#i miss the more human personality besides data ones to make things just boring

[junespriince]

I miss the charm and whimsies places used to have before capitalism destroyed it all, monochrome and the sleekness is boring, it's forgettable, can we just stop making boring building and decor choices and live a little again?

[kimthwariru]

Namjoon reaction—calling him a ‘friend’ when he clearly has a thing for you

❀genre: smut, a bit of fluff

❀collage au

(This was originally supposed to be a quick reaction but something happened to me and I couldn’t stop writing)

“Look, Jisoo, I’d agree with you, but then we’d both be wrong” you flash a cheeky smile at your best friend. She’s being going on and on about how this Kim Namjoon guy had a thing for you.

You can’t lie, you’ve seen him around in campus and sometimes you’d wish he would suffocate you with these thighs of his. Ugh. The perfect combo, lean yet masculine physique with a brain that actually functions for a change. You’ve seen the way these collage girls were circling him around and you can’t blame them, the guy was a catch.

But he was not your crowd of people. He was outgoing, social and had loads of what you like to call “the lad friends”. You guessed his main activities were partying and getting shitfaced every night.

You’ve talked to him a couple of times. He uses the same bench as you to read now and then. You would eventually take sneak peeks at the books he was reading, check if he had any taste or not, and the result was always better than what you expected. This guy knew books. He was not just reading what was on the best seller’s that week to look sophisticated in front of others.

When he caught you peaking he’d started having small talk with you. You swear you’ve never experienced a better conversation flow with another human being. This guy screamed comfort. He seemed genuinely curious about the things you were saying. None of that painful act of pretending to be interested just because he wanted to get laid. You had been talking with him for a month straight and aside from a few moments of some what flirty looks his actions never suggested something more.

His aura was welcoming and he always paid attention to the little things. Unlike some other shallow guys out there, he felt…different.

But how different could he really be? You’ve seen the people he hangs out with. Kim Taehyung? He had a relationship with three girls at the same time. Didn’t even apologize for being the biggest jerk in history. You’ve heard Jung Hoseok’s body count was reaching a 3 digit number AND Jeon Jungkook once fucked 4 different girls at the same night.

Just thinking about it makes you sick. It pains you to admit but there’s only one truth to this. Even if Kim Namjoon was interesting, he was definitely a person you needed to stay away from. All the data point to a big fuckboy alert!

“Come on y/n…. If he wasn’t even in the slightest interested in you then why did he tell me explicitly that he wanted you to attend the party??”

“An invitation to a party doesn’t mean anything. Besides, I’m sure I’m not his style. Have you seen the type of girls he hangs out with? Yikes.”

Jisoo smirked at you “Oh, I see you’re stalking him now?”

You shake your head “Don’t be ridiculous! We take Econ together, that’s all. What? Am I supposed to cover my eyes every time I see him?”

“Maybe you should” Jisoo came closer to you “Y/n, we’re going to that party”

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

“This is a big mistake, I’ll get bored within the hour” You scream at Jisoo over the loud music.

“Don’t be a whiney ass and enjoy yourself for once” she handed you a drink.

Enjoy yourself for once. You and Jisoo’s definition of enjoying one self were clearly very different. You scan the room to look for any familiar faces you could talk to. Unfortunately, not a lot of your acquaintances attended frat parties.

Your head motion immediately pauses when you meet eyes with Namjoon across the garden. Was he looking at you this whole time? You feel your cheeks burn.

Initially, you don’t know how to react but eventually you flash him a small smile and focus back on Jisoo

“Kim Namjoon just gave me the biggest stare of all time” you say as you down your drink

“What!?” Jisoo’s eyes widened “This is the time where I say I told you so.”

You think for a second that maybe Jisoo was right all along. But that just makes the whole thing more dangerous for you. You can’t lie, Namjoon is attractive, but you knew he was trouble. Maybe he liked you today and then liked another girl tomorrow.

Suddenly, you feel a hand touch your shoulder “Hey y/n, Jisoo. Glad you guys made it” Namjoon’s low voice pierced your ears.

Jisoo gave you a look before replying to him “Hey!! We couldn’t miss such a night!” She smiled “right y/n??”

“Yeah!! Totally” you cheer kind of awkwardly.

Namjoon’s eyes fixed on you. You felt his stare eat you up. His whole presence felt angelic yet overwhelming. “Do you guys maybe want to join us? We’re sitting right by the pool”

“Oh! Sure, why not!” Jisoo answered almost immediately

You were walking towards the pool, Namjoon was pacing right next to you, he was so close to the point where you could sort of smell his cologne. You swear you could get drunk off his scent.

“I have to be honest, I didn’t think you’d actually come” He chuckled

“Are you disappointed?” You teased and raised an eyebrow.

You see a dimple smile making its appearance, how can this dude be so incredibly hot and cute at the same time? “I think pleasantly surprised would be the right way to put it”

Why do you feel like you can not breath? He hasn’t said much, yet you feel yourself burn up all of a sudden. “Good to know” you smile back.

“Joon! You have to see this” was the first thing Taehyung yelled when you arrived to the place where the guys were sitting “12 o’clock, Hobi making out with Mina from 3rd year. Can you believe it? After two years of trying to get it, he finally succeeds”

Of course the main talk is girls. No surprise there.

“Jungkook bitch, you owe me 20 bucks” Taehyung eyed Jungkook

Your expression screamed disgust. Apparently, Namjoon noticed “They are not as bad as they seem” he elbowed you.

You give him and awkward laugh “I’ll take your word for it” You lie.

“Guys, this is Jisoo and y/n. Can you stop trying to head lock each other and say hello? You’re embarrassing me” Namjoon introduced the pair of you to the boys who were still arguing about the bet. 

“Oh, hey girls.” Taehyung paused to inspect Jisoo’s face. “Hey, business and shipping? Ain’t it?”

“Oh, yeah, right!” Jisoo smiled

“Hyung aren’t you taking that class for like the third time? How many times can you fail you recon?” Jungkook teased him and Taehyung answered by giving him a slap on the shoulder.

“Hey y/n, do you want to go grab a drink? I think you’ll need it if you are to tolerate these guys” Namjoon offered.

“I trust you know best” you smile and quickly follow behind him. His shoulders wide and his muscles very visible even through his airy shirt. This guy was a whole statue.

“By the way, I’ve never seen you at parties before. I think I saw you once at the December ball but that’s about it. Not really a big fan of these kind of things, are you?” He suddenly said. You can’t really decode his words. How did Kim Namjoon know you even went to the December ball? You’re pretty sure you didn’t even talk to him that night.

“Interested in me much?” You give him a cheeky smile but he was just looking at you, a couple of seconds passed without him responding “I’m only joking! It’s true I don’t really attend these sort sort of things.”

“And what do you do for fun miss y/n?” He laughs and you swear if you could bottle the sound and get drunk on it you would.

“Oh you’ll think I’m lame”

“Try me” he said in a serious tone while starring right through your eyes. Suddenly, your body felt too heavy for your legs to bear. How can he get to you like that?

“Okay…” You start, him looking at you like that didn’t help control your train of thought, but you manage to get a hold of yourself “So you know that little corner cafe on willow street? Every Friday they have these comedy music nights. A guy-“

“Park Jihoon and the little funny guitar, yeah! I used to go there every Friday during my freshman years! Do they still do that old thing? I swear the pun with the atom never failed to make my day.” He started laughing again.

“Whoah what? You’re telling me you’ve been to the shrieking shack?” That place was a little treasure you’d found earlier this year. It was an amazingly cozy place, perfect during the cold winter time. The staff were all so kind and wore these big oversized colorful ties. But the people going there were all much older than you. You’ve never heard someone your age talk about that place. Let alone a person like Namjoon.

“Careful how you talk to a veteran y/n. I’ve basically helped to build the place” he chuckled.

“Y/n is that you?” A familiar voice greeted you.

“Jimin! Oh my god, hey! It’s been ages since I’ve seen you!” You hug him.

Jimin was a great soul, he majored in contemporary dance and ballet. He had been traveling for the past couple of years enrolling in some extra ballet classes in the magical city of Paris. You envied him for his talent and admired him for his passion.

“Girl, you have to come visit me. You’ll love Europe!”

“I would also LOVE to have some money in my wallet” you laugh “Oh Jimin, this is my friend, Namjoon. We go to collage together”

Namjoon gave you a look and soon after shook Jimin’s hand “What’s up. Nice to meet you”

“Nice to meet you too! But y/n, I’m so so sorry, I have to go. I was actually on my way out just now. I sort of uhm, have a thing-you know” he coughed “I’m leaving in two weeks, can we please meet before that?”

You knew Jimin was probably off to his ex boyfriends house. They broke up before Jimin left for Paris but every time he got back he’d have a couple of hookups with him. “Oh yeah! I bet you’ve got something very important right now, you better go quickly” you teased him “I’ll text you tomorrow, ok?”

Jimin laughed so much his eyes were barely visible “definitely! text me! I’ll be off then! Bye mister Kim Namjoon” he playfully said and was out of your sight a second later.

“You two seem…close” Namjoon suddenly commented

“Yeah! We were! But he has been studying abroad for like two years now.”

Namjoon’s facial expression was quite enigmatic “Did you guys ever… you know”

“Oh no no no.” You pause to make a small chuckle “Jimin isn’t exactly interested in, well, girls like me, or to be exact, girls in general”

Namjoon’s eyes widened and he immediately bursted into laughter “oh… I see” he made a pause “So tell me then, how come the old soul that never goes to parties finally attends one?”

You feel your cheeks burn red. Partly because the reason you went was him. You don’t know why, but the past month you and Namjoon hit it off very well and you wanted to test Jisoo’s crazy theory, you wanted to make sure for yourself if Namjoon was interested in you or not. Now the problem was, even if it turned out he did like you, you didn’t know what you’d do exactly. Namjoon was a really nice guy, but he didn’t come without his red flags.

“Just wanted to try something different, I guess”

“And how’s that 'different' treating you so far?”

What could you possibly tell him? That you have enjoyed every minute you guys have been talking? That you think that just by staring at you he could make you feel things no other guy could? You barely can admit all of that to yourself. “I think pleasantly surprised is the right way to put it” you repeat his words from before.

You see him smile at that. “You know what y/n? I’m really happy you came”

How can he make your heart beat so fast with just one sentence? “Oh really? And why is that?”

“I don’t know, I guess… I just like talking to you, you know? Whenever I’m around you I feel at ease, like I can tell you anything. I feel different when I’m with you, but in a good way”

“Wow” that sound escaped your lips without your consent

Namjoon laughed “Why? Is it too weird?”

“No! Definitely not weird, more like, I don’t know, surprising?”

“In what way?”

“Well you’re… Kim Namjoon, you’re the 2021 class president and you’re like the most popular guy in the whole campus right now.” You made a pause “And I’m just..-“

“The most interesting girl I’ve ever met” he cuts you off

The way he was looking down at you made butterflies grow in your stomach “You really think so?”

He gently grabbed your waist and pulled you closer to him “I know so” he leaned down, you swear his eyes had the whole galaxy painted inside of them. You couldn’t even breath properly at this point. Kim Namjoon was too close and the only thing you were thinking about was how well his kiss would feel “God, you’re so beautiful” he said and pulled you in for a soft, gentle kiss.

You couldn’t believe your senses. Kim Namjoon was kissing you and you really thought the earth had stopped spinning right then and there. You could feel his big palms traveling up and down your back.

His kiss was breathless, jubilant, filled with the joy of life, and you should stop him, he is no good to you, you know that, but his scent is delightful and his lips are so warm.

Unconsciously, your hands reach the inside of his shirt. His skin hot and soft at the touch.

"y/n" he practically moans your name, and just the sound makes your knees go week "Don't do that, I don't think I'll be able to stop"

"Who said anything about stopping?" You say and go back to kiss him even more passionately this time.

“There’s a lot of people here, my room is upstairs, would you perhaps want to-“

“Yes.” You immediately say. You don’t care about anything anymore, you’d let your future self deal with the consequences of today’s actions. The only thing that has been lingering in your mind is how good he’d feel inside of you.

The moment you’re finally alone in his room, he lifts you up, swinging you around and kissing you. It was like a dream. Namjoon was everything you wanted. Your reluctance about getting with him didn’t matter any more, the tingly feeling in your stomach overtook every single bit of hesitation you had. You needed him.

“God, you’re lovely” he exhaled

He looks at you as he sinks you down on the bed. Planting a soft kiss before his hands quickly begun to peel away clothes, yanking his belt loose, fumbling hurriedly at his trousers.

You look at his lips tracing your skin and the faint moisture left behind, you look at his muscly arms as he lifts you up and sinks you down again, you look at him looking at you, with eyes brighter than the sun itself. Was this all a dream?

When your dress was finally off he undoes your bra clasp on the way down. Slowly planting kisses on your collarbone, the tops of your breasts, your sternum, and you arched you back as you were needy for more.

His lips finally reach your nipples .Your boobs smooth under his hands, your nipple firm under his tongue, and there, that makes you squirm again, a little more insistently this time.

“Fuck, I’m so fucking wet right now, I feel it” You moan

You see him raise an eyebrow. A vivid smirk painted on his face “Let’s check, shall we?”

He splays his hand low across your belly, and the first brush of his thumb over your clit makes you breathe in sharply and him forget to breathe at all.

“I’m your friend?” He breaths in, his voice dangerously low

“Oh come on” You manage to say in between moans “what was I supposed to tell Jimin?”

His strokes and flicks are light and teasing, his thumb carefully circling around your clit. He gives you a slow, constant, unyielding pressure that makes your breath come up short, makes your toes curl in the effort not to move.

“I’m gonna fuck the word ‘friend’ right out of your pretty little mouth” he covers your mouth with an intense kiss before slipping two fingers of his free hand inside of you, and you makes a noise like triumph and want all wrapped up together. If his fingers felt like this, you can’t imagine how his dick felt like.

“Hmm?” He doesn’t look up, he keeps his eyes on his hands, on you, spread out beneath him “You like that baby?”

God, just the way the word 'baby' sounded coming from his mouth could make you come right this second. You look at him, his eyes look as hungry as his voice sounded. This dude was out of this world.

“Please Namjoon, I want it, I want you inside of me right now”

Namjoon lowered his underwear, and simply pressed his hard member on your slit. You could feel his balls softly caressing your clit as he made subtle movements while kissing you. “Such a needy little thing” he teases “Tell me how bad you want my cock inside of you”

“Oh..” you moan “I’d do anything, please…give it to me… fuck me like you own me” you whined as you used your pussy to caress his length up and down. He seemed to enjoy they way you touched him.

“Fuck y/n… that feels so good” he rests his forehead on yours.

“Imagine what my inside will feel then” you whisper in his ear “I’m such a tight good girl” you move your mouth in front of his, bitting his bottom lip as he growled when he felt your movement grow faster

“Fucking hell” he immobilized your body with his hands and pressed you down to the bed. He immediately shoves his dick inside you, filing you up to the brim before staying there for a couple of seconds and then pulling out completely. That movement made your vagina crave to be filled all the way up again.

“More” you whine, a dopey expression all over your face. You were so needy of him, but you didn’t care.

He lowered his left hand towards your thigh and gave it a big squeeze, kissing you aggressively while doing so. He quickly braced himself back into you, you felt your walls completely wrap around his member. It felt magical.

His strokes long and steady in the beginning. Every time he went in and out completely you felt the pit of your stomach burn in pleasure. Namjoon was doing everything right, you can’t lie to yourself, this is the best sex you’ve ever had. Normally with other guys you don’t even come close to coming, but now, you feel yourself trying not to do so.

“You like my dick being inside of you baby?” He plants a small kiss on your neck and goosebumps run down your spine.

‘Like’ was nowhere near good enough of a word to explain how much the sensation of him thrusting his hard member in and out of you made you feel. “I love it Namjoon… I just love it…”

Your words must’ve turned Namjoon even more on, because his pace immediately started becoming faster and sloppier. Every time your skin touched a loud sound could be heard. Namjoon was thrusting deeper and deeper into you, and every time he’d fill you up completely you’d cry out his name.

“Ah, I like my name so much better when you fucking moan it like that” he says and started shoving his dick inside of you like crazy. You could tell he was close to coming, and so were you.

It wasn’t long until you felt your walls clenching and your toes curling. The sensation overtook all of your body, it was mad… your heart beat uncontrollable. Namjoon made you feel a completely new range of emotions.

“Ah y/n, I can feel you cumming all over my dick” his voice cracky, You could see how turned on he was by all of this, by you. “Fuck” he shoved harder “You’re so” harder “fucking hot”

Namjoon stopped and pulled out immediately spreading his cum all over your tummy. The sight was breathtaking, you’ve never found a man so attractive while coming before, but then, Namjoon is no ordinary man.

He quickly grabs a couple of tissues and wipes you clean before laying on top of you again, placing another soft kiss this time. His hand playing with your hair. You were both naked and sweaty and a mess but it felt so magical. You wrapped your hands around his broad shoulders, pulling him even closer to you. You didn’t want even a centimeter of distance between you and him.

He suddenly stopped kissing you and simply stared at your eyes. After a minute or two, or maybe three, you're not really sure, time didn't exist right now, he tacked a string of hair behind your left ear.

“Y/n, let me take you on a date. Please. I know you don’t normally go out with guys like me, but I swear I’ll make it worth your while-“

“Park Jihoon and the little funny guitar. How does that sound? Or are you too good for the shrieking shack now?” You chuckled

“I’d love that” he smiled, making your heart melt a little.

[downwiththemutantnjnjaturtles]

We Met Within This Screen (chapt. 2)

[Donnie x fem reader]

Sfw, part 1 here

Intellectually, Donnie was the best matchup for their leader as today was sparring day. He'd gone against his oldest brother many times, sometimes even coming out the victor himself, but today was just not his day.

He held his staff with that iron grip of his and waited for Leo to come at him. Donnie was more on the defensive than any of his brothers; he had to be. Out of all he was weakest physically but superior in calculations, but he was missing range in this matchup. Leo had a hard time disarming him as his katana could sometimes get lodged in the solid wood staff, giving Donnie leverage to perform the finisher in the short time it took him to dislodge his sword. He thought this time would be how that would happen.

"You're slow today, Donnie," Leo said as he lunged at his brother with a swing of his katana, forcing Donnie to step back. He was too focused on blocking Leo's rapid succession of attacks to respond.

Leo reeled back to swing his blade again but Donnie parried and struck his arm with his staff, shoving it aside. For a split second, Leo actually thought he was fixing to go down by this move if Donnie could hit him again quick enough. But his brother hesitated in thought, and without any reluctance himself, he used his other katana to put him in a compromising position. The match was over and Donnie was forced to stand down.

"Why did you hesitate?" Leo questioned him, lowering his blade. Raph watched from the sidelines with Mikey as they prepared to go up next. Since Leo was the winner, it was Raph's turn next to spar in his younger brother's place.

Donnie huffed and dropped his stance, putting his staff away. "It's just an off day," he replied. Splinter wasn't there to dictate today's training session and tournament, so Donnie was already on his way out to go to his lab by the time Raph stepped up to spar. But Leo sheathed his sword and put a hand on Donnie's shoulder, stopping him in his tracks.

"You've been pretty eager to run back to your lab lately," Leo said matter-of-factly. He was wondering what was going on, why Donnie seemed weirdly distant the last couple of weeks. He had gone through a very withdrawn phase in earlier times upon entering his teenage years, but now, he was legitimately making everyone guess. He didn't snap at his brothers, and he wasn't any more impatient than usual. But something was different. He'd been spending a lot more time holed up in his lab, which everyone began to notice. Leo wanted to know what was wrong.

Donnie shifted and shrugged, "Like I said, I've been busy with some projects. Also, it's not like I have much to do out here beside training and patrol."

Leo opened his mouth to speak, but Mikey jumped on between them. "You missed game night last week! You never miss it," he butted in. Both Donnie and Leo gave him a look as if to say really? and he added in, "Well, uh...not usually."

Gently moving Mikey aside, Leo wanted to continue, but he saw Donnie staring at him expecting a follow-up when he didn't really have one. Whatever this was, Leo knew that coming at Donnie with questions was not the way to go about it. So he stepped back and gave his brother some space.

"We all have off days," Leo said finally after an awkward moment of silence. "Just work on your speed, Don."

"Got it."

With that, Donnie turned to leave, and Raph entered the ring to go against Leo in the last match of the night.

Once Donnie was gone, Leo got ready to spar with Raph. As they got into position, he contemplated bringing this recent development up with the other two, but decided against it in the end. He didn't want to incriminate Donnie, especially with Raph's assertive approach to handling things. Donnie could be somewhat flighty at times when it came to resolving matters of emotion, at times a little too introspective, but Leo couldn't fault him—he had his own struggles with that very thing, too.

Done, finally, Donnie thought as he skirted into his lab and started up the game. He was late to the party quite literally; training lasted longer than he'd thought, and he was disappointed to see that his newest friend was online, but not responding to his invite. Did everyone get together and play without him? After a few minutes, he almost decided on giving up. The instance made him contemplate whether he even wanted to continue this. Perhaps he'd been too eager.

He sighed. And then the menu pinged, and he was there reading the message in an instant.

Hey, sorry I partied up without you, I just didn't know if you were gonna be on or not :/

Without even thinking, he licked his lips typed back, repeatedly deleting and retyping his message to make sure it was casual but not too casual, apologetic but not desperate—

It's okay, don't worry about it

Likewise sorry it took me so long to get here.

That would do. He'd be lying to say he wasn't feeling that flutter in his stomach; the excitement of something new got to him in a way that only a discovery in his research did, or how he felt when he mastered a new technique in his training.

Let's get started then :)

They started the game, and this time he kept the mic on, as she did. They talked back and forth as they fought creatures and enemies and looted things, eventually coming to learn that she herself was in New York City. He was surprised; suddenly, the world felt a lot smaller, and he couldn't concentrate on just playing after that. The time they spent became more of an opportunity to converse than to play a mundane game for hours on end.

At some point, she switched the topic to his whereabouts. Donnie's breath hitched.

"I'm...not anywhere near. So it doesn't really matter," he told her, cringing. If the guys found out—if Splinter found out—he would be in such trouble.

"Oh," she paused for a moment, trying to find something to say. "That's alright, I don't want you to feel like you have to tell me, you know?"

He'd muted his mic to release a deep breath. He got lost in thought thinking about how in that moment, he wanted to be human. If he weren't a giant mutant turtle, he could actually form a connection with someone. It was a very "Mikey" thing to think, he reckoned, but at times he wanted friends just like his brother did.

"Yeah, sorry, I just…"

"It's really no problem, dude."

He felt as though he could hear the smile in her voice. What did she look like, he wondered. He wanted to see her, but he couldn't ask for that when he could never do the same. If he could get her name, he'd be in the clear to do some preliminary lookups on this person, but so far, she'd been dodgy about sharing info about herself as well. He couldn't blame her. They were two strangers online, one with a huge secret and the other completely in the dark about who he truly was. For all she knew, he could have been a creep, looking to stalk her online and perhaps do even worse. The thought made him feel almost nauseous, how she could be considering that about him as a possibility as they spoke. But she seemed comfortable enough. Unlike him, who was still slightly skeptical of the entire thing, because after spending his whole life in practical isolation, he was at a loss as to what to say or do after a certain point. The conversation died off and both of them thought simultaneously about how weird the sudden silence between them felt.

She hummed, as if searching for something to bring up. When she spoke, he was taken aback—"Hey, I'm gonna be honest, I really like talking to you but this game is getting boring. Do you wanna chat somewhere else?"

"Uh…" he trailed off, mind shooting blanks. Oh, was it just a horrible idea. He couldn't keep the jig up forever; the truth was bound to get revealed somewhere down the line. He was fixing to reject the proposition, tell her that he didn't want to take it that far. She could be anyone. The likelihood of it being a clever ruse on account of the Foot Clan was slim, but the paranoia still worked ambiently in the background noise of his mind. But his other doubt stopped him—when would he ever have a chance at this again? He wanted to have the strength to say no and leave it at that. The loneliness that crept up on him from time to time had something else to say.

"Yeah," he answered after a terribly long pause of mumbling, fighting with himself all the way as she told him where to add her. He could have kicked himself had it not been for the fact that he knew how to encrypt data, and that as long as he didn't leak a word about his inner circle or life, it would be okay. It didn't feel okay, though.

"Nice! I'll text you, see you later, Bo. I had a lot of fun tonight," she chirped.

Before he could respond, she was gone from the party, and the mic went silent. It happened so fast. He was barely caught up with the fact that he was now receiving messages and prompts to talk, but he couldn't bring himself to answer right away. He had to refocus his logic; how could this be used by the enemy as a way to get to them? Could they have somehow anticipated he'd download this game and find this random on there? The more the thought about it, the more glaringly obvious it was that it was not the case. It was just too improbable.

"The probability of the Foot being able to simulate such a specific scenario in order to get intel on us is so slim, it is practically non-existent," he told himself as he finally pulled up the messages. He read through them. "Approximately a zero-point-zero-zero-zero..."

My name is (Y/N), by the way :)

Well, that was easier than expected. He figured that somehow, the name suited you—a fitting name for such a personality. But it also gave him a glimmer of hope. It made him want to ask why you appeared to trust him, as he could be anyone on the Earth over the screen, not his benevolent self. Which she had no way of proving, technically. But he soon came to realize the screen painted him in a whole new light that it casted on him. It hit then that he could be anyone. He didn't have to be himself; not necessarily. She'd never have to know, as he could wear a human mask and she'd be none the wiser. Problem was, the lying made him feel guilty, and slowly would develop to be the thorn in his side.

Donnie thoughtfully stared at the screen. Now that he was here, some of his anxiety began to fade. He found himself actually able to talk, someone to listen to his tangents and even build upon them. They spent hours texting back and forth about anything and everything until it was almost time for him to put the phone down to leave for patrol. He felt giddy, like a kid, all over again.

________________________________________

Had you ever been able to talk to someone this easily?

You asked yourself that question as you exchanged with the faceless and nameless stranger over your screen, chatting from afternoon to night. Time flew by in an instant, with him, and you loved every minute. He was someone intellectual, but funny and so easy to talk to that it was as though the conversation carried itself. After some time he came out about his age after you revealed yours. Oftentimes, he'd just present to you a random question when the subject tapered off and run with it, like now:

What do you think of reptiles?

Puzzled, you took a second to reply. Odd question.

Why do you ask? Do you have one?

I was just curious

What do you think of them?

The chat indicator flip-flopped between "typing" and "idle" a few times before a message finally popped up, and you smiled. You'd learned over this short time that he was a dork in a cute way.

Well...I think they're pretty cool.

They've got natural armor and you would be surprised to know just how fast a turtle can be

You laughed a little to yourself. It was such a random thing to bring up, yet you were endeared. Deciding you'd go along with it, you asked him what else he knew about turtles.

Well...

__________________________________________________

Donnie was wondering what he was talking about just as much as she probably was. Stupid, he thought, facepalming. His first time really speaking with a human as an equal and he starts talking about turtles. Of course he knew a lot about them, he was one himself—but for some reason he found himself wanting to dispel myths and misunderstandings about turtles as if they reflected on him, when as far as she knew, he was just a human guy like herself.

