and bring it to Champ. And he’ll deal with contacting the necessary authorities. I’ll be here to help you sift through any tech or emails. And if you need another person undercover.” She explained. 

“Perfect. I have a feelin’ I’ll need another face on this mission at some point.” He admitted. 

“We’re keeping you as you on this mission. The premise being that Statesman Reserve is environmentally friendly and wants to expand its partners.” Ginger told him. “And you, CEO and the face of the company… Wants to invest in UrbanEdge.” 

Jack loved when Ginger worked on missions with him, she was efficient and always thought ahead. “I take it, you already called and made an appointment for me?” He smirked at her. 

Ginger smirked back. “Tomorrow morning. Miranda was very interested in meeting you and potentially investing with her company. You’ll get a full company tour and meet with the shareholders as well so they can pitch to you.”

“Perfect. Guess I’ll need a suit for this. And an assistant. Wanna go?” He asked her. “You can hack into their systems easier if you’re in the building.”

“Sure thing, partner.” She told him with a grin. 

~~~~~~~~~~

“Ugh.” You moaned as soon as you shut the door to your loft apartment. Compared to your stepmom and sisters who lived on Fifth Avenue, your apartment was a shithole. But it was your home and you loved it. 

Today had been a long day. Your stepmother had you prepping all day for a potential investor coming in the next day. And you had put together a powerpoint presentation, made copies of all the numbers from finance and put all of those in folders. And that was just for work. You then spent the day helping your stepmother deciding what to wear to impress this CEO, followed by your sisters who were simply hoping to ‘land a husband’ and meet him. They didn’t know jackshit about the company, or care about like you always had. 

You missed your father dearly and wished the company had passed to you. You strongly suspected your stepmother was doing some shady shit with his beloved company. But you had no proof unfortunately. So, you were stuck watching her destroy the company and your spirit at the same time.

Kicking off your heels and setting your purse down, you now had just enough time to shower, eat a quick meal and crash for bed. Tomorrow was yet another long day of pretty much doing all the work and your stepmother taking all the credit. Not to mention her and your step sisters talking shit about you, directly to your face. It was exhausting. 

You awoke early the next morning. You had to get to the office early to prep for Jack Daniels, CEO of Statemsan Distillery to arrive and his tour. You arrived at the office in a high waisted gray tweed skirt, a blue sweater and black suede Mary Jane pumps. Once there, you made sure the breakfast spread was being set up. Bagels, croissants, fruits, coffee and juice. Your stepmother was certainly making a big deal out of this CEO’s arrival. 

After making sure the cars were on the way to pick up your stepmother and stepsisters, you finally sat at your desk to respond to some emails until everyone started to arrive at the office. With the exception of the one person she doesn’t read emails from, Miranda didn’t allow you to read emails from her investor for whatever reason. But you just shrugged that off. 

You were so absorbed in your emails you didn’t hear the elevator doors open to announce your step mother and sisters arrival. 

“You weren’t downstairs to meet us, so now your sisters are soaking wet.” Miranda announced and you looked up from your laptop on your desk. Blinking at your step sisters who looked bone dry. 

“I… Don’t understand.” You sighed out. 

“My makeup to meet Jack Daniels is ruined!” Madison screeched out. “He’s New York’s most eligible bachelor.” She told you, as if you were an idiot who didn’t know anything about the man. “And I’m going to marry him.” She added confidently. 

“You both look fine. I was busy getting work done for today.” You told them calmly as you rose to take all their coats and hang them up. 

“See that it doesn’t happen again.” Miranda warned you as you hung up their coats and sighed. 

“Yes ma’am.” You told her quietly as your desk phone rang. “Yes?” You spoke into it. “Thank you. Send them up.” She hung up and looked at them “They’re here.” 

Your step sisters squealed. “Oh my god, I can’t believe I’m about to meet my future husband!” 

“Girls. This is a business meeting first and foremost.” Your stepmother warned them. “Husband hunting is for after hours.” She winked at them and then looked at you. “Not for you. Jack Daniels is not for your eyes.” 

