#i randomly popped off so hard for chapter 13

[thesimperiuscurse]

act ii — fall.

[psychovigilantewrites]

Chapter 13 - Alone Again

Word Count: 15,835

TW:  mentions of child r*pe, mentions of p*dophilia, mentions of self-harm, mentions of trauma, unconsensual biting, unprotected sex, mentions of mental breakdown.

A/N: Hey guys! I felt very bad for updating so slowly, so here it is early! Happy Valentine’s! Special thanks to those who has sent me fanart and kofis!! I appreciate them all, honestly, it’s really amazing. 

Masterlist

Kofi

The ding of his phone woke Jason up from sleep. Even during the grogginess of slowly regaining consciousness, Jason knew who it was.

He blinked his eyes a few times to get used to waking up, and cleared his dry throat. He laid there in bed for a few moments, staring at the tin roof of the safe house he was so proud of. He wondered whether the text would be business or pleasure.

He liked it when you were there with him at night.

But you were too fucking stubborn, and was still hesitating to continue seeing him. It had been a month since the first time you joined him, and since then you went out with him a couple more times, only to investigate the elite pedophile ring that plagued Jason’s mind ever since he found out that it existed, and that Bruce had kept it from him.

Your dilemma meant that you weren’t with him all the time and got upset every time he killed someone.

Jason wasn’t a patient person, but the two of you still texted and called. Discussions, or banter. It was as if you were his friend.

As if everything wasn’t as fucked up as it was.

And however hard he tried to separate his feelings from his goals, to keep you at a distance, to wall himself off, he had obviously failed.

Because now he was smiling to himself at the thought of waking up to your texts.

He had freaked out at first, confused as to why he had started to hate you less and less over time, but now he realised that it didn’t matter how he felt anymore.

As long as he could snatch you away from Bruce.

The fact that you made him feel like he wasn’t alone anymore was only a bonus.

***

To say that it was troublesome to have Dick around would be an understatement.

He had originally mentioned that he was only going to stay for a week, but one week became two, and a month later, he. Was. Still. Fucking. Here.

The fact that you were living under the same roof as Batman meant that you were almost constantly on your feet, but now Nightwing was added to the equation, it felt suffocating.

At least Bruce didn’t like to poke into your personal life as much. Dick Grayson on the other hand, loved to play the doting older brother. You weren’t fooled, though. You knew he was still suspicious of you, and was using his caring nature to his advantage, touching the line between concern and straight up paranoia.

You sighed out loud.

Michelle Myers turned her head to glare at you. You stuck up your middle finger to her, earning an audible gasp.

Shit, you hadn’t meant to do that. You forgot where you were for a second.

School was one of the ways to escape the prying and ever analytical eyes of your older brother, and a way to run from the feelings of growing distance you felt between you and your family.

It was all Jason’s fault.

You had let him get into your head ever since he told you that Bruce had kept a disgustingly huge and important piece of information regarding Gotham’s elite society- the society that you were a part of.

You felt as though there was an invisible line that separated you and Bruce now.

It wasn’t a nice feeling.

“What the hell was that?” Michelle came up to your desk as you were packing to leave.

“I’m sorry?” you feigned innocence.

“You bitch!” she hissed, “You know what you did!”

“Hey, hey, what’s going on?” Rob interjected.

“I have no idea?” you lied.

“Michelle?” Rob turned to her.

“She- she- she showed me the middle finger!” Michelle fumed.

“What?” Robert asked, “No way. That’s not something she would do. Would you?”

He turned to you.

You wondered if his parents were part of this human trafficking ring. You wondered if Michelle’s parents were.

“Of course not!” you defended yourself, “That would be unbecoming of me!”

“Michelle, it’s not nice to make up stories,” Rob rolled his eyes.

Rob’s father was the CEO of Gotham’s number one cybersecurity company, his mother inherited generations worth of wealth. Her lineage meant that she had an iron grip on Gotham and was often Bruce’s rival when it came to influence. If she were a man and didn’t take her husband’s surname, Bruce would probably have lost to her on countless occasions. The possibility of one or both of them secretly running an organized crime was high.

“I’m not!” Michelle snapped, “I’m telling the truth.”

Michelle’s mother was Gotham’s famous socialite in the 80s, her father a nobleman from England. Both very rich, but Mrs. Myers was new rich, and Mr. Myers wasn’t born and raised in Gotham. The chances were there, but probably not as high.

“Even if you were, and she did show you the middle finger, what’s the big deal? Stop being so uptight, Michelle,” Rob scolded her.

Michelle looked like she was about to pop a vein in her temple.

“Thanks Rob,” you said, “But really, it’s okay. I think Michelle might have made an honest mistake, that’s all. I’m sorry too, Michelle. Maybe I was brushing my hair aside and might have accidentally made a vulgar gesture.”

“There,” Rob smiled warmly at you, “Just a mistake. You going back now?”

“Yes, I think Alfred should be here already,” you nodded, “I’ll see you guys next week?”

“Good luck studying!” Rob wished you, “Though mocks would probably be a breeze for you.”

“I doubt it, but thank you Rob,” you made your way to leave. You turned your head to Michelle and gave her a knowing wink you knew would make her lose her mind, and walked away.

“Dick?” you called out to your older brother, who was attracting a lot of attention on the sidewalk. He had parallel parked his car on the side, and was leaning against it with his sunglasses on. He waved at you once he saw you approach him.

“What are you doing here?” you asked.

“Picking you up,” he shrugged.

“Where’s Alfred?”

“Home,” he simply said.

“And why did you come to pick me up?”

“Because why not?” he grinned, opening the passenger door for you to enter.

You narrowed your eyes at him and entered the car.

Dick had always made you feel comfortable, and you naturally felt at ease when you were with him, but lately, it was different.

You felt stiff, alert, and on guard when Dick was around because it felt like he was just waiting silently for you to fuck up, to let something slip. You hated it.

You hated how your family felt so far away from you because you had betrayed them.

“Hey, Dick?” you asked after five minutes of unusual silence.

“What’s up?”

“What does Bruce do when he’s on patrol alone?” you brought up.

Did Dick know about this elite pedophile ring? Was Dick keeping secrets from you as well?

“He patrols, I guess?” Dick answered.

“No, I meant during the nights when he tells me that he doesn’t need me around,” you explained, “What does he do then?”

You saw Dick frown.

“I don’t know,” he stated.

“Did he ever do that to you? Tell you he doesn’t need you and go off alone?” you probed.

“All the time,” he sighed.

“And you never found out what he was doing?”

“I- well- look, what’s this about?” Dick turned the question back at you, “Did something happen? Did you find something?”

“What am I supposed to find?” you interrogated.

“I don’t know!” he answered exasperatedly, “Sure, I wondered a lot back then, but that’s- that’s just how he is! He keeps secrets and leaves us out of a lot of things. Like Jason being alive for fuck’s sake. If he can keep something like that a secret for so long, God knows what he’s up to when he’s alone.”

“Didn’t you ever stop to question it?” you argued.

“Didn’t you?” Dick retaliated, “All these years as Robin, why are you only bringing this up now?”

You fell silent.

“Did something happen?” he repeated again.

“Nothing happened,” you insisted, looking at the cars zooming by outside the passenger window.

Silence again. And then-

“Jason used to question it all the time,” Dick sighed, calming down. “Even followed Bruce out. That was hilarious. Imaging trying to tail Batman.”

“He asked the right questions, then,” you grumbled.

“He did,” Dick admitted, “Didn’t get him anywhere, though.”

“Except six feet under,” you muttered bitterly.

Dick never replied to that.

***

“We still don’t know her identity, she pops in and out seemingly randomly, has mediocre tech, mediocre skills… I don’t know, Bruce. What kind of purpose does Jason have for her?” Dick stated.

You tried not to clench your jaw upon hearing that.

The three of you were in the Cave, discussing your next step for tracking Red Hood down. Bruce had suggested going after V instead and hoped that she would lead you to him. You were treading dangerous waters, and remained silent most of the time.

“The fact that she has still remained elusive shows some form of skill,” Bruce argued.

It was hard not to defend your alter-alter-ego. But, you were relieved. You had tried your best to ensure they wouldn’t suspect you, even changing your fighting style to something you weren’t too familiar with.

“Still doesn’t explain why she’s with him,” Dick shrugged, “Nothing on the traffic cams?”

Your heart skipped a beat.

You had also made sure to avoid all cameras, even parking and changing blocks away before meeting with Jason. Jason, on the other hand, drove the same fucking car, or the same fucking bike, though he frequently changed plate numbers.

Still, this was Batman and Nightwing you were talking about.

“Only one thing,” Batman replied, before pulling up a security camera footage.

Fuck.

“This was taken along Jackson Avenue in Old Gotham,” Bruce continued and played the footage.

It showed a very low quality pixelated video of you wearing a black hoodie and a black cap covering your head. You had a surgical mask on to blend in better with the crowd instead of a black mask that would automatically made you suspicious. Your face was unidentifiable.

You walked into an alleyway and never came back out.

“How are you sure this is her?” Dick asked, “She wasn’t seen in Old Gotham.”

“Height and body type are a match,” Bruce justified, “That backpack could be carrying her weapons and clothes.”

You hid that backpack in an unused dumbwaiter of a guestroom all the way on the other wing of the manor that Alfred did not bother to dust.

“Or it could be carrying textbooks,” Dick scoffed.

“There is also this-”

Bruce pulled up another traffic footage. It was of you in the same clothes, with Jason next to you on a nearly empty sidewalk with shops already closed. Jason was also wearing a hoodie that covered his head, and the camera was far away. The two of you were walking away from the camera.

“This was three hours later on Schnappe Avenue, three blocks away from Caprice, where they were last seen together a week ago.”

You had followed Jason to Caprice, a bar that hosted many criminals, and was owned by the Italian mob. Red Who was simply there to take his profits and ask a few questions regarding their connections to certain politicians in Gotham.

Rendezvous with Jason was complicated, as you both had to protect your identities. You would leave the manor two hours early, park somewhere very far away, then walk or take a taxi to a location maybe 3 kilometres away from where you would meet Jason, duck into a dark alley to change into your gear, and then grappled to where Jason parked. From there, the two of you would grapple to your location. Once you were done, you would go to his car where you stashed your bag. You would then reverse your steps and go home.

That night however, Jason, the fucking dickhead, got hungry and insisted that you followed him to a diner, which was why the both of you were in casual clothes walking together in the streets. Good thing that by fucking sheer luck, no security cameras picked you up at the restaurant.