He groaned lightly and typed, thinking up a fact that wasn't too conspicuous.

Red eared sliders are semi-aquatic.

As he typed the next part, he caught himself writing "we" instead of "they", to his dismay. He quickly fixed the error and continued, feeling weirdly exposed as it was almost as though in sharing this information, he was putting himself under a microscope for her to inspect.

They can hold their breath for up to thirty minutes, usually

Holding his breath was something he'd tested numerous times before. He and his brothers had actually made a game out of it on a few occasions, with Leo leading at thirty-three minutes, Donnie in second at thirty-one. Raph broke at twenty-nine minutes and Mikey followed behind in last at just twenty-seven. The ability could be trained, nonetheless.

That's interesting, I wonder what it's like to be able to go underwater so long?

It's kind of cool, you should try sometime

For THIRTY MINUTES?

Shit. He promptly replied:

No—not like I can hold my breath that long, I just mean you should try to see sometime I guess

I tested it just for the fun of it.

Looking up how long humans could hold their breath on average (between thirty seconds and two minutes), he bumped the number up a little bit and added:

Personally, I'm at two minutes and forty-five seconds

He was embarrassed, partially covering his face as he waited for a response. Such a foolish slip-up; he couldn't afford to say anything cryptic. But he still was fairly sure that he had recovered that alright. He couldn't help but think about how awkward or weird he seemed to her. Who talked about this?

I don't think I could hold my breath for more than a minute, kudos to you haha

Anyway, sorry to switch gears all of a sudden but if you don't mind me asking, what's up with your family? You have any siblings?

He told her no. He would not bring his brothers into this, lest it be the slim chance of a ploy, after all. He said his family situation was unconventional and left it at that.

With that, he said to her goodnight and put his phone away, getting up to go get geared for patrol. It was only then he noticed the figure leaning against the doorway.

Chapter 3

[awhitehead17]

Universal Signs

Chapter 3 / Previous Chapter

A/N:Just for the record for some of this story I will be making up things, such as names of places and different items. They're not overly important, but I'm trying to build the idea that it's slightly different to Earth and what humans would be used to in a way. 

Also on AO3

Enjoy! :D

Flying the ship was basically second nature at this point. Kon had been learning to fly a variety of ships since he was born and this one was no different. Of course the other two also fly it, but he prefers to be the one to handle the controls.

Cassie often likes to navigate them, leading them from galaxy to galaxy as they go which Kon doesn’t mind because despite being able to fly ships, his sense of direction was horrendous. Bart doesn’t tend to fly or navigate, he finds it hard to sit still for long periods of time and gets bored easily, he will fly however if Kon or Cassie aren’t around to do it.

With a smooth take off, Kon gets the ship into the air and expertly flies it up and out of the atmosphere. Once they were safely away from the planet and once again in space, Kon shouts over his shoulder, “Right where are we off to now Cassie? What’s the next stop on our route?”

His blonde team mate comes over and stands beside him, her hair falling over her shoulders as she looks down at him, “Our next stop is two galaxies away, we need to gather up 50 bags of Hydrinain Seeds from the planet Romore.” She leans over and starts pressing buttons and typing in commands on the dashboard. “That’ll be where we can restock everything we need as well, the planet has a wide range of markets we can explore.”

Kon nods, he’s not exactly sure how she knows that but the knowledge is helpful and useful in the best ways so he’s not going to argue against it.

Once she’s done with the commands he takes a moment to study them, they were simply directions that needed to be followed and different bits of data from the planet they’ve just left. Kon guides the ship for a moment before activating the autopilot. Two galaxies away is a long way to travel, the autopilot allows Kon to be away from the controls until they reach close to their destination.

“Right, autopilot is on and I’ll check it every now and again just to make sure we’re on track. We’ve got a long while to go before we reach our destination yet.” He says standing up and looking at her with a smile.

Cassie nods, “Yeah, also don’t forget to write the report and check in. You know they hate it when we miss check ins.”

Kon rolls his eyes, he hasn’t forgotten. “Yes boss.”

She opens her mouth to retort but is interrupted by Bart who appears next to them, “Guys I think he’s dead. Did he die? We killed him!”

They look wide eyed at Bart who had his gaze set behind them. Snapping their attention that way they find their fourth passenger slumped on one of the seats. His head was resting on his chest, which really didn’t look like a comfortable position, and he wasn’t moving.

Kon looks back at Bart feeling slightly panicked. “Is he dead?” He looks back over and sure enough he hadn’t moved in the few seconds Kon looked away. The metal pole that Tim had been carrying around was grasped loosely in his fist on his lap

He certainly looked dead and Kon couldn’t believe it. Tim looked fine when they picked him up off the planet, his actions and speech made him sound healthy so what happened between then and now? It wouldn’t have been to do with leaving the atmosphere because the ship has been designed to circulate every kind of element every species in existence needs to breathe, therefore meaning there’s no way he died because he couldn’t breathe.

“No wait! His chest just moved!” Cassie blurts out, hitting them both as if to get their attention. Kon narrows his eyes at Tim’s chest but couldn’t see any movement.

“You sure Cass because I can’t see it.”

Cassie hits him again and looks at him, “Why don’t you use your hearing to see if his heart is still beating.”

Kon pauses and blinks. He hadn’t thought of that. He completely forgot he could even do that to begin with. Now feeling stupid he rubs his head with embarrassment, he had been too panicked to even think of it.

He focuses his hearing on Tim and moments later hears a steady beat. It was slow but firm enough to be deemed alive. Kon turns back to the others with a sigh of relief, “He’s alive and his heart is beating, it’s just slow, maybe because he’s apparently unconscious?”

“So he’s just sleeping?” Bart asks vibrating on the spot, looking between them all. “That’s an awfully weird place to fall asleep, how is that possible? But that’s great to know, at least we haven’t killed him!”

The three of them go quiet for a moment watching as Tim ‘sleeps’. It’s odd thing to see considering none of them three really need to sleep at all. It isn’t an unknown thing to them, just one of a rarity. Bart needs to sleep the most out of all of them but that’s for only a really short time before he’s back up bouncing around. He and Cassie hardly sleep at all, like once every four days maybe, probably longer. Their species aren’t really designed to rest like that.

It’s probably to do with Tim’s own species, once they work out what he was then that would give them some answers. Whatever Tim is, why did their ‘resting’ have to look like they were dead? There are lots of other ways to rest without looking like he had died.

“Bart go poke him. Wake him up.” Cassie tells him, nudging the ginger towards the slumped figure.

“Why me? Why can’t you do it?” Bart pouts.

“Just do it.”

Kon snorts in amusement as Bart heads over to Tim without further protest, he always gives in way to easily.

The two of them watch as their friend steps up beside Tim, clearly trying to work out the best way to wake him. In the end he stands just to the side of Tim and reaches out to poke his shoulder with a finger. When the first poke achieves nothing he does it again this time firmer. For a second time nothing happens. They hear Bart huff in annoyance before he changes tactics and simply shoves Tim with his hand, nearly pushing him out of the chair as he does so.

With a shout that startles them all, Tim snaps awake and jumps to his feet. His hand grips that metal pole tighter and he takes a swing at open air. It was a good thing Bart was a speedster because he would have been smacked right in the face if he hadn’t of moved out of swinging range quick enough.

The three of them stare with wide eyes as Tim frantically looks around for the threat. Kon takes a note on how tense he was now and even how fast his heart was beating, it was such a contrast to moments before.

After what feels like forever Tim seems to come back to himself, he meets their gazes and frowns. This time looking around more cautiously, as if trying to remember what happened. He lets out a quiet sound and drops his defensive position he had gotten into after jumping out of the chair, the pole falls to his side as he runs a hand over his head.

“Uh sorry. I, um, I forgot what happened for a moment. Did I fall asleep, cause that wasn’t supposed to happen, I guess I was just really tired, it’s been a long day and a lots happened, plus that chair is actually really comfy. And I’m rambling so I’m just going to shut up now…”

Tim snaps his mouth closed and looks at them apprehensively. There was an edge to him that Kon picked up on but he couldn’t work out what it was. He was still on the defensive side despite appearing relaxed, the grip on the pole hadn’t loosened even though it was down by his side.

Maybe he was scared? If that was it, Kon could totally understand because it was a scary thing to wake up not really knowing where you are or who you’re with. This isn’t exactly a normal scenario, if Kon was in his position he would probably be scared too.

He feels bad for Tim but was unsure on how to help. It’s not like he would be able to understand him considering their language difference and how Tim doesn’t have a translator.

Kon turns to his friends who turn to him at the same time. Cassie was frowning, “You brought him on here Kon, you help him.”

“I don’t know what to do! He’s scared, doesn’t trust us and is unable to understand us!” Of course he knew this when he convinced the others to agree to let Tim on bored but it’s now only really hitting how hard this actually could be.

Bart shrugs, “Why don’t we offer him something? Like a peace offering to show we don’t mean any harm. He just said he was tried and since he sleeps why don’t we offer him a safe place to rest? After that we can try and work out where he’s from.”

Kon scratches his head, “I guess. You go and lie down to rest don’t you? So he would need a bed to rest comfortably?”

“Yeah, he could have one of our rooms or even the seats down in the common room?”

“That could work, he may feel more at ease when he can relax comfortably.”

Kon turns back to face Tim who was staring at them with an intense expression on his face, like he was desperately trying to work out what they were saying. Kon would love to be able to clearly communicate with him but unfortunately they don’t have the right equipment in order to perform the procedure needed to implant a translator. That’ll have to be something they look into soon.

Kon heads for the exit and gestures for Tim to follow him. Once at the door he opens it up and waits for Tim to join him. As he’s done the last few times, Tim hesitates as he looks around at everything before finally moving. Kon sends him friendly smile and repeats the gesture before walking down the corridor to the opposite end where the common room was.

They reach the other end of the corridor and Kon opens up the door before walking through it, he keeps it open to allow Tim to enter after him. Understanding that Tim will look around at the surroundings first, Kon gives him some time before encouraging him further into the room.

It wasn’t anything special, the room was designed as a place to chill that wasn’t their own personal rooms or the cock pit. One side of the wall held a large universal transmitter screen which allows them to access any form of entertainment from around the galaxy they were currently in. Just opposite that was a long comfy seat, it stretches across the room and curls in at the ends creating an arc like shape. It was great for lying down on and resting.

Behind the seat, just opposite the door, was a large rectangular table was designed for multi purposes. The three of them use it for everything, games, a place to eat at or even a desk when they need to work and don’t want to be in the cock pit. After the table there was a large kitchen set up, with counters, storage places, cookers, coolers and it was all stocked with a wide variety of food. A long thin window was just next to the kitchen area which allows they to see out into space.

After several moments Kon points to the seat. Tim blinks at him, clearly not understanding. Sighing, Kon firmly points at Tim before pointing to the seat again. Tim continues to look at him but then his eyes flicker to the seat before coming back again.

He still looked like he was unsure on what Kon wanted. Kon pinches his nose in frustration, why was it so hard? Either he was terrible at getting his message across in gestures or Tim was incredibly stupid. He thinks for a moment before getting an idea.

Walking over to the seat, he jumps over the back of it and sits down on the plushy material. He sprawls out over it and leans his head back to mimic what Tim had been like earlier in the cock pit. After a few seconds he gets back up and looks expectantly at Tim, hoping he finally gets what he’s trying to tell him.

The guy raises an eyebrow, looking just as confused at before, “Are you saying I can sleep here? On this sofa?”

Kon doesn’t know what a sofa is, but if he means this seat then yes. At least he gets it! Kon smiles and nods is answer.

Tim makes a face of understanding, letting out a little “oh” as he does. He rubs the back of his neck smiling slightly, “Uh, thank you. I guess this is better than being upright in a chair.”

Now getting up from the seat, Kon nods again and gestures to Tim to take his place, he assumes Tim would feel more at ease if he wasn’t close by. Just as Tim begins to walk over and as Kon walks away a loud rumbling sound could be heard.

Kon straightens up and looks around for the source because that wasn’t right. He’s never heard such a noise before. It happens a second time and he feels himself getting worked up. Had something gotten onto the ship without them knowing? He’s going to need to alert the others as soon as possible because if it was a threat then they would need to fight it off.

Opposite him, now standing by the seat Tim makes a harsh noise and smacks his stomach, “Oh shush….”

Kon stares at him confused, especially when that rumbling sound could be heard again. Was that sound coming from Tim? What kind of species makes that kind of noise?

After hitting his stomach a second time, Tim looks up and meets Kon confused stare. He blinks as if surprised to find Kon looking at him, red appears across his face and he smiles shyly, “Uh sorry. Its been a little while since I’ve eaten, my stomach is just being annoyingly noisy.”

So that noise was coming from him. But from his stomach? He doesn’t understand that, did all different parts of his body make different sounds then? That was oddly strange. Tim was from a strange species.

After the initial shock of Tim’s stomach apparently making noises, Kon’s mind catches up with what he had said. He hadn’t eaten in a while, which implies Tim was hungry. Was his stomach making that rumbling noise because he was hungry? Kon would ask him, but sadly can’t because Tim wouldn’t understand him.

He glances over at the kitchen and holds a finger up to Tim before darting over there. He’s sure there’s something for him to eat. Not knowing what species Tim was makes it harder to know what he can and can’t eat but there surely will be something.

He rummages through the cupboards and cooler until he finds something. While he could make something with various of ingredients he figures Tim would want something packaged because of his trust issues at the moment, which was understandable.

In the end he finds and gives Tim a packet of dried out flat bites. They were from Cassie’s planet but they were a decent snack, he’s sure Tim wouldn’t mind them. He also gets Tim a bottle of water, nearly every species needs water so hopefully Tim’s does to.

Walking back over to where Tim was still standing, who had been wearily watching him, he holds the items out for the guy to take. Tim blinks at him for a moment before moving to place that metal pole down and grab the items from his hands.

“Thank you. You didn’t have to but thanks.”

Kon nods and smiles, he gestures to the seat once again before motioning to the door. Without further prompting Kon leaves the room, leaving Tim to do whatever he needs to, hopefully he’ll feel a little more at ease now in his own space and with some food at hand.

He walks back to the cock pit and finds the two others around the table looking over some papers. “This is going to be a lot harder than I thought.” He declares loudly while walking over to them and slumping down in a chair.

Cassie snorts, “Why am I not surprised?”

Bart simply looks curious, “What happened?”

“Well communication is difficult, we’ll need to look into that by the way, understanding gestures takes a little longer than it should. Also his stomach made a weird rumbling noise. I’ve never heard anything like it and actually thought something had snuck onto the ship before realising it was just coming from him.”

Bart pulls a face, making a “huh” sound and Cassie raises an eyebrow in question. “What was the rumbling noise?”

“I think it was because he was hungry. He smacked himself and told his stomach to be quiet so I’m not entirely sure. Maybe something else lives inside of him?” Kon says cocking his head to the side thinking about it. “I gave him your flat bites Cass, I hope you don’t mind. It’s hard to know what he can and can’t eat at the moment.”

She waves the comment off, clearly not bothered by it. “We really ought to work out what species he is if he’s going to be staying with us. While you were dealing with him, Bart and I started to go through our archives looking at what we have to try and figure it out. We used that he doesn’t have a translator as a starting point.” She tells him.

Kon perks up at hearing that, he straightens up in his seat and peers at the papers on the table, “What have you got so far?”

“Well in the short amount of time we’ve been looking we’ve been able to narrow it down to basically one option. We did consider him potentially being an Atlantean but he doesn’t show any signs of gills or webbed fingers so we ruled that option out.” Cassie explains looking at him. “We could be wrong though, his Caucasian skin makes it a bit harder to specifically work out what he is.”

Bart jumps in then, “We think Tim is a Human Being. Which is awesome because I’ve always wanted to meet a Human!”

Kon’s eyes go wide at hearing that. A Human Being? Was that even possible? “Are you sure?” He questions them.

Cassie sends him a knowing look, “We know what you’re thinking and we thought the exact same thing, but it’s the only option that makes sense.”

Kon frowns thinking about it. Humans are rare to find out in the galaxy. They’re considered to be one of the lowest species in existence at the moment because of how under developed they are. Kon’s never met one before but he’s heard a few stories about them and what they’re capable of. No one has much knowledge on them because they’ve barely made it into space travel, so you wouldn’t find them anywhere but on their own planet where they originate from.

However, Kon does know that Humans haven’t yet discovered the universal translator that every species has. It allows them all to communicate with no problems as it automatically translates any language into your own. Humans haven’t explored enough of the galaxy yet to have come across this, so if Tim was in fact a human, his lack of translator would make more sense.

Apart from that and what he’s heard, Kon doesn’t know a lot about the species. “How much information do we know about Humans, because my knowledge on them is very limited.”

Cassie sighs and sits back in her chair, “All I know is that they are a high maintenance species. Those who had talked about Humans on Themyscira used to all complain about how needy and underdeveloped they were. I didn’t learn anything besides that.”

Bart was nearly vibrating form where he was sat. “I know that they aren’t as developed as the rest of us are but my grandpa talked about how he once met one and what it was like and I’ve always wanted to meet one since! If Tim really is a Human Being then we should take this opportunity to learn about him, this is totally going to be crash!”

Kon shakes his head in amusement over Bart’s enthusiasm to the situation. It doesn’t help them much but it’s something that’s not hatred at least.

“Assuming that Tim is a Human then, do we have anything about the species in the archives?”

“Some,” Cassie tosses a small file over to him. It couldn’t have more than six pages in it but it’s better than nothing.

“Looks like we’ve got some reading to do then.” Kon says. At least this will help them understand Tim a bit more. And Kon isn’t going to lie, he’s curious to see how different Tim is and what a Human Being is like to be around. He’s never been in the presence of one, so if their interactions so far are anything to go by, this will be interesting.

[mizu-writes-kumo]

For your dark shance au, think you could write the first time dark shance met. Like maybe evil lance tells canon lance about in a flashback or something please?

Yes, I very much can.  I did mention a bit how the meet in the first fic I ever did for this...but I did like diving into it more.  Because honestly Honvera and Zarakon’s first meeting is adorable, and like I love it for Shance too...so yeah.

You can read it on AO3: Chapter 4: Save Me from Myself

Here you go, I hope you like it...

----

“So…like you and…”  The alternate human version of himself started out.  Using his chatter to distract from the fact that he is testing the tight bonds that strap him down to the table.  “The...glowy-eyed....version of Shiro....are like a thing?”

Lance raised an eyebrow slightly at the question.

Well more the wording of the question.

Such dated human slang.

But that it the most he does in terms of a reaction.  

Not even sparing the other version of himself a glance beyond what he can see in his peripheral vision.  It’s more than enough to see the other test at the bonds that give nothing to him, as Lance continued to look at the readouts of his datapad.  Recording the base levels the other gives off before he does his experiment so he can compare later.

“You know...a thing...together...a couple.”

“Emperor Shirogane is my husband, yes.”  Lance answered flatly.

The other version of him made a strangled sound.

Looking a bit taken by surprise by the fact when Lance looked up from his readings.  As well as uncertain of how to take the fact. Sort of like he figured it, but the confirmation still slapped him hard in the face.

“Oh…”  He started again as Lance placed his datapad down.  “Well...um...that’s…How did you two meet then?”

“My sister introduced us to each other.”  Lance answered flatly as he approached the table.  Tapping at the bonds on the other’s wrists just to check.  “Many decapheebs ago.”

Though the memory of it doesn’t really feel like it.

--

Lance let out a breath of frustration.

Ancients, why did he let Allura talk him into doing this.  

He was content and happy with his work back on Altea.  Theorizing and exploring the bonds of Alchemy, working out how to better develop technology and life, teaching a few classes here and there. It wasn’t the most exciting some days, but Lance didn’t mind.  He felt like he had something of purpose there, than well...anywhere else.

It was a good thing he had going.  

But Allura had to come to talk him into helping researching the rift a comet tore into...reality on their good ally’s planet, Earth.  

Well it was more like complimented and begged him to join.

Because Lance, at first really didn’t want to at first.  

Allura had persisted though, claiming he was by far the best qualified for the job.  The top Alchemist on Altea, who better than that for the job, really. And this was like nothing they had ever seen before. There was so much he could possibly learn from it, both in observation and trying to close it.  He would be right at the forefront of great discoveries. And how she wasn’t asking at his Queen but as his sister, and she will just persist until he said yes.

Though she conveniently left out the part about dealing with humans.

Most specifically, humans that have little to no regard for sensitive instruments and don’t listen to him.  Especially when he tells them to be careful.

Honestly they created twice as much work for Lance.

As if he didn’t already have a ton of data to shift through and organize.  

It was just…

…

A lot.

Part of him wished he had asked Allura if he could help her research the comet.  But there was something in her eyes that Lance knew not to get in the way of. He can only hope it doesn’t over take her.

Though the rift was far more interesting.

So…

There he was.

“And you are totally sure it is safe, Allura?”  An unfamiliar male voice asked behind Lance.

“Yes, the rift is well and fully contained.”  Allura’s voice returned easily. “And all our readings indicate things are at normal human levels.”

Lance turned to the sound of his sister’s voice.  She was just in front of the central containment unit for the rift. She was dressed a lightly armored dress that was expected of her, as the Altean Queen, when she visits foreign planets.  Especially to such places like the military base they were on currently.

Beside her was a man Lance had never seen before.  He was taller than her, with broad shoulders, dark hair, and structured facial features.  He’s dressed in the gray uniforms everyone on around the base wore...save the younger cadets still in training that would run around.  His uniform was decorated with all times of things that indicate rank and achievements.

Lance was too far away to see what they were.  Not that he would really know what any of them meant if he could see.

As an Altean Prince, he should know probably know them.

But as a researcher, Lance just doesn’t have the time.

“Your people should be able to start staying longer than a varga at a time, and start to join our team full time by the end of the next movement.”  Allura continued pleasantly to the man. Making a board gesture to the room and equipment around them. “Everything should be in order by then, everyone should be settled in by then.  And it should be a smoother transition for those involved.

Lance watched as the man nodded at his sister’s words, before he reached down to piece out a digital read out sheet.

The man looked at them for a moment.  A clear look of confusion on his face, as he can’t seem to make out what it means.  Or maybe even what it’s for. Tilting he has a bit from side to side some as he looked at it. Though he did look like he was trying to desperately understand what it was as Allura turned to ask someone a question as they past by.  He just can’t seem to work it out for the life of him, looking more out of his depths with each passing second.

Possibly because he had he read out sheet upside down.

Lance couldn’t help the smile that came to his lips.

The man look rather...cute.

And he found himself walking over towards the two after a tick of watching the man some more.

“Here,”  Lance started warmly as he grabbed the bottom of the sheet gently.  Easily pulling it from the man’s grasp to flip it over the right way. “It was upside down.”  He added as he held it back for the man to grab.

The man blinked at him in surprise.

Before his cheeks changed color slightly.

“Oh, thank you…”  He muttered out softly, before he turned back to the read out...and continued to look lost.

Which caused Lance to smile more.

Yet before Lance could give him some guidance as to what it all meant, Allura noticed his presence.  

Beaming brightly at Lance like she hadn’t seen him in movements.  Despite seeing him that morning for breakfast, because she had to see how he was settling in, and tell him she was introducing the human liaison, the officials has appointed to oversee everything.  The one he would report to and likely work closely with among the others.

“Lance, there you are!”  She exclaimed, before turning towards the man beside her.  “This is Commander Takashi Shirogane. He’s been appointed to oversee this operation.”  Allura introduced the man with a grin. “Shiro, this is my brother, Prince Lance. He's one of the top alchemists Altea has to offer, and the best person for this job.”

Lance resisted the urge to rule his eyes at Allura’s words.

Instead settling for offering his hand out, as per Earthen custom, to the Commander with a smile.  “So, are you the Shiro I’ve heard so much about from Allura, but always seem to miss?”

It was an educated guess that the man was the same Shiro that was Allura had befriended, along with three other humans, some decapheebs back.  Lance had never really had met the man. Unlike the other three, Lance always seemed to just miss Shiro, either arriving after he left, or vise versa. And Allura never really shared anything beyond verbal stories about the ventures she had with her allied friends.

Not that Lance minded.

Allura and him both lived separate lives after their father died and Allura ascended to the throne.  The only really friends they truly shared was Coran. Well...okay maybe Hunk as well, but that was still a budding sort of relationship of Lance’s side.

And that was totally fine with the two.

But still, the brief informal behavior Lance had observed between the two.  It didn’t seem like too much of a leap to assume.

The Commander smiled in return as he took Lance’s hand and gave it a solid shake.  “Does Allura know many Shiros?” He asked as he turned to give Allura a bit of a look as she huffed at him slightly.

“I am aware of only one, Commander Shirogane.”  Lance returned as he pulled his hand away.

“Then I must be the one, Prince Lance.”  Commander Shirogane stated easily.

“Lance is find, Commander.”  Lance corrected warmly. “I’m afraid my young nephew holds the prince title more than I do now. Nor are formalities really needed if we are going to be working together on a day to day basis.”

“Or course.”  Commander Shirogane said with a nod.  “Then you can call me Shiro. Everyone pretty much does it.  It’s less of a mouthful.”

Lance can’t help the small bark of laughter that left his lips.

And Allura smiled on at the two.

--

“Are you and your version of Shiro a...thing?”  Lance asked in a bored hum as he doubled checked one last time that the bonds were secure.  He peered down at his human counterpart with something of a curious expression.

A version of Shiro had not been on the little group they had been delivered.  But the group clearly knew Shiro by his appearance. So they likely know him in some capacity they just haven’t disclosed yet.  Lance wonders what Shiro might be, but not to much. It isn’t relevant to the experiments he has planned, or anything else really.  And frankly it probably never really would.

It was just a curiosity.

The human version of himself glares back at him for a tick or two.

“No.”  He finally admits in a harsh tone.

“Shame.”  Lance stated, before he gamed his fingers into the other’s chest and let the energy of his alchemy flow.

The experiments had begun.

----

AN: Another cliff hanger.

Though spoiler alert, Lance doesn't actually get hurt from the experiments exactly. 

This takes place before the previous chapter.  By like a day or two.  Because I imagine the Paladins being stuck there for a while.  Though between the two dimensions time works differently.  It flows the same way in each, but a few vargas in one, could mean a whole like half day in another.  

Sorry for the weird pacing, that is all me.  I tried to rush writing this...

Any way, I hope you all enjoyed it.

[pxiao]

Reasons I’m glad V///R is dead and gone forever

So V//R is dead and cancelled and my only reaction is FINALLY. Since VR is gone and we can finish forgetting the forgettable show and get rid of all our salt. You’re free to add to the post but there are rules. 

1. DO NOT TAG IT SO THE FANS CAN SEE. As much as I hate the show and the fandom even they don’t deserve to see people bashing the show in their tag. 

2. Don’t write the name of the show or the characters. Use /// or ---- in the character’s name like Yu///saku so the tumblr search can’t pull them up

ok good? Good. 

Everyone but Yu///saku is worthless. 