You internally rolled your eyes. “Yes ma’am.” 

“Like Jack Daniels would want to date her. She’s an assistant.” Madison sneered at you.

Soon, the elevator doors opened and revealed the CEO of Statesman and who, you could only assume was his assistant. “Ladies, it’s an absolute pleasure to meet you.” He drawled out as he stepped into the office and took his time greeting each one of them charmingly. 

“Oh, Mr. Daniels. I’m absolutely thrilled that you are interested in investing with our company.” Your stepmother told him. “These are my daughters, Madison and Jade.” She gestured to your stepsisters. 

Jack nodded to both of them and then turned to you. “And who, may I ask, is this charming creature?” He asked, studying you intently with a soft smile on his lips. 

“Her?” Madison asked with a laugh. “She’s unimportant.” 

“That’s no one. Just my stepdaughter.” Your stepmother waved at you dismissively. “Go get everyone coffee and be useful for once.” She told you. Completely missing the looks Jack and his assistant shared as you blushed and walked away silently. 

“I’ll help you.” Jack’s assistant chimed up as she hustled to your side. “I’m Ginger.” She told you with a smile. 

You introduced yourself and smiled back at her. “Thank you.” 

“So… Working for your stepmother. That seems… Interesting.” Ginger told her as they prepped all the coffees. 

You snorted. “If by interesting, you mean hell… Then sure.” You told her. 

“She does seem like a bitch.” She smirked at you. 

You smiled at her and chuckled. “That’s putting it nicely.” 

“Your boss seems to at least not treat you like shit in front of other people.” 

“Jack? Oh, he’s the best boss. Kind and treats the whole company with respect.” Ginger nodded. 

You blushed at the way you remembered Jack complimenting you. “He seems very sweet.” 

Ginger didn’t miss the way you blushed, but chose not to say anything. 

You brought out the coffee and nearly collided with none other than Jack Daniels himself. “Oh my god! I’m so sorry!” You told him, frantically looking around for your stepmother or sisters so they didn’t yell at you. “I-I was distracted. Did I get any coffee on you?” 

“Hey darlin’... It’s alright.” He soothed you, large hands coming to your arms to steady you. “I got you. And no, not a drop of coffee on me.” He reassured you.

You shivered at his hands on your arm, despite the sweater. “I-Thank you.” You stammered at him. 

“I’m not gonna get you in trouble with your family. I promise. You deserve better than that.” He murmured in your ear before promptly going to Ginger where she held his coffee and then entered the conference room for the presentation. 

Leaving you to contemplate what he meant by that as you quietly brought in the coffees and sat down. Very much aware of Jack Daniels’ gaze almost always drifting to you when there was a lull in conversation.

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Irreverent Pt. 21 - Dearly Departed

Title: Irreverent Pt. 21 - Dearly Departed Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x Reader Rating: R Words: 2934

Irreverent Series Masterlist

"You're leaving?" It was Derek who had managed to speak first. The rest of you were still processing what Hotch had said.

"I have been given a temporary assignment in Pakistan by the Director and have been told I have minimal choice in the matter. In the interim, Morgan will be Unit Chief." That's what he'd said. You were pretty sure you'd heard him correctly. On their own each of those words held meaning. But strung together like that and coming from Hotch, they might as well have been gibberish as far as you were concerned.

He looked upset at having to leave. He doesn't want to. You tried telling yourself that. But this was also Hotch. You'd seen him stand up to Strauss on countless occasions for the better of the team. So why was he just going along with this? Why was he abandoning you while you were in the middle of the search for Doyle? What about Emily? What about the team? What about you?

You looked around and saw your thoughts in everyone's mind. Penelope still looked struck. Derek seemed more pissed off than anything else. Spencer looked broken - he'd had it the worst with Emily's death. You knew JJ had been with him a lot the past few days. Even Rossi seemed upset. You wondered if Hotch had bothered telling him first on his own or if this was intended to be dropped on everyone all at once.

You could feel the stillness in your body. You weren't sure what you felt yet. Upset? Abandoned? Angry? All of the above? Hotch was clutching the papers that were undoubtedly his marching orders, tightly in his hand.