“There were no cameras to follow them after that,” Bruce grit, “They must have strategically chosen the route.”

No, Jason was just hungry.

Dick remained silent, so you turned to look at him. You frowned at his expression. Dick’s eyes were glassy and soft.

“Is- is that really him?” he whispered.

“High possibility. It’s too coincidental to dismiss.”

“Wow,” Dick breathed, “He looks- he looks different.”

Ah, it was Dick’s first time seeing new Jason without his helmet on.

“Yes,” Bruce nodded stiffly.

“How different?” you spoke up for the first time.

You were curious.

“Well, he’s much bigger,” Dick chuckled, “And taller. Good for him. He always complained about his height. Used to bet with me that he’d grow taller. Can’t see his face, though. He used to whine about how I was stealing all the girls too. Pretty sure he had a crush on Barbara.”

Dick gave a sad smile, and you saw Bruce had turned to face away.

“Anyway,” Dick cleared his throat, “How do you suggest we go about this V girl?”

“Uh,” you started, “Why not interrogate the guy they were meeting?”

Fat chance Elio Bianchi would spill anything with what Red Hood threatened him with.

“Already did last week,” Bruce answered.

You didn’t patrol last week. Bruce suddenly extended your “grounding”, but you suspected that he wanted to keep you away from Jason.

“And?”

“Refuses to speak. Red Hood must have something on him.”

Yes, the age, location, and photos of all three of his daughters.

“So what next?” you wondered.

“We wait for his next move,” Bruce sighed, “He doesn’t seem to be doing anything too rash lately since making Elena Ciobanu shoot Victor Ibenescu. He is waiting for something.”

“Or maybe he’s finally got control?” you suggested, “Over everyone? I mean- the reason why he did all those violent things were all gang-related, wasn’t it? Maybe now he’s made his point, so everyone is following his rules?”

“Maybe,” Bruce hummed, “But this wasn’t about taking control. Now we know who he is and what his motives are.”

“He did kidnap you,” Dick added, “It’s more likely that he’s planning to do something like that again.”

“Which is why,” Bruce continued, “I don’t think you should be out with us for now.”

“Oh, come on, Bruce,” you complained, “You already grounded me for an extra week!”

“It’s not about punishment. It’s about keeping you safe.”

“I wasn’t even in uniform the last time he kidnapped me!” you debated, “I’m the safest with you.”

“In the event that we do find him, I would need to talk to him,” Bruce insisted, “Having you there might trigger something in him. It’s best if you stayed away.”

“Dick!” you turned to your older brother for help.

“Sorry kid, but I’m with him on this one,” he gave you an apologetic look.

“He could kidnap me in the middle of the day!” you ranted, “He could blow up the school, the train, hell, even the library again!”

Both Dick and Bruce frowned.

“Again?” Dick repeated.

Fuck.

Fuck.

“Yeah, I already lost one library, he could very well just find out where I am and blow it up or something,” you covered.

Bruce remained silent, just looking at you with intensity. You tried your absolute best not to recoil, not to give away that your heart was beating so violently against your chest that you could hear it in your ears.

“How important is your exam?” Bruce spoke.

“It’s my mocks, Bruce,” you grumbled, “Scholarships are waiting for mocks results. I’m not letting a delusional psycho with daddy issues get in the way of my future, no matter who he is.”

You intentionally aimed those words at the both of them. Jason was Bruce’s son, and Dick’s brother, and you wanted them to feel it.

“Then you’re only to go to and from school,” Bruce directed, “No staying back, either, and Alfred will wait outside the whole time.”

“Seriously?” you pinched the bridge of your nose, “Fine! Fine. I just- I just wanted to test myself. Whatever.”

“Test yourself?” Dick asked.

You looked at Dick straight in the eye and said, “I wanted to see if I could face him after he kidnapped and sexually assaulted me.”

With that, you stormed off after manipulating the people closest to you to make sure you throw them off of any suspicions of you.

You locked yourself in your room and collapsed on the bed with a frustrated huff. You took out your phone to send Jason a text.

You: What are you doing tonight?

Five minutes later, your phone dinged.

Sexy Hunk From Library: Usual. You coming? You: You have any leads? Sexy Hunk From Library: Possibly.

You stared at your phone, assessing the risks if you were to go out with him that night. Then, your phone dinged again.

Sexy Hunk From Library: Kill time with me?

The corners of your lips twitched upwards.

You: Miss me that much?

You saw that he was typing, then stopped, then typed again. Until finally-

Sexy Hunk From Library: Are you coming or not?

It was funny how you could still chuckle to yourself despite how fucked you were. You were fucked because you betrayed your family, you were fucked because your family was suspicious of you, and you were fucked because for the past couple weeks of occasionally seeing and texting him, you realised that you had begun to like him more and more.

The dangerous and violent parts of him still made you wary, but despite all that, you couldn’t help but want to be by his side. It confused the hell out of you, because sometimes he didn’t act like how you would expect him to act at all.

Sometimes he was actually nice.

For instance, he had treated you to that burger when he insisted that you went with him to the diner.

Or the time when he argued with you over pineapple on pizza, as if you were friends who didn’t hate each other.

And even when you almost got punched in the face by a massive brute who had been dealing to kids. The punch never landed because Red Hood stopped him, beat him half to death, and then shot him in the kneecaps, before turning to you and asking if you were okay.

You thought that was sort of nice of him.

Fuck, you wanted to see him.

You texted him back.

You: Time and location?

***

Jason waited impatiently for you to arrive.

He was tapping his fingers rapidly against the steering wheel. Somehow he felt like he was going to be sick.

Despite the gentle drizzle that fell against the glass windows and the cold wind blowing outside, Jason felt hot and stuffy.

He looked at his reflection in the rear view mirror, coming into contact with his tired, sunken, blue eyes. He tried to fix his hair, combing it to the side with his fingers then groaning before ruffling it up again.

Fuck, what was he doing?

He spent the next minute trying and failing to fix his hair, that he didn’t notice you approached the vehicle until your rapped your knuckles against the window. He jumped at the sudden sound, earning a raised eyebrow from you. He unlocked the door and you climbed inside.

“You’re late,” he grumbled, aware of his hoarse voice. It was the first time he had spoken to anyone in two days.

“Only by five minutes,” you pouted.

“Late is late,” he snapped.

“You’re okay with killing people, but will bitch if I’m slightly late?” you scoffed.

“Just be on time next time,” he grit.

“Fine, I’m sorry I’m late,” you rolled your eyes. “Now can we get to it?”

Jason gave you a glare, his jaw clenching in frustration. He took a few moments to calm down.

“You know Maria and Joseph Powers?”

“Of the Powers Group?” you frowned, “Powers Hotel? Sure, I know them.”

“I have reason to believe that they’re one of the people involved in this child trafficking business,” Jason revealed.

“W-what?” you gasped, “Do you have evidence?”

“Some,” Jason replied, “They’ve been investigated before. I guess Batman played a part in that, but everything seems to have been dropped. Document trails, eye witness statements, physical evidence- all disappeared.”

He saw that you were struggling to keep up, mouth gaping and eyes wide.

“What’s wrong?” he frowned, “Get a hold of yourself.”

“Bruce knew?” you whispered.

“What doesn’t he know?” Jason scoffed.

“I sat on the same fucking table as them last Christmas ball,” you growled, “I went to their kid’s fifth birthday party. Bruce shook hands and smiled at them and then invited them over for drinks.”

Jason resisted a smirk. He finally got you to understand. Your arms were crossed, and your face in a scowl, obviously pissed.

Bruce probably did all of that to keep them close so he could keep an eye on them, maybe even find some more details. But Jason wasn’t going to tell you that.

You still had a lot to learn, but Jason was willing to be the one to teach you.

“Where will he be tonight?” he asked.

“I… I’m not too sure,” you said quietly.

Jason raised an eyebrow at you.

“What’s this? He didn’t tell his beloved Robin his plans? Again?”

You remained silent, looking straight ahead.

“I was wondering about that,” he continued, “Friday night and you’re here with me instead. Something happened?”

This time, Jason waited patiently for you to respond, enjoying the way you were obviously uncomfortable with his interrogation.

“He…” you started slowly, “He won’t let me out with him.”

“You got into trouble again?” he smirked.

“No, it’s because of you,” you shot him a sharp glare.

If only looks could kill.

“He knows you have it out for me, so for my safety,” you spat, “He won’t let me out.”

Jason blinked at you once, twice, then let out a booming laugh.

“Oh, man. Oh, sweetheart,” he pretended to wipe away tears, “Look at you, all angry at me.”

He reached across towards you and booped you on the nose. You swatted his hand away violently.

Jason loved teasing you. It made his heart all warm.

You were looking away again, and had the mask covering half your face, but even in the dark alley, he could make out your long lashes, clumped together because of the rain, and the way your shiny hair framed your face, also damp.

Your smell was intoxicating, filling his car with a pleasant scent of vanilla and strawberries. The longer Jason spent time with you, the more he felt himself getting pulled deeper and deeper in-

“He’s investigating me,” you interrupted his trance. “Well, not me specifically, but V. He’s got footage of us walking to that stupid diner-”

You paused to shoot daggers at him.

“-good thing I kept the hoodie and mask on, and thank the fucking stars that there were no cameras after that leading to to the diner. We can’t be reckless like that again, Jason.”

Jason rolled his eyes at your lecture

“So now what? You gonna kill the Powers’? How did you find out about them anyway?” you asked.

“Through the Ibenescu problem,” he explained, “Whenever they trafficked girls, I’ve always found a few kids. Always not more than ten at a time. Didn’t add up. All this while I’ve made sure there were no kids involved, be it local or foreign. And after going to each and every single fucking brothel and threatening every single pimp in Gotham-”

Jaon let out a tired sigh at the memory of going all over Gotham to turn over every rock, paying and threatening people for information. He allowed sex work as long as they kept to his standards, and as long as they weren’t trafficked. He made sure all the girls were well taken care of, and he made it very clear as to what would happen to the pimps if they weren’t.

The girls all loved him.

“- no sign of kids. Which meant that Gotham was being used as a proxy and they were being transported outside of Gotham, or there were other powers at play. So I dug in deeper. Hacked into GCPD records, looked at the political scandals and allegations that got dropped and was never brought to court. The Powers and some others came up a few times, but not too heavy. Tax evasion and stuff like that. Until I hacked into the FBI.”

“The FBI?” you gasped.

He smirked to himself. You were paying careful attention. It made him feel like he was some sort of mentor.