Seriously when have any of the characters actually progressed the story? Potentially only SB have done anything truly worthwhile. Everyone else was just to die to build tension for Yu//saku. And if you’re asking for RE///volver. OHHH I have a section just for him, don’t you worry.

Sto//rm Acc/ess aka Yu//saku is such a shitty duelist that the MINORITY of his duels has him not cheating. 

SERIOUSLY it’s written that Yu//saku can get a random extra deck monster with his skill BUT the issue is despite it being “random” Yu//saku ALWAYS gets the monster he needs to win. NOT ONCE IN THE 100+ EPISODE HAS HE GOTTEN A USELESS CARD. ALWAYS THE ONE HE NEEDS. Totally doesn’t seem like plot armor. And you know it wouldn’t be as big of an issue IF HE DIDN’T USE IT FOR EVERY SPE///ED DUEL!!!!!!!! For a character that the show likes to say is “invincible” he sure isn’t good enough to win with the deck he built. It got ridiculous with his duel with G/oo in season 2 where G//o countered his skill BUT A//i revealed it had a secondary effect that let him draw a card AND still get a new extra deck monster. 

Plot twists: 

They fall into two camps, “we already knew you dumbasses” or “THE HELL WERE YOU GUYS SMOKING!” Essentially the twists are obvious like A///i was based off of Yu//saku’s data as why wouldn’t he be. Or the dumb ones like Spec///tre beating A///oi or somehow Spec//tre had CONSCIOUS TREE AS A MOTHER. There have been a few twists that I can count that surprised me but they lead to other twists that fall back into stupid.  

the “Plot” just plain doesn’t exist.

 It’s just things happening with some connecting plot lines BUT they rarely lead into each other. Light///ning revealed that his plan was happening THE EXACT SAME TIME as season 1′s finale. A//i being the villain is more due to Light//ning’s simulation somehow proving that A///i will destroy humanity than the fact that A/i’s the only Ig//nis left. And each season’s arc has no connecting plot either. Season 1 can be broken down to Yu//saku gets A//i which has him meet the “main cast” and then Yu///saku go to S//OL for info that was TOTALLY pointless. Which is isolated from Re//volver setting a virus that traps you on the internet which leads to Re//volver learning Yusa//ku’s face AND MEETING HIM but does jack shit with that info. And then Re///volver’s final plan happens that was based on timing than anything else. 

Does that seem disjointed? YEP because there is no narrative at all, things are just happening. There is a vague connection at best but none of the characters’ actions actually affect how the story goes. THE FRUSTRATING PART IS THEY SET UP MOMENTS WHERE THEY COULD HAVE BUT THEY DIDN’T. SEASON 2 AND 3 IS THE SAME THINGS JUST HAPPEN AND THEN YU//SAKU HAS TO SAVE THE FUCKING DAY. V/R has no rhyme or reason why things happen, they just do and let me tell you, that’s fucking boring.

The Yu//saku praise

 My fucking god. Look the protagonist getting praised isn’t new, it happens with each series BUT the issue is the volume that Yu//saku gets and how early he gets it. Most protagonists have to wait till at least the second series before the population love them. Yu///saku got it by the THIRD EPISODE. BY. BEAT. A. MOOK. He was called a hero, people were saying he was hot, people were copying his avatar. AND IT NEVER STOPPED. EVERY OTHER EPISODE HAS SOMEONE SAY HE’S AMAZING, STRONG AND SOOO IMPORTANT. 

An A//oi episode in season 1 has a less than five minute section just to show that a kid HERO WORSHIPS YU//SAKU AND WAS IT. The kid appears with an avatar based on PM, PM saves him and tells the kid to trust him to save and then the kid logs out. AND THIS HAPPENS CONSTANTLY. “YU//SAKU IS INVINCIBLE”, “YU//SAKU IS MY HERO!”, “EVERYONE DEPENDS ON YOU YU//SAKU”. IT’S BEEN AN ENTIRE SHOW OF PEOPLE SINGING YU///SAKU’S PRAISES AND THE WORST PART OF IT IS, HE DESERVES NONE OF IT.

The setting. 

Let me ask ... THE FUCK IS IT. What even is Link Vr//ains? Is it a game, a site, a program? WHY IS IT ONLY IN DE///N CITY? WHY IS DESTROYING IT WILL LEAD TO THE ENTIRE INTERNET CRASHING???????? Link Vr///ains is something that NEEDS to be explained but the show NEVER DOES. HELL IT NEVER EVEN TRIES. 

The girls

Jesus christ ... the girls are .... just sad. A///oi ... my fucking god A//oi. A///oi’s personality starts and ends with “onii-sama”. NEARLY EVERY MOTIVE OF HER’S IS I WANT TO DO SOMETHING FOR MY STEPBROTHER. Everything else is a passing fancy. Mi///yu? Yeah nice motivation but that’s why her two duels as BM in season 2 is more about her relationship with Ak//ira than her “friend”. 

Em//ma’s backstory was absorbed into BS’ despite the fact he was a new addition when Em//ma was around since season 1. 

Vir//ya is just a bit character meant to fill out the remain KOH, since their return in season 2, she haven’t done anything of value. 

Qu///een ... why is she there? I mean she appeared in a Bikini ... in virtual reality. seriously there is no point in that shit, and then did nothing besides watch over Ear//th’s death and then lost to A//i when her skill was named honey trap. 

Mi////yu is so unimportant we haven’t gotten a scene of her out of flashback despite being a lost chi//ld.   

Back to A//oi, it’s not even that A//oi isn’t important,sadly that’s not uncommon in YGO, it’s the fact EACH TIME SHE TRIES TO DO SOMETHING, THE SHOW PUNISHES HER FOR IT. She tries to be a symbol for people, it’s stupid why she trying but still, Spec///tre reveals he was toying with her the entire time and she had no chance. She tries to get stronger in season 2, SB beats cause she doesn’t have an Ig//nis and then she does nothing for half the season. She tries to save her “childhood friend”, Bow//man beats her and takes her consciousness so Yu//saku has to save her ... again. She tries to protected Ak//ira, A//i beats them and only takes A//oi to taunt her over her failure. THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE SHOW, ANYTIME A//OI TRIES TO DO ANYTHING, THE SHOW BEAT HER UP AS IF TO SAY, YOU SHOULDN’T DO ANYTHING EVER. Great message there. 

Simulations

You know as people there are plenty of reasons that conflict starts, greed, hate, anger, lust, desperation to survive, hunger. And how does conflict start in V/r? FUCKING SIMULATIONS. EVERY SINGLE CONFLICT IN THIS SHOW IS BECAUSE OF A SIMULATION. K//OH are a thing cause Kog///ami did a simulation that showed that the Ig//nis are learning TOO FAST AND WILL CAUSE THE END OF HUMANITY. Ligh///tning turned evil because he learned no matter what he can NEVER BE FRIENDS WITH HUMANITY CAUSE OF A SIMULATION. A///i turning “evil” because he’s doom to end the world cause of you guessed it a SIMULATION. Simulations are just tools and are NEVER THE FINAL RESULT. There are too many variables to truly make an 100% accurate simulation BUT HERE THEY ACT AS IF SIMULATIONS ARE A FUCKING GOSPEL. IT’S STUPID AND INCREDIBLY LAZY THAT THE CAUSE OF ALL the conflict in this show is because of independent simulations.  

Mental illness

As a person with a mental illness and went to therapy I can say this, VR doesn’t deserve any brown points for covering mental illness. If anything VR touching mentally illness takes points away. I have already said my piece on how poorly VR tackles mental illness. But my take away is this when it comes to mental illness VR is a absolutely horrible.

Rev///ovler

Re//voler is in all honestly a shitty character despite what his fans think. He’s an asshole that has no drive of his own. He admit he does this all BECAUSE OF HIS DAD. The one time he did do something of his own accord, turn his dad in, he later regretted so much that he refuses to do it again. LOOK I can understand missing your father despite the fact he’s trash, human relationships are complex BUT RE///VOLVER BEING “FATHER I WILL NEVER EVER GO AGAINST YOU AGAIN DESPITE THE FACT YOU KIDNAPPED KIDS AND THEN TORTURED THEM BECAUSE YOU FELT SAD HUMAN WILL EVENTUALLY GO EXTINCT ONLY TO TURN ON YOUR CREATIONS” IS FUCKING STUPID. And then he goes the EXTRA MILE OF ASS and says to Yu//saku’s face that he REGRETS SAVING HIS LIFE TWICE. And he never apologized either. 

Also his “development” is forced as shit, Revo//lver never develops onscreen or shows signs of changing, just the show and characters say OH YES RE//VOLVER CHANGED.... IN A SHORT PERIOD OF TIME.  Honestly after his return in season 2 where he showed he DIDN’T CHANGE, then he tries to help Hom//ura despite telling Yu//saku he regrets saving him. WHY THE CHANGE. HE HAS SEEN NOTHING THAT MADE HE FEEL SYMPATHY FOR THE LOST KI//DS. BUT HE’S ALL OF A SUDDEN KIND TO HO///MURA. AND THEN AFTER HE LOSES TO LIGH//TNING AND SAY’S A/I NAME, ONLY TO SNAP BACK IN SEASON 3 AND WANTS TO KILL A///I. What I’m saying is, he has no real character development, you can tell what the show WANTED him to become but my god they were too lazy to actually show him changing. 

Yu//saku

OH BOY this is going to be long. Yu//saku is by far the WORST WRITTEN PROTAGONIST IN YGO HISTORY.  He has no personality and no real background besides HE WAS TORTURED, POOR HIM!!!!! Seriously what was his life like before the Lo//st Incident. What did he like to do, did he have friends, where the fuck are his parents. There is no information about him, past or present. Like his current “personality”, WHAT IS IT besides he’s stoic/emotionless. He’s not nice or even mean anymore. He has no likes or even dislikes. All we know is he’s determined ... and that’s it. Yu//saku is a blank slate for the viewers to project on. Yu//saku is honestly NOTHING. 

Honestly, Yu///saku isn’t strong as he cheats the MAJORITY of his duels, he isn’t smart as rarely does he do anything that’s smart, wanting to brutal force the solution and he doesn’t follow his own advice. 

Yu//saku: Bonds are important and the only thing that are absolutes

Yu//saku then fucks off for 3 MONTHS NOT TELLING ANYONE

And like Re//volver, his “development” is forced as hell. He just says things that make no sense for him to say. Yu//saku shouldn’t say revenge doesn’t help WHEN IT OBVIOUSLY DID. The show was supporting him and he got the guy that kidnapped him killed and then he got better. HELL JI//N WAS SAID TO GET BETTER ONCE THE K//OH WERE BEAT.   

[leolamin97]

INVADER PINK- The Pink Nightmare Part 1

INVADER PINK

The Pink Nightmare

      In the Farthest reaches of space, beyond the limits of the human imagination was a planet whose name was unknown. But to its inhabitants it was known as Homeworld. This fractured planet was home to the mightiest conquers in the universe known as the gems. Light based creatures known for their gemstone and insane power. This race has gone across the cosmos taking planet after planet in order to further grow their numbers. And today would be the start of their biggest expansion yet. Thousands upon, thousands of ships slowly descended upon the planet in calm orderly lines entering the atmosphere and landing at the space docks.

  At least until one small ship flew in. The small craft violently pushing its way through the other ships destroying the once orderly lines. The ship burning through the atmosphere and coming in hot towards a sparkling city. The ship narrowly dodging building and bridges, well one bridge got nicked as it flew by. The ship coming up to a dock pushing another ship out of the way as it landed.

   Many gems looked at the ship confused as it settled. The ship opening and a set of stairs descending. The gems looked on curiously at what was in the ship, until something revealed itself, a pink ballet slipper with a little white poof on it. Upon seeing that all the gems gasped in recoiled as a towering figure exited the ship. The figure took a moment to look around before pulling out a small device and throwing it before the gems. The device landed and then formed into a metallic donut shape and began to float from the ground. The figure then leapt from the ship onto the device and pink bubble forming in the center of it which they landed on. The figure then began to run on the bubble making it move forward, all the gems getting out of the way as the figure barreled through. The figure then jumped on the bubble launching it and itself high into the air where it proceeded to bounce across building moving towards the center of the city.

   In the center of the sparkling city was a Citadel where thousands of gems were flooding in of every shape color and size making their way into a massive stage area. Yellow and Blue lights shined on the area as two small figures stood in the center stage.

“Everyone, behold! The daunting, beauty and elegance that is, Yellow Diamond!” Yellow Pearl said striking a pose

“Ahem, everyone prepares yourselves emotionally for the overpowering elegance that is, Blue Diamond.” Blue Pearl said as she gave a small bow

   As soon as both said their piece a pillar of light erupted from the ground. And once it died down two massive figures stood before the gems. Two of the rulers of Homeworld Yellow and Blue Diamond. The arena erupted into cheers at the mere sight of their grand leaders shaking the entire citadel.

“Thank you, Thank you. Your all to kind.” Yellow says quieting them down

“Woooo!” one lone gem cheered

“And you’re just brown-nosing.” Yellow said glaring at the gem

“Oh.” The gem said sadly

“Our dear gems, welcome to start of Era 3!” Blue Diamond says as the gems cheer again

“Under our leadership you shall be instrumental in the continued expansion of our race across the universe. Every gem has a role they must fill, and it is through your obedience that this well-oiled machine keeps running.” Yellow says proudly

“Now before we begin the assigning, we would like to take a moment to once again congratulate a special gem. Carnelian Facet-3G6, Cut-4WF, whose brave sacrifice helped us achieve victory in the battle of Leo-Dejo.” Blue said as the light shined on a gem in the crowd who was missing half its body but still waved to the crowd with a pained smile

“How are you?” Yellow asks

“It only hurts when somebody touches it-AAAAAH!!!” Carnelian screams when a ruby touches the fractured gem

“Right. Now let us begin I will take a number of you to the western quadrant to do battle with the Allama Armada who have been a thorn in our side for a while now. You all must be prepared for battle.” Yellow says sternly

“I will be handling the eastern quadrant. The planets we colonize will pose little resistance, still there will be much data to gather and records to be made.” Blue said

“So, without further delay-.” Yellow says until a Massive crash filled the hall getting everyone’s attention

“WHO DARES-?!!!” Yellow yells angrily looking to the doorway with energy crackling around her

“EXCUSE ME!!” A bratty voice says down the hall shocking Yellow and Blue

“That voice.” Blue says frozen

“Pardon me! Coming through! It’s nothing personal I’m just important!” the voice says getting closer

“It can’t be!” Yellow says in disbelief

“MOVE PLEASE!! SORRY!! THAT’S NOT AS BAD AS YOU THINK IT IS!!” The voice says getting closer and closer

  Until a pink blur entered the arena and leapt over the crowd everyone looking in awe as it soared overhead landing before the Diamonds. The Diamonds looking on in shock as the figure pocketed it’s traveling device into its massive head of Pink hair.

“PINK DIAMOND?!!!” The two gems yelled shocked as they looked before the smallest and youngest of the Diamonds

“Hi Yellow, Hi Blue, and no White- as usual. My invitation must’ve been lost. If I hadn’t heard from that Jasper, I would’ve missed this. That would’ve been unlucky for you.” Pink says with a small chuckle

“You-weren’t-invited!” Yellow says with a growl trying to contain herself getting an elbow from Blue

“Pink…. Dearest, weren’t you supposed to be having your lessons in the Classroom?” Blue said kneeling down a bit to talk to her

“Oh, I quit when I heard about this.” Pink says

“You…. Quit…... your lessons.” Yellow says annoyed

“Come on it was so boring. I have the fracking schedule forever etched into my gemstone.” Pink reasons

“That was the point! So, you can finally mature and act like a Diamond!” Yellow said looking down at Pink

“Besides, this is the beginning of Era 3! All the Diamonds should be here, it’s a time for new beginnings and new ideas. Like me having a colony!” Pink says with a wide grin

“NO, no, no, NO!! That’s not happening, you’re going back to your room and then we’ll discuss you leaving your lessons once were done here.” Yellow says pointing out of the arena

“COME ON!!! IT’S BEEN SO LONG!! You can’t start the new Era without me! Yellow I was a big part of your invasion on PeeTee-345, don’t you remember?" Pink pleads

"Oh yeah, I remember." Yellow groans pinching the bridge of her nose

(57 years ago)

Sirens wailed and Gems were running and screaming as an enormous pair of Pink's mechanical legs march through crushing everything in its path. The Tiny monarch was inside laughing maniacally as she controlled the legs stomp furiously on everything in her path. A team of gems inside as well controlling the laser fire.

"MY DIAMOND PLEASE!!! THIS IS OUR COLONY!!!" A Peridot pleads

"SILENCE CLOD!!! Increase power! LASERS, I DEMAND MORE LASERS!!!” Pink yells causing the Peridot to frantically moves dials on a screen

“And you push more buttons, MORE BUTTONS!!!" Pink says laugh maniacally

    Yellow sat on a throne face in her hands as Pink’s legs marched by destroying everything in its path.

“MY DIAMOND!! Pink is-.” Yellow Pearl says coming in

“yeah.” Yellow says defeated

“Aren’t you going to-?” YP asks

“YEAH?!” Yellow says glaring at her

“…...yes, my Diamond.” YP says exiting the room and Yellow sunk into her chair the sound of screams and explosions filling the air

(Present Day)

“What?! I thought we were under attack.” Pink reasons

“By what? THE DIRT!!!” Yellow growls before Blue puts a hand on her shoulder

“You caused a lot of damage Pink. I mean you crushed my Pearl.” Blue says

"Right before I put her back together again" Pink gestures to a BP, who is a shambling mash of limbs as she crawls about like an ant. Blue's current Pearl grabbing her Diamond's cloak and hiding behind it slightly

“PINK!! You-are not ready- FOR A COLONY!!!” Yellow yells

“Bu-But it’s not fair! You both got colonies when you were 12,000.” Pink pointing accusingly at the two

“Yeah, but by then I wasn’t bringing pet organics into the Citadel or distracting gems doing their jobs with a new ‘bouncer’ trick I learned. In fact, I never did that ever!” Yellow argued

“I was observing those organics to see how they would react in a gem environment. And the other gems love when I do my tricks.” Pink said

“I actually do, there was this one time she bounced off the wall and….” One gem whispered to another only to then get zapped and poofed by Yellow

“YELLOW!” Blue yelled accusingly

“This is why she can’t have a colony; she isn’t taking this seriously. The way she is now, she is incapable of being the leader they’ll need to control a colony.” Yellow says

“I am taking this seriously! So, I do things a little different? Doesn’t mean I’m ineffective.” Pink says

“Pink you have a…… special way of doing things. But it’s not the Diamond way, the right way.” Blue says

“B-but I have ideas! Things that could work for other colonies if you’d just let me show you!” Pink pleads

“Oh stars, not this Organic integration idea again.” Yellow cringed Blue doing so a little as well

“No no no, please just listen. It can work if we can control the population, we wouldn’t need to create so many gems and kill the planet so quickly. We can have a colony last twice as long.” Pink said holding up two fingers

“Pink, organics are…. Well useless. They’re chaotic, disorganized, expire incredibly fast, and are…. just really disgusting.” Blue said with a cringe

“And hard to control.” Yellow added

“Eh, what’s a little rebellion to us. It’s like you said Yellow ‘You just gotta break’em down until they listen’ like you did with those Jaspers. Right guys?” Pink said looking to a group of Jaspers who was deathly silent looking at Yellow

“WE ARE NOT DOING THIS INSANE PLAN, JUST SO YOU CAN PLAY WITH ORGANICS!!” Yellow yelled

“B-but I’m being serious, honest.” Pink said looking sadly

“Pink your serious, is not the seriousness needed for a colony.” Blue said trying to reason with Pink

“W-Why not? You both have so many worlds and I don't even have! It's not fair! You never let me do anything important except make parties for your victories! You send me away for 50+ cycle expecting 100! YOU TREAT ME LIKE I’M NOT EVEN A DIAMOND! I want one! I want my own army! I want my own planet! I deserve it! I'm just as important as you!” Pink yells stomping her foot and pointing at the two

   Yellow then roughly grabs Pink’s arms glaring at her intensely shocking everyone in the room. “Then why don't you act like it, Pink?!”

   A chill went down Pink spine, she wanted to shoot back with something but she had nothing. She simply bowed her head in defeat as Yellow let go of her arm.

“Yellow that wasn’t necessary.” Blue said

“Pink, got to your room-NOW!” Yellow said sternly pointing to the exit, Pink doing so her head still bowed her massive hair covering her face, but anyone close enough could hear a small sob from her

   The suddenly all the lights went out in the citadel surprising everyone. Then in the center of the stage between Yellow and Blue a beam of white light shined down. And in the center of that light was a White pearl arms stretched out. Blue and Yellow yelped and jumped back upon seeing the tiny gem, Pink turning around and wiping some welled up tears in her eyes.

“Greetings everyone from White Diamond.” The Pearl said creepily cheerful

“Pearl? PEARL! PEARL IT’S ME!” Pink said happily waving to the gem

“Pearl! Pearl! Pearl! Pearl it’s me! Right here! Pearl! Pearl! I’m right here! Pearl! It’s Pink! Pearl! Pearl! Hey Pearl!” Pink yells and waves at the gem despite being only a few feet away from her and getting no reaction

“Pink you were supposed to spend 100 cycles in the classroom, yet you only spent 54.” The White Pearl said in the same creepy voice

“Yeah well….” Pink says

“Ever so eager as always. Since you are so passionate White has been persuaded to give you a chance.” White Pearl says

“WHAT?!” Yellow and Blue yell

“I’M GETTING A COLONY?!” Pink says eyes sparkling

“No, but if you do this right it could lead to one.” White Pearl says as a 3-D space map overtakes the room

“Pink, my Diamond has decided to give you a special assignment to prove whether you are ready for your colony. My Diamond has decided to give you a special assignment.” White Pearl says as Pink gasps

“SPECIAL?! JUST LIKE ME!!” Pink says with Diamonds in her eyes as a Space Map fills the room

“You are to take a small squadron to an unexplored section of space and look for new planets for us to colonize. If you find any suitable planets you will contact us so that we may send the proper aid and begin colonization. But you will be the one in charge, all the planets you find in that sector will be yours.” White Pearl says, Blue wants to interject but is stopped by Yellow

“All-Mine? S-so If I find like 50 planets, I get them? No Blue, Yellow, or White stepping in and telling me what to do?” Pink asks with a nervous laugh

“Yes, do you accept?” White Pearl asked

“…… yes-Yes-YES!!! Thank you, thank you so much! You will not regret this!!” Pink says as Blue and Yellow look concerned

“You will be given some gems to help with your exploration. Now-.” White pearl says

“HI BEST FRIEND!!!” A high pitch joyous voice shrieked echoing through the building

   Pink looked up and her eyes widened at what she saw descending on her. “SPINEL?!!” Pink yells as the small pink heart gem landed on her face wrapping her limbs around her in a hug. All the gems in the hall only looked on confused as this situation proceeded to get weirder.

"SPINEL? How did you escape the classroom?" Pink asked as she pulled the gem off her face and held her up

"I followed you when you left my diamond!" Spinel said happily with a toothy smile

"But I didn't see you on the ship." Pink says confused

"I held onto the outside!" Spinel says laughing

"I was flying dangerously fast; I'm surprised you held on." Pink says as she lowered her to the ground

"I think I swallowed an asteroid on the way here!" Spinel says smiling showing a hole in her teeth were the space rock flew through Pink giving a nervous grin

“Oh, great your Spinel’s here. Well why don’t you leave her to your room, she’ll be here when you come back.” White Pearl says

“Oh no, Spinel’s coming with me.” Pink says pointing to the small gem

“PINK!! If you are going on a mission you need to focus and-.” Yellow says

“Very well you can.” White Pearl says

“Excuse me?” Yellow asked confused

“Yellow and Blue Diamond, White Diamond requests your presence immediately.” White Pearl says as she vanishes in her bubble once again

    The Two Diamond give a concerned look before they to vanished in a pillar of light. Thus, leaving Pink and Spinel in front of the huge crowd of gems who were waiting for something to happen. An awkward cough filled the air.

“Soooooo…... WHO WANT’S TO SEE ME JUGGLE?” Pink says with a smile not sure what to say at the moment.

“……. I do!” One gem yell

----

     Blue and Yellow appeared in the Pristine chamber of White Diamond, the Luminous gem towering over the two with her calm smile.

“White, I don’t think this is a good idea. Pink is still so…... under-developed she’s not ready-.” Blue pleads

“What’s your game? That sector you showed is a dead zone, there’s no suitable planet’s out there! I’ve seen it.” Yellow says with narrowed eyes

“What?!” Blue asks shocked

“Yes, it is, but Pink doesn’t know that.” White says

“Your gonna send her to roam some barren section of space?” Blue asks

“Of course, this is all just Starlight’s newest game. She comes asking to feel important, so we let her. She isn’t going to take this seriously, it’s just another chance for her to play. She's even bringing her favorite toy. Let her play this little game until she gets bored and comes home, then she can get back to learning to be a true Diamond. Plus, this little distraction will keep her occupied while we work.” White says

“She will leave immediately; you will give her the bare essentials she needs for her trip. Best to see her off. Oh, she will have some much fun with her little game.” White says with a smile

---

“THIS IS NOT A GAME SPINEL!!” Pink says now in her room gathering various things

   Spinel sat on a chair kicking her legs as she watched Pink run around the room the pebbles hanging onto her.

“This is it! This is my chance! I am going to show them that I am a Diamond! I cannot mess this up! I and doubly determined to do this! And Your gonna help me Spinel!” Pink says pointing to Spinel as she held various crystals in her hands and hair

“YAY! ADVENTURE!!” Spinel says clapping her hands

“Yes, Spinel! To the farthest reaches of space to discover new world in order to expand the gem empire. You and me facing untold dangers and gaining unimaginable glory! You are gonna be the first Spinel to colonize another world.” Pink says grabbing Spinel getting an amazed ‘Ooooooo’ from her

“And finally, FINALLY!!! Yellow, Blue, White! They’ll see, they’ll see I got what it takes. That I can stand with them. That I am a Diamond, just like them.” Pink says looking out to HW imagining her greatness

“Are you having that fantasy where you have the other Diamond’s respect and are sitting next to them instead of below them in the throne room. And where your super big like them.” Spinel asks

“I told you that dream in confidence.” Pink says glaring at Spinel

“No, it’s super cute.” Spinel says smiling

“Either way, this starts the Legend of Pink Diamond!! LET’S GO!!” Pink says pointing towards the door only for it to open revealing Blue

“So just you and a Spinel are going to colonize a planet. Need I remind you that you are only cataloging and coming back to us, before you colonize. And I believe a few more gems will be needed on your journey.” Blue says looking down at Pink

“Oh-yeah- I guess a few more hands would help.” Pink says sheepishly

“This mission will be smaller so I will send a small team of our best gems to go with you.” Blue said as a group of gems stepped up in front of blue

“These Rubies will serve as your protection, and they are led by one of our most experience ruby commanders.” Blue said gesturing to 5 ruby soldiers

     Pink examined the soldiers they were all pretty standard rubies all with a gem on their bodies. One on their left arm, another on their left leg, one with theirs on their belly, one with a gem with their left eye. And finally, the commander who had their gem on their right palm and wore a Yellow visor and a red headband.