"What about Jack, Aaron?" It was Rossi who asked that.

You should move. Say something. But what?

"I've arranged for him to stay with Jess while I'm away. He should be alright there."

JJ was still gone too…Hotch was leaving. You looked around at the rest of the team seated at the table and you could feel Derek shouldering the full weight of what Hotch was asking of him.

You felt Hotch's eyes on you. You still hadn't spoken. What was there to say?

*------------*

You'd kept in touch with Clyde Easter after you guys had released him from detainment. At first you'd reached out to him to tell him about Emily - you felt like he should know. He'd come to the funeral and the two of you had spoken briefly. Before he left, he'd tucked a card with a different number on it in your hand.

The two of you had been corresponding for some months now as he worked Doyle from the Interpol angle. With Hotch gone, Derek had wanted to ramp up the search for Doyle but he'd been shut down by Strauss citing jurisdiction. You were forced to move underground. After months of nothing, Clyde had gotten solid proof that Doyle was moving and there might be a window of opportunity coming up. It was time to bring Derek in.

*------------*

"So let me get this straight, after Strauss shut it down, you took it upon yourself to open communication with Interpol to continue investigating Doyle?" You'd called Rossi and Derek over to your house under the ruse of dinner, feeling it would be safest. After dinner the three of you had sat at your dining room table over drinks, when you'd decided to reveal the true nature of the invite.

"Yes," you replied, standing to grab the file from the back of your hidden wall safe. "Here's everything I have on Doyle. Per Clyde," you note the look Rossi and Derek gave one another when you referred to Easter by his first name, "Doyle has operations underway but he has a visibility issue, forcing him underground for the most part. However, he has a meeting scheduled with his stakeholders for which he has to be present. That's our window of opportunity."

"And you trust Easter?" Rossi had left looking through the file you'd put in front of them to Derek. He chose to watch you instead.

"No, but he has nothing to gain by lying to us about this. He's still on Doyle's list and he would much rather we go after him than have Doyle barging through his front door."

"You should've told us, Y/N." Derek had flipped through the file and confirmed what you'd relayed to them.

"Look, you can choose to be pissed at me for not reading you in earlier, or you can help me go after Doyle." You weren't about to be guilted into feeling bad about how you went about this.

"Help you?" Derek raised his eyebrows at your word choice.

"I'm doing this with or without you."

He scoffed and finished his drink. "Yeah, you and what army?"

"I won't fight with you Derek. You want to be pissed, go be pissed. Break something and get it out. But don't act like you don't want to go after Doyle. You're not upset I did this. You're upset you didn't."

His shoulders tensed, feeling the brunt of your retort. You thought he might lash out at you again, but he seemed to be coming to terms with the situation much faster than you had anticipated.

"We still need to find where the meeting is going to happen."

"All we need in order to do that, is leverage over the right person. I have someone in mind," you responded. You'd thought this through. To the end.

"We need to call Aaron."

*------------*

He'd grown a beard. He was back after seven months and that was the first thing you noticed. What anyone noticed really. Besides that he looked tan and more rugged than usual, though that could be chalked up to the lack of a suit. He was dressed like a civilian. Which made sense. He wasn't SSA Aaron Hotchner, BAU Unit Chief. That title was still Derek's. As far as you knew, he was simply SSA Aaron Hotchner, temporarily in Pakistan running a joint task force. If the definition of temporarily had been swapped out with indefinitely, that is.

"Sir, the beard suits you," Penelope had told him in greeting.

"Thank you Garcia." Those were the first words you'd heard from him in seven months.

You hadn't gotten up to greet him. You'd looked up in his direction when he entered and smiled, stifling seven months' worth of anger tight inside. It didn't pass your notice that Spencer hadn't stood up either. At least someone else was also sick of taking the high road. You needed that kind of camaraderie.

"Morgan read me in before I arrived. If you're ready, we can talk through the plan to obtain the meeting location and see how it should be executed." Funny how quickly he fell back into the role of Unit Chief. As if he hadn't absconded the throne.