“It’s really not that difficult when you know people,” he scoffed, “Anyway, the Powers’ were originally under investigation for money laundering because the Powers’ Group Executive Accountant, who mysteriously died of a suicide, reported large sums of money that didn’t belong there. Then they got an external auditor, who is also deceased, reported inconsistencies with signatures and accounts.”

Jason reached to the back seats of his car and passed you a thick file that contained the FBI investigation.

“After that, they checked emails. Nothing. Then they wiretapped them, and recorded conversations regarding child sex trafficking from all over the world, for other politicians and rich pigs in this goddamned country- whose names are redacted in the files. However, they didn’t keep the audio evidence. Everything’s been terminated.”

“Wait, this can’t be right,” you frowned, flipping through the pages. “This case is almost twenty years old and… dropped? In 2012!”

“Exactly,” Jason grit.

“How long have you been investigating this?”

“Over the last two months.”

“So you already knew the Powers’ were involved,” you looked at him in suspicion, “Why haven’t you killed them yet?”

Ah, you caught on quick. Not bad.

“Because of tonight, sweetheart,” he answered, “I wiretapped them myself. There’s a shipment tonight, and one of the Powers’ need to confirm it half an hour before docking, or else they won’t dock, and it’ll be a bitch to track down again.”

“Then this is great,” your eyes widen, “We catch them red handed at the docks, take photos, spread them online, make it go viral. They won’t be able to cover it up when there’s a public outcry.”

Jason started chuckling.

“What?” you demanded.

“Look through the files. Do you see any pictures? Videos?”

You frowned.

“Do you really think they would be stupid enough to physically be there, where the authorities can, and I quote, catch them red handed?”

You shook your head slowly.

“Even if they were there, pictures can be easily faked these days. Hell, even videos. Audios, easiest of the two. They would just claim that someone was slandering them, then move on. If the feds don’t want to charge them, do you really think the cops could? And what happens if they were brought to court anyway? They can easily pay off judges and jurors.”

Jason liked this. Educating you.

Just face it, baby girl,” he added, “The system is fucked. Batman’s been trying for over a decade, and the Powers’ are still having Christmas balls.”

You let out a sad sigh.

“Let’s just get to the docks, then.”

Jason put on his mask and helmet, and drove away.

***

You were sick and tired of Dixon Docks, but criminals just couldn’t stop choosing that location for smuggling. There was also Port Adams, but the port was located near Blackgate Isle, so the marine security was tighter.

Any normal city, a place like Dixon Docks would have much tighter security after countless cases of illegal smuggling, but this was Gotham.

The security that GCPD put out on patrol with what little resources they could spare were easily bribed. The dock security company themselves were probably owned and bought over by a crime lord, not unlike the one beside you right now.

“They’re here,” Jason pointed out. The both of you were on the rooftop of a warehouse on the docks.

You squinted in the distance and saw a ship coming nearer. You missed Batman’s tech whenever you went out with Jason. Your lack of state of the art domino mask made it harder to see faraway objects and in the dark.

The docks were quiet, except for the sound of the water currents and sea breeze, and the twenty or so hired guns grumbling about the weather. You theorized that this operation was usually similar in the past, where it went smoothly without much obstacles, judging from the lack of hired security. Jason also mentioned that the kids were usually brought in along with older trafficked victims from other operations to help cover up, but since his harsh crackdown on human trafficking, they were forced to operate alone.

You waited until the industrial ship dock amongst the other unoccupied ships, and then heard some voices yelling in the distance. From the ship came out 4 girls and 3 boys in tattered clothes, malnourished and with frightful eyes. Their ages ranged from about 12-15 years old.

Accompanying them were three armed men, shoving the children to walk faster. Your blood started boiling at the sight.

“This should be easy,”Jason stretched, getting ready to make a move.

“We shouldn’t underestimate them,” you advised, “We should think of a strategy to-”

Jason leapt from the age of the rooftop without warning.

“Wait! Red Hood! Fuck!” you whispered angrily, and followed suit.

Red Hood ran ahead of you with inhuman speed towards the children, guns out and firing at the men.

You heard the children scream, the men shouting, and more guns firing.

It all happened so fast, that by the time you reached there, Red Hood was standing tall and proud over more than a dozen dead bodies.

“What the fuck?!” you shoved Red Hood as hard as you could. He didn’t budge. “Are you fucking crazy?”

“What?”

“You opened fire when there are children right in the middle of everything!” you yelled.

“I’ve got an excellent aim and I caught them off guard,” he defended, “They couldn’t even respond on time.”

“The kids could have caught a stray bullet, you fucking dickhead!” you shoved him again.

This time, he growled at you and gripped your wrists tight, pulling you harshly to him.

“If you do that again, I’ll make sure you regret it,” he threatened you with a low voice that sounded even more hostile through the voice scrambler.

You wanted to say more, but then you heard a cry from one of the children. You wrenched your hand away from his grip and walked towards them.

They were kneeling on the ground, gripping each other tight by the clothes and arms. They were Asian. You guessed maybe South or South East.

“Hey,” you gently called out, slowly kneeling to their level. They recoiled at your approach.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt you,” you said, putting your arms up in surrender to convince them. “See? No guns.”

Their expressions didn’t change. You were just another threat to them.

“Don’t any of you speak English?” Red Hood grunted.

You glared at him.

“What? It’d help,” he shrugged.

“Even if they did, do you really think they’d speak to you?” you snapped.

You turned to them again, and despite the risk, pulled down your mask and hoped that there weren’t any cameras nearby.

“Hey, we’re here to help okay?” you maintained a slow, low voice.

Two girls then looked at each other, and one of them spoke up.

“I- I can speak English,” she said in a shaky voice.

“That’s great,” you smiled sweetly, “What’s your name, sweetheart?”

“Magdeline,” she whispered.

“Nice to meet you, Magdeline. I’m V,” you pointed at Jason, “And that grumpy tomato head there is Red Hood.”

You saw Magdeline and two others share a smile. They must have understood you.

“We’re not going to hurt you, okay? We just want to help.”

“Are you going to take us home?” another girl squeaked.

“No,” you winced, “But, we’re going to take you to the police, and they will help, okay?”

They nodded, wiping tears from their eyes.

“So what we’re going to do is that we’re going to call-”

You stopped mid sentence.

Suddenly, you felt a chill down your spine, as if someone dropped an ice cube down your shirt. The hairs on the back of your neck stood up, and you hurriedly put on your mask again.

“What’s wrong?” Red Hood sensed. You stood up straight, your heart beating fast.

“We need to go,” you told him, hearing the blood rush to your ears, your eyes darting quick to every shadow, to detect any movements from the darkness.

“What?”

“He’s here,” you whispered.

Red Hood looked at you for a moment, and then-

“Fuck. Come on.”

“Please don’t leave us,” Magdeline fisted your clothes, “Please.”

She looked like she was going to cry again.

“It’s okay,” you told her, “Someone’s here to help you.”

“No! Please! I want you!” she wailed.

“Shh,” you tried to calm her down.

“V, we don’t have time,” Red Hood growled.

“He’s a hero,” you ignored him, “He may look big and scary at first, but he’s a hero, okay? I promise.”

She continued to wail. You forced her off you and stepped back.

At the corner of your eye, you saw a shadow in the sky, and felt your heart drop to your stomach.

So this is what it felt like to be hunted by Batman.

“Come on,” you told Red Hood, and the two of you ran in the direction of Jason’s car, swerving between shipment containers for more cover.

Then, in the distance, you heard a loud familiar boom.

“JASON!”

The man in question who was running ahead of you started chuckling, then raided two middle fingers up in the air.

You looked behind you, but Batman was nowhere to be seen. Not in the sky, not on the roofs, not on the shipment containers, not even in the shadows.

Perhaps he saw the children and stopped-

You ran into Red Hood’s hard back. He had come to a sudden stop.

Fuck.

You peeked from behind him, and was relieved when you only saw Nightwing standing about ten feet away from you.

“Jason,” he called out, “Hey, buddy.”

“Quit your Golden Boy act, Grayson,” Red Hood snarled, “You’re almost as guilty as he is.”

He took out a handgun and aimed it at Nightwing.

“Come on, Jay,” Nightwing tried, “You’re not gonna shoot me.”

“You wanna bet?” he growled and cocked it.

You remained behind Jason for cover in fear of being recognized. Half your face was covered and you were wearing contact lenses that hid your true eye color, but you couldn’t be too careful.

“Who’s your friend, Jason?” you felt Dick’s eyes on you, “We can helo her too.”

Jason responded with a dark chuckle.

“Hey, sweetheart, what’s your name?” Nightwing stepped closer in your direction.

“Stay the fuck away from her,” Jason fumed.

Dick stopped in his tracks and raised his arms back up in surrender.

“Okay,” he nodded slowly, “It’s fine. Let’s just talk.”

***

Jason felt a punch in his gut when he saw his older brother appear in front of him.

Grayson had aged slightly, his hair longer, face more defined. It was guilt that Jason was feeling. Grayson had always been there for him. Training him, teaching him, giving him advise on girls and on being a teen.

Yet, even at that time, he had felt immense anger towards him, jealous that he was constantly in Grayson’s shadow no matter how hard he tried to be his own man.

And now? Grayson didn’t do jackshit to Joker either, the person who took the life of his supposed younger brother whom he said he always loved and cared for. No, Grayson was the same as everyone else.

Once Jason was out of the picture, they all gladly moved on and replaced him with you.

So fuck talking.

“No,” Jason tried as hard as he could to not let the tightness he felt in his chest affect him. “Move. I won’t repeat it again.”

“We miss you, Jason,” Dick pleaded, “You have no idea how happy I was when I found out you were alive.”

His throat was constricting, his breath shallow. No, Grayson was lying.

“Alfred spent the whole night crying,” Dick chuckled.

Stop it. Don’t talk about Alfred.

He felt his eyes stinging with tears.

“He was saying that he couldn’t wait to make your favourite-”

BANG!

“Fuck!” Dick screamed out in pain, collapsing to his knees and clutching his left thigh.

Jason heard you gasp behind him, and he grabbed you by the wrist and pulled you to run with him to his car.

“You shot him,” you quietly whispered.

Jason was speeding away, the docks long behind him.

“He’s had a lot worse,” he grunted at you.

“You didn’t have to shoot him.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he snapped, “Would you rather he caught the both of us? Unveil your identity? Show him how you were with me all along?”

“We could have taken him down together,” you muttered.

Jason let out a bark of laughter.

“You’re fucking stupid if you think the both of us can take down Grayson with just hand-to-hand,” he sneered, “Even if we could, let’s waste time and wait for Batman to catch up, right? Was that what you wanted?”