“Ah rubies, I would’ve preferred Quartz. But you all look capable and your commander brave and strong. I expect great things from all of you.” Pink says

“Thank you, my Diamond.” The rubies say saluting

“And this shall be your sapphire.” Blue said gesturing to the small blue gem beside the rubies

“Ooooo, a sapphire. I’ve always been fascinated with your type. I will look to you to set me on the path to victory, as long as it doesn’t involve me doing something stupid.” Pink says

“I will try not to over step my boundaries, my diamond.” The Sapphire said saluting and bowing getting a nod from Pink as she walked away

The Ruby commander than walked up to the Sapphire

“Me and my rubies shall give our all in protecting out Diamond and you my clarity.” The Ruby said with a small bow

“She’s going to be disappointed in the next 2 minutes.” Sapphire said getting a confused look from Ruby

“This shall be your Peridot.” Blue says gesturing to the green gem

“Top of my sector, not to brag my Diamond. Here for all your tech-based needs.” Peridot says saluting

“Good to hear, I like tech. Especially ones involving travel like my bouncer. And not to brag myself, but am an expert with ship tech.” Pink says

“Flying a roaming eye through an asteroid field and around a sun only to crash it into a small bodega does not make you an expert.” Blue says

“YES, IT DOES!” Pink says stomping her foot

“Right, and Finally your Pearl.” Blue says

     Pink’s eyes immediately sparkle at the mention of Pearl. A large smile takes over her face as she holds out her hands. Blue then holds out in her hands a Pearl and Pink’s face fell.

“Who the heck is this?” Pink says

“Your Pearl.” Blue says

“B-but this isn’t-.” Pink says

“White is still holding your previous Pearl. This Pearl is specially made to serve and assist you with your other Duties.” Blue says

“You think I can’t do this by myself?” Pink says offended getting an unsure shrug from Blue. Pink was about to yell until the Pearl landed before her

“I wish to serve you to the best of my ability, my Diamond.” The Pearl says bowing before Pink

Pink got a good look at the Pearl and sighed with a light blush on her face

“I…... know you will, welcome to my court Pearl.” Pink says with a groan

“YAY, NEW FRIENDS!!” Spinel says from the back

“Now Pink, it will be your job to guide these gems on this mission. You will be the pillar holding up the foundation of your…. Colony. And these gems will look to you as their perfect leader.” Blue says

“I know, blue I’m ready for this!” Pink says just as Blue scooped her up and hugged Pink to her face

“Ooooooh be safe my little Pink!” Blue cried

“B-Blue it’s hard to look like a strong confident leader, when your crying over me!” Pink complained embarrassed

“Oh of course, they’ll be waiting by your ship for you once your ready.” Blue says as she walks out leaving Pearl with Pink

   Pink lets out a sigh as she goes back to pick up the various crystals. Pearl approached as Pink tried to organize.

“What are these my Diamond?” Pearl asks

“Oh, just some stuff I’ve been working on. Top secret colony stuff I’ve been hanging onto for years.” Pink says examining a crystal

“There are so many. You are really taking this seriously.” Pearl says

“Of course, I am! This is my chance to finally show them all, what Pink Diamond is made of!” Pink said trying to be serious despite the small pebbles running across her

   Pearl hummed before having her gem glow enveloping the pile of crystals. They all then vanished into her gemstone, surprising Pink and Spinel.

“I will have to discuss the actual organization later my Diamond, but I’ll keep them safe.” Pearl says smiling

“Oooooo, do me next! DO ME NEXT!!” Spinel shrieks

“Oh wow, I haven’t had a Pearl in so long I forgot you all can do that. Well done Pearl, you’ll come far here! Now let’s get going! TO ME SPINEL!!” Pink says as she holds out her arms

   Spinel them jumps on her back wrapping her arms around her shoulders and her legs around her waist becoming a backpack. Pink then takes off down the hall Spinel giggling as she was carried. Pearl had an uneasy smile but followed.

---

   In one of the gems ports a massive pair of Pink legs stood as the team of gems looked up at it in surprise.

“I heard about it, but I never actually thought it real.” The Ruby commander says

“The ship will be controlled by Pink, but we’ll be running support making sure it keeps running. I hope you all are well-versed in some ship engineering; we have three roaming eyes on board for surveillance purposes.” Peridot says looking at a chart made from her limb enhancers

“They’ll manage.” The commander says looking to her team who were looking at the ship

    Then Pink finally arrived confidently with Spinel on her back. She saw the ship and immediately exploded into excitement.

“YOU’RE GIVING ME BACK MY SHIP?!” Pink says eying the legs

“You’ll need it to travel…... though we did remove all the heavy artillery from it just to be safe.” Blue said whispering the last part

“Alright then let’s get this show on the-!” Pink says before getting interrupted by “PINK!”

Pink turned around to see a stern Yellow looking down at her arms crossed

“Oh yellow, nice to see you. And no White as usual.” Pink says

“Pink…… there’s something I need to say.” Yellow says actually sounding a bit unsure

“Okay.” Pink says eyebrow raised

“Pink-I…... sometimes I can…... and you…...oh-kay. When I look at you, I see…... I know that.” Yellow stammers

“Yellow, if you need to write this down you can call me later. But I gotta go now-.” Pink says until Yellow jabs a finger on her head squishing her poofy hair and holding her place

“YOU-are not going anywhere! You are gonna stay here! And you are going to LISTEN!” Yellow growls getting a nod from Pink

  Yellow puts her hands together taking a breath and trying to gather up some courage. She then drops to her knees wanting to get lower to Pink and holding out her hand. Pink cautiously steps onto her palm and is lifted up.

“Pink…. you are a Diamond, don’t ever think that you aren’t no matter what happens. You are meant for greatness and it never comes when we expect it. You have you own special way of doing things. And while very inefficient and sometimes destructive, it is your way and there is merit to it.” Yellow says kindly Pink’s eyes widening

“Pink, I know you are capable of great things. I just worry that your antics will get you in deep trouble if you were to ever get out there. But now I realize that it is best to leave you be and let you ride this out. Just know that…. When you are out there…... what you are looking for, may not be what you need.” Yellow says

“Oh-okay Yellow, I-I’ll be sure to remember that-.” Pink says surprised by Yellow tone only to then get a hug from Yellow

“You are a Diamond, and you are going to be a great one. No matter what happens never lose pride in yourself.” Yellow says her voice wavering

“I-I won’t yellow, please let go.” Pink says enjoying the moment but not wanting to admit it

“Aw this is nice.” Spinel says still on Pink’s back surprising yellow making her let go

“Hmf, anyway good luck.” Yellow says blushing making Pink smirk before turning to the gems

“Now, I know you all probably have heard stuff about me. I want you all to forget that, cause what you are getting now is 100% pure-uncut-PINK DIAMOND! You are all about to apart of something great as we venture into the great unknown to further our mighty empire. You will all be remembered as not only the pioneers of the new frontier, but at the first of the Court of Pink Diamond. The story we forge out there will not only be mine, but the story of our COURT! NOW LET’S GO!!” Pink says proudly as Spinel claps for her and the other salute

    Yellow and Blue watch Pink and the others enter the ship. The Massive legs shudder and began to move. After knocking down a few ships the Legs take off towards the sky, the two Diamonds looking on with a smile but also worry.

“Don’t worry, this will be good for Pink. White said so and she’s always right.” Blue says trying to encourage her making Yellow’s sad frown deepen.

   In space the pair of Pink legs took off through the void. In the main control center of the room Pink stood with her gems surrounding her doing various things.

“Ah this thing still runs like a dream.” Pink says

“Coordinates are set, we are on route for the unknown sector.” Peridot says

“Excellent! Soon we will bring glory to the gem race and DOOM to our enemies!” Pink says with a grin

“Yes, my Diamond!” The rubies said, the commander realizing Sapphire just left the room

“I’M GONNA SING THE DOOM SONG!!” Spinel says jumping in front of Pink

“Oh, that isn’t-.” Pink says trying to stop her before

“ Doom, doom, doom, doo doom, doom, Doom, doom, doom, doo doom, doom, Doom, doom, doom, doo doom, doom, Doom, doom, doom, doo doom, doom, Doom, doom, doom, doo doom, doom, Doom, doom, doom, doo doom, doom-!” Spinel sang as she did a little dance everyone watching just put off by the display

“Sooooo…... how long is she gonna do this?” Peridot asks

6 MONTHS LATER

(TO BE CONTINUED)

[angel-scythe]

Chloe : Chapter 20

Hi !!

I’m so excited to show you this chapter and those coming after!!

I love you all for the interest you gave to my first long DBH fanfiction and the first one I could actually finish since six hellish months (what’s actually horrible for someone who can’t live without writing)

I hope you’ll love it.

You know what to do, right?

Smash the |   °| or keep reading!

7th December, 15:21

 School was over and Elizabeth came to the entry, didn’t know who will take her back to home or wherever she will be brought. Probably the precinct, anyway. Her papa’s or her daddy’s one, it was the same in the end.

She said goodbye to few friends and pulled out the tongue to Andy. Then she finished to cross the schoolyard. While she wasn’t yet at the end of the yard, she recognized someone and her heart bumped in her chest. She bounced then ran toward the person whom was talking in a cellphone. They looked to struggle.

She ran a little faster and jumped at the person legs, hugged them tightly.

“Hiiiii!”

“Hi!”

“I missed you!”

“Me too.”

She smiled widely and turned the head when she heard something. It was Andy whom coming and she hugged more tightly the legs.

“You see?! I told you my stepfather was an Android!” she screamed, as proud as a peacock.

“Elizabeth,” Connor said softly. “Don’t bother your little friend.”

“But…”

She looked toward him and saw that his cheeks were quite blue.

“Come, we’ll go to the precinct. You’re papa isn’t there already but he will soon.”

“Okay. You’ll stay with us?” she asked, looking him with wide eyes.

“I think, yes. If your papa is okay.”

“I’m sure he’s! He likes you so much!”

“Are you sure it’s not you who like me so much?”

“Too!” she giggled.

She had her hand in his and they walked in the street and she was so happy. She even didn’t care about the looks that finished on her. On the hand softly held. Or they were watching Connor. Maybe it depended of whom did it? The Androids looked her, for example.

After all, how a Human could love an Android and inversely.

Both didn’t care since the little girl talked about her day, so happy to share that with Connor. He was listening carefully and asked things. Then he talked about Sumo. He loved so much Sumo and Elizabeth was, of course, really entertained to listen about everything he could do.

As they walked, they arrived at the bus station. The precinct was not so near of the school and since Connor couldn’t drive a car… In fact, when the segregation ended, much robots started to want to drive and a lot gained their driver’s license. Few because they were already able to because of their works. Since, they should have passed the license. However, Connor didn’t feel the envy to drive especially because he was with Hank or, now, Gavin. Both could drive so it wasn’t really useful.

Now, just at this moment, he felt a little more the need to drive because people were looking his LED and his hand around Elizabeth’s one. Even the Androids looked him with astonishment. After all, a lot of Android discarded any sign of the fact that they were Robots. Some still used it but they were more and more rare.

The bus came and Connor let people got down and other got up before entering with the little girl. He has real money to help the transaction, knowing he should take the bus, and he took two tickets. The man behind his flywheel looked him as he walked in the alley. He let Elizabeth choose the place, near a window, and came to follow her.

“Wait a second!”

The voice was harsh.

Connor turned his head toward the head of the bus. It was the driver, getting up to come toward him.

“You’re an Android, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“You can’t come here. The Androids are in the back.”

“I’m sorry?”

“You can! Go in the back with the others!”

Connor was perplexed.

“I thought Markus has asked for the segregation to stop.”

“Yes. He does. And what he got? This! You have seat in the back. It’s pretty cool, no? Go there!”

Connor shook his head.

“I’m sorry, but no. I guess Elizabeth can’t come with me. Do you think I’ll let her alone? I rather sit with her.”

“I’ll kick you if you don’t move in the back, you shit!”

The Android looked him as the others passengers watched. A lot of Androids didn’t dare to act, in fact. Markus has gained rights for them but things needed time. They couldn’t just appear as they wanted to be seen for now. And they waited… Seat in the back, it was already a good thing. Even if it wasn’t the right law. Sometimes, it was better to just bend over and accept...

“I won’t repeat a third time, you dipstick. You. go. in. the. back. with. your. littles. friends.” The driver put his hand in his back pocket.

Elizabeth moaned, afraid.

“Conny…” she cried.

Connor couldn’t bear that. He really liked the little girl and she was Gavin’s daughter. For him, make her cry was like a double-crime.

“I hope for you it’s not a gun in your pocket.”

“Fucking Android!” The driver started to take what he had and Elizabeth screamed.

Connor got something in his jacket, too. People screamed in the bus, afraid. But the Android didn’t have a gun or whatever. However, what he showed frozen the man who licked hardly his lower lips.

“W… where do you…”

He watched the police badge in Connor’s palm.

“I’m Connor Anderson, the Android Detective working for the DPD. May I look in my data if you did something wrong, those lasts weeks? Or you prefer to try your chance with the gun? I never saw a trial from inside.”

In fact, Connor knew the man didn’t have a blank police record and he perfectly knew the man can’t force him to go in the back. It wasn’t the law after all.

“Okay. Okay… Just sit down. B… But, next time, say immediately you’re a fucking cop.” The man went to the front of the bus to sit behind his flywheel, mumbling against the Androids.

Connor sat beside the little girl and took her in his arms.

“Are you okay?”

“I… I’m okay. But I was scared.”

Connor hugged her more.

“I didn’t want you to be hurt.”

“I didn’t want you to be alone and hurt.”

The youngie cuddled in his arms. She was still scared. Maybe more because her both fathers were in the police? She knew. Sometimes, one will come back with bruises or wound and will explain, shortly, it happened in the work, because people weren’t kind. She knew what being hurt by a bullet or a weapon was and she had already her daddy in hospital. That time, he said it was the appendage but since her papa was worry and her daddy didn’t have his appendage since she was four, she didn’t think it was really the appendage.

She was just happy the man was okay now. And she was happy to get some love, caresses and hugs.

 7th December, 17:37

 As they came back to the precinct, Felix did the report on the computer and for Gavin too. For him, it was quite surprising that five of Gavin’s Classmates couldn’t remember him. Each of them, tough, used to have problem with Chloe when they were at school. The lady had warm blood and couldn’t stand it when people said something wrong about her brother. Since Elijah was weird and too intelligent, he really had people who hated him and insulted him. So Chloe was quite hated too but nobody has killed her or the ST200. Not with the alibis they gave.

Gavin couldn’t bore to hear him talk and talk.

It was weird because he almost had the same voice as Connor and he liked to hear Connor talk, in fact.

Almost because, for him, the voice were absolutely different. Connor’s one looked more soft, cute. And Felix has just a weird cold voice.

In his opinion.

He turned off the motor and went out of the car. Felix followed him, still doing the report. For three hours and half. Just kill him. And he even hadn’t eaten during the day. Only the coffee everyone offered to him and maybe a biscuit then, of course, the gum he chewed to don’t smoke. He wanted to smoke…

He went to the precinct and crossed the security.

“Connor is here.” He heard in his back.

Felix, of course.

But inside his heart, Gavin was happy to know that. He searched the Android with his eyes and smiled when he saw him but not only. As he was working, he had Elizabeth on his lap and seemed to help her to do her homework. She didn’t look like she was drawing anyway.

He went to the desk even if Hank was in front of it, drinking coffee while trying to make a report in his computer.

“I’ll do it, Lieutenant. Don’t worry about that. Do you need something in particular? I can make it appear in your terminal, maybe…”

“Don’t make life easy for you old dad, Connor. I won’t learn if you do everything for me.”

Well in fact, he tried to understand and manage his live around informatics since he was born. And he was from 85! Imagine how lame he could feel when he grew up with this technology. When all his friends got new and high-tech mp3, 4 or whatever the number and he still use a CD player because he preferred that and it was more easy. Well, now, he has a compact music player but still struggle with that.

“Plus, if you let him in his shit, it’ll be funnier. And I said sheet. With two e.”

“Of course,” Hank said with a fake smile.

“Papa!” Elizabeth jumped on the ground then at her father’s waist. “Papa! You should have seen Andy’s head when Conny came to pick me up! It was so funny!”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah! But most fun of that, we plied at rock, paper, scissors and you know what?”

“What?”

Gavin took his daughter in his arms and go back to his place.

“I win each time!”

“Awesome!!”

How Connor did that?

Connor got up after a quick glance to Felix whom went to his desk. In fact, he used Wilson’s one when this one didn’t use it. He had his own session since this morning so… But he could as well use Connor’s one, especially because the RK800 took Elizabeth’s stuff and came to Gavin’s desk to put it in.

He turned to go back with Hank and Gavin gave a quick look to him. He smiled as his daughter told things and things. In the same time, he looked the homework his daughter has made. It was obvious Connor helped her since he couldn’t see something wrong. Of course, his daughter was smart but she used to have one or two mistakes.

He kissed her head when she started to talk about her lunch. She had French fries with cheese and a salad with tomato sauce pellet so it was good. It was her daddy who paid for her lunch at school and sometime, she was a little guilty but it was so good. And her papa said it was okay and it was easier. Sometimes, she had bread or other things made by her papa. She was always happy. Gavin rose her like that. To be happy with wade live given to them.

 7th December, 19:02

 The door was closed when Gavin entered in his home. He got to the kitchen and his daughter bounced behind him.

“Can I help?”

“Yeah. What would you like to do?”

“Hmm…”

The little girl looked in the refrigerator as the TV was turning on. The emission they always watched was put on. The LP600 was still the main candidate.

She heard her papa’s belly gurgle.

“Pasta’s risotto?” she proposed.

It was something her papa made often since he didn’t have a lot of time to cook. They went home pretty late every time.

“Let’s do this.”

Gavin let her daughter took the ingredients and choose if they’ll do a cheesy recipe or more meaty. He wanted her to be happy and did what he can with that.

Finally, she chose for a fishy and seafood one. Gavin was glad to use the breaded fish and the last gambas he still have in her freezer. That make some place and he could buy new stuff after that.

 “Tadaaam.”

Elizabeth was bright and happy as the meal was over. She put one ladle of pasta in each dish and they went in the sofa, in front of the TV. The game was almost finish and the youngie still needed to wash her, check her homework a last time and she maybe could hope to play a little before go to bed but she didn’t really hoped for that.

“May I taste?”

Elizabeth looked Connor, sit beside her.

“I thought you couldn’t?”

“It was right. I made some upgrade, in fact… Now, I can eat.” Connor smiled. “I wanted to taste your awesome meal. And I’m not disappointed you made a such meal with your papa, then!”

“Oooh!” Elizabeth took her fork and gave it to the Android.

He thanked her and taste. It was particular but… good?

“What can of other upgrade did you make?” Gavin asked.

Now he understood why the bot wanted to stay at Jericho and discuss with the people.

“I… can blush! The regular color for us his blue, to remind the thirium, the blue blood but we can choice the color. I hesitated for the red to look like you and North said I should choose the multicolor’s one but… I choose the blue finally.”

“Awesome!” the little girl smiled. “Blue his great! I love blue!”

She hugged him.

“You’re awesome, Conny!”

“You are,” he said, hugged her back.

Gavin hided a little smile, seeing them together.

[lifeafterten]

RtN 02: Sept 02 -Sept 12; Get Me the FUCK Outta Here

I’ve been here for days. Who the fuck stays in the hospital for days?... Fucked up people. And I’m in Fucked-Upville-- Population (points to self) this mother fucker. 

Okay. Okay. I’m turning the drama down.  Honestly though... I’ve been here a fucking while. I have an I.V. tube in each arm, one for fluids, because I’m perpetually dehydrated, the other is for the antibiotics that don’t seem to be working, because I still feel like death. I have to often lay in awkward positions so I don’t tangle myself and make the machines go off. So. Much. Beeping. And I swear to Christ, if they come at you with a little blue bag and claim it’s potassium... RUN--Fucking run, because once they hook your ass up to that shit you’ll feel like they’re injecting fire into your veins and you can’t scream because let’s face it: you’re too damn tired, so you settle for some weird case of facial Tourettes in the form of wincing and hissing. And they turn the drip down enough for the fire to feel like a sting... and you feel that effervescent sting until it’s done. It’s “supposed” to take 30 minutes-- they say. But my pansy ass can’t take the heat so the slowed down version makes it last at least an hour and some change. I pray I’m not stubborn enough today to take the morphine.  Why won’t you take the morphine, Ashley? I’ll fucking tell you why-- I have control issues.  And the morphine feels too fucking good that I need the pain to remind me that I’m still alive and to gauge between dream and reality.

At this point I’m agitated (by pain and impatience). I’ve been stuck by damned needled so many times, because of all the bloodletting I’ve been doing.  These assholes have been taking my life source (no, not coffee, you freak) twice a day. Oh, I’m sorry, they’ve been taking my “blood cultures” twice a day.

Why? They don’t say. They tell me to ask my doctor. My doctor is a pussy.  Soft spoken; pussy footing fucking pussy, who can’t give me a straight answer.

I dismiss my doctor more than a person dismisses alcoholism. Day drinking is not a bad thing. Who cares if it’s barely noon and you’ve been drinking since 9. ... Not speaking from experience-- Anyway!

I dismissed my doctor a lot. I couldn’t help it. I’ve been laying up in this bitch for weeks and you can’t give me some indication of what’s going on; let alone a time frame of when I’ll be able to go home-- on top of a mother fucking reason why I’m being kept in here for so damn long? Yeah. Fuck that shit. Dismissed, mother fucker. I have no fucks to give for useless asshats. Come talk to me when you can tell me what the fuck’s up. 

I’ve been moved to three or four rooms. From the ER bed to Surgery... Then to another room in Surgery... to the Telemetry ward, because my heart rate was too high-- which honestly I’m not surprised... I’ve been on permanent pissed the hell off for quite some time now.  They take my vitals every 30 minutes.  I’ve been counting because I literally have nothing else to do, besides... I only feel that it’s fair that I monitor them while they monitor me. But mostly it’s because I’m bored and there’s nothing on TV.  By now I’ve refused visitors.  I’ve dodged death a couple times.

Homicide via Mio overdose: Backstory: I asked for Mio, because they kept saying I was dehydrated and I thought I needed electrolytes like a muh’fug, so when my friend Kris came by (note she had no idea what Mio was let alone how to use it) and had dumped an entire bottle of Mio (24 servings) into my water jug (16 - 24 oz tops). I take one sip of it and I thought I was gonna die. Chest was on fire. My machines were going crazy, because I was coughing my lungs out and poor Kris is panicked and distraught. Its hard to convey you’re okay if you’re croaking like you’ve been smoking for about 300 years and your vision is obscured by tears. Sidenote: The incident still brings her to tears to this day, she feels so bad. Personally, I think it’s adorable and funny... Now, at the time...? Owie.

Suicide via Mother doth Love too much: I love my mother. I do. I love my entire family. But they like to hover and it was stifling. They’re looking at me with worried eyes when they think I’m asleep and I get it.  It doesn’t look good, kid.  My sister? God love her, she tries to keep the worry and her tears in check because she knows I don’t know how to handle them.  My Dad? Shit, my dad knows what’s up. He knows I’m gonna handle my shit the only way I know how. On my own terms. This is why I’m a daddy’s girl. My brother and sister in law on the other hand? My bother spilled water down the front of my gown (had to change that shit. not fun) and his wife, in her efforts to break my fever, stuffed my fresh new gown with ice packs.. And when I say ice packs, I mean latex gloves filled with ice stuffed in my gown. Stuffed. In. My. Fucking. Gown. That’s it-- I’ve had it! Everyone’s banned.

And it’s also hard to put on a tough front when all I wanna do is cry, but I end up just being angry instead.

The only human interaction I had is when the nurses are taking my blood, or my vitals, or switching my IV bags, or helping me to the bathroom to do bathroom things, or giving me sponge baths because I’m too weak to get out of bed, or shooting morphine into my body to ease my torment; or shoving pills down my fucking throat because nothing is fucking working. I’m still getting fevers out of nowhere.  People are coming in and out every morning to lift my gown up (they do it so much they don’t even ask anymore. A brief thought of charging them crosses my mind, and I allow a small giggle. Because it’s silly, because I’m glad I still had somewhat of a sense of humor.) Still, I think my cooter deserves some ounce of respect. Women’s lib and all that crap. I’ve turned this part of the day into a game (I’m SO fucking bored). I like to spot the face tightening moment when they assess whatever the fuck is going on with my leg (I don’t know. I haven’t seen... I don’t want to see yet). 

It’s fun for me, because they’re medical professionals-- they’re supposed to be used to this kind of thing. But the face tightening? To me that’s a victory. That just means they have to school their expressions to indifference so as to not alarm me. Ah, bed side manner.  They’re so sweet. But I know just by their non-expressions that it looks fucked up. I have to look at the small details; read between the lines of what they’re not telling me.  I’d be in the dark otherwise. What are they not telling me? I know they’re testing for something... But I don’t know what they’re testing for. I stamp down fear, because I don’t have enough data to panic.

My dreams are getting scarier, because of the morphine. No more morphine, I promise myself. Vicodin only.  Yeah, that seems safer. The nurses, I’ve learned, just need someone to listen to them. Since I can’t get a decent night’s sleep because they’re fucking coming in every 15 to 30 minutes all day, every day, all the fucking time... Why the fuck not? I got nowhere else to be. I seem to have opened Pandora’s Box, because it’s 3am and I’m giving life advice to Agnes who has a very rebellious son, whom I point out is 16 years old and he’s going through a phase, it doesn’t mean she’s a bad mother.  Which I reminds me that I need to tell Doris who’s part of the Day crew that Agnes is off on Wednesdays too and that they should hangout together, because I think they would get along. I make a mental note to pass Agnes’ number to Doris later. I really should start charging... This pro bono shit aint working out. 

During my hospital stay I’ve managed the following:

Make only 4 nurse assistants cry

Befriend most if not all the Filipino nurses (they gave me all the apple sauce I wanted)

Make that one stern Indian Night Nurse smile (she gave me yogurt and bananas every time she was on shift)

Counsel only 5 to 6 nurses, mostly 5.. the 6th one kinda got weird. Didn’t take whatever she gave me.

Snob my doctor almost every day. 

Made my main nurse laugh because she thinks I’m a riot. 

Days later it was time for me to go home. I knew this for damned sure.  I saw so many specialists from an infectious disease doctor to a surgeon. I was so fucking bloated from all the fluids they were trying to fill me with that they could barely find veins to stab to get their precious blood cultures from. 

I also decided that with my body like this the Mitchelin tire man was my cousin.