"It's handled. I'm running point on it. You're welcome to join the others in the van or listen in from here with Garcia."  Your voice came out a little harsher than you'd intended.

He looked a little surprised but quickly recovered and nodded.

*------------*

"Subject is approaching." Spencer's voice came through the earpiece you had on. You were seated at a restaurant downtown, your hands folded in front of you on the white linen tablecloth. You remembered this place from one of the first times your father had visited you whilst you were doing your training at Quantico. He had come to talk you out of it but hadn't been able to resist taking you to a nice meal.

"Hello sister."

Dominic had arrived with his permanently cocky smirk firmly in place. He took off his coat and sat down across from you, unbuttoning the bottom button on his jacket. A waiter arrived to bring him a drink menu. You'd been nursing yours for some time now. After he had ordered, he looked right at you. He was trying to mimic your father's infamous staredowns. It fell flat coming from him. Maybe you had to actually be afraid for it to have its desired affect.

"So, you've finally come to your senses, have you?" He leaned back in his chair as the waiter quickly dropped his drink off.

"How are Katie and Amara?"

His brow furrowed slightly before he answered. "Katie is fine, she sends her regards. Amara is seven now. She's started second grade."

You smiled. It had been some time since you saw your niece. "That's a good age."

"Yeah, she's cute. She made a family tree for class, you know. Made sure to put you on it. Julian too."

"That's sweet," you answered, stirring your drink with the straw provided. "You love Amara, don't you Dom?"

There was a pause before he replied, his brow furrowed more if that were possible. "She's my daughter Y/N. Of course I love her."

"She's your daughter. You wouldn't want any harm to come to her."

His shoulders tensed immediately as he leaned in closely to you across the table. "What the fuck are you trying to say?"

"Just that it is regretful when children get hurt because they become pawns in their parents' wars."

He was still leaning across the table and his next words came out dangerously low. "You think you can just come in here and threaten me? Threaten my family? And you'll get away with it?"

"You have two options Dom. Tell me where Valhalla is meeting his stakeholders."

"Or?"

"I'm sorry, I misspoke. You only have one option. That was it."

"And if I don't comply?"

"There are US Marshalls waiting to escort you home so that you can grab your wife and daughter and pack any personal belongings. They'll take care of you."

"You didn't say what happens if I don't comply."

You looked at him sitting across from you in his expensive suit. Being almost fifteen years older than you, Dominic used to intimidate you. He was never the brother that spoiled you. When you'd been born he'd been a spoiled teenager used to bullying and taking his misplaced anger out on Julian. But your father wouldn't have stood for anyone laying a hand on you (Except him apparently, you thought, thinking back to your last encounter with your father.), so Dominic had tortured you in other ways.

You fixed Dominic with a small smile geared to unnerve him, before answering his question. "Papa used to say that I was the pretty one. Julian was his artist. But you Dom, you were always the smart one, right?"

You stood and retrieved a $100 bill from your pocket and placed it under the drink glass.

"You have fifteen minutes. I'll be outside. Clock's ticking."

*------------*

Hotch and Derek stood next to you as the Marshalls helped your brother into the back of the dark SUV across the street.

"You threatened a child in there, Y/N." His voice was low, and yet still carried the full force of his accusation.

You felt the roiling anger bubbling to the top. He had no right to tell you how to handle this. "I won't make excuses for how I choose to fix the mess you ran away from," your rebuke was at the tip of your tongue and thrown at him before he could prepare for the rally. With that, you turned and left, leaving him to watch you walk back to the van.

*------------*

The following day, Hotch had asked the team to come to the conference room first thing in the morning. When you had walked in, you saw JJ standing in a corner talking to Hotch. You'd smiled at her despite being confused as to why she was there. Once everyone was seated Hotch stood at the front of the room. JJ was standing too. Why was she standing? Why was she here?

With all eyes focused on him, Hotch began speaking. "Seven months ago, I made a decision that affected this team."