You remained silent.

“Didn’t think so.”

Jason gripped the steering wheel tight while he drove to the rendezvous point, selected carefully based on the absence of cameras in the area.

“I need to get back quick before they do,” you spoke up, “With Dick injured, they’re probably rushing back as well.”

“How do you plan on sneaking back in?” Jason asked out of curiosity.

“I deactivated the motion sensors.”

Jason frowned. Interesting.

“And I rented a motorbike a while back specifically for this. I park it outside the gate, hide it in some bushes so I don’t need to make noise opening and closing the gates every time I go in or out,” you explained, “I either play music in my room or play recorded noises of me doing things.”

“You’ve truly mastered the art of sneaking out now,” Jason teased, a small hint of pride swelling in his chest.

He made a turn into the same alleyway as before and switched off his engine.

“I need to go,” you moved to leave.

Without thinking, as if on reflex, Jason reached out and grabbed you by the wrists. You looked at him in question, an eyebrow raised, waiting for him to say something.

Jason looked back at you, the nauseous feeling returning again.

“Nothing,” he let go of you, “Sorry.”

You hesitated, as if you wanted to say something. In the end you nodded stiffly and left.

Jason took off his helmet and let out the breath he didn’t realise he was holding. He leaned forward to rest his forehead on the steering wheel, coming to terms with the realisation that the nausea he felt was actually butterflies.

***

You tripped over your chair as you were climbing into your room from the window, causing some things on your desk to fall to the floor with a loud thud.

“Fuck,” you whispered to yourself.

You hurriedly took off your shoes and changed into your pyjamas, kicking the backpack full of your gear under your bed to be hidden in your secret place later. You ruffled your hair and then looked into your mirror, realising that you hadn’t taken off your contact lenses yet.

You heard footsteps approaching.

“Fuck, fuck, ow!” you accidentally poked yourself in the eye.

The moment you put in the last contact lens in its case, you heard a knock on your door.

“It’s me.”

You took a deep breath to calm yourself down, then went to open the door.

“Yeah?”

Bruce looked at you with serious, tired eyes, still in his Batsuit sans the cowl.

“Dick got shot,” he stated.

“W-what?” you widened your eyes in shock, just as practiced. “Is he okay?”

You rushed out the room and hurried to the Manor’s infirmary where all of you went if there was a serious accident besides scrapes and cuts. Rushing out in panic would cover any body language that could reveal anything.

“He’s fine,” Bruce followed you from behind, “Lost a bit of blood, that’s all.”

You opened the doors to the infirmary to see Dick in a t-shirt and boxers on a bed, hooked to an IV bag. His left thigh was already bandaged. Alfred was adjusting the flow of the IV.

“Dick!” you rushed to his side, “What happened?”

“I’m fine,” he rolled his eyes, “I’ve had worse.”

“What happened?” you repeated, sitting on the side of the bed.

Dick exchanged a look with Bruce.

“We were patrolling near the docks, then we heard gunshots,” Dick explained, “Turns out it was… Red Hood.”

“He… shot you?” you whispered.

“Yeah,” he groaned, “I really didn’t think he would.”

“You have to stop thinking that this is the Jason you used to know,” you scolded, and then turned to Bruce with angry eyes, “Both of you. Don’t you think your judgement’s been clouded? That’s why it’s better if I’m with you. I never knew him, I’d be more objective and-”

“No,” Bruce said sternly, “End of discussion.”

You scowled. “What was he doing there anyway?”

Dick glanced at Bruce again.

“Weapons exchange,” Bruce answered, “He was hijacking a weapons exchange.”

If you weren’t there, you would have believed Bruce without a doubt. You clenched your jaw, making sure you don’t reveal anything.

“Why did he shoot at you?” you turned to Dick.

“He was probably being protective,” he said.

“Protective?”

“Yeah, the girl was there,” Dick recounted, “You should have seen him with her. It was like he was protecting her from me. His body language, stance and everything made it seem like she was precious cargo.”

You frowned.

“If I had to guess, she’s probably someone he cares about,” Dick smiled softly. “I’m sort of happy, you know?”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s… going through a lot,” Dick went on, “I’m glad there’s someone with him.”

Your mouth was dry. You turned and saw that Bruce was long gone.

“You don’t think she’s his prisoner or something?” you tried, “Maybe she’s being blackmailed or forced into staying with him.”

“No, I don’t think so,” he shook his head, “She looked like she was depending on him to protect her.”

Your left eye twitched in annoyance.

“Really,” you grit.

“Yeah, I mean,” Dick elaborated, “She looked scared. I guess I can’t blame her. It’s Batman.”

You remained silent to recollect your thoughts. Then-

“What are you going to do once you catch him?” you pursed your lips.

“Help him,” Dick replied like it was the most obvious thing.

“What if he doesn’t want help?” you pressed on, “Are you going to lock him away?”

“Only as a last resort,” Dick said, “But maybe being with family will make him see sense. Hopefully.”

“I guess you and Batman defy your own system too, huh?” you scoffed, standing up.

“What do you mean?”

“If Red Hood wasn’t Jason,” you argued, “If he was just some random guy who wanted to take matters in his own hands using violence and murder, you and Bruce would just lock him up either in Arkham or Blackgate depending on whether or not he pleads insanity. But because you know Jason personally…”

“You’re saying we should just lock him up instead of helping?” Dick asked perplexed.

“No, I’m just saying it’s kind of hypocritical that just because you know him, you’re giving him an out that you wouldn’t give anyone else,” you shrugged.

“We don’t just know him, he’s family,” Dick reminded you, “We don’t abandon family.”

You remained silent.

“Look,” Dick sighed and looked at you sympathetically, “I know what he did to you was wrong, and trust me, Bruce will make sure he atones for that. I’m not suggesting that he automatically come back and live here, especially because, well, you won’t be okay with it. Which is fine. You don’t have to put up with him. And we’re not making up excuses for him either. Like I said, Bruce was… very upset when he found out what happened to you. And that’s putting it lightly.”

You tried not to roll your eyes. You really didn’t care much about all of that. You had since then voluntarily asked him to do more to you than just suck hickies on your neck.

“But, this isn’t Jason,” Dick went on, “I mean, yes it is, but, he’s not rational. He’s angry and lashing out, and needs help. I’m not siding with him for what he did to you and we’re not dismissing it. I just wanted you to know that.”

“Yeah, I know,” you smiled, “Get some rest. Text me if you need anything.”

At least Jason’s sense of righteousness was simple and straightforward. You harmed innocents? You get his gun. There weren’t loopholes and justifications and complicated principles.

Plain and simple eye for an eye.

You turned to leave, unsatisfied with the lies and hypocrisy.

*** From the first crack of lightning you saw in the dark sky, you should have used it as a warning to stay home that Saturday night. But somehow you couldn’t help but go out to see Jason, knowing what he was planning to do.

You could have been in your bed, studying for your mocks with a mug of warm green tea in your hands and a plate of cookies on your desk, but instead, you were clutching the leather of Red Hood’s jacket, slippery and glistening from the downpour as he zoomed on his motorbike, you seated behind him.

Unlike the Robin uniform, though it wasn’t waterproof, the clothing you wore on nights with Jason was not state of the art. At least your Robin uniform didn’t get heavy when wet, and at least it wasn’t as absorbent. The rain made the zylon even heavier, making it difficult for you to move around.

The sound of rain pounding hard on your helmet was almost as loud as the wind. Jason didn’t care that the ground was slippery, he was still going recklessly as fast as he usually would.

He made a sharp turn into a lonely, dark road, with nothing but trees surrounding it. The road was going uphill, away from the city centre. You were approaching a mansion- modern style with glass walls.

Right before the trees cleared up, Red Hood swerved the bike into the bushes without warning, and then stopped once the both of you were deep enough within the cover of the trees. He cut off the engine, and you hurriedly climbed off.

Red Hood followed suit then, and you tried your best to not let your eyes linger on the way the water trickled down his chest, past the the red bat symbol, and down again, dipping into his-

“Fucking Gotham,” he grunted, voice crackling through the scrambler.

“At least you have a jacket,” you grit, teeth clenched as to not let them clatter.

He turned to look at you for a moment, and then started removing his leather jacket.

“N-no, it’s fine,” you refused, “It’s too big and it’ll be hard for me to move in. It’ll just be a hazard.”

Inside, your heart fluttered at the rare display of kindness.

“Whatever,” he shrugged it back on. “You remember the plan?”

“Plan?” you scoffed, “You mean sneak in, look for the master bedroom, then kill the Powers’?“

“You’re not going to stop me, are you?” he came closer to you, “If you’re going to mess it up, I’d rather tie you to the tree.”

“My, Red Hood,” you smirked, knowing that he couldn’t see it underneath your mask, “I didn’t know you were so kinky.”

“I’m serious,” he growled, “If you try to stop me, I will make you pay for it.”

“Whatever, let’s just get inside,” you turned away, “I’m fucking freezing.”

It would have been tough for anyone to sneak past all the security, cameras, bypassing alarm systems and into the mansion. But you and Red Hood weren’t just anyone. Both being trained by Batman, plus whatever it was that Jason gained over the years he wasn’t with Batman, it was only trickier than average.

Once you were in, you had to admit that you always thought the Powers’ had good taste. The interior was minimalistic, with furniture that were all neutral tones that went with the glass walls and with marble tops of exquisite design placement. You glanced at the exit to the backyard, which was a glass sliding door that spanned all the way from the ceiling to the floor.

It had only been one year since you were last there for their daughter’s birthday, ignorant of what was going on.

What the hell were you doing there?

“Split up,” Red Hood whispered from behind you, “Look for the master bedroom. Let me know when you find it.”

He gripped your hand and forced an earpiece in it.

Both you and Jason went up the marble staircase and stopped at the top. The hallway stretched from one end to the other, nothing in the way but a few potted plants.

He went right, and you took it as an instruction to go left.

Fuck, what were you doing? Were you going to stop him?

But the Powers’ deserved it. There was no other way, or else Bruce would have done something already.

Still, were you just going to stand by and watch while he murdered people?

You peeked into the first room, and saw that the bed with pink sheets was occupied by a small figure, wrapped in the covers like a cute little burrito.

Carrie Powers. Sleeping soundly while her parents were about to be killed.

Oh, God.

But how could they do this? Traffick other children when they had one of their own?

“Down the hall, first door on the left,” Jason’s hushed voice appeared in your ear.

Fuck, you had to stop him.