Sidenote: To hell with the Infectious Disease doctor. That heifer made me lay on my side for two fucking days straight. Fat load that shit did for me. With all the extra fluids in my body, it just shifted to one side. All it gave me was a backache and lopsided boobs... and some fucking fluid in my lungs. Fucking devil woman. I got a fucked up leg, I’m the size of a float during the Macy’s Day Parade, and now I got lopsided tits. It’s funny... now. At the time? Not so much. It was September 12.  I had broken out in a rash due to an allergic reaction to one of the antibiotics. (Let’s just add that to the list of whatever the fuck else is wrong with my body, shall we?) My “doctor” (doesn’t deserve the title nor respect. Sorry not sorry) was trying to get me to stay a few more days. I’ve had quite enough. I told him to get the discharge papers ready. I’m leaving. My fevers were gone. My leg wasn’t draining so badly anymore (ew, gross. sorry) I felt fine. Despite me constantly checking my hands so they don’t try to scrape my skin off. Fucking hell I was so itchy. I didn’t need to be in here. That’s when the good doctor decided to divulge that I hurt his feelings and that I was his least favorite patient. (Boo freakity hoo.) But I was a good girl and let him talk, said all the appropriate things. ... He’s still a pussy.  He was glad to be rid of me and the feeling was more than fucking mutual. I did not tell him to get fucked. I did not tell him to suck my dick. I did not flick him off. I did not throw shit at him. I was rather proud of myself. I showed great restraint.  But I did point out that just because he had the “MD” attached to his name, does not mean automatic respect. Respect is earned Dr. Pussy foot.  I signed the paperwork with relish. Jessie came to pick me up and I was whisked off to spend my mandatory (couldn’t argue my way outta that one) bed rest at the Joseph’s.  I’m so tired of laying down. TBC...

[fanficwriter013]

The Tower - Chapter 25

The Tower: An Avengers Fanfic

Chapter 25

Chapters:one / two / three / four / five / six / seven / eight / nine / ten / eleven / twelve / thirteen / fourteen / fifteen / sixteen / seventeen / eighteen / nineteen / twenty / twenty-one / twenty-two / twenty-three / twenty-four / twenty-five / twenty-six / twenty-seven / twenty-eight

Word Count: 2466

Warnings:   Little dramatic, little angsty, talk of sexual acts.

Synopsis:   Elly moves forth with the plan to infilitrate HYDRA. There’s still some kinks to iron out.

Author’s Note: Listen y’all, written with Kate. My best friend, she literally keeps me sane when things aren’t exactly going my way. @emilyevanston

Chapter 25 - Switching Sides

My slow turn took about two weeks.  By this stage, we had been away from the Tower for over a month.  Tony had been keeping a track of FRIDAY and she had been hacked every update he made.  The only way for us to know it was safe to go home was to finish this properly.

I started by just becoming very sullen and withdrawn every time Natasha and Sam took me in to talk to her.  I’d start having irrational outbursts about not being given options.  Then I started to ‘sneak’ into where they were keeping her.   The first time I went in there I didn’t even say anything to her.  I just sat on the ground and cried with my legs pulled up against me.  She kept trying to engage but I’d just shake my head and not look at her, eventually getting up and saying I shouldn’t have even come here and leaving the room.

The second time I snuck her in some of the nicer food.

“What’s this for?”  She said, looking at it suspiciously.

“Just… You… They… If they’re going to…” I stammered looking everywhere but at her.

“So this is like my last meal?”  She said.  She laughed and shook her head slumping against the wall.

“No.  Not last.”  I replied.

“So when is it going to happen?  Tomorrow?  A week from now?”  She asked.  “That will make you an accomplice you know?”

I shook my head.  “Not an accomplice.”

She looked at me right in the eye.  “They’re going to make you do it?”

I dropped my gaze and left the room.

The last time I went to see her I shuffled in the room and just sat against the wall putting my head on my knees.

“What are they up to now?”  She asked.  I shook my head without looking at her.  “Must be really screwed up if you won’t even talk about it.”

I took a deep shuddering breath and wiped my eyes on my knees.  After a little while of us just sitting there silently I looked up at her.  “Have you ever been in love?”

“I have not.”  She said.  “Is your little group not working out for you anymore?”

“I never had before.  I thought this was what this was.  But how can it be?  What is this thing I’m feeling?”  I said to her desperately.

Alexa looked me over.  “What are you feeling?  Like a caged animal?”

I started opening and closing my fist and shaking my head a tiny amount.  “I say the words but they don’t say them back.  Then they tell me I have to do this.”  I said waving my arms around.  “Like it’s some lesson in life that I have to learn.  They’re the Avengers. The Avengers are the good guys.”

“You know we teach too.  But it’s more free-range.”  Alexa said.

“Who are we?”  I asked.

She smirked at me.  “They still haven’t worked it out?  Why I’m HYDRA, sweetie.”

“I thought you were related to Justin Hammer,”  I said.

She scoffed.  “I can’t be both?  He’s my father.  My name is… was Justine Hammer.  He is a piece of shit.  The cancer was him.  He was experimenting on me when I was still a child.”

“I’m sorry, Alexa,”  I said quietly.

“Not as sorry as me.”  She said and shook her head.  “That’s the past though.  The future is HYDRA.  Come with me.”

“HYDRA are the bad guys,”  I said in monotone.

“It’s all semantics.  I’m in this for the science.”  Alexa said flicking her hand like she was brushing away an irrelevant annoyance.

I buried my face in my knees again.  “I’m not a bad person.  Why is the only option here doing something I don’t want to do?”

“There are always other options.  You just need to look at it from another angle.”  Alexa said.

I looked up at her with a pained expression.  “What other angle?  What’s the other angle involved in cold-blooded murder makes it okay?”

“Not doing the cold-blooded murder, Elise,”  Alexa said.  “Switch sides.  You can do the work you want to do.  Help me.”  I looked up at her but I didn’t say anything.  “We’d be able to help further your research.  Do human trials.”

“I can’t,”  I whispered.

“That’s why it’d be your assistant doing the actual human trials.  Your hands wouldn’t be dirty.”  Alexa explained in the flawed logic of a psychopath.

I started to scratch at my wrist like there was something crawling under my skin.  “I shouldn’t have come here.”

“You keep saying that and yet you keep coming back,”  Alexa said.

I got to my feet and started pacing.  “They won’t let me go.  I know too much.  It’s useless.  I just have to get used to it.  Maybe they do love me.  Maybe they do know what’s best for me.”

“I may not know what love is.  But I doubt them forcing you to do something you don’t want to do counts.  That forcing you to do something that goes against your values is knowing what’s best for you.”  Alexa said coming to the door of her cell.

I started to cry and pressed my face against the bars of the cell.  “I should have left them when I had the chance.  I’m a stupid child who thought she could play superheroes.”

Alexa put her hands through the bars and stroked my hair.  “I’m giving you the chance now.”

I let out a hollow laugh.  “You’re in a cell, Alexa.  And I’m nothing.  We both have to accept our fate.  They’re making me take your healing factor away.  I’m sorry.  Even if I did want to get you out of here and join HYDRA, I’m just a person.  They’re the Avengers. Neither of us are going anywhere.”  I pulled away from her and headed to the door.

“Elise… Elly, keep my offer as an option.  Don’t let them do this to us.”  She said the slightest hint of pleading to her voice.

****

The rest of the day and the following morning was about preparing me for what was going to happen.  What I needed to do.  When they’d come for me.  The following morning I said my goodbyes to everyone and went to find Tony.  He jumped when I came through the door and turned quickly to face me.

“You’re late.  Give me your arm.”  I rolled up my sleeve and held out my arm to him.  “Sorry, I got caught up saying goodbye to B.”

“What?  How many times is that?”  Tony said, tapping on the inside of my elbow as he tried to find a vein.

“I don’t know.  Uh… what since we’ve been here?  Twice.  All up?  I’ve lost count.  Why?”  I said looking at him confused.

He stopped what he was doing and shook his head.  “Once. It was once for me.  With the three of us.  So it barely even counts.  I’ve known that man for years now.”

I ran my hand through his hair.  “What still?”

Tony nodded and went back to finding my vein.

“I think you might need to talk to him.  I think he needs that, Tony.  He needs to have the other guy be okay with it.”  I said.

“Why are your veins so small?”  He asked deflecting the question.

I pulled my hand away and started rubbing the inside of my elbow while I pumped my fist.  “I don’t drink nearly enough water,”  I said.  “If you can’t talk he’s not going to either, you know?”

Tony grumbled something unintelligible and looked away from me.

I tapped my inner elbow and found a vein on the outer edge.  I took Tony’s hand and pressed his fingers against it.  “Feel it?”

He nodded and grabbed a little glass vial from the bench.  “That’ll do.”

“We can just keep having science club threesomes if you like,”  I said.

He laughed and raised an eyebrow at me.  “I’ll never say no to those.”  He held my arm out straight.  “This is going to hurt a lot.  I’m really sorry in advance.”  He tipped the vial and something that looked like the tiniest grain of rice in the world landed on my skin over the vein.  It opened up and started boring into my skin.  Tony was not kidding, it stung like hell.

“Ow, fuck!”  I cursed.

Tony continued to hold my arm in place.  “It has to burrow to get a decent tissue sample.  It becomes biometrically attuned to you so it can tell us if you’re in pain or distressed or …” He trailed off.

I clenched my teeth and looked away from it tears pricking my eyes.  When it was done I let out a sigh of relief and Tony started to clean up the wound.  I moved to a bench and grabbed a tablet.  “I’m going to take this with some of the data I’ve put together.  I’ve got a fake set with things still missing so people can’t make super soldiers or whatever.”  I said as I started deleting files and importing other ones onto it.

“I am really sorry about this.  I have one in too, I know how much it hurts.”  Tony said as he finished dressing the wound.

“It’s fine, honey.  I get it.  And now we’re all matchy matchy.”  I said without looking up from the tablet.

He rested his chin on my shoulder and kissed my cheek.  “That’s what you’re concerned about?  Being matching?”

“No, of course not but if I focus on the things I’m concerned about, I’ll chicken out,”  I said, reaching behind me and rubbing my palm on his cheek.

“Do you want me to show you the control panel to show you the chip is working?”  Tony asked.  “I hear those Avengers guys are coming to rescue you.”

I looked up from the tablet and met his eyes.  “I trust you implicitly.  Honestly.  But that doesn’t stop those pesky intrusive thoughts from creeping in.  Me being a dork distracts me.”  I explained as I ran my hands up and down his sides.  “Besides, not only are those Avengers guys coming to rescue me, I have that genius, billionaire, playboy, whatever he is tracking me and a tiny ant guy to ride in my pocket.  I’ll be fine.”  I turned back to my work.

Tony’s chin returned to my shoulder and his hands teased over my sides.  “I think you forgot philanthropist.”

“Oh yeah.  He is very generous in lots of ways.”  I teased.

Tony started to rub his hands in circles over my stomach, it felt warm and soothing.   “Are you done yet?”  He asked.

I kept tapping away without looking up.  I moved one last thing and put the tablet down.  “I am now.”

Tony turned me around to face him.  “You’re really dedicated.  It’s cute.”

I pulled myself a little closer to him.  “You’re cute.”

“Just cute?  I thought I’d get a better descriptor word than that.”  He teased.

“Hmm…”  I said, pretending to think.  “Old?  Was the other descriptor old?”

Tony shook his head trying to hold back a smirk.  “You’re asking for trouble.  That’s not any better.”

“I’m always asking for trouble.  I’m a known troublemaker.”  I teased and tilted my head leaning in to kiss him.  I flicked my tongue over the corner of his mouth.  Tony hummed and dragged his teeth over my bottom lip.  I pulled myself flush against him and my tongue dipped into his mouth and danced with his as my hands carded through his hair.  He ran his hands up my back and I pulled back and rested my forehead against his.  “I love you, Anthony Edward Stark.  Don’t you forget it.”  I say tapping him on the chest.

“I - You know - I do - It’s …”  He stammered.

I put my finger on his lips.  “It’s okay.  I would rather I never heard it and to feel it like I do.”  I said and kissed just under his ear.  “I’m going to be back. You can keep showing me when we get home.”   I slide my hand up and down under his t-shirt, grazing my nails over his skin.

“I’m getting mixed signals here.  Do you want me to behave or not?”  He teased, his hands running down to my ass.

I brought my lips to his ear.  “No.  I want you to lift me up onto this bench and fuck me until I can’t even form words.  Until I forget everything except your name and when I try to say it, all I can do is scream it out.”  I whispered and leaned back, looking at him.  “But, Scott is probably waiting for me.  We’ll have to have a rain check.”

Tony shook his head.  “You are the worst.”  He teased and kissed me softly, stroking my throat with his thumb.  “You better be prepared for the inevitable orgy you’re inciting when you get back.”

I quirked my eyebrow at him.  “I look forward to it.”  I kissed him one last time and picked up the tablet and headed towards the door.  “Don’t forget to come rescue me.”

“You can count on it.”  He said.  “El?”

I turned to look at him.

“I do.  You know?”  He said.

I smile back at him.  “I know.  I love you too.”

I headed into the hall and about halfway to the cells I found Scott waiting with Steve and Thor.

“You’re ready to go,”  Steve asked.

“As I’ll ever be,”  I replied.

“And you know the plan?”  Steve asked.

“Just get her to take me to where she has them.  Don’t try to escape or be a hero.  I’m on her side.  Scott will do most of the rest of it.  Avoid eating or drinking anything she gives me.”  I say.

“Good.”  He leaned down, cupped my jaw and kissed me, his lips softly caressing mine.  “Stay safe.”  He said as he pulled back.  He looked at Scott.  “Keep her safe.”

“Yeah.  Of course.”  He said with a smile.  He pressed a button with his thumb and disappeared.   A moment later I could feel him crawling into my hair.

Thor took my hand.  “Lady Elly, take care.  I still haven’t had a chance to get to know you and we are to be lovers, am I right?”

I felt myself blush and Steve clapped Thor on the shoulder.  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen her blush before.”

Thor leaned down and kissed me.  It was firm but tender and there was a static spark that passed between us.  He pulled back and smiled.  “To be continued.”

“Most definitely.”  I agreed.

Thor and Steve watched as I headed down the hall to the cell and I disappeared through the door.

[recentanimenews]

I Wanted to Write a Tourism Article, But I Touched a Mysterious Glowing Portal and Somehow Ended Up in Another World?!

So, cards on the table, this wasn't the article I was originally going to write.

  The plan in my to-do list—and the plan in newsroom chat—had been for me to head out to Japan, meet up with a friend there, and review a bunch of the collab cafés currently running. (Astute readers may have gathered that, since I cover the news pieces for like 90% of them, I'm kind of infatuated with them.) I had the reservations all set for all of them, I had my round trip ticket, got my passport renewed, the whole nine yards.

  Then on the layover in San Francisco, I killed some time looking at the modern art pieces scattered around my gate, and... long story short, things happened, I touched what I thought was an interactive NASA display but oh silly me it was an interdimensional portal.

  No lectures, please. Lessons were learned.

  At the moment, I have two issues. One, I have ended up getting so turned around in my efforts to get home that I've actually ended up going through a total of seven worlds, none of which are the one I'm trying to get back to. Two, I have a feature due, like, now. So I figure while I'm waiting to meet up with this mysterious guy who looks and sounds eerily like my childhood friend, I might as well knock out two birds with one stone.

  So, in lieu of what was going to be an adorable romp through anime-themed parfaits and soda, here's a travelogue of other worlds you may find yourself visiting someday.

  Yggdrasil

  If I'm going to get thrown to the four winds, this isn't the worst place to start. Yggdrasil actually seems to have the same view of the stars as Earth, which means technically I was pretty close to home? Also, things aligned pretty well with Bronze Age technology and society, so it wasn't 100% culture shock. Well, you know, except for all the magic and stuff flying around.

  Hospitality was pretty decent: all the local tribes were set up as "families," with a Patriarch at the head of each (male or female) and their followers referred to as children or siblings. Apparently loyalty within that system is a big deal around here, to the point that the success of peace negotiations can rest on that.

  Then there are the Einherjar: straight-up magic using warriors. You don't want to mess with them, but as long as you're not on the receiving end of their attacks, they're amazing to watch in battle.

  Best thing about Yggdrasil? Amazing reception. Data comes through like you're just sitting next to your router no matter where you go. Phone calls are a little tougher, though... you have to be near some kind of magic mirror to make it work. Which is fine if you've got nowhere to go. But, if someone had a loved one back home and had to keep leaving their base and knowing they couldn't call, I imagine that'd make them crazy after a while.

  Worth the Trip?: The good news is that with a few web searches and some skilled friends, you can survive the primitive nature of Yggdrasil with some familiar creature comforts. (And then they get a new skill set!) Downside is, no matter how nice people are, if you're living anywhere with anything like society, you're probably about to be in a war zone.

  Cross Reverie

  Okay, this one was a little weird. I swear I've seen this game around online (I'm more a Fate/GO girl myself), and pretty much everything I saw when I came through here matched up with the game. Same landscape, same types of people, and basically enough going on where if you know the game you can get around like nobody's business.

  Here's the thing: everyone is super low-level.

  Like, initially I was completely ready to believe I'd ended up inside a game. It wouldn't be the weirdest thing that happened to me on this trip. But everyone's "levels," even the really capable fighters were down in the teens. Then again, I guess when you're talking real-world adventuring, you're not going to spend several hours a day beating up monsters just to ding a higher level.

  Interestingly, a lot of the ladies around here don't... wear a lot of clothes? I felt weirdly overdressed a lot of the time. That's not a fast rule, but it was not uncommon to see lower- and higher-cut outfits in fashion. (Take note and... I guess don't visit when it's cold?)

  Worth the Trip?: If you're a gamer, you'll feel right at home. Things tend to function on game logic, but at a more "human" level. Just don't expect in-game creature comforts like teleportation. Though, if you're looking for actual straight-up game stuff...

  Sword Art Online

  There we go. No fuss, no messing, no wondering what translates to what. This is a game. You're in a game. Welcome to an RPG that you actually, like, do.

I'm pretty down with that. I like swords, I like adventure, and being able to do raids and quests without having to worry about spinning the camera around. Extra bonus? Your fellow adventurers are from the same world as you. So less culture shock, less having to explain your bad references in conversation. Overall a lot more welcoming. Plus, it's gorgeous there—exactly what you'd imagine a fantasy world to be, with all the cool clothes and critters included.

  There is one major down side, though... transportation out of there is not. Easy. And I don't mean like "flights are expensive" or "there's only one bus route." I mean like "you have to fight your way up a giant tower and not die and that might not even work." So not (and I speak from experience here) the best stop for a multi-stop trip where time is of the essence.

  Worth the Trip?: Really depends how into it you are. If this is somewhere you specifically want to go, yes. If you have other plans in the next, like... rest of your life? Plan with care.

  Disboard

  I mean... I'm sure it's just a coincidence that so many of the places I ended up in seem to have gaming themes to them. Maybe our world is the odd one out?

  The world of Disboard is a dream come true if you're one of two things: an adept gamer or a flawless cheater. If you are neither of those things, though, you might have a bad time. Disboard functions on games in pretty much any way you can think of. Disputes on anything from rulership of a country to whether you're about to get robbed are handled via bets and competitions. And it could be anything, from a hand of poker to God-tier shiritori.

  If you're crazy lucky or crazy smart, you'll probably rock Disboard within hours. But if you've got my kind of luck?

  It might be best to leave the gaming to the pros.

  Worth the Trip?: Even if you're a garbage-tier gamer, Disboard is really beautiful. So you can at least take in the sights and do your best to stay out of trouble.

  The Hidden Realm

  The first thing you're told about traveling in other dimensions is not to eat the food. But you know what? I'm already in too deep. Might as well enjoy myself.

  The Hidden Realm is that mysterious place where gods and demons live—and when you have a realm of gods and demons, what do you need? Come on, you've watched enough anime to know this... that's right. An inn. And inns need food. Sadly, the Tenjin'ya has some pretty boring food in its main restaurant.

  But turn a few corners and go around the back of the property, and you will find the best little Japanese/spirit fusion restaurant. Seriously, it's crazy good. And it's run by a human girl who learned how to cook for spirits, so you know you're getting quality.

  Worth the Trip?: Completely. I mean, okay. Whether or not the spirits will be nice to you really depends on their personalities, so you might meet a few jerks. But that food.

The Kingdom of Belfast

  Belfast is part of a larger world that's accessible in one of two ways: you can either cross dimensions, or you can, uh... die. I highly recommend the first one if you have any sort of choice in the matter.

  That said, dying and being reborn in this world does apparently net you some profits. There's been a case where the person reborn here was actually able to use all seven facets of the world's magic. (For reference, you're usually going to run into people who can use one or two at best.) That's going to make you popular... especially with the ladies, apparently.

  Added bonus? Finally got reception again! This is another place where, if you've got any smart devices, you can make use of them once again. I'm not entirely sure what roaming charges are here and elsewhere... frankly, I've been too afraid to look.

  Worth the Trip?: With good reception, plenty of magic to go around, and some frankly adorable fashions going on? I'll give it a thumbs up.

  El-Hazard

  And so we come (maybe?) to the end of my journey. I hope. I think. With a stop in El-Hazard, a world that's equal parts ancient tech and Arabian Nights culture. And, you know, I kind of dig it. Beautiful scenery, really cool magic and machines, and...

  Bugs? Oh. Yeah. I forgot. There's literally an entire nation of giant bug people. Called Bugrom. They also might be a little at war with the humans here, and their might be some doomsday items scattered around.

  But I mean besides that, it's actually pretty fun. Lots of room to wander and explore, a variety of landscapes, interesting people... and bugs.

Worth the Trip?: Depends how you feel about giant insects and ancient biomechanical creatures — conditional yes.

  If you find yourself in another world (whether on purpose or through a completely honest and understandable accident Nate), stay smart. Bring a solar-powered charger. Be prepared to rule at least one kingdom or tribe while you're there. Look for sad girls with glowing necklaces, because they tend to know what's going on—and whatever you do... try not to touch anything. [EDITOR'S NOTE: I'm only okay with Kara missing the cafe coverage because she brought souvenir snacks. We good.]

-----

Kara Dennison is responsible for multiple webcomics, and is half the creative team behind the OEL light novel series Owl's Flower. She blogs at karadennison.com and tweets @RubyCosmos. Her latest book, Black Archive #21 – Heaven Sent, is currently available from Obverse Books.

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com

[whichwaytowonderlandep]

Whatever It Takes | Ch. IV

Pairings: (Yoongi/Reader/Hoseok)

Genre: Romance, Angst

Words: 4,638

Tags: Gang AU, Cop AU, Smut

Chapter One | Chapter Two | Chapter Three | Chapter Four 

Chapter Four

"You mean to tell me she's the daughter of a man no one has seen or heard from in twelve years?" Hoseok asks as he chuckles in annoyance, not really believing what his people had come up with. "How do we know it's actually her? We don't exactly have a photo to compare her to."

"About that," Jimin gestures towards V, grabbing the file in his hands. "We may not have a picture, but we have DNA on both."

Hoseok is intrigued by this information. "Are those the results?" He asks as he holds out his hand, "They're a match" Hoseok mumbles with raised eyebrows. He definitely wasn't expecting that.

"Not only that, he's also the boss of one of the best and most dangerous gang out there" Jimin continues, "He's the king of kings. Now, my question is... what was his daughter doing at our little event last night?"

Hoseok stares at the wall with a serious expression on his face, subconsciously playing with the rings on his fingers.

If he had you on his side, that meant he had the most powerful man in the world by his side. Oh, the things he could do with that much power in his hands. "I don't know about that, but it seems we've struck gold with our unexpected guest."

He smirks, the gears in his head moving at a rapid speed as millions of ideas run through his mind. "Where is she staying?" He asks as he looks towards V, who was now standing silently in the corner —waiting for an order like a good little soldier. "She's staying at the Melrose Hotel" Taehyung answers, his eyes glaring slightly at the man in front of him. Just because he temporarily works for the man, doesn't mean he has to like him.

"Anything you can get on her, I want it in my possession as soon as possible. Now." He continues, watching as V nods before walking out of the office. His curious eyes watch the younger man leave the room.

"Did he pass your little test, yet?" Hoseok asks, nodding towards the door. "He's trustworthy enough. We can just get rid of him if he fucks up, but at the moment, his the best at what he does" Jimin answers him as he sits down on one of the chairs in front of his desk, crossing one leg over the other as he chats with his long time friend. "Good. Where are we on the Russian deal?" Hoseok inquires as he opens the file that was marked as yours, picking up the photo that was taken of you at the ball last night. It didn't do you justice.

Hoseok nods as Jimin continues to speak about the new shipment that was coming in tomorrow. He didn't bother listening to every detail, he had been in this business long enough to know how everything went. Right now that wasn't his top priority. Right now, the number one thing on his list was you.

"Fine, make sure to bring more men." Hoseok answers, watching Jimin stand up from the chair. "They tend to get a bit unpredictable when things don't go their way." He finishes off, his hand reaching for your picture. He didn't even notice the small smile that appeared on his face as he took every inch of you — all the things he could do with you by his side.

This is going to get very interesting — The thought ran through his mind as he threw down your file into one of his desk drawers. He stood up, buttoned his suit jacket and made his way out the door; Jimin following behind him. "Who's our first victim of the day?" Hoseok asks as he made his way into his car, with a smile on his face that seemed almost child like.

You watch with a look of disgust on your face as Jungkook slurps up the cream in one of the cannolis, That boy is not normal— thinking to yourself as you shake your head , finally managing to look away from him. "That is just disgusting" You take a big gulp of your coffee, your eyes scanning the board filled with surveillance pictures, reports from Taehyung and old/new data Jungkook had collected at the beginning.

There was still no way Hoseok's empire will come crashing down, he was thorough and made sure nothing could ever be traced back to him. Lucky for you, you love the thrill and adventure that comes with the challenge.

You hear the front door of the apartment open behind you, "Where are we with Taehyung?" Yoongi says, throwing his coat onto the couch before standing right next to you —his hands on his hips. Yoongi had been taking turns here and at the office, he was joining the team and leaving his second in command in charge of the station.

"Met with Hoseok this morning, gave him info on (Y/N)" Jungkook replies, making Yoongi nod, "Okay. Good, good. We're getting somewhere, let's move on with the next step."

"And that is?" You yawn into your cup— not your most attractive moment — feeling it burn the back of your throat as you gulp it down.

Yoongi turns towards you, "You're moving out" He says before walking away from you. You knew for a fact he had officially entered the investigation, he was running the whole thing now —somehow you couldn't help but wonder if this was the only reason he had even agreed to let you in on it in the first place.

You continue drinking your coffee as you stare back at the board, the creeping feeling you in your gut when you know something bad was going to happen. You decide that's it's better to ignore it than to keep thinking about it.

You sat in the back of the car, watching as the run down buildings turn into mansions and expensive boutiques. The people in the car beside yours matching the present atmosphere. You sigh as you cross your legs, the short dress riding up on your thighs as you look towards the driver.

This time, Yoongi wasn't there with you. The decision to have a legitimate driver this time was made and you were already thrown into character. You didn't say much as you take out your room key out of your purse, seeing the gold shine when the light coming through the window would hit it at just the right time.

"How much longer?" You ask your new driver, putting the card back in your purse. The same nervous feeling as before creeping up again. "We're almost there, Miss" you hear him say.