Your mind went faster than he could speak. JJ was there. Seven months ago. When he left. When Emily died. Seven months ago he made a decision. JJ is here. She was at the hospital. Why had she been at the hospital that day?

"She's alive," you expelled, pushing up and away from the table and towards the back of the room, furthest from Hotch and the door, your realization propelling you to put as much distance as possible between yourself and the two people at the front of the room.

"What?" Spencer looked at you as you had interrupted Hotch's speech before it had even started.

"She's alive. Emily's alive. That's it right? That's why we're all here. That's why JJ is here and why she was at the hospital that night. Emily's alive." Your mouth was on autopilot as you spoke. The words had left your mouth before you'd truly understood what they meant yourself. It just…fit. It made sense.

"Y/N, we buried Emily. She's dead." Derek stood to move towards you, as if you were having a mental break.

You ignored him. You only looked at Hotch who had stopped speaking as soon as you'd stood up. Both him and JJ were looking at you in what could only be described as horror. Why they were horrified you didn't know. If anything you should be horrified. What does it say about me that I'm not even horrified at this. It's almost as if you'd seen the lies coming.

"Tell them." Your eyes bored into Hotch's. It was a credit to him that he hadn't looked away yet.

"Yes."

His confirmation was accompanied by the click clacking of familiar heels outside the conference room and then the door opened and there she was. Emily Prentiss. Back from the dead.

Penelope recovered first, leaping up to go hug Emily. She looked well, you noted. She was walking around the room. She'd hugged Hotch and JJ next. Now she'd moved on to Spencer who looked like he should be sedated. She was apologizing to everyone. Derek could barely bring himself to wrap his arms around her. Rossi recovered remarkably. He pulled her in for a hug and even kissed both her cheeks, causing her to laugh. You hadn't heard that laugh in seven months.

She was walking towards you. You felt yourself physically recoil.

"Y/N." JJ was using her mom voice. The voice that told you to be fair and kind and sharing is caring.

"Don't JJ." You turned away from Emily who was standing closest to you, to face the front again where Hotch and JJ stood. The only two people who had known. Who had watched the rest of you fall apart and allowed it to happen. And instead of sticking around to watch the fallout, they'd both been conveniently far away.

"How are we supposed to trust you? Either of you?"

"Y/N, that's not fair." It's the first time Emily had spoken directly to you in seven months.

"You were dead. But he was here. He saw what it did to us and then he just left and the whole time! He knew! He knew how it wrecked us." You voice fluctuated throughout and you were breathing as if you'd just run a marathon.

There was silence and then Derek was standing in front of you, shielding you from the rest. He tucked the strand of hair that had fallen out of your ponytail behind your ear and leaned in to hold you so he could speak and not be heard. "Let's do this later. Eye on the prize, yeah?"

For him, you let it go. You owed him that. Not them.

*------------*

Hotch watched Morgan hold you and the visual was a gut punch.

No one else had said anything. But you were never quite that easy. You'd never once not shared exactly how you felt. Likely a testament to having stifled how you felt for years. After you'd confronted your father it was an awakening. You no longer held your punches and while it had been something Hotch had admired in the past, right now in this moment, when those punches were directed at him, he had to admit there was a downside. Even still, he couldn't help himself from being impressed. This was why he loved you. He no longer actively denied the fact.

Your words hurt more than he let on. He had prepared for Morgan to be pissed and for Reid to fall apart. From you he had hoped for a hug hello for both himself and Emily.

But then he had to remind himself of seven months ago. The hospital had been the last time you'd let him hold you. After that you'd been gone. There hadn't been any light behind your smiles. You hadn't confided in him about how much you missed Emily. Well you'd have to be around to have heard that wouldn't you. His guilty conscience had taken your side and was doing an excellent job beating him up in your silence since Derek had talked you down.

He couldn't deny that he was extremely worried about you. He'd talked to Derek after the Marshalls had picked up your brother but Derek had brushed him off, saying you were doing what had to be done to keep afloat. He wondered if Derek was right. You were treading water to stay afloat because he'd taken the life raft right from under you.

He worried how long you could keep going before the force of the waves drowned you.