You closed the door quietly, and went to the room Jason had mentioned. It was opened by a crack, and you pushed it softly.

The view you saw made your heart skip a beat.

Red Hood had taken off his jacket and dumped it on the white setee in the middle of the very large master bedroom. He was standing by the super king sized bed, pointing an oddly shaped dagger at Maria Powers, who was fast asleep.

The power he so obviously exerted as he was standing over her, muscles taut with anticipation, contemplating which angle was best to slit her throat- it made your breath hitch.

“What do you think, V?” he said out loud, “How should I do it?”

His voice stirred the Powers awake, but before they could react, he grabbed Maria by the neck and lifted her so she sat upright, immediately pressing the knife against her cheek.

“Any of you scream, I’ll carve a smile into her face,” Red Hood threatened.

Joseph Powers, who finally snapped out of his groggy state, scrambled to his feet.

“W-what? Who are you?” he panicked, “What do you want?”

“No sudden movements,” Red Hood ordered, “I’m thinking whether or not I should make this quick and easy, or have some fun first.”

“We have money,” Joseph started, “Please. We’ll give you anything. Just don’t hurt us.”

“Oh, it’s not money I want,” Red Hood said cooly, “No. I want names.”

“What? What names?” Joseph asked, perplexed.

“Names of every politician, judge, CEO, or beat cop who is in on this little operation of yours.”

“I- I don’t understand,” the man stammered, “I think you’ve got it all wrong. We don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh?” Jason played along, “Maybe I’ll give you a little reminder.”

Red Hood snapped his head towards you, his red helmet glowing ominously in the dark.

“Bring the girl.” Despite being soaking wet in a weather that would usually make your bones clatter, hearing Red Hood say those words in a calm voice made a chill run down your spine for the first time that night

“No,” Maria whimpered, but silenced herself when her captor tightened his grip.

“What?” you gasped.

“The kid,” he growled, “Bring her here.”

“We’re not involving the kid,” you stood your ground.

“V,” he warned, “Don’t make me repeat myself. You better-”

“Mommy?” you heard a small squeak at the door and turned to see little Carrie, with her big chocolate eyes wearing her purple butterfly print pyjamas.

“Carrie, go back to your room,” Joseph ordered, “Please. She’s innocent.”

“And the kids you have kidnapped, shipped, and raped aren’t?” Red Hood fumed.

You saw the microsecond momentary realisation in both the Powers’ eyes, before they tried to cover it up again.

“Daddy? Mommy?” Carrie called in a shaky voice, “What’s going on?”

“Go back to your room, Carrie!”

“Carrie, do you want to help mommy?” Red Hood drawled.

“Yes,” she nodded.

“Come closer, Carrie,” Red Hood persuaded.

“Red Hood,” you protested.

“If you’re not going to help, then shut the fuck up,” he snarled.

Carrie entered the room but stood quietly behind you.

Her father looked at you with desperation in his eyes, “Please help us.”

“You’re filth to me,” you snapped at him, enjoying the way he cringed.

Joseph was usually a proud man, handsome for his age, with a fit body and perfect salt and pepper hair. The man you saw then was pathetic. DIsgusting,

Filth.

“But I won’t hurt your kid,” you added.

You expected to see relief printed on his face, and clenched your jaw when you didn’t.

“I can’t promise he wouldn’t, though,” you nodded at Red Hood, feeling like shit for using his daughter as leverage, “So you’d better give us names.”

Joseph looked like his brain was about to explode, his eyes quickly darting back and forth from his wife, to his kid, to you. He was running his hands through his hair in obvious distress.

“You don’t understand,” he admitted, “If we give you names, we’re as good as dead.”

“Joseph!” Maria yelled.

She was furious at him- and you thought at first it would be because he wouldn’t compromise to save her. After observing the way he took a small step back and the way she was holding him by the eyes, you realised that she was warning him not to confess.

She was obviously the one calling the shots.

“If you don’t give us names, you’re good as dead,” Red Hood told him, “Or would you rather me convince you in other ways?”

He nodded at Carrie. You felt a little protective of her, standing up straighter to defend her from Red Hood.

Joseph and Maria ignored the threat and was looking at each other intensely, trying their best to communicate without words.

Then, Joseph calmed down. He straightened up into the proud man you always saw him to be, a smirk playing on his arrogant features.

“I’m sorry, but this is business,” he sneered, “And we swore our clients’ secrecy.”

Red Hood paused.

Then-

“We’ll see about that.”

He grabbed a fistful of Maria’s cropped blond hair and pulled her to the dressing table. You heard that Carrie had started to sob behind you.

“Put your right hand flat on the table,” he demanded.

“Red Hood-” you tried.

“Now!” he barked.

She raised her shaking hand and rested it on the table hesitantly.

The first thing you heard was Maria’s cry- muffled by Red Hood’s large gloved hand- before you registered what had happened.

In an instant, Red Hood had cut off her pinky finger, and then raised the dagger, which you now saw had a blade that was wavy from the bottom to the tip, glistening a sticky, sickly dark red.

“Mommy!” Carrie screamed.

With all the commotion, you wondered why the security still hadn’t heard you yet. Then you realised that the glass walls were probably shatter and bullet proof, making it thick enough to be almost sound proof.

That shook Joseph slightly, his smirk had been wiped off clean and his forehead had beads of sweat.

“I can do this another nine times,” Red Hood snarled.

You had to stop this before it went too far. Slowly, you approached him.

“Red Hood,” you cautioned, “Let’s continue this another time, when the kid isn’t around.”

“Stay out of my way,” he turned to you.

“Let’s think rationally here,” you went closer, trying to speak over Maria’s wails, “There’s no way we have the time to torture for information when there’s a dozen armed men outside who might notice that something is off.”

“That’s why you’re here,” he scoffed, “So you can deal with them.”

“Do you really want to deal with them in front of the girl?” you tried again, “She’s five. She shouldn’t have to go through this.”

“They were going to wait a few years before selling her off anyway,” he seethed, “I’m doing her a favor.”

“No!” Joseph denied, “Not her. Never her.”

“How sweet.” Red Hood hissed sarcastically.

“Red Hood, come on,” you persuaded, “We can pick this up again another time.”

“And what?” he yelled, “Wait for them to run to the other side of the world? Where I have to hunt them down all over again? I do not have the time or the patience to- what the fuck did you just do?!”

Red Hood shouted at Joseph, who had moved quickly to the bedside table. His eyes widened in panic, and so did yours when you saw he had pressed a button on the underside of the table.

“Fuck!” Red Hood swore, “This is your fucking fault!”

He brandished the blade at you. “Fine,” he pulled Maria up again, “Looks like playtime’s over.”

Without warning, you saw him raise the dagger to Maria’s neck, and as if in slow motion, you just looked on by as he carved a big red smile across her throat.

The next thing you felt was a gush of warmth spray all over your face and torso. The blood that had gushed out of Maria was like a pulsating fountain of red.

“Maria!” Joseph screamed, “You fucking bastard!”

Red Hood leapt across the bed and pushed the man violently against the glass wall.

“Names!” he growled, taking Joseph’s head and thrusting it against the glass, leaving a smear of dark red.

Yet you were there, just frozen and blinking on the spot as you stared at Maria’s lifeless body on the grey carpeted floor, blood still splashing from her throat in the rhythm of her slowly dying heart.

Everything was red, and smelled like metal, and tasted like metal. Ew, did some get in your mouth? But you were wearing a mask. Why was there so much of it?

Did humans have this much blood in them? It seemed endless. Are we all just bags of blood in the end?

Carrie’s wails snapped you back to reality.

You rushed to her and kneeled down.

“Hey sweetheart, listen to me,” you tried to get through to her, “You have to go hide in that closet over there, okay?”

You picked her up. She was light, her body fragile and weak, and you opened the closet to reveal a walk-in.

You set her down on the floor and tried to comfort her again, “I want you to close your eyes, and close your ears, and then sing a song, okay? Don’t stop singing until the police comes. Can you do that?”

All she did was cry.

Fuck, she wasn’t going to listen to you.

So you just closed the closet door.

Red Hood was still smashing Joseph’s head against the wall. You noticed that he was now missing an ear.

Then you heard footsteps approaching you fast. Lots of them.

You took out your escrima sticks and got ready to fight a dozen armed men while Red Hood tortured Joseph Powers for information.

***

“Did you even get any names?” you monotoned.

The both of you were at the rendezvous, with Red Hood leaning against his beautiful black superbike and you standing awkwardly, holding your arms.

The smell and sight and taste of blood still consumed you. You hoped that the rain would have washed it away, but against all your luck, the moment you escaped the mansion, the rain had stopped.

Red Hood and you left behind a crying kid in the closet, a woman with a slashed throat in a pool of her own blood, a man beaten to death so bloody that he didn’t have any recognizable human features left, five unconscious and seventeen dead men in that house.

Red Hood simply looked away from you and took off his helmet and mask. He looked clean, because even in the midst of everything, he had managed to take his jacket from the settee.

“No?” you smirked, “So all of that for nothing?”

He gave you a glare, cold blue eyes piercing yours.

“Can I just ask you one thing?” you sighed, taking off your mask as well. It was soaked in blood.

“What?”

“Were you really going to hurt the kid?”

You saw his jaw clench.

“I don’t hurt innocents,” he looked away from you again.

You felt a wave of relief alongside your nausea, but however relieved you were, it still didn’t get the image of him slitting a woman’s throat out of your head.

If the circumstances were different, maybe you would have been turned on by that, as fucked up as it was. By the power he exhibited, the precision, the danger - you knew that you had a thing for that.

But he killed her in front of her own daughter, who shouldn’t have had to see that. Hell, who shouldn’t have had to be there in the first place.

It made you question him even more than before.

“Nope, you just traumatize them for the rest of their life,” you scoffed.

In a flash, his hands were around your throat.

“Don’t fucking talk to me that way,” he growled, “I haven’t forgotten how you fucked things up for me.”

“Fucked things up for you?” you repeated.

“You distracted me,” he told you, “And that prick went and sounded the alarm.”

“Oh, I’m sorry for trying to convince you not to murder a mother in front of her daughter!”

“Sweetheart,” he said in a low voice, “You’re playing with fire.”

Jason’s pupils had started to dilate, as if it was a black hole that was eating away at the blue. Your eyes fluttered towards his lips, which were slightly parted.

And then he smirked.

“I guess I have to punish you for disobeying me,” he drawled.

You gulped loudly, trying hard to not let the warmth in your stomach spark for the man in front of you.