"You've been asking him that for the past thirty minutes."You hear Yoongi say into the earpiece, smiling to yourself as you hear an exaggerated sigh coming from Jungkook. You could already imagine him running his hands across his face as he does so.

"I can't help it, I'm bored" you whisper to yourself, knowing that they had most likely heard you. "Find something else to entertain yourself with, before the guy drives himself into a wall." Yoongi hinted, leaning back into his chair.

His eyes drifting over to Jungkook as the younger began to sloppily eat his ramen. Being the tech guy usually meant you didn't get to go out a lot — maybe that's why Jungkook forgot how to eat in front of another human being. His social skills were dwindling with every investigation, Yoongi knew he needed to send Jungkook on a real mission — let him do the physical work for once.

Yoongi looks away already used to such a scene, glancing at the monitors once again. He didn't really have a visual of how you were doing, he could only hear you and everything within your personal bubble. Other than that he couldn't exactly tell what was happening around you, but he could definitely take a wild guess.

His hand reaches up to scratch the back of his neck as he leans his head back further into the chair, the sound of the car engine and your breathing fill his ear.

You could only feel excitement as the Melrose Hotel came into view, making you sit up in your seat as you  put on your sunglasses. "Miss" You hear as soon as your door is open.

You smile a thank you in his direction as you grab your purse, stepping out of the car as you look at your new surroundings. This is where you were going to spend most of your time in, might as well get familiar with it.

You smile as you catch sight of how the bright lights flooded into the hotel suite. The way the room was completely open and boy free was a sight as you tip the bellboy who had helped you bring your bags up. You nod in his direction as he bows before leaving the room and as soon as the door closes behind him you drop the act of the perfect heiress as you kick your heels across the room.

You always loved cases like these, the ones where you could just lay around all day and still catch the bad guys. The ones where you didn't have to put that much effort into things.

You throw yourself on the king sized bed, bouncing as you spread your arms wide across,"I freaking love my job" You moan out loud as you sink further into the soft cotton sheets, feeling the mattress engulf you as it adjusts to the curves of your body.

"Don't get to comfortable" You hear Jungkook through your earpiece, "and... It's ruined now" You sigh deeply before you stand up from the bed, walking over to your bags you start to rummage through the expensive clothing that you had borrowed from an old friend. "You need to be ready in the next two hours, of course I need to ruin your peace and quiet" Jungkook finishes with a smirk, before leaning back into his chair, crossing his hands behind his head. He was the one giving the orders now, at least until the chief came back.

"Yeah, yeah" You roll your eyes, taking out your earpiece and placing it gently on the desk. You didn't know how long you were going to be staying at the hotel, but you were going to squeeze every little cent out of it.

This is the long awaited vacation that you needed in the last three years and you were planning to enjoy every last minute of it.

"Then if he tries to hurt me, I'll shoot him in the testicles" You tell Yoongi as you walk around your hotel room. You woke up to the sound of your new phone ringing nonstop inside your purse. You were confused when you saw the name MOM flashing on your screen, before you remembered that it was Yoongi's contact. That could've gone so many different ways.

You slip on the short black dress up your body, feeling it become tighter as you zip it up. You walk back towards the laptop, watching as Yoongi's eyes widen at the sight of you.

"(Y/N), You can't hide a gun in a cocktail dress." You hear Jungkook say, sounding as if he was on the other side of the room. "Fine. I'll stab him with my fork, can I go now?"

"Yes, with your new security detail. They should be coming up now." Yoongi tries to argue once again, the idea of just sending you alone with nothing but your wit and your fists to protect you, —although with very good reason — did not settle well with him.

"I don't need security, Chief,I'm fine on my own" You tell him without even looking at him. You were making sure that your make up was intact, before opening the door to your hotel suite. You could that the two men who stood in front of you were newbies  —most likely fresh out of the academy, trying to suck up to the man who signs their paycheck.

Yoongi might have your best intentions at heart, but he was basically putting you on babysitting duty. "You need to look the part" He sighs, only you would question his every motive, "You need to have bodyguards. It's an order."  Yoongi says, before the whole screen went black making you groan in frustration. The fact that he had sprung this on you at the last second made it harder to turn down. You take a deep breath, trying to find zen —whatever the hell that meant— and you force a smile on your face as you hear a knock coming front your front door.

You make your way to the front door of your hotel suite, "Det-" "Don't even finish that sentence" You interrupt, walking past them as you make your way down the hall and to the elevator, you could hear the rushed footsteps quickly following behind you. You could feel their stares on your exposed legs as you wait for the levarle to arrive. "Never call me by my tittle when on the job." You clarify as you wait for the elevator doors to open. "I'm just (Y/N) to you two today."

This is what you get when you sign up as a teacher — a lot of teachable moments on the field. You get into the elevator first, turning around you notice them frowning from being scolded. "Are you both just waiting for an invitation? Get in." They may not like you now, but they will be thankful when they're leading their own investigations.

"So this is how it's going to go," You say, watching the numbers flash as the elevator goes down to the lobby. "The two of you are going to stay out of my way, but make sure the mark knows you're there" You turn around, watching the looks of confusion flash across their faces, "Understood?"

"Uh..." You wanted to laugh at the baffled looks on their faces. Man, did you love your job.

"Understood!?" You yell this time, receiving a "Yes, Sir!" in return. You roll your eyes, turning back around as the elevator doors open. "I'm surrounded by idiots." You mumble to yourself as you make your way out and into the half empty lobby.

"We can hear you." Yoongi hinted into your ear, "You were meant to" You respond as you begin to strut towards one of the bars. The sassy you was back as you made yourself fit into your new persona.

It was hard not to notice all the people looking in your direction. You were a diamond in their eyes and someone they needed to be next to, someone they needed to be to live a good life — but of course that was the whole point.

You walk into the bar watching the people dancing around the place with a drink or two in their hands. "This music makes me want to kill myself" You mumble to yourself as you make your way into one of the stools, gesturing with your eyes to the men following behind you to back off.

You watch as they finally take the hint and make their to the end of the bar, their eyes never straying from were you were sitting. You had to give it to them, you could tell they were newbies and yet you knew they were taking their job very seriously.

Your face is adorned with a flirty smile as you make your way to the bar, signaling to the bartender before your eyes glance over the tall tables placed across the room.

"A glass of red wine, please." You tap your red colored nails against the counter top as you sit back on your stool —as comfortable as you could get.

"Put it on my tab" You smile at him, handing over your room card. "I've got it" A male voice says from behind you, before a two twenty dollar bills were placed on the counter in front of you. The familiar smell of his cologne fills your senses, "Nice to see you again Mr. Jung" You turn your head slightly, giving him the up and down before you look away.

Hoseok takes this as an invitation, sitting right next to you as he still manages to keep his distance.

Your eyes glance down at the his battered and bruised hands tapping against the black marble counter as you take a sip of your wine glass. "How about we get you something a little stronger?" Hoseok suggests, gesturing over to the bartender.  "Maybe help you loosen up a little more." He gives you an obnoxious smile.

"How about a sex on the beach?" You scoff at the mention of the girly drink, interrupting him before he embarrasses himself any further. "Actually that sunset rum looks better." You smile sweetly at Hoseok, "and much more expensive"

"Fine." Hoseok agrees as he nods towards the bartender, "and a vodka for me."

"It's like you want me to carry you out of here" Hoseok smirks, "Don't worry, that's never happened before. Either way, my guys can do that for you." You point towards your new bodyguards, they were staring at the both of you like a hawk.

Good to know they're taking their job seriously— You think as Hoseok looks back at him, "And I'm going to go ahead and say that the other pair of eyes across the room belong to you" You say as you pick up your rum, taking only a small sip and feeling nothin gas it runs down the back of your throat.

"So you pay attention" Hoseok turns back towards you, biting his bottom lip as his eyes glance up and down your body once again. The fact that she's hot is definitely a bonus—the thought crosses Hoseok's mind.

"So what brings you to Korea?" Hoseok continues, his eyes finally meeting yours. "Last I heard you were in South America" this makes you chuckle.

"Shouldn't you first buy a girl dinner before you start looking into what she's been doing for the past year?" You take a sip of your drink as you look at him with a questioning and curious look, the smile on your face was still present.

"I like getting to know said person before I continue anything" He quickly responds, somehow the atmosphere still calm and playful. "And you are one woman worth pursuing." He looks at you with that signature look all guys give, the one where they think they have you trapped in their clutches.

"I'm sorry. Is this you flirting with me?" You ask, a hint of curiosity in your tone. There was no harm in making him work for it a little longer, even if you both knew the end result.

"Oh no, I'm full-on hitting on you" Hoseok answers with another smirk, leaning in closer to your body. You chuckle, turning in your seat towards him, "Is there a difference?" You challenge him, "Yes, flirting is perceived as innocent, I prefer to go for what I want and right now — I'm looking straight at her" You genuinely chuckle, "A man who knows what he wants," a smirk, "I like it"

You always thought that the best part of your job was that most of the time, you didn't really need to pretend to be somebody else. "And I like a woman who can give me a challenge."

You could hear Jungkook gagging from the other side of the earpiece, making you bite your lip as you hold back a laugh. You can just imagine Yoongi's face of disgust as he does the little bunny scrunch he does with his nose, at how corny this conversation turned out to be.

You were sure Hoseok thought the same thing the moment he said it, he shook his head with a chuckle. "Is this conversation a little cheesy for you?" Hoseok finally gives in as he sees you trying to silently hold in your laughter. "I swear I have more game than this." He might as well try something else, being cocky and suave isn't exactly working.

You end laughing out loud at that. The once cold gangster was gone and the man trapped behind him appeared. "A little bit" You giggle, biting your bottom lip as he looks anywhere else but you.

"Uh, let me start over" He laughs silently, licking his lips as he takes another drink. He needed liquid course if he was going to get anywhere near you tonight.

"I'm usually not this sleazy" Hoseok assures you, inching his chair a little bit closer to yours. Now this side of him you can work with — it seemed almost sweet.

"I'll be the judge of that" You smile at the genuine look he was giving you. You take another sip of your 'rum', feeling absolutely sober. For some reason, you think to yourself that maybe it didn't have any alcohol in it and only one person would pay the bartender to do that.

You don't waste time as you continue to act as if the alcohol was flowing through your veins and flooding every single coherent thought in your mind. You sway your body from side to side, moving your hand to rest up high against his thigh.

You didn't dare move it out of the way and by the look on Hoseok's face, he certainly didn't mind.

"How about I walk you to your room?" Hoseok offers, taking a gulp of his vodka as his eyes catch the way your body sways from side to side — the half empty glass of rum resting lonely on the counter.

"That would be a good idea right about now." You giggle at him, wrapping your arms around Hoseok's neck. You lean your head on his chest, feeling his hands around your waist.

You watch over his shoulder as your 'bodyguards' stand up instantly, their eyes on high alert as they see you being carried out by the target. You wave your hand in their direction —telling them to sit down, that you were fine— as Hoseok holds you closer, carrying you towards the exit.

"Don't fall asleep on me now." He grunts as he feels your weight on him, feeling the swells of your breasts press against his side as he waits runs into the open elevator doors.

All Hoseok wanted to do at that moment was place his hands all over your body, to have the satisfying feeling of your skin touching his with absolutely nothing in the way. He was tempted and as the elevator doors open to your floor, he took a deep breath before he held you closer.

You look up at him through half lidded eyes, smiling as your giggles resonated through the empty hall. Nothing was funny about the situation, but you acted like a happy drunk. Hoseok's eyes glance down your dress, biting his lips as he them jiggle with every step you took.

God, how he was tempted to just push you against the wall and have his way with you. The thought of doing things to you almost made him act it out in real life and as he reached your door, he noticed your men following a couple of feet away.

"Where's your room key?" He sighs, shaking his head as if that small movement could get rid of his wicked thoughts. You took this moment to take him by surprised, leaving him with something to remember you by.

His soft, thin lips move rough against yours as his hand instantly grip on your hips, tightening and with every movement of his tongue against yours, he brings your body closer to his.

"(Y/N)?" You moan as you suddenly hear the familiar voice calling out your name, "(Y/N)?, Are you okay, I can't hear anything. What's happening?" Yoongi's panicking voice fills your ears as you finally pull away. You clear your throat, feeling yourself blush for getting lost in the kiss.

"Stop hitting the computer, it wasn't cheap!" You could hear Jungkook yell, to who you presume to be Yoongi. "I know, I'm the one paying for it!" You flinch a little as you hear feedback coming from the other side as the other two continue fighting.

"Why did you stop?" Hoseok asks, almost breathless. His eyes were still close as he swayed slightly in his spot. "Let's keep going" He jested as he leans in once again, resting his forehead against yours. "I liked where this was going." Hoseok whispers against your lips.

"How about we call it a night?" You chuckle, patting his chest before stepping out of his arms. You reach out with your hand, wiping his lips of any extra lipstick you may have passed onto him in your little moment of no self control.

Hoseok takes this moment to grab onto your hand, bringing it close against his lips. You smile as you feel him leave a lingering kiss on your lips. "Then," He smirks, his hand running up and down your sides, "go out with me tomorrow. I'll show you all the things your missing by being stuck in this hotel."

I think I just got goosebumps, you think to yourself. "Okay." You nod at his request, earning a peck on the lips, "I'll hold you to that" he whispers against your lips before the warmth radiating from his body disappears.

You watch his retreating back, confidence radiating from him in rays as you push the door your hotel suite open. "Will you two stop fighting already?" You yell out, hearing complete silence come from the other side. "I swear the two of you are like children" You mumble under your breath, finally able to throw your heels across the room.

"Please do remember that I sign your paycheck" Yoongi's annoyed voice rings out and for a moment you though of answering something related to the bedroom and who was really the boss, but then you remember Jungkook.

Letting him hear something like that with the vicinity in the room was a horrible idea —not that Jungkook will ever let you live it down. "That is irrelevant and I'm tired. Goodbye." you argue before you take off your earpiece, throwing it on one side of the bed. You throw yourself on the other side, feeling the ache in your ankles from having your heels on for so long.

"Nooo..." You open your eyes when you feel your phone vibrating against you, the name MOM flashing repeatedly before you put it on silent. "Go away." You mumble against the pillow before throwing it to the couch on the other side of the room as your eyes close once again. You'd answer his calls later.

Yoongi could only stare at the phone in frustration as he tried calling you again. He knew you weren't going to pick up this late, probably already snoring away.

To you, it never did matter if he was your boss, but then again it was his idea to continue doing whatever it was you two were doing. A relationship? Just sex?

Yoongi didn't really know. He just knew that he likes having you around him, it makes him feel all soft and tingly inside.

He lets out a deep sigh, giving up on calling you. You had done your job for today. "Stop drinking so much Red Bull" he tells Jungkook, grabbing the van from the younger ones hand and taking a sip of it himself. Leaving Jungkook dumbfounded at the action.

This is going to be a long night, he thinks to himself as he yawns, his eyes glancing at the monitors for what seemed like the hundredth time that day.

<< Chapter Three | Chapter Five >>

[not-just-any-fangirl]

Flirting With Disaster

A/N: Happy Birthday to @constellunaa! I saw your beautiful drawing of Laxus and Cobra and thought ‘hey what if she actually ships it?’ and then wrote 6.5K of it in hopes that you actually do lmao.

If not, have some hint of nalu bcus I am so sorry

Part of my deaf!Natsu college au bcus I’m a slut for continuing universes! Also shout out to @papalogia for putting up with me yelling about this and for helping with some of the words. Natsu and Cobra are cousins, with Indian!Igneel and his unnamed brother who is Cobra’s dad. 

Also praise @rivendell101 for helping me title it! Apparently I’m useless without my friends :D

College!AU

Pairing: Cobraxus, Nalu, Fairy tail

Words: 6515

Rating: M for language

Part: Oneshot

Laxus wanted to die, and not just because of his pounding headache or the fact that he was in an eight AM lab for fucking chemistry of all things. No, Laxus wanted the sweet embrace of death -or maybe to plead for manslaughter on account of insanity- because of his benchmate.

“Could you please make your stomach make disgusting noises quieter? I’m trying to measure out our chemicals, considering you’re going to be useless today.”

Laxus narrowed his eyes at his labmate, thinking of other uses for the sodium hydroxide solution that was being poured from the erlenmeyer flask to a petri dish.

“Stop looking at me like it’s my fault you decided to do jagerbombs instead of sleeping like a normal human being with an eight AM.”

Laxus scowled. The dude wasn’t even able to see his face, eye on Laxus’ side closed from a nasty looking scar. Laxus felt his own scar over his right eye twinge in sympathy, line thinner than the other boy’s. “How’d you know what I was drinking?” he asked, tongue fuzzy and thick in his mouth and voice rough with disuse. He sounded like his dad, and Laxus wished for another double jager to push back that unwelcome comparison.

“Because you reek of licorice, red bull, and regret.”

Laxus snorted, grinning as he scrawled down the fourth trial’s measurement in his lab notes. “I showered.”

“Don’t feel bad,” the boy drawled, sealing the vacuum box the petri dish now resided in before they turned on the chlorine gas, “it’s a stench that permeates engineering students.”

Laxus frowned, wanting to bite back against the generalization of his major, but flashbacks to the group of twenty somethings doing keg stands and flip cup after their last electrical midterm stopped him. His labmate wasn’t exactly wrong.

But his class had fucking earned going a little wild, especially after the hell that was the four hour midterm of Jose’s quantum nuclear midterm. Laxus was pretty sure that time length wasn’t even allowed by the school board, but seeing as how his grandfather was at a bit of a cold war with the dean, Laxus wasn’t about to say shit.

“Well I’m sure you biology kids know all about the danger of popping illegal prescription pills, don’t you?” he snarked. He had yet to meet one that wasn’t permanently shaking from a near overdose of Adderall, struggling to stay awake to finish making their four hundredth flash card.

“I'm not a biology major,” he said flicking on the highly poisonous gas with the most uncaring expression Laxus has seen on something besides his mirror.

Laxus eyed him critically. “Only biology majors are actually interested in chemistry labs,” he said finally, watching the plastic cube in front of him as the gas reacted with the solution.

“What about chem students?” he asked flatly, switching off the gas lever after the thirty seconds had passed on the stopwatch.

“Those freaks can do this shit in their sleep and try to go and set shit on fire under the fume hoods.” Laxus said just as flatly as his lab partner, focusing on writing down the chemical equations involved in their experiment. “If you aren’t biology then why the hell are you in this lab then?” Laxus asked. He knew why he was there, stupid requirement for his degree saying he need at least a 200 level in each of physics, chem, and bio. Not that Laxus fucking understood why he needed to know how bases and ions reacted to make deadly gases, considering he was going to be an electrical engineer.

Fucking reqs.

The student gave a long suffering sigh, turning his face so Laxus could see his withering look, red-so-dark-it-was-almost-brown hair falling in his face and styled on the sides and back, chin and cheekbones sharp. HIs tan skin was smooth, Laxus fairly certain it was because he could only make two facial expression: blank apathy or an unimpressed sneer. “I’m a toxicology major,” he said, opting for the latter of his whole range of two emotions.

“What the shit is that?” Laxus asked, barking out a laugh before writing the final time when salt crystals stopped forming in their solution.

“It is what it sounds like it would be,” the darker hair boy hissed, opening the cube and retrieving the crystallized solution so they could separate the salt and the bleach.

“It sounds fake,” Laxus snorted, adding a fourth row in the weight of the crystals and the PH of the solution. He must still be drunk to be egging on someone he didn't know, but Laxus really didn't give all that much of a fuck.

“And you still sound drunk,” the boy said coolly. He held out the filtered vial of lab-made bleach. “Here, drink this and it'll disinfect your stomach.”

Laxus blinked at the clear liquid behind the glass before barking a short laugh. “Alright, what's your name for the report.” Lab or human resources to be determined by if his bench mate slipped the chemical into his coffee thermos.

“Cobra,” the boy said, grin sharp in victory at Laxus’ startled expression. “It's similar to my major, don't you think?”

“Still don't know what the fuck toxicology is,” Laxus shrugged, recovering quickly. His cousin’s boyfriend’s name was Natsu and one of her best friend’s Gajeel. At least Cobra was a thing that existed and not a fucking season.

Laxus wrote down the name, frowning at the spot ‘ Freed ’ usually went. His best friend -and ex-boyfriend- unusually absent. Laxus had found out when he sat down from a text from Ever that he was delirious with a fever and needed to be restrained so he couldn't spread it to the rest of the university in his attempt to not miss class. Hence how a late Laxus had ended up with the possible-psychopath as a lab partner.

“It's the study of toxins and poisons you dumbass,” Cobra said flatly. He huffed in irritation before prattling off the volume of the fifth sample of sodium hydroxide. “How did you even pass Biology Two-hundred if you couldn't put together ‘tox-’ and ‘-cology’?”

“By studying for twelve hours and then forgetting everything about that bullshit course.” Laxus said back, defensive. He'd worked hard for that A in the course, and was proud of it.

“Only idiots forget what they've learned,” Cobra hummed, face once more a mix of cocky and blank. How he managed to look bored and superior at the same time was starting to grate on Laxus’ last nerve, though he knew he was one more incident away from academic suspension.

Laxus could really use that shot right now.

At least this was the last trial they needed before he could fuck off and never worry about dealing with Cobra again.

Laxus looked over, taking in an appreciative view. Laxus may be stoic and rough around the edges but he wasn't blind. Cobra was hot , with rich brown skin and spiky hair and two bars in his right ear. His personality might have been garbage, but that'd never stopped Laxus from being able to appreciate someone's aesthetic.

“Take a picture, it'll last longer,” Cobra said, corner of his mouth twitching at his own joke. Laxus remained unfazed, expecting to be caught and uncaring.

“How'd you get your scar?”

“How'd you get yours?” Cobra sneered, flicking on the gas switch and recording the pressure and flow rate of the gas as shown on the display connected to the nozzle.

“Fair,” Laxus hummed. “What's your number?”

“What the fuck? ” Cobra spat, eye large as he whipped his head to look at Laxus. He thought the boy's cheeks might have been a little darker, but he couldn't really tell. The thought made him preen in victory though, that he had gotten the upper hand.

“For the lab report? In case our data doesn't line up?”

Cobra grunted, looking back at the chamber as the reaction took place. “Whatever.”

Laxus blinked when at the end of the lab there was a torn off corner of paper shoved in his notebook, ten digits scrawled across it in sharp handwriting. He shook his head with a rueful smile, typing in the numbers to his contacts under the name ‘Snake Boi’.

Why was everyone he interacted with so fucking weird.

Laxus woke up, sitting straight up in his small single bed that came with his dorm room, staring unseeing into the dark.

“I fucking hit on him.” Laxus whispered to himself.

And Cobra gave him his number .

He jerked the cord from his phone where it had been charging on his bed side table, barely registering the time of 3:47 fucking AM as he blinds himself with the full brightness. Cursing, Laxus adjusted the screen to barely painful before typing a message to Freed. Laxus was smart with books, but interactions with other human beings was a thing Laxus liked to avoid at the best of times. And now he was texting his ex about the possibility of him hitting on some random dude. And succeeding.

Me - 3:47 AM: So uh I asked a guy for his number for a lab cus you have the fucking plague and looking back i think i flirted with him and i think i hit on him and now i have his number uhhhh what the actual fuck is this?? Was I actually hitting on him?? Did he hit back??

Me - 3:48 AM: is hit back the right term?

Me - 3:48 AM: I don’t think it is but I’m going to use it anyway bc fuck english

Laxus flopped back on his pillow, rubbing his scar. Fucking emotions. Did Laxus even want to have been hitting on Cobra? He thought about his fuller bottom lip and the twinkle of mischief in his eye when he was telling Laxus to drink bleach and the way his cologne smelt like the riverside and musk and his stupidly spiky hair that Laxus wanted to fuck up just to see that small fire light his dark eye.

Ah fuck, Laxus wanted to hit on him.

His phone buzzed in his hand, and Laxus blinked in surprise at Freed still being awake. Or maybe he had woken him up. Either way, Laxus wasn’t about to complain about getting some damned advice.

Freed (Sword Emoji) - 3:50 AM: Yes, babe. You were hitting on him. It’s okay, it took you four dates to realize we were dating.

Freed (Sword Emoji) - 3:51 AM: Two weeks to realize we broke up.

Me - 3:52 AM: I’m beginning to realize why you wanted couples therapy

Freed (Sword Emoji) - 3:55 AM: It’s okay babe, I still love you. Now go get laid please, you’re insufferable when horny and have a crush.

Laxus snorted. He wasn’t insufferable , if anyone was insufferable in their group it was Ever and at all times. Insufferable. Ha.

Wait.

Did Freed mean right now? Wouldn’t that be uncouth, as Freed would put it? Did he want a booty call? Or did Laxus want more? Laxus didn’t know what the fuck he wanted to eat most of the time how in all holy hell was he supposed to work out stupid things like feelings .

Ugh.

Me - 4:00 AM: Like... now? Cause its 4 am and idk if hes up. I mean, hes a fucking chem/posion/fuck knows major so probs but wouldn’t it be rude? To start a date with a booty call? I feel like asking for sex this early would be rude

Me - 4:00 AM: both time of day and in regards to a possible relationship

Laxus stared up at his ceiling, eyes barely able to make out the rock poster above his head from the brightness of staring at his phone screen. Him and Bixlow were supposed to be going to the Thunder Claps next saturday and Laxus was looking forward to getting stoned and zoning out to some good rock EDM for a couple hours with one of his best friends so-fucking-much. He startled out of his thoughts at the dark phone buzzing on his chest, screen lighting up with Freed’s text.

Freed (Sword Emoji) - 4:05 AM: I love you, but how you manage to keep your stupidity secret from everyone we know I’ll never comprehend.

Freed (Sword Emoji) - 4:06 AM: No do not text him for a booty call at four am.

Freed (Sword Emoji) - 4:06 AM: You animal.

Me - 4:09 AM: Ohhh, like later today okay i get you

Laxus rolls over, groaning into his pillow. He turned his head, typing another message.

Me - 4:13 AM: Can’t we just date again that was a good thing

Freed (Sword Emoji) - 4:07 AM: No darling. We tried that before and while the sex was amazing you were frankly a horrible boyfriend. But you have grown and I have full confidence in you not fucking this new one up horribly.

Laxus grinned at his phone, rolling his eyes before typing out a quick ‘gee thanks’ and clicking off his phone.

Ah fuck what the shit was he going to say to Cobra?

Laxus adjusted the strap on his shoulder as he exited the math building, three stories tall and made entirely of brick that was probably twenty years old when it was built fifty years ago. He groaned as he rubbed his neck, thankful that he was finally done his last class of the day. How Natsu had gotten into his fourth year electrical physics course Laxus had absolutely no fucking clue, and how that fuckhead had gotten a better grade than him on the last assignment was even more astounding.

Thinking of annoying chemistry majors, Laxus’s pocket burned where his phone rested and the uncontacted number that Laxus felt judging him. He could actually hear Cobra’s snarky voice calling him a pussy in his head, scowling as he continued to walk along the cracked sidewalk.