“You know,” he whispered, his other hand snaking around your waist and pulling you flushed against his chest, “I’ve always imagined what you would look like covered in blood.”

Oh, fuck.

So did you. You had imagined what he looked like when he was beating a person half to death, how the muscles in his back would ripple with every blow.

You were so fucked up.

“And what do you think?” you bit your lip, squeezing your thighs together.

You were just upset at him a moment ago, and now you were turned on? You pieced together that you had a dangerous coping mechanism.

The fingers that were around your throat were caressing your cheek now, his thumb brushing against your lips.

“Better than I imagined,” he grinned, dipping down to kiss you.

He pushed his wet tongue into your mouth without hesitation, fucking it while he grabbed your ass and squeezed hard, almost painfully. He would bite and nip at your lips before licking them.

“Fuuuck,” he groaned, “You taste like blood.”

You felt him grind on you, though you knew the hardness was from the protective cup he was wearing. You still couldn’t feel much either, due to the soaked body armor.

“Bend over the bike,” he commanded.

“Wait, what?” you gasped.

“You heard me.”

You felt the blood rush to your cheeks as you slowly approached the vehicle. When you were at its side, you glanced behind you. Jason had the most arrogant smirk ever while his arms were crossed.

After taking a deep breath, you tiptoed and winced in embarrassment when you positioned yourself bent over the seat, your ass jutting out.

Warm hands started rubbing your waist, going down to your ass and thighs.

“How do I take this off,” you heard him complain.

Your bottom was only latex tights.

When Jason finally figured it out, he pulled down hard, exposing your ass to the cool air.

“Fuck,” he cursed, his hand roaming to massage it.

“Jason, we’re in public,” you reminded him.

“So?” he responded, “It’s 2am, and it’s Gotham, baby. Public indecency is the least of everyone’s worries.”

You felt him shift behind you, and gasped when you felt a long, wet strip from your clitoris to your hole.

“Taste so good,” he groaned.

His tongue felt good.

He continued to tease you by licking your wet opening but never dipping inside, just making you wet with your own juices and his saliva. But suddenly you felt a sharp, piercing pain on your pussy flesh.

“Fuck!” you screamed and turned to look back at him grinning at you, “Did you just fucking bite me?”

“What did you think I was going to do when I said you needed punishment?”

“I don’t know, spank me or some shit?” you breathed, “Not fucking bite me!”

“Oh, but you would like to be spanked,” he told you, “And that wouldn’t be much of a punishment would it?”

He bit you again, but this time soothed the pain by licking you after.

Still, it didn’t stop the jolts of electricity that stung you every time he did.

“Fuck!” you gasped again, “Stop it- oh, fuck.”

He had slid a finger inside you- you noticed it was ungloved.

And then he started a barrage of confusing sensations, biting and nipping at your pussy to cause you pain, and then licking it away while pumping his finger inside of you to spark pleasure.

It didn’t take you long until you were moaning and panting and fucking sweating in the post-rain weather.

The warmth was building and building as he kept licking and biting and finger fucking you, twisting inside of you and touching your most pleasurable spots. You felt yourself start to tighten around his finger as the now familiar sensation of approaching orgasm started.

And then it was all gone.

Jason removed his finger and stopped licking. You turned around furiously to see him smirking at you with dark hooded eyes.

Oh, now you understood. The punishment wasn’t the biting at all.

He wouldn’t let you come.

You spent the next minute glaring angrily at him, refusing to say a word while he just stared back with intense eyes, breathing almost as heavily as you were.

And then he dove back in.

“Fucking hell,” you moaned as the pleasure built and built and built again.

And then stopped.

You wanted to fucking yell at him, but you weren’t going to give him the satisfaction.

He continued again, this time even harder with the licks and bites, harder with the way he fucked your cunt, even inserting a second finger that drew the most vulgar sound from your lips. You felt yourself building again, but when you expected him to stop, he didn’t.

This time, he kept you going higher and higher, your knees growing weaker, until you reached and were just dangling on the edge of-

And it was all gone.

“Jason!” you yelled, “Come the fuck on!”

You heard him chuckle behind you. And then you felt him grind against your ass, rough and heavy and desperate.

Probably because he was still wearing a protective cup, which meant that he wouldn’t be able to feel much. You wanted him to take his cock out already, so he could start fucking you senseless as you were bent over his bike.

But then, he stopped. And he pulled up your pants to cover you up, even giving you a small smack on the butt.

“What?” you straightened and turned around.

“What?” he pretended to be clueless, even though you saw the obvious lust that was etched on his handsome yet tired face.

“You- I- why don’t- fuck!” you stuttered, squeezing your thighs together. You were so wet that you felt yourself soaking through the tights despite it already being wet from the earlier rain.

“Oh, did you want to come?” he asked innocently, “Sorry, but girls who disobey my orders don’t get what they want.”

“You’re torturing yourself as well,” you grit, and to prove a point grabbed his crotch, earning yourself a hiss from him.

He grabbed your wrists to pull you closer, “We’re in public. Remember?”

Then he took a step back and gave you a shit eating grin.

“Whatever,” you sighed frustratedly, “I’m fucking covered in blood anyway. Fuck, I need to get PEP tomorrow. You should, too.”

“What?” he frowned.

“Post-exposure prophylaxis,” you explained, “We’re covered in blood, Jason, ever heard of HIV?”

He blinked once at you, and then broke into a fit of laughter.

“It’s not funny!” you defended, “It’s just for a just in case!”

“I’m pretty sure Maria fucking Powers does not have HIV,” he teased.

The mention of Maria brought the image to your mind again. The Jason in front of you had a twinkle in his eye, his expression soft after laughing at your logic. It was hard to imagine that under an hour ago, he had slit a woman’s throat.

In front of her own daughter.

Jason must have noticed your expression change, because he became serious again.

“What’s wrong?” he asked softly, concern in his eyes as he held you by the waist.

Was he actually concerned? Or was he still playing mind games with you?

Why would anyone want a dirty whore like you?

And, there it was. Mother was back again.

“Nothing,” you looked away. “I just need to get all this blood off me.”

“We’re done here,” Jason informed you, “You can go back any time.”

“Well,” you started hesitantly, “I don’t think I can go back like this. All this blood- it’s too hard to cover up. My clothes, my shoes, everything is just covered in blood. Why is there so much fucking blood-”

“Hey, hey,” he stopped you, “Calm down. It’s fine. You can come back with me.”

“W-what?” you looked up at him. He seemed so genuine. Was it a trap?

He must have noticed as well, because his face immediately turned into a scowl, “I trust that you won’t tell Batman. After tonight, you’d be fucked along with me if it ever got to him. Take it or leave it, I’m not offering again.”

He let go of you and climbed on his bike, turning on the engine.

He looked back at you, who was still stunned on the spot.

“You coming or what?”

Oh, you were so fucked.

***

Your jaw dropped when you saw the interior of his safe house.

From the outside, it looked just like an abandoned shipment container amongst many other abandoned shipment containers in an abandoned shipping dock. You had expected it to be just a mattress, some pillows, with his weapons dumped messily on the floor.

No, his safe house looked like an actual safe house.

His bed was an actual Queen sized bed with matching bed sheets and pillowcases. His weapons were arranged in a glass cabinet display neatly against the freshly painted cream colored walls- the walls weren’t even the tin walls of the shipment container. He must have added another layer of plywood, with some sort of insulator in between which kept the room warm.

You noticed a beautiful katana resting on its stand. He had a wooden dining table with a fucking oriental tea set on it.

“The shower’s through there,” he pointed at the far corner of the room, which was separated by a wall. “Take off your clothes and just dump it in front of the washing machine.”

A fucking washing machine.

You nodded silently and followed his directions, turning into the corner. His bathroom was simple, yet still elegantly placed with tile flooring.

He had the time to put fucking tiles in his fucking toilet.

The white porcelain of his toilet and sink shined brightly in the warm lights of the bathroom. Next to the toilet was the shower, the segment separated by a curtain. The only thing that was out of placed in his entire makeshift home was the mirror over the sink.

It was cracked. You only saw glimpses of yourself in the pieces that were big enough to catch your reflection- a pair of tired eyes and skin that was covered in dried blood that had long ago oxidized and turned dark brown.

You stripped off your clothes, struggling to peel them off your skin, and then dumped them on the floor in front of the washing machine and stepped into the shower.

You turned it on.

The bastard even had hot running water.

You moaned at the relief and looked down on the floor, watching as the water turned brown, washing away the blood and sweat and filth on your skin. You reached for his shampoo and couldn’t help but giggle at his choice.

It was pomegranate scented with red packaging and labelled Long Term Relationship.

Well, it smelled divine. He had great taste in scents.

Look at you. So desperate to smell like him. Pathetic.

“Him and hundreds of other women, probably,” you muttered.

Once you were done, you stepped on the floor mat and saw a neatly folded towel and clothes on top of the toilet seat. You dried yourself off and put on his t-shirt.

It was too big on you, the sleeves went down to your elbows and the hem went down to your mid-thighs. You saw that he also set aside a pair of shorts, but there was no way you were going to be able to wear that without them sliding down.

You breathed in.

The combination of the shampoo, and the smell of his t-shirt made you smile. It was familiar, but you never really noticed it besides the fabric softener.

Yet, it was unmistakably him. Now all you needed to do was rub gun-powder all over yourself and voila.

You stepped outside to see he had shrugged off his jacket, and was sitting at the dining table, wiping his helmet down with hand sanitizer.

“Shower’s free,” you approached him, passing him your wet towel and his shorts, “Thanks for the shirt, but the shorts are too big.”

His jaw clenched when he looked up at you. You saw the way his eyes darted from your own and down to your body.

He snatched the items from your hand and got up. “Don’t touch anything.”

You heard the shower turn on.

And then you were alone, standing awkwardly in the middle of his safe house.

Everything seemed so normal.

There weren’t many personal things lying around aside from clothes and a few books that he had arranged on a bookshelf, but it didn’t scream ‘Go away’ or ‘Psychopath’. It was simple, homey, warm.

Until you noticed a pinboard that hung in front of his bed.

The nearer you got, you saw familiar faces. Mainly yours.

A blurred photo of you as Robin with Batman. A few articles regarding Batman handing Joker over to the authorities, a couple about Bruce Wayne adopting you following your parents’ deaths, and photocopied police statements about the investigation of your parents.

You frowned.

You knew he had done extensive research on you, you knew that he had shimmied his way into your life and manipulated you for his gain, you knew all that. But seeing everything out in the open made your heart ache.

A whole portion of the board had many of your pictures on it, as well. Stalker photos, as you liked to call it. Zoomed in from far away, candid shots of you in your uniform, swimming, smiling and waving at your classmates, walking in the mall, studying in the library.

“Like my photography skills?”

You jumped at his voice. He was so silent whenever he approached you. You should have noticed that much earlier on.

“You’re a fucking psychopath,” you shook your head, still looking at the photos, “But I have to say, I didn’t know I looked this good in my uniform.”

“Oh, baby girl, if only you knew,” he chuckled.

“Please, I-”

You finally turned and choked on whatever words you were going to say.

Jason was standing at the foot of his bed behind you with only a towel wrapped around his waist, his hair wet and dripping droplets of water down onto his bare chest, his arms crossed and accentuating even more the size of his biceps. He looked so clean.

So normal.

Well, his hotness was hardly normal, but he didn’t seem like some trigger happy crime lord.

He raised a knowing eyebrow at your expression. You didn’t realise your mouth was open.

“I should burn this fucking place down for what you did to my library,” you shot at him.

“It’s been months, get over it,” he rolled his eyes, and sat on the bed, back resting against propped pillows.

“Aren’t you going to get dressed?”

“Why would I? I’m in my own bed.”

You gulped.

“Bruce- Dick- Everyone-” you stammered, “They’ve probably figured out that I’m not in my room. It’s three thirty in the morning and the music is still playing loudly in my room, I mean, someone has probably knocked and didn’t get an answer so-”

“Your clothes will only be ready in two hours,” Jason interrupted you, “Or would you rather go back home in just my shirt with no bra and panties?”

“I can actually think of an excuse if I did,” you chuckled nervously, “Dick thinks I’ve been sleeping with a guy named Carter.”

“Who’s Carter?” Jason demanded, his expression changing into one that was furious.

“No one,” you quickly explained, “He saw your stupid texts, so I told him your name was Carter and that we were going out.”

He relaxed at your explanation.

Wait a minute.

Was he jealous?

You smiled to yourself, entertaining the possibility.

“And I do actually have a change of clothes in my backpack,” you said, “Which is in your bike.”

“You’re not leaving me with the laundry, princess,” he scoffed, “Stay. Once your clothes are done I’ll even fold them for you.”

“How hospitable,” you snickered.

You stood there awkwardly again, not knowing where you’d be welcomed.

“The bed won’t slit your throat, you know,” he teased, “You can lie down and sleep until you need to go.”

You pursed your lips and played with the edges of the shirt. You knew what was going to happen in that bed.

You went to the opposite side of bed and sat down nervously. You put your feet up and stretched it, just like Jason’s .

The bed was comfy, the pillows fluffy and warm. You could finally feel yourself relaxing into it-

Jason grabbed your waist and pulled you closer to him, your back flushed against his front. And finally, finally you could feel the hardness of his cock pressed against your ass.

“I’ve been hard ever since you came out of the shower,” he breathed into your ear, grinding against you.

You wanted to moan at the feeling of his heavy length on you, you wanted to grind back onto him and turn him on even more, but mother started screaming.

ARE YOU A LADY OR A WHORE?

“Shut up,” you muttered.

“What?” Jason asked.

“Nothing,” you turned to him. “Kiss me.”

He granted your request and gave you a searing kiss.

Rolling in bed with a dirty criminal.

“Shut up!” you screamed.

“What the fuck?” Jason yelled, “I didn’t say anything!” “No,” you shook your head, “Sorry. Not you. I wasn’t talking to you.”

He looked at you suspiciously.

“I- I hear my mother sometimes,” you admitted.

You waited for him to call you crazy, but he never did. Instead, he looked at you seriously.

“Tell me more.”

“Not physically,” you started, “But I imagine what she would have said to me if she were watching me- which is why I never kissed a boy before this. Or masturbated. She stops me from doing anything filthy.”

“Filthy?”

“By her standards,” you elaborated, “Filthy or vulgar or inappropriate, she controls my actions.”

“How long,” he asked.

“Ever since they died,” you sighed.

“But you were fine all those other times,” he inquired, “Why now?”

“It gradually became less and less frequent,” you explained, “Like, when we did those things through video call, I felt comfortable and it just- it felt right. And it stopped completely during my first time with you.”

“So you saying it doesn’t feel right, right now?” he clenched his jaw.

“It’s not you!” you added quickly, “It’s me. No matter how much I want to, I just can’t help it. She’s there.”

“Look, I get it,” he sighed, leaning onto the propped pillows, “Fuck, I get it.”

“You do?” you looked at him with hopeful eyes.

“What? You think getting beaten to a pulp with a crowbar, getting exploded, and having to crawl out of your own grave wouldn’t fuck you up?” he growled, “You’re not special. Get over it.”

Even though he said it in a way that was harsh and definitely not conventional, he basically told you what you needed to hear- that you weren’t the only one that was fucked up, and if there was any comfort at all, it’d be the fact that you were fucked up together.

You smiled when you saw him, his arms crossed, eyebrows stitched together in a frown, his lower lip jutting out in a pout.

“Well, I really wanted to,” you paused, “You know.” Jason looked over to you then. “You said she screams in your ear, right?”

“Yeah?”

He smirked, then came closer to you again, caressing your cheek and tucking a wet strand of hair behind your ear, where he leaned in to whisper.

“Then that just means we need to be louder.”

He gripped your thigh and forced your legs open, cupping your sex with his hands.

He’s defiling you.

“I hated you,” he slipped a finger between your folds and gently ran it up and down, gathering your slick, “But now I just can’t seem to keep on hating you anymore.”

Your heart fluttered at his confession.

He teased your clit, giving only light brushes on it, barely even touching you.

But everyone else will hate you.

“Talk to me, baby,” he instructed, “Tell me you don’t hate me anymore.”

“I-” you panted, “I don’t hate you anymore.”

A filthy man for a filthy girl.

“Mmm, good girl,” he purred, now adding pressure to your clit, making you squirm.

The praise did wonders to you. You felt your cheeks heating up, your heartbeat going faster and faster.

I raised you to act like a lady, not like a bitch in heat.

His other hand slipped underneath the shirt, trailing up from your waist to cup your breast and gave it a squeeze.

You moaned out loud when he started pinching them.

Vulgar sounds will only get you dirty men.

“You’re so fucking sexy, you know that,” he rasped against your skin, hot breath sending goosebumps all over. “I want you to moan for me, beg for me, scream for me.”

“Jason,” you sighed.

He started properly rubbing on your clit now, sending tingles right to your toes. “Fuck, baby. You’re so wet. It makes your pussy look so fucking pretty,” he praised.

At least prostitutes get money when they sleep with other men, and you’re doing this for free.

It was so confusing. On one hand, you had your mother’s voice ringing in your head. On the other, Jason’s dirty, sexy mouth made you think you could actually die from sheer horniness.

He finally slipped a finger inside of you, eliciting a long moan.

You’re going to be loose before you hit-

“Mmm, you like that, baby?” he husked, “You always like it when I put my finger in, don’t you?”

“Yes,” you gasped.

No one will want you after-

“Tell me what you want,” he demanded.

Ruined goods-

“Please,” you whined as you spread your legs further apart.

YOU BELONG IN THE-

“Please what, sweetheart?” he teased.

You could only mewl.

LISTEN HERE-

“Please stop?” he added a second finger, and started pumping in and out excruciatingly slow.

STOP IT-

“Please make me come?” he increased his pace.

HORRIBLE-

“Or just… please? .”

He suddenly switched into a brutally fast pace, causing you to scream.

“Jason! Fuck, Jason please just put your cock inside of me and make me come, fuck!” you begged.

He stopped finger fucking you and chuckled out loud. He was hovering over you, his towel long gone, aligning the tip of his dick at the entrance of your cunt.

“That’s my girl,” he grinned, and then pushed inside in a swift motion.

“Fuck!” you cried.

“So fucking wet for me,” he panted, pounding into you. “So tight.”

“Jason,” you could only say.

He dipped down to push his tongue into your mouth, fucking your mouth the same rhythm he was fucking your pussy. You were in a state of desperation and euphoria, hazy to reality.

The only thing you were hearing at that moment was the wet sound of flesh on flesh and Jason’s loud grunts into your mouth.

The combination of his cock repeatedly pressing onto the spot within you and his tongue in your mouth made your pussy tighten in no time, closer and closer to orgasm.

“You wanna come, baby girl?” he whispered against your lips.

You nodded hysterically.

“Come for me then, come all over my cock,” he commanded, fucking you faster.

The tight coil in your core exploded, and you felt yourself pulsating all over his length which was still moving.

Jason didn’t give you time to rest.

“Get up on your knees and face the wall,” he growled.

You immediately obeyed, afraid that he would start biting you again if you didn’t. Jason pushed aside his pillows and you placed your hands on the headboard.

He took off the oversized shirt and his hands started roaming your body from behind, squeezing your breasts, running them up and down your thighs, all the while he was kissing your back.

He pushed his cock inside you again without warning, and in the post-orgasm sensitivity, you accidentally gave out and collapsed backwards against him.

“Woah there, baby,” he laughed, gripping you tightly by the waist to stabilize you. “I want to make you come again.”

“Please,” you rasped.

“Yeah?” he started moving slowly behind you, “You want to come again, baby?”

You nodded weakly.

“Tell me, baby girl,” he nipped your earlobe, “Tell me.”

“I want you to make me come again.”

“What a fucking good girl,” he licked your ear.

You could only whimper in response.

He hammered his hips into you hard and fast, all the while gripping your tits with one hand and your waist with other, fucking himself up into you.

And because you were so sensitive from the first orgasm, the fact that he was fucking you again soon after meant that you were already fast approaching your second one.

“Hold out for me just a bit more, sweetheart,” he breathed in your neck, “Please?”

That ‘please’ sort of made your heart melt.

“Anything, Jason,” you replied, trying your best to maintain a level head while he fucked you.

“Ah. fuck, baby,” he stuttered, his hips stuttered, his pace stuttered. “Okay, come with me. Come with me, fuck, fuck.”

The heat you felt before started spreading again, and this time you allowed it and let go. You reached behind you to hold Jason’s head, running your hands in his hair and gripped on it tightly for leverage as you came loud and long.

He withdrew from you so fast that it almost hurt, but then you felt warm splashes on your lower back, dripping down to the globes of your ass and to your thighs.

Your whole body gave out, and you fell down on your front, crashing into the soft bed.

You heard Jason chuckle, and then felt him get up. He returned with his towel and wiped your back, and then joined you on the bed next to you.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Better than okay,” you smiled.