“Angel I swear to every fucking god in existence if you tell anyone -”

Oh shit, Laxus was really hearing Cobra’s voice.

He looked up, spotting Cobra standing beside a bust of some old dead dude that had helped found math or whatever, a pretty woman with long silver hair pinching his cheek with an almost cruel smile. “That our little snakey has a crush ?” she sang. Cobra’s shoulders tensed, and Laxus leaned against the bust five feet away, curious to see where the fuck this was going to go.

“I talked to the bastard once ,” Cobra snapped, swatting away Angel’s hand. The girl smirked as if Cobra had just told a joke, twirling a piece of hair between her fingers.

“Uh huh, and that’s why you’ve kept your hand on your phone all day. ‘Cus you two ‘talked’ once.” Cobra sputtered, Laxus watching the side of his face twist in a flustered sneer. “Tell me, was he tall and muscular? You always were too easy for the masc types.”

Laxus snorted, covering it with a cough but too late not to draw Angel’s attention, and by extension, Cobra’s. The girl’s face lit up like it was fucking Christmas and Cobra looked like he wished he still had that bleach.

“Awwww you two match face scars!” she cooed, clapping her hands together once in excitement.

“You say another word and I’ll put Kerberos in your fucking bed.”

Angel pouted at Cobra before huffing and flipping her hair over her shoulder. “Whatever, spoil my fun as usual, Erik ,” Cobra -or should Laxus say Erik?- glared at her sharply but Angel carried on, paying his threat display absolutely no attention, “I’m off to make sure Midnight didn’t die in their sleep in whatever nook they’ve found now.”

Laxus returned her small nod as she passed, lifting an eyebrow at her sniff as she looked him over again. He thought it might have been a silent ‘my friend could do better than you’ and judging by the RBF she had Laxus was pretty sure he was right.

Cobra was silent as he glared at Laxus, a new expression painted on his face; pure and clear murder.

“I don’t know what fucking game you’re playing but I’m over it and-”

Laxus interrupted the rant Cobra was spitting at him, looking over his worn but polished combat boots and torn black jeans that were tight enough on his thighs to leave Laxus with no need to imagine how muscular he was, tight black tank top with a deep purple snake skull partially covered by leather jacket that had deep red accented strips of leather along the arms and two over the breasts, dark black studs on the shoulders and back of the arms from what Laxus could see, band patches thrown over the pockets and back as a visual record of all his concerts. Laxus finally eyed the thick black collar with large and shallow spikes on it before meeting Cobra’s pissed-off glare.

“I’m going to the Thunder Claps concert next weekend. Judging by the Poison Blood sticker you got on your ass there I’d say you’re in need of being taken to a concert with good music playing.”

Cobra choked on his words, staring at Laxus blankly before barking a sharp laugh. He drew his pointed gaze over Laxus’s own slides, ripped jeans, loose work out tank, and the large bright yellow headphones that hung around his neck.

“I highly doubt you’d be able to have any taste in music if you insist on dressing like a fucking gym rat, but I won’t turn down free shots and concert tickets,” Cobra smirked at him, grin sharp as he insulted him. Laxus grinned back. Flirting was fun when you got to rip into the person.

“Who said I’d pay for your drinks?”

“The way you can’t take your perverted eyes off me would be a damned good hint that all I have to do is touch your dick and have you wrapped around my little finger.”

“Aw, that’s not a very nice thing to call your dick. I’m sure it’s at least three inches.”

Cobra sneered at him, stepping closer as fire danced in his eye, obviously delighted at the challenge. “Two inches longer than yours.”

“You wanna find out or something? Laxus asked, tipping his head down as he towered over Cobra by a good four inches, stepping forward as well.

“You that desperate to get fucked?” he asked, meeting Laxus’ gaze and holding his own, unperturbed by Laxus’ height.

“ You that desperate to get your face pinned against a wall?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Cobra smirked, thumbs hooked in his belt loops and leaning further into Laxus’ space, looking up at him through thick lashes and a promise of danger and battle of wills in his dark gaze.

“Yeah, I think I fucking would,” Laxus said, unashamed. His smirk widened when Cobra’s faltered and his cheeks got distinctly darker as he blinked up at Laxus, the blond man’s confidence sure enough at this point that he hooked his pointer through one of Cobra’s unfilled belt hoops and pulled his crotch closer so that it brushed against Laxus’. “Wha'dya say, Erik?” Laxus breathed against the shorter man’s lips, noses almost touching.

“Call me that again and I’ll strangle you in your sleep, shithead,” Cobra hissed, not pulling away from him as his eye darted to Laxus’ lips and then back up. Laxus swallowed roughly at the challenge that sparked in his sharp grin as he reached up with both hands and yanked on Laxus’ headphones so that their foreheads touched. “Now why don’t you show me your tiny ass dorm. I ain’t getting my sheets fucked up for a douchebag like you.”

“Ain’t you full of romance?” Laxus snorted, brushing his nose against Cobra’s and barely speaking above a whisper.

“One of us is about to be full of something and I was never big on the flowers and chocolates crap.” Cobra said back, chin tilting up slightly to brush his top lip against Laxus’ lower one.

“Good to know,” Laxus grinned, pulling back before he could actually kiss Cobra. He readjusted the strap on his shoulder again, nodding with his head in the direction of his dorm.

Cobra looked at him like he was a lab report that wasn’t making sense - a thing that Laxus interpreted as baffled and irritated and determined to understand- before nodding and walking towards where Laxus had nodded.They walked in silence, Laxus’ hand twitching each time he almost grazed Cobra’s. It felt wrong to just walk apart considering what they had planned, or at least insinuated, but Laxus had zero fucking clue how to make the first move. Especially because Cobra apparently wasn’t into that. The minutes passed awkwardly as Laxus considered just fucking texting Freed about what to do but also not thinking that texting his ex-boyfriend would be good hook up etiquette. Was this a hook up? Was this all that was? Cobra had said yes -kind of- to the concert and oh fuck Laxus had asked him out on a date without realizing it-

And Cobra said yes again.

They were halfway to his dorm, just passing the English building his cousin Lucy was probably still in working on her seventh draft of her creative writing piece, and her stupid boyfriend probably draped over her like a god damn blanket -how was that for romantic, as if Cobra would ever let Laxus do that to him- when Cobra moved and startled Laxus from his thoughts.

“You’re useless at shit like this aren’t you?” Cobra sighed. He kept looking ahead as he grabbed Laxus’ arm and slung it over his own shoulders. “I could basically hear you thinking about holding my hand. Better?”

Laxus swallowed thickly, grunting an affirmative as his face heated at being caught. He glared at a flock of geese under a tree to their right, channeling his anger into the birds resting in the shade on the warm fall afternoon.

What the fuck had Laxus’ gotten himself into?

“What do you mean you haven’t kissed besides when you fuck ?” Lucy gaped at him, dumbfounded as she gathered her own nine dollar strawberry cooler and Natsu’s four dollar beer, Laxus both thankful and irritated that he had run into his cousin and her dumbass boyfriend at the concert. Bixlow hadn’t been the happiest to give up his ticket, but had been placated by Freed reading aloud first Laxus’ panicked four AM text messages and then his even more panicked nine PM text messages about having just gotten laid before going on an actual date.

Fuck, all of his friends were massive dicks. No wonder he was dating Cobra.

Well, kind of dating Cobra.

“Listen I don’t need to be lectured about relationships by someone who brought their deaf   boyfriend to a fucking concert.” Laxus frowned, careful of the shitty vender beer cups so that he wouldn’t crush them by accident in his annoyance.

“One,” Lucy huffed, half running to keep up with him through the crowd, “ Natsu dragged me here. He likes to be part of the chaos of the crowd and to feel the bass bump through him or whatever. And two, we are still on the topic of you and your inability to have a relationship like a normal human being.”

Laxus rolled his eyes as they walked to where Natsu and Cobra were standing by one of the entrances into the stadium, hands moving quickly and in agitation as they signed to one another.

Laxus couldn’t fucking believe that Lucy was dating his maybe-boyfriend’s cousin.

“You fucking dick, you know I can’t understand ISL!” Natsu roared, throwing his hands above his head, voice loud enough to draw passing glances from a few people entering the large arena.

“Not my fault you don’t know your own heritage,” Cobra sneered, following it with something that Laxus could extrapolate was an insult by the sneer of his lips despite not understanding the other language. “ Ullu de pathe.”

“I can read Hindi on lips,” Natsu hissed. Lucy smiled as she moved the beer in front of his face, Natsu blinking at the sudden liquid blocking his view of Cobra. He smiled down at her, lip ring shifting as it was pulled. Lucy signed a quick hello, her hand flat as she did something that Laxus thought looked like a short and relaxed salute, quickly dropping her hand with her pointer and middle finger intended in a weird peace sign and flicking her lower lip with her middle finger twice.

Natsu grinned and rolled his eyes, Laxus lost at what the gesture meant. He had managed to learn a few swears and the alphabet, but otherwise relied on Natsu’s ability to read lips and speak when interacting with him. He’d offered to take better notes for Natsu in their class, but the stubborn bastard had refused and instead relied on a voice to text app on his phone as he took his own notes from the board.

Cobra signed something, the only sign Laxus caught making him grin at the end; Cobra flicking his hand from under his chin and out with his palm facing towards himself.

“I ain’t a bitch you fucking emo furry.” Natsu spat.

“Just because I respect and collect snakes doesn’t mean I want to fuck them,” Cobra snarled, “and at least I’m passionate about animals that actually exist, dragon boy .” Cobra held his hand so his fingers were splayed, wiggling the three middle fingers as he moved it from his chin outwards, palm facing down this time. “I don’t even know how we’re related, even your fucking hair is off brand! What kinda genetic fuck-up gets pink hair?”

“I like his hair,” Lucy defended. Laxus groaned loudly, throwing his arm around Cobra’s shoulders.

“We're gonna go somewhere else now,” Laxus said to Lucy, nodding at Natsu as he led Cobra away from his own cousin. They moved through the crowd, Cobra fitting nicely under Laxus’ arm as they walked. They entered the stadium, filing their way to the ground level where they would be standing for the show, Laxus letting Cobra stew as he learned the other man liked to do.

“That useless little jackass follows me everywhere,” Cobra hissed. Laxus looked at him from the corner of his eye, debating if he wanted to get into family dynamics right now. Considering how Natsu was more likely to become family than Cobra though...

Laxus swore internally before speaking against his better judgement.

“Technically they decided to come here before you,” Laxus said, not looking at Cobra. He felt him stiffen under his arm, but didn’t pull away.

“Whatever,” Cobra spat, taking a long sip of his beer. Laxus grunted, content with listening to the crowd around them mill between one of the opening acts and Thunder Claps. Two girls were standing by them, talking loudly with flower crowns in their hair and neon bras under white netted tops, one tucked into her short jean shorts and the other hanging down to her mid thigh and touching the top of her thin stockings, her own shorts barely visible under the netted fabric.

Laxus didn’t think he’d have noticed if it weren’t for Cobra tensing again under his arm and leading them away from the girls.

“I know you’re a big fan of my dick but I didn’t peg ya as needing to avoid an entire gender.” Laxus commented, taking a sip of his own drink as he waited for Cobra to speak.

“Their voices were irritating me,” Cobra said flatly, lips turned down slightly in his neutral expression. Normally when Laxus wore that look as his own neutral expression people said he looked liked he was plotting murder, when in reality he just thinking of dumb shit. Laxus was pretty sure Cobra was definitely plotting to murder someone, though. Laxus thought there might have been more to it than what Cobra was telling him but decided to drop it. Freed had been very adamant about not pissing off his date when at a social event.

Cobra took out his phone as Laxus glared at a boy that was staring a little too intently at Cobra’s biceps, revealed by his ripped sleeve tank top. The boy scurried off as Cobra slipped his phone back into the back pocket of his tight jeans. Jeans that Laxus knew for a fact Cobra was wearing because he was aware how tight they were on his ass and Laxus’ appreciation of it.

“Natsu and Lucy will down here in a second and if you say anything about it I will bite your dick off tonight.”

Laxus blinked once before nodding. He pulled Cobra closer to him when the other man downed his drink in a way that the other engineering students would cheer on, and made Laxus respect him just a little bit more.

Natsu and Lucy appeared again like Cobra said, Natsu sending a wary glance at Cobra before smiling brightly. Laxus huffed and sipped his beer as he scanned the crowd again. Natsu didn’t have a fucking single grudge-holding bone in his body when it came to abuse against himself. Laxus also wondered how the pink-haired pyro freak and Cobra were related, though for different reasons.

Laxus noticed Lucy lean towards him and Cobra, Natsu’s attention on the stage as the stagehands brought out the equipment and instruments for Thunder Claps. “If you do anything to ruin this concert for Natsu I will find out where you live and do something so horrible and scarring you’ll never be able to sleep again.” Lucy said sweetly, not bothering to lower her voice as the back of her head was to Natsu. She smiled once, lips pulled up sharply and eyes cold enough to make Laxus’ heart skip a beat like the time he thought he had missed a final. He took another sip of his drink, already half done but choosing to pretend he hadn’t just witnessed his cousin promising to maim another student in a huge crowd. His one law course taught him nothing if not plausible deniability.

He snuck a glance at Cobra’s face, somehow surprised and not at the bright grin pulling up one corner of his mouth.

“I like her.” Cobra said, looking around the crowd as well. Laxus shook his head, offering the rest of his beer to Cobra. “Well isn’t someone trying to get me drunk.”

“You’re much easier to top when you’re already a little fucked up,” Laxus grinned down at him. Cobra snorted, drinking Laxus’ beer and twisting his lips into a sneer, retort lost in his disgust.

“Thought an alcoholic like you would at least know how to drink good beer,” Cobra drawled.

“If you don’t like it I’ll definitely be needing it to deal with you all night,” Laxus said, raising an eyebrow at Cobra. He rolled his eye, taking another large sip with a grimace.

“I’m a fucking delight.”

Laxus snorted loudly, grinning at Cobra’s flat glare.

The crowd began cheering as people in ripped jeans and wearing over a dozen glow stick pieces of jewelry began filing onto the stage, the lights dimming and the crowd enveloping them so there was no place that Laxus wasn’t being touched by slightly sweaty and glitter covered bodies. Cobra glared, hiding deeper under Laxus’ arm and away from the chance of anything too sparkly and happy touching him. “Why’d you agree if concerts ain’t your thing?” Laxus purred, leaning down so his lips brushed his ear.

“I like concerts ,” Cobra hissed back, turning his head so his lips almost brushed Laxus’, “I don’t like raves.”

“This isn’t even close to rave. I’d be on way more drugs if this was a rave ,” Laxus murmured back, distracted by Lucy’s lecture in the back of his head about normal relationships. Heat from where Cobra was pressed against his side and under his arm scorched him, Laxus’ brain focusing on Cobra’s lips and how the top one was thinner than the bottom, a slight dimple under the left corner of his lip where a lip piercing might have once been. Laxus’ throat grew dry at the thought of seeing the silver against his warm-toned skin.

Laxus lifted his gaze to meet Cobra’s, a dark, unreadable expression piercing him.

“Maybe you just wanted to be here with me,” he said, leaning forward slightly so his nose brushed Cobra’s. A slight grin lifted the corner of Cobra’s mouth, a mocking glint flashing in his eye that made Laxus smirk in turn. Whatever Cobra was about to say was lost as the DJ of the band made the bass drop and the crowd went wild, jumping and thrumming around them. Cobra got jostled, shoving him towards Laxus, his forehead pressing into his lips. Laxus glared at the clearly drunk girl who had shoved Cobra and ruined whatever the fuck Laxus had been trying to do.

Laxus grinned when he heard Cobra swear under his breath, pleased that he wasn’t happy about it either. Deciding that a EDM concert probably wasn’t the best place to figure out what the shit was going on between them, Laxus turned his attention to the stage and lost himself in the performance. He sang along with the next few songs, moving with the crowd, bouncing on the balls of his feet and losing himself to the pounding that resonated with his bones and overrode his own heartbeat in his blood.

Cobra shifted slightly in front of him when Lucy and Natsu got crushed to his side, rolling his eye less sarcastically than Laxus expected at Lucy’s mouthed apology. Laxus grinned at the opportunity to both touch and embarrass him, grabbing his hips and pulling him against Laxus’ chest, dancing behind him as one song bled into another, the crowd going wild at the new mix.

Cobra stilled at first, looking over his shoulder with a sharp glare that made Laxus’ smirk grow larger as he rolled his hips against Cobra’s ass. His cheeks looked darker when a strobe light rolled over his face, bathing him in purple light and a voice in the back of Laxus’ mind compared him to what a god of contempt and poison might look like. Thoughts of how fucking whipped he was were forced out of his mind as Cobra gave him a dangerous smile before turning his head back to the stage and crushing his ass into Laxus with a lewd and rough roll. Laxus cursed through a grin, fingers digging into Cobra’s hips, thumbs slipping under the hem of his shirt and moving over the taut skin of his hip bones and stomach.

More songs passed like that, Cobra and Laxus working up a heavy sweat grinding and rutting against one another in the sweltering heat created by a crowd full of young adults doing the same. Laxus pointedly ignored his baby cousin going even harder against Natsu than Cobra was to him, Natsu’s sweaty forehead connected to her jaw as he sucked at her neck, one hand flat on her stomach as he guided her in deep rolls against him in what Laxus was almost disgusted to note was practiced movements.

He didn’t know how well Natsu would understand a ‘touch her and I’ll castrate you’ without being able to hear Laxus’ tone but he was hoping he’d be able to convey the right amount of ‘I could kill you with you hand’ in his eyes when he cornered the pink haired brat after the show.

He was thankful to see Lucy stop trying to ride Natsu’s dick through their clothes, shrieking with joy when Natsu stooped low and put her on his shoulders. She gripped his hair as he stood again, bare thighs clenching around his head and his own hands gripping into her pale skin tightly. Laxus was stopped from straight up decking Natsu for putting his face so close to parts of Lucy Laxus would rather fucking claw his eyes out with a rusty spoon than think about when he noticed Natsu looking up at Lucy. His eyes were soft, fondness almost palpable in an aura around them as they met each other's gazes. Lucy beamed as she smiled down at him, braid messed and slung over one shoulder and glitter paint smeared over her cheek and bare shoulders. Natsu’s smile was lopsided, the couple completely separated from the music and crowd around them as Lucy leaned down, sealing her lips against his sweetly. She pulled back slightly, giggling as Natsu rubbed his nose along hers and they got lost in each others eyes again.

Laxus let his gaze drift to Cobra, an unfamiliar ache in his chest making him frown at the spiked hair in front of him.

“Put me on your shoulders and I’ll create a mosh pit,” Cobra said, serious and flat as he looked over his shoulder at Laxus again. The blond smirked, nodding and forcing his attention back on the stage. He frowned down at Cobra when he stopped dancing against him. He cocked his head at Cobra’s searching scowl, unsure of what was going through his head. "Fuck it,” he grunted, confusion making Laxus knit his eyebrows at Cobra’s low grunt. He froze for a second, Cobra twisting fully in his arms and threading his fingers into the short hairs at the base of Laxus’ neck. He grunted as Cobra slammed his mouth to his, rough and a little awkward as he leaned up into Laxus.

The music dulled in his ears, arms winding around Cobra and pulling him flush against his chest. Their lips slated against one another's easily as the kiss drew on, Cobra’s short nails digging greedily into the back of Laxus’ neck and fisting at his short hair. Laxus nipped at Cobra’s lower lip, opening his mouth at Cobra’s demanding swipe of his tongue along Laxus’ lips.

His hand dropped to push into the back pocket of Cobra’s jeans, squeezing harshly and pulling his body flush to Laxus’ again. Cobra broke the kiss, grinning up at him hungrily and with lewd joy dancing in his eye. Laxus squeezed again, returning the dark smirk. Cobra chuckled under his breath before kissing Laxus softly once, returning to demanding and impatient kisses as if to cover up the almost tender action. Neither said anything, resuming dancing and losing themselves in the atmosphere of the show and trying to one-up one another.

Laxus figured Cobra liked having a boyfriend that wasn’t afraid of a little friendly competition.

His hand released Laxus’ hair, sliding between their bodies and roughly groping at the front of Laxus’ pants. Cobra smirked against his mouth when he grunted at the unexpected touch. His self-pleased grin fell when Laxus pulled his hand from Cobra’s pocket and instead ran along the center seam of his jeans, fingers pressing firmly and rubbing at him there. Laxus looked at Cobra through his lashes, pleased to see Cobra’s deep scowl and to feel his face warm in the lack of space between them.

Okay, so maybe a little less-than-friendly competition.

Not that Laxus was complaining.

[cwdcshows]

Supergirl - S5 E3 - Blurred Lines

I'm begrudgingly considering watching Batwoman, mainly because I'm OC'd and I'm watching the other DC-CW series, but God damn, I catch glimpse of it whenever I cue-up Supergirl and the DVR has recorded the last few minutes of the preceding Batwoman episode, and it's not inspiring me with any confidence.  It apparently takes them 3 episodes to give her, her God damn hair - the hair we saw Batwoman sport nearly a year ago in the crossover, meaning at least part of this season is set in the relative past, presumably.  But then we get this bullshit commentary about "the bat being back, but curvier and sexier," like fuck you.  How the hell can you tell what this person looks in this suit?  And so much for the urban legend angle.   More importantly, how dumb is it that they have work so hard to come up with her name?  Are we supposed to believe anyone was seriously considering calling her "Batchick"; while "Batwoman" flies under the radar? Moving on.... So at the end of the last episode, we see Billy-the-Kiss ass volunteering at a shelter; now he's hassling some guy at a night club about playing ball?  

Of course Kelly gives random people she meets on the street unsolicited advice about their lives; because nothing makes someone more sympathetic than someone who likes to stick their nose into other people's business.  And it seems this show has once again tricked me into walking into a double entendre. It's her job to listen to people?  What is Kelly's job?  She's so boring and last season seems like a lifetime ago, I have genuinely forgotten.  Is she supposed to be a therapist or something?  I suppose that explains her guiding J'Onn through this ordeal in the previous episode; I was wondering what made her qualified to do that, but it seems completely incongruent with the high tech coporate setting they've put her in. And Alex going from Kelly giving advice to her barista to being kidnapped by a shape shifter is a hell a segue.  I have a feeling Alex has been waiting hours to find the right opportunity to bring that up; and it would seem she cracked under the pressure. "You don't want a world full of robots, you just want better people."

Oh.... Idiot Jed..... How does Brainy even function?  Data was more adept at picking up behavioral cues. Wait, do people really like reading about death?  I mean, I'll read the obits in my weekly hometown newspaper; I try to make it a point of at least paying respect to he recently deceased by reading their name and age at the time of death, but I'm don't go out of my way to scan for newspapers with a corpse on cover. Interesting aside, I was reading said newspaper just last night and noted how a local woman had died at the age of 44 - certainly a tragedy for a family to lose someone at such a fairly young age - and then I also saw that it noted her "husband of 30 years" and now I'm left wondering if one of those numbers was a typo or if this woman got married at 14..... So she hears Billy's heart beating fast and has to use her x-ray vision to confirm it?  What else did she think it could have been? Okay, so Kelly is a Doctor.  Yet the place she works doesn't remotely look like a hospital; and the staff don't look like medical staff.  They (and the set) looks like they're trying to audition for a future JJ Abrams Star Trek film. So Kara is going all over the world to get lunch and coffee, but are any of these items going to still be hot by the time she gets back to the states?  For that matter, how the hell does manage to carry all of this shit?  I have a hard enough time carry my order from McDonald's from car the dozen or so yards into my house; especially if I have to also carry in anything else besides the bag of food and my drink.  The couple of time I had my niece with me also got her something I absolutely asked the server at the drive-thru to put it all in one of those plastic bags they normally put salads in, because they have a handle - a fact I learned not because I have ever previously ordered a salad from McDonald's, but rather because I asked them if they had a bag with a handle they could put my order in to make it easier to carry and they responded, "you mean like a salad bag?" and I respond, "yeah, whatever." I'm just picturing Kara rigging up some sort of harness or something she can wear to help carry things around as she flies internationally; thumbing her nose at all of the customs agencies and international trade violations she's willfully causing. Also, now that Brainy has set it up so her suit materializes as soon as she takes the glasses off, shouldn't she get more clear of the doorway before doing that?  That also raises the question of what happens when she just wants to lounge around without her glasses or is going to bed.  Does she have to sleep in her suit now?  Is it bonded to her skin?  Is there a snooze button that allows her to take off her glasses and not activate the suit?  What if she just needs to remove her glasses to get something out of her eye or to clean the glasses?  Or those times like earlier in the episode when she just brings the glasses down just slightly to use her x-ray vision?  What's the point of no return her glasses have to pass before the process starts?  Can it be immediately reversed when she put the glasses back on; or is it something you have to wait until it's all the way done before you can go the other way? There are so many questions..... Seriously, Kara, Lena would be the only person interested in Lex's journals and there'd be no other constructive use for them other than therapeutic?   Wait just a damn minute, she took her glasses all the way off to x-ray the dead body and didn't generate her suit.  What the fuck?   You lied to us Brainy.  You lied and that can't be forgiven. What, the boy being called J'Onn might be J'Onn?  Whodda thunk it? Although I suppose J'Onn might be a common name on Mars, like John, Jacob or Jingleheimer Schmidt. I can buy that children on Mars or other planets even might develop games similar to hide and seek; it's a basic concept that seems fairly plausible.  What doesn't seem plausible is that children on Mars would play this game as humans. So in the last episode, J'Onn hit a wall in trying to recover his memories; and it was suggested that trying to use the Q-wave technology to go any deeper could do damage to J'Onn.  Now this episode J'Onn barely has to try, with the help of a woman who isn't even a telepath. Kara can fly halfway across the world to get lunch for her and Lena, but forgets to put in an delivery order for dinner with Alex - come on Kara, strap on your harness and go get dinner, chop, chop! You know, if Terrible-Boss gets and more terrible, Kara could probably make bank moonlighting with GrubHub.  Or start her own food delivery service - SupperGirl Should Brainiac have a clapper, as opposed to say, Alexa? Now that I think about it, why is Brainiac using his appearance filter when they're home alone or when he's sleeping for that matter?  Surely these devices don't have an unlimited supply of power; and Brainiac shouldn't be concerned about his appearance in private. Guardian: "Yeah, I came prepared." With what, a glow stick?  Seriously, is this supposed to be not-Spider-woman's not-Kryptonite?  Did I miss a whole big schpiel about this alien thing have some special weakness?  And why didn't Supergirl likewise come prepared? Also, who looped James into this?  Was it Kara? "This device uses magnetic resonance to attract the heavy metals in their ink." You really could have just said "this device des magic" and it'd make about as much sense.  Especially since it's not really ink, but rather some type of alien life form that only mimics the appearance of a tattoo.   Are we supposed to be surprised that it was actually J'Onn who did the mind wipe?  Like I mentioned with the last episode, I'm fairly certain he's wiped other people's minds without the permission; and we definitely know he's done it with their consent. In the last episode, Kelly was able to use her contact lenses to enter J'Onn's mind and interact with him in real time.  Now it appears on a computer monitor and there's a time delay.  In spite of this apparent de-evolution of the technological ability to merge one's mind with technology, this is still some next level shit that the characters just seem to be glossing over as no big deal. So if this...shadow... could kill bug-lady so easily, why even need her at all as an assassin?  Was it for the plausible deniability of the target seeming to die of natural causes Is this going to turn out to be the Shadow Thief?  Maybe Shade?  I kind of hope it's not Shade.  I know he (or sometimes she) has been a villain, but I kinda liked the run in the comics when he was an immortal good guy. Come on Brainiac, there's a fucking difference between "operating at 100%" and the fucking nuance of going overboard with things like food and poems.  It's the sort of difference between being able to open a fucking door and ripping clear off the hinges; or holding someone's hand gently or crushing it.  It's unrealistic to suggest that this quasi-organic-AI doesn't realize you can't go "full thrust" on every conceivable thing, because nothing in nature could function that way.  And if he really needs things in those terms, then it's a matter of variable comprehension of where those critical thresholds are; because 100% maximum food consumption in a meal is not dozen whole pizzas.  That is more than 100% of what one person can physically eat in one sitting and therefore should exceed his logical behavior. On the flip side, mazel tov when things turn physical and Brainiac brings this type of mindset to the bedroom....