“Mother quiet?” he frowned.

“Surprisingly so,” you yawned.

“Good,” he nodded.

The two of you just stared at each other, and soon enough you got lost in his face. His tired eyes, his crooked nose, his scarred skin. He gave you an odd expression. It wasn’t anger, or hate- hell he was hardly frowning.

He just looked… content.

You guess killing someone would take the energy out of you.

***

When Jason stirred awake, the first thing he felt was the warm body next to him.

For the first time in his entire life, he didn’t wake up alone.

He blinked his eyes open, and nearly laughed out loud when he saw your face next to him. You weren’t a graceful sleeper. Your hair was messy, your mouth hanging open with a little drool on dribbling at the corner.

Yet, he couldn’t help thinking about how absolutely gorgeous you looked.

He felt his chest tighten.

He shifted to the side to look at the clock on his bedside table. It was already 6am. Your clothes were long dry already in the dryer.

“Mmm,” he heard your voice, probably waking up because of his movements.

He turned back to you and saw that you were indeed already awake, facing tummy down with his blanket covering you up to your waist so he had a view of your beautiful, smooth back.

“What time is it,” you asked, voice still heavy with sleep.

“Six,” he answered, “Your clothes are probably dry.”

“Fuck,” you swore. He loved it when you swore. “I’m going to get into so much trouble.”

“You’re a teenager with a so-called boyfriend,” he snorted, “Make something up.”

“That’s the plan,” you grinned.

You pulled the covers up to your chest and laid on your back.

“I should go,” you sighed sadly, and then sat up.

“Wait,” he grabbed your arm.

Fuck, what was he doing?

“Don’t go,” he whispered, “Stay.”

“I guess I’m already fucked anyways, right?” you smirked.

“No, I meant-” Jason paused, his words catching in his throat. “Stay with me forever. Leave them.”

He saw the many phases of your thoughts written clearly on your face. You blinked with realisation, stopped yourself from smiling, but finally settled with a deep troubled frown.

Fuck.

“I can’t,” you croaked, “I’m sorry, Jason. I can’t do that.”

He felt like taking the keris and ripping out his heart.

“Fine,” he clipped, “Whatever. You want me to send you back, or what?”

“No, it’s fine, I’ll find my way back,” you got up and walked to the dryer to change into your gear. Jason reached for the shorts that you didn’t wear.

He walked you to the door silently, awkwardly. He had given you your backpack from the compartment in his motorbike.

“Jason,” you suddenly turned to him, the frown still evidently clear, “I can’t do this anymore.”

“What?” he grit, his heart dropping to his stomach.

“This thing with you,” you explained, “I can’t see you again. The next time I see you, I’ll be on Batman’s side.”

He felt like someone was throttling him, squeezing every ounce of sanity he had left out. He felt his nails digging into his palms, fists closed, still refraining from doing something he knew he would regret.

“I’m sorry, Jason,” you said, “I won’t tell them about you. If they find you, it will be completely because of them, not me. Okay?”

He didn’t want to look at you. He didn’t want you to see through him.

“Just go,” he managed to choke.

You pursed your lips and then nodded, turning away from him.

He slammed the door shut, and then rushed to his room.

“FUCK!” he roared, grabbing the bed and flipping it over.

“FUCK, FUCK, FUCK!”

He went to the dining table and swiped the tea set off, hearing it crash into tiny pieces on his floor before proceeding to flip over the table as well.

“YOU FUCKING BITCH!” he cried, aware that his cheeks were wet with his tears.

He couldn’t breathe.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

He crumpled to the floor and picked up a broken piece of china, closing his fists around it and feeling the stinging pain as it cut into his flesh.

He was losing his mind.

He didn’t know what was up, or down, or what was real or wasn’t.

He wanted it to be all just a long, shitty fucking dream.

He wanted to just wake up back in his room in the Manor, fifteen years old, with the sound of Alfred knocking on his door, asking if he was alright.

It was a different kind of pain that he felt as compared to the one Joker had inflicted on him. It was the same hurt, the same stabbing feeling in his chest when he found out that Bruce had replaced him with you.

The same feeling when he found his mother on the floor with foam in her mouth.

In the midst of pulling his hair, and contemplating on whether he should really use the keris to carve his heart out or slit his own throat, he eventually calmed down after an hour of broken sobs and choking on air.

He sat there on his floor, the blood on his hands now sticky and brown, listening to the deafening silence of his room.

He was alone again.

[iaintyourbro]

What’s your take on the experiments that we saw in chapter 13? For me, I think it might be the bodies from the Nibelheim incident that Hojo decided to kidnap and experiment on them. Also, saw some people say it’s Tifa or it’s her mom, but I doubt it’s Tifa, it’s more likely that it’s her mom’s body *if ever* since Zangan took Tifa before Hojo came

Hey anon! 

Well, for one, Tifa’s mother died when she was 8, so it’s definitely not her, unless they exhumed or body and/or she was given to scientists when she died. I’ve heard the theories of Tifa and her dad.

Let’s look at screenshots.

The male seems to have brown hair - or at least darker than blonde hair. He also appears somewhat young. Tifa’s father is 40 when this all happens. It’s still possible it’s him, because this is a blurred image. Guy’s pretty ripped. 

Here’s a picture of Tifa’s dad from the FFVIIR Ultimania. It could be him. I can’t tell if the guy in the tank has a mustache or not. I doubt Hojo would take the time to shave it off, he was a sloppy son of a bitch. However, it’s very possible it is Brian Lockhart. He was in the reactor. 

I think Brian Lockhart was long dead before Hojo and his team got there, unlike Cloud and Zack, who were severely injured, but alive. So whether he could utilize him or not, I don’t know. 

So we get more shots of the female. Hair color is most likely darker than blonde, and it’s very hard to tell because of the green/fuzziness of this. These also are hallucinations or flashbacks from Cloud. We also see him during this in a tank, and the whispers are like oh shit get them outta here, he’s gonna find out too much too soon. 

So there are theories that this is Tifa. If it is, then we need an explanation on the letter that comes along with Tifa’s Level 4 Limit Break in the OG. Could it be a planted letter? Yeah. Personally, I think Zangan did get Tifa out of there and saw Hojo and his cronies coming up. If she was in the tank, then she wasn’t in there long, because I haven’t seen anything saying she hasn’t been in Midgar for about five years. Marle would probably be the best source for this. 

I do find it interesting that they do not show any of her face, but show the faces of everyone else. 

So who else could these people be? Well, it’s very possible they are in other parts of the Compilation: OTWTaS, TKaA, DoC, CC, etc. It could be characters that will be introduced to us later. It could also be Cloud imagining it from his own paranoia. 

TKaA talks about the Nibelheim experiments, and I didn’t go through very deeply since I was only skimming to find things to add to my CoT post. 

What I do find interesting is, right after they show the woman both times, they also show what you just fought.

So both times they show the woman, this flashes up right after. This is intertwined with showing Cloud in the tank as well. 

There’s also other people in the tanks.

This is the first one that’s focused on before the green static takes over. So this is what they’re actually seeing at that point. This is clearly Voldemort. Hojo created Voldemort. (I actually don’t have any theories on who this is, since it’s present day, it could simply be a random person.)

I also wonder if Don Corneo was helping Hojo at all? Giving him specimens? If people were randomly disappearing from Sector 7 to be experimented on? The lab was right below them, so if they needed people, why not some poor slums people?

This is part of the flashback/hallucination. This guy is another one that is focused on. I haven’t seen much discussion about him. In fact, they spend more time on this guy than they do on the two above.

Cloud freaks out and I think that’s why the whispers come... because if he began to remember this, then that would cause his mental break too early. Not to worry, whispers to the rescue to prolong Cloud’s problem.

I do hope we get some clarification on this. Was it just him remembering incorrectly? Also, once we get to Shinra mansion, it may help to see if it’s a much more elaborate setup than what we saw in CC and OG. Is there more than two tanks down there? We also have the area that Lucrecia was using for Vincent in DoC, so I’m assuming that room - or something similar - will be there as well. 

I do appreciate the fact that they show this. I think once you find out this part of Cloud’s history, this moment will pop back into your head and Tifa’s head and make sense on why he’s so freaked out (for those who didn’t play CC or OG, then this scene will definitely make more sense). It also adds to the mystery of Cloud Strife early on, to further allude to something is wrong, something isn’t right, and Cloud has some serious memory issues. 

[piercebaron]

episode 22 and adaptations

Actually, I do want to talk about it! I feel like episode 22 encapsulates my “weird” feelings towards the anime adaptation and how it has cut and reframed certain things. It’s not bad? Just weird. 

Spoilers for the Plunderer anime and for the manga, up to chapter 36. 

prefacing all of this with a general note: if you’ve only seen the anime, please read the manga. You’re valid, I’m so glad you’ve been enjoying the anime, but please read the manga because as horny as Minazuki is (and the man is . . . very, very much so), his art is also amazing and some of his panels deserve a second, third, or even a fourth look. The little details here and there actually crop up later and become important, and it’s just great. Chapters 46 - 53 are some of my favorite in media in a long, long time and I absolutely cannot wait until they’re released in an official capacity so I can fork over my money for them.

(seriously, you guys don’t know how hard I’ve tried to legally purchase volume 13. I want to give my money to this series so bad.)

This will also be a little scattershot and bounce around between other episodes, so apologies in advance. I’m trying to double-check chapters and whatnot as I go but if I get something wrong or miss something, please don’t hesitate to correct me in the replies! I’ve been watching the anime through Funimation’s site -- dubbed up through episode 11 and then subs from then on. 

Adaptations! Adaptations. By their very nature, they are not a 1:1 sort of thing. A lot of times, you’ll hear people say “read the book” when a movie adaptation of said book comes out. This is because by its very nature, a movie adaptation simply can’t capture everything in the book -- nor should it. Little things will slip through the cracks. This doesn’t make the movie adaptation bad, necessarily, just that it loses something. 

By the same token, if someone tried to do a direct 1:1 adaptation of a book where, say, the book is used as a script (which is an extremely bad idea for so many reasons, please have a script oh my goodness), chances are it’s not going to be a very good movie. There are musicals, for example, where when filmmakers try to make them into films, they flop because they’re not “cinematic.” The directors didn’t take into account the shift in mediums or, more likely, they sorely underestimated it. Understandable, since it’s two visual mediums, but still.

This is all leading up to me talking about Plunderer, I swear.

Manga to anime is a tricky, tricky thing. A manga has [X] amount of pages to work with, depending on if it’s a weekly or monthly