"You were right, I was too open and too trusting. It's all my fault." Fuck you Supergirl Writers, for trying to bring this back to the opening bit between Kelly and the random person she was offering advice to on the street.  J'Onn's brother manipulated Kelly by appearing to her as someone she knew and had at least enough of a past history with as to have a photo of him in her home.  Had he appeared as the street barista or was just walking along the street not even looking for Kelly when Kelly came along, randomly zapping people with Q waves to help make them feel better, whether they asked for that help or not, sure, that would be "her fault". But this was a sneaky fucking telepathic shape shifter was determined to get your to do what he wanted; and while admittedly it barely took him much effort to convince you, it was only because you were legitimately doing what would have been the right thing under any other normal circumstance. "For a friend like you, there are no boundaries." Alright, now the writers are just fucking with us with these two. So Kara evidently didn't just pop in and grabbed the books, but also the watch too; seems she decided that so long as she was committing a felony, she might as well get her money's worth - and I suppose that makes sense.  Is stealing some journals and a watch worse than just stealing the journals and not the watch, if you've only had to break into the one place? Next we'll see that she just cleared out the whole evidence lock-up, because you never know when you might need something else that's being held in Federal custody, and that way she's only had to break the law once; anything after that is just curation.

[jolteonjordansh]

Thoughts on Digimon Adventure tri.: “Coexistence”

Alright, I kept telling myself I was going to give a day to let my thoughts on “Symbiosis”/”Coexistence” (I'll go with Coexistence generally just to clarify) sink in, but I cannot get my mind to shift on anything else so let's just get to it. If I miss anything, I’ll make an additional thoughts post or something, but I feel like I’ve covered everything here for the most part. So, how did this go as we’re nearing the end of Digimon Adventure tri?

Oh boy, where do I even begin?

Let me lay this down straight: “Coexistence” isn't absolute garbage and is not the worst thing I've ever seen. I still think other series like Digimon Frontier are far worse than tri as a whole so far, but... “Coexistence” pretty much puts a lot of tri's flaws all in one big package.

The "padding" of this movie wasn't so unbearable that I wanted to shut the thing off, but I can certainly say that for 3/4ths of the movie, I was so bored. Not ready to die bored, but questioning "When the hell does all of the material this movie kept pressing so hard before release supposed to show up? Where's Kari's development? Where's Ophanimon Falldown Mode? Any answers to all of the plot threads you've left open? Are the Digimon going to regain their memories? The 02 cast? Anything?" There were cute moments here and there, but I felt that the payoff wasn't good enough to sit through so much of this. This isn't to say that the payoff wasn't good at all--I'll get to that towards the end. Let's get the bad stuff out of the way first. Other than the music anyway; that was as good as always.

The animation, while mostly okay, had some weird moments. I know it's happened throughout tri, but the size inconsistencies of the Digimon were especially obvious in “Coexistence”. Maybe I just never noticed it until now, but there were so many moments where I was thinking things like "Agumon isn't that small," or "Why did Patamon suddenly shrink from one frame to the next?" Also, there were a good number of stills used here for some reason. Why? I have no idea, but it looked bad. There was also this one shot of Piyomon flying that was really choppy, yet Patamon's flying animations looked as fluid as usual just a few seconds later. Are they trying to save all their budget for the last movie? Come on guys, this isn't “The Scuffle of Legends” for crying out loud. The animation was at least good where it was supposed to be, especially towards the end (the scene where the ground was falling apart were super quick and fluid? I'm not sure if it was just me, but it stuck out to me as looking really well-animated and flowing compared to the rest of the film).

There's sadly not much fighting to talk about animation-wise either. It looks good when it happens--I personally thought watching Alphamon and Jesmon duke it out was awesome. The Digimon from the DigiDestined, other than Tai and Matt who manage to bring together Omegamon, sadly don't get to do much. But hey, the animators learned to put all of the Digivolution animations together in one shot instead of making us watch ten minutes of Digivolution animations! I mean, I love watching them and all, but sometimes you have to cut to the chase, and this was one of those cases. I just found it funny that the one Ultimate Digivolution we hadn't seen, WereGarurumon, gets boxed. But I was sad to see MetalGarurumon's boxed. I mean, his pose and everything looked awesome so I would have really liked to see it in full! Hopefully, we'll get to see it in full in the next film. I mean, come on! I demand to see my metal puppy with some shiny awesome Digivolution animation! Omegamon also got a... sort of Digivolution animation, but it still looked neat! I just wish it was even flashier since, you know, this is a Mega/Ultra level Jogress Digivolution. It deserves to be insanely flashy!

I know I've been saying "towards the end" a lot in these thoughts so far, but...  that’s because, sadly, you don’t really need to watch the first three episodes except for like, some exposition about Meicoomon. You know what the rest is? Meiko wondering and whining and mulling over what to do with Meicoomon. Over. And over. And over. If you weren't tired of it the last couple of movies, you will be absolutely sick of it by the end of “Coexistence”. I cannot stress how I tried so hard to give Meiko a chance. I tried to look at things from a sympathetic viewpoint. So many times, I was ready to just give up on her character, but I came into this movie thinking, "Okay, I'm going to try one more time. This might be where Meiko gets interesting. Maybe after all of this 'development', it will actually pay off into something really great."

That didn't happen. We got the same kind of thing with Meiko as we did with the rest of tri. The self-doubt, the crying, the blush stickers, the "Why was I chosen!?" subplot which was already done so much better with Joe, the pity party, attempting to take responsibility for things only to rinse and repeat everything I just mentioned--anything you have seen of Meiko in the last four movies of tri, you will see here (except maybe blatant fanservice) but it is done for three full episodes. It was tiring, it was frustrating, and I just wanted to see the movie focus on something besides Meiko for five minutes. I mean, we get some nice bits with the DigiDestined like them reaching out to their parents as they're unable to go home--but of course, most of these are silent and the one that gets the most attention is Meiko's.

I hate to go on and on and on about Meiko as much as I am, as I understand some people like her. However, I wouldn't be going on as much about Meiko as I am if tri wasn't focusing on her so much in the first place. My biggest issue with all of this focus on Meiko is that these attempts to "develop" her and make her more likable are far too little, too late. These are things that we should have been seeing in “Determination” and “Confession” for us to understand and connect with Meiko as a character. Instead, they wasted time with her being unrealistically socially awkward and fanservice-y, and then being outright whiny and insufferable in “Confession”. And the writers expect us, more than half-way into this series, to truly invest in her and care. This might have been doable at this point if it was in small increments with balance with the rest of the DigiDestined rather than focusing so hard on her because the writers realized they were running out of time, but that's not what they did.

There were things they could have done to make her more likable and human throughout this series. There was the potential of her father being an abusive asshole father to at least explain how shy and scared and shut-in she was, except he... wasn't really that terrible. He was just a workaholic who asked Meiko to let Meicoomon be experimented on, and... that was about it. Suddenly he started caring about her in this film like he woke up one morning and said "Oh shit, I'm a bad father." It was more like a parody of the asshole dad than an actual use of the trope, with little execution applied. There's also this tick Meiko has of having a Tottori accent, which was only used a record time of once in “Determination” to show she had this quirk and for the cast to giggle about. Suddenly, after a phone call with her father and crying about Meicoomon again, Meiko starts speaking with this accent, likely forgetting her habit of speaking so formally around everyone. This is honestly a minor thing, but it did give more flavor to her character and had she grown more comfortable to use it more often around the DigiDestined cast, I would find her character to be more believable. She just shifts around from being uptight and formal to suddenly open and willing to cry her whole heart out to them. There's no gradual development. What was also weird to me is that, with all of flashbacks Meiko had, we don't really hear her using this accent she supposedly has in her childhood (at least as far as I could tell?), so yeah... we also have inconsistency issues! Yay!

I also simply cannot bring myself to like Meicoomon either. I get it, I'm supposed to sympathize for this poor Digimon who was basically born as an outcast and technically did nothing wrong. But... She barely has a personality other than "Mei! Mei! Mei!" and how am I supposed to care about a Digimon who serves as nothing more than a plot device and flipflops from being a cutesy kitty to a devastating killing machine? This was something Digital Monster X-Evolution did infinitely better with Dorumon. Now, we do at least finally get an explanation as to why Meicoomon freaks out so much without Meiko and why she's so uncontrollable in the first place. And... it's one of the dumbest asspulls this series has had.

Meicoomon was basically born from a fragment of Apocalymon's data. I've seen some people point out some things foreshadowing this, but they're super filmsy to me and nowhere near convincing enough for me to really follow as something the writers really thought through. It feels like some lazy excuse the writers came up with to try to connect Meiko and Meicoomon back to the original Adventure series in some way, when really it just makes their whole existence feel all the more hamfisted. I've tried to avoid the "blatant self-insert Mary Sue OC" label with Meiko as much as I could with how overused it's been applied to her by so many people who watch tri, but if anything made her fall under this label, it would be this. She has a Digimon formed from a fragment of the original Big Bad's data? Seriously? Let that sink in. Did that really sound like a good idea on paper to someone? If that's not enough, this is literally recycling the plot of Ryo and Monodramon from the Tamer games on the Wonderswan, where Monodramon Jogress Digivolved with the Big Bad Millenniummon and ultimately became his partner after being reborn, which led to the Ryo we know with his berserk Cyberdramon from Digimon Tamers. Hell, Battle of Adventurers did the whole "leftover fragment of Apocalymon" thing a lot better. It's just shameful how lazy this whole thing is put together when the writers have been building up the plot for, what, five movies over the course of three years? I guess this also explains how Meicoomon was the special snowflake who wasn't affected by the Reboot at all, but... whatever. I barely even care at this point. Meicoomon and Meiko are special snowflakes and that's just how the writers are going to treat them.

What makes this special treatment of Meiko all the more frustrating is when you look at the DigiDestined constantly comforting her and acting like she's been with them for years, saying things like "We're with you because we're all DigiDestined!" and were even willing to depart from their own moral compasses (referring to Tai's willingness to kill Meicoomon as Meiko wishes when he just said in the previous episode that he didn't want to kill a friend) when... they're completely ignoring the Adventure 02 cast. I get it, some people are tired about people questioning where they are, but when the writers have been waving teases at the audience like showing them being "killed off" in the beginning, Gennai taking on the Digimon Kaiser disguise, Kari and T.K. being concerned for their whereabouts a record one time and bringing back the freaking Dark Ocean (because, you know, that went so well in Adventure 02!), you have to question the cast's lack of concern. Adventure 02 has not been de-canonized, or these little things wouldn't exist. So I hate how the Adventure cast is constantly catering towards Meiko's needs when they've maybe known her for a couple of months at best, but don't even show a wink of concern for the Adventure 02 cast who they have probably known for years (I imagine they kept some contact over time) and both T.K. and Kari went through a whole series of adventures with them. It really does make it feel like the cast are written in a sort of bad self-insert fanfic whenever Meiko has any sort of presence as if the world revolves around her.

Once again, I get that a lot of my problems surround Meiko and Meicoomon, but the problem with this movie is how freaking heavily it focuses on them. A lot of this movie before the last episode is simple padding like the cast trying to get back to the real world, telling ghost stories and having other cutesy moments. I didn't hate all of these, but when we're getting so close to the end... I want this time being spent on the writers finally tying up loose ends. There's one movie left, and yet here they are continuing to add even more questions to the plot and not enough answers and then otherwise wasting time with things that do not answer these issues. I am not against filler--I was fine with most of “Determination”'s because it was the beginning of the series, things were still rolling in, and there were still increments of development happening here and there (Mimi's narcissism and Joe's questioning of his identity as a DigiDestined). But this late in the series, it's time to cut that down and focus on ending the story. Instead, “Coexistence” does a whole lot of nothing with terrible pacing issues, retreading on things we already know/are tired of hearing about, and just adding more instead of answering more. The writers have dug themselves in a big hole and bit off more than they could chew, and it is the most apparent in this movie.

So I must hate this movie then, right? Actually, no. Even though I think three of the four episodes are tough to sit through, with only cute moments to salvage them, the fourth episode was good and finally gave me what I was hoping for in this movie.

Because it's a minor thing, yes, Himekawa had some of her insanity breakdown. Not as much as I wanted, but I still ate up the nonsense she was saying and... she got a gun out of nowhere? What? When? How? I don't know, but it's hilarious. I swear, she's ready to kill someone who speaks a word to her. What's even weirder is that the guns she has changes between scenes. One moment, she as a BFG or some sort of grenade launcher, the next she had a handgun. What, did she find some Weapon Shop in a village somewhere? I have no idea where she's going or what she's going to do since she ended up in the Dark Ocean, but I hope if she shows up, she's just off the walls laughing like a maniac bonkers when we see her next. Insane Himekawa is the best Himekawa.

We also get a little bit of the OG!DigiDestined, like a shot with Nishijima's partner Bearmon. Dawwwwww!

But the best parts are when this movie finally decides to get to the focus I was personally waiting for in this movie--Kari Kamiya. While unfortunately it got nowhere near as much focus as I wanted (because apparently a certain other character really needed it more for some reason...), what we got was damn good. I love that Kari, with all of the times she's been possessed by Homeostasis, finally stood up to a fucking deity of worlds. She wasn't taking any of that shit, and she stood up for it. And I love that if tri has done anything, it's given Kari far more character than Adventure or Adventure 02 ever did. While she isn't forceful or rude, she does not take shit when people spew things she can't possibly bring herself to agree with. She has a firm ground, and she's willing to stand on it. Much like the scene where she talked some sense into Joe in "Determination", it was damn good to see.

And then there was her breakdown. Man, what a breakdown. While we all know Tai isn't really dead (if the Adventure 02 epilogue doesn't count to you, he's on the freaking poster of the next tri movie--he's not dead guys), there was no better way to break her. We've seen that Tai and Kari are close like in some bits of the Dark Masters arc in the original Digimon Adventure, so what else could they take from her but what's most important to her? And the way she just breaks is incredible to watch. Dead silence. Disbelief. Broken sentences. She is in such despair of Tai being gone that she just wants the rest of the world gone. While I wish Gatomon had been a little more involved, with the Dark Digivolution just sort of... happening, it was still a damn good lead-up. But man, is it a terrifying one.

While my personal favorite Dark Digivolution moments still go to Takato and Guilmon and Marcus and his Agumon, Gatomon to Ophanimon Falldown Mode and then Jogress Digivolving with Raguelmon to... whatever terrifying Evangelion experiment they combined into, was just horrifying, down to the body horror. It gives the whole "Coexistence" title double meaning (along with the whole coexistence of the Real and Digital Worlds), and just... seriously, look at that thing! If that's not a destroyer of worlds, I don't know what is! And it's basically a living embodiment of Kari's will and feelings after seeing her dear brother "die" before her eyes. Even after this whole thing happens, she's just a living shell just sitting there. You can really see just how broken she is after that.

While I still want to see more of Kari breaking, like how she'll deal with this whole situation and cope with her brother's "death" until he returns, it was still just good to see her develop in some way. And I will say, yeah, the cliffhanger is pretty dirty when the whole movie felt like a set-up for the last one while still doing a lot of nothing until the end. "Confession"'s cliffhanger, while absolutely painful, still felt more genuine than "Coexistence"'s just being there for the sake of set-up. And I think part of the reason it's so frustrating is because that... again, this movie didn't do a lot, so leaving it at that just when it was starting to finally get moving is aggravating.

This is still easily the weakest entry in the Digimon Adventure tri series though. And while it was frustrating at many moments, I would still call it... okay. I think it could have been even worse. The last episode did make it worth a watch, but the rest did make me want to bash my head into a wall at times. At this point, there's no way tri will be able to possibly tie all of its loose ends in a satisfying way. Hell, we may never even get an answer for things like the Digimon's memories or the Adventure 02 cast (though I certainly hope we do). But there is some good set-up here... So if we can at least get some answers, some awesome fights, and good character development and interaction, I am going to look forward to seeing Our Future, though with some optimistic skepticism. Here's hoping, to what little tri has left and how much going against it... that it pleasantly surprises us somehow.

[chloefraazers]

ME:A post-game thoughts

I should be writing my essay, but here I am talking Andromeda, because I just finished the game and OH MY GOD.  So there are definitely spoilers under the cut. If you haven’t finished the game, don’t click it.  I repeat:

Do not click to read more if you have not finished Mass Effect: Andromeda because there are spoilers below. 

For my first playthrough, I created Bellatrix Ryder.  This was basically decided ages ago: for my first play (and my considered “canon” play) of the Mass Effect trilogy, my Shepard was named Andromeda.  It was kind of by accident.  I went with a space-themed name (my headcanon is that her parents named her after the galaxy because, after the First Contact War settled and spaceflight across the Milky Way was possible, they dreamed of how far people could go in the future), and then later I learned about the Mass Effect: Andromeda game and just laughed about it.  When rumours came around that the ME:A Pathfinder would be named Ryder, I started thinking of names and of course the Black sisters from Harry Potter came up (Andromeda, Bellatrix, and Narcissa).  Bellatrix Ryder actually sounded awesome, despite her HP counterpart being… uh… evil.  ANYWAY. I apologise for the shitty pictures of my TV screen from my iPhone, but:

I had wanted to name her twin Jericho, but your twin is pre-named the default.  Makes sense, since they have to refer to them throughout the game.  I know Codsworth in Fallout 4 has over like… 300 known names for your Sole Survivor, but I think a game of this size would be… just impossible for that.  So I’m not too upset, I guess.  In the end what I decided was that each of the Ryder parents picked a name for a baby and decided not to tell each other what the names were until the babies were born.  Papa Ryder actually picked out Bellatrix (come on, an N7 picking a name that means “female warrior”? Makes more sense than Sara lbr) and Mama Ryder picked Scott after a family member.  Bellatrix was young, but obviously heard about Commander Shepard becoming the first human Spectre and kind-of idolized her, especially after she saved the Citadel from the Reaper geth attack.  In some ways, she looked up to her more than her own father.

Speaking of youth: I loved Ryder’s characterisation.  The Bioware team said the squad would be younger and less experienced, and I really felt that with Ryder.  She was definitely green and had a spunky personality that came from youth.  The characters all-around were excellent.  Jaal was nothing like what I expected: I thought he’d be this hardened warrior, but he was such a cinnamon roll giant spacekitten HONESTLY.  I went with him as a romance option and I regret nothing.  Gonna be honest, I really wasn’t expecting that much nudity or graphic sex from Mass Effect.  Not sure how I feel about it, but I’m more amused than uncomfortable.  I can see why some people got a “manic pixie dream girl” feeling off Peebee, but I think she has enough personality to contradict the stereotype a bit.  I feel like they could have done more with her, but maybe in sequels?  Suvi was lovely, of course.  I was worried about Liam, and though he, Cora, and Kallo were a bit weaker in comparison with the others, there was still enough to all of them that I wasn’t really annoyed or bored with any.  I can’t wait to romance Vetra with a future fem!Ryder, and as always, I love a krogan.  I really wanted to see what “Dating Drack” did, but not with this Ryder.  Next one, I’m totally seeing what happens.  Probably some quality comedy with my favourite salty space grandpa.

Overall, I fucking loved the game.  All of it.  Beginning to end.  It did have bugs and weird facial animations, mostly near the beginning of the game.  You could definitely tell where they spent more time on the details.  But I’m okay with it, because they’re only going to get better.  No game is ever going to be perfect.

And to me, that really didn’t matter as much as the rest of the game.  ME:A had diversity, representation, strong story, and wonderful characters.  It had mystery, twists, and gave enough answers to satisfy some questions but left enough open to leave me aching for a sequel. Among the humans alone, there were so many female characters - and female characters of colour.  One of my favourite moments was on the Nexus, when the angaran was speaking to the asari liaison in the cultural centre and he asked about pronouns, and she said some asari prefer male or gender-neutral.  Avitus and Macen weren’t explicitly stated as being in a relationship that I recall, but it was very obvious that they were definitely in love with each other - and I would love to know more about homosexual relationships among the turians.  (I didn’t romance Vetra this round because… because Jaal, but maybe next time.)

My biggest fear with this game was that Milky Way species, especially humans, were going to burst into a new galaxy and just colonize the fuck out of it and have it… what’s the word… but basically have it be seen as this awesome thing that humans can bulldoze their way into a galaxy and take charge.  I was worried that it would be… ignorant of the implications and negative impact of colonization in the past.  In a way, my fears were expressed in the kett, but thankfully I had no feeling of it in the main storyline of the Pathfinder.  At every step along the way, it was made clear we were there as explorers, and we weren’t going to make a home on a planet already colonized by the angara without permission (the exiles on Kadara might be… complicated, though).  The fact that we didn’t establish an outpost on Havarl or Aya was super important in this respect.  The angara welcomed scientists to Havarl, but it’s their home, not ours.

(Also - I’ve been light on spoilers so far, but here come some major ones.  Last warning.)

In fact, further into the story and the reveal of Papa Ryder’s knowledge of Reapers almost made it… a refugee story? Almost.  Not entirely, but in some small degree.  Which is an important story these days.

Ryder fixing the planets because of SAM made sense, then, especially with the reveal that the angara were created.  If the Jardaan created the angara and, as suggested in one of the post-game terminal emails, there may be “sleeper agents,” it might make sense that it would be somewhat “ingrained” in them to never try to create artificial intelligence, and therefore never interact with Remnant technology the way Ryder could.  Convenient storytelling, sure, but if your playable character in a video game isn’t the hero, then… there isn’t much of a point, lol.

I don’t know if there are major things I missed - and I hope not.  I’m hoping that there will be sequels with the Ryders.  Mass Effect is so unique because of the ability to import previous game data, so playing another game in the Andromeda galaxy without being Ryder might be… strange.  And they definitely set it up for a sequel.  Like, I have to know about the quarian ark, and the Jardaan.  Not to mention, Ryder has the upgraded SAM implant, so… that makes her stand out.

As for my personal theories, not all questions were answered - I don’t think?  Unless I missed something fucking huge, we didn’t discover the truth about Jien Garson’s murder (my working theory is that she’s not really dead), and we didn’t find out the benefactor’s identity, though I’m 100% convinced they had Cerberus ties (not sure about the Illusive Man - seems like he’d want to be more directly involved in the project, even with his Reaper obsession).  Did the Reapers have influence on the project itself?  WHO KNOWS.  Despite nothing actually… happening… I don’t fully trust SAM.  I feel like the game tried to push in the direction of trusting him because EDI turned out fine, but… I dunno, I got a bad feeling off SAM.  Wonder if I’m the only one.

For big decisions, I’m hoping I made some interesting ones.  I chose to save the krogan over the salarian Pathfinder and her small team, and… this one may prove fatal, but I also chose Morda as the ambassador.  In hindsight, I should have chosen the Moshae, but I fucking love the krogan and kind of had this feeling of “it’s now or never,” you know?  Like, if Ryder didn’t nominate them to have a position like that, they would never have one because space racism.  And, like, after the scene where you talk to Drack in the med bay, like… no way am I not siding with krogan.  That scene had me in actual tears.  I’m hoping my decision doesn’t bite me in the ass but the problem with playing a brand new game with no announced sequels is that you really don’t know the impact of your decisions.  It’s great, but also stressful.

Every callback to the trilogy basically had me in tears, though.  I will gladly let Bain Massani call me “little duck” all day, every day.  Throwbacks to Project Overlord, Gavin Archer, the Illusive Man, Miranda Lawson, and Project Lazarus were so great.   Seeing Papa Vakarian and hearing him talk about Garrus and Shepard, and hearing Liara’s logs… like, it was the perfect amount of references to the trilogy to acknowledge its relevance without overtaking Ryder’s own story.  Really, really well done.

I do have some criticisms, besides the facial syncing and some bugs with additional tasks.  Bioware got a bit better with hair options, but I felt like they could have had more for women of colour.  I have four additional tasks I’m unable to complete (which is why I’m stuck at 98% and the completionist in me is distressed), but hopefully a patch will fix those.  What I liked in this game is that no mission, not even the additional tasks, felt tedious.  Like the side quests in Mass Effect got really draining after a while, and so did collecting minerals in ME2 - thank god that system was much easier in this game.  Basically, I was invested in the entire game, which is really fucking great for a semi-open world game.

My biggest… complaint, I guess?  Is the soundtrack.  I felt like I was never really moved by music, even in combat.  In this sense, the game felt a little incomplete.  I don’t know if it was a time issue because I don’t know how this process goes in game development, but I was actually really disappointed in Andromeda’s music - or lack thereof.  The suicide mission in Mass Effect 2 is something that has stayed with me since I first played the game, and the entirety of Mass Effect 3′s soundtrack was just… I mean, it moved me.  From Leaving Earth, to Aralakh Company, to An End Once and For All, it hit every emotion and every drive.  I just didn’t feel that with Andromeda.  What was there was… fine.  Like, it was adequate.  But I felt like there should have been background music in places where it was otherwise silent (the love scene between Ryder and Jaal was a little awkward because all I could hear was their breathing, for example).  I didn’t feel the “video game drive”, like the music was propelling me forward, that I felt in the previous games.  

I really hate saying that, though, because I know the soundtrack people do work just as hard.  I just feel like in this game… there could have been more?

(Edit to add: One other thing I missed… I loved the new dialogue options with the emotion wheel rather than paragon/neutral/renegade, but I do miss aspects of that system, like opening new dialogue options if you have enough paragon or renegade points. I’m not sure how to incorporate that into a game like Andromeda or if it would even work.  Maybe it’s just nostalgia?)

On a final note, Movie Night was a blessing.  If you complete it post-Meridian, I wish you had the option to bring Scott aboard to watch it, but that’s me being super nitpicky.  This game really had an ME3 Citadel DLC feel to the squad, which shows that Bioware really listened to what the players wanted and loved and improved on that.

Definitely going to be playing this again.  Weirdly, though, I feel like replaying the trilogy first…

Gonna do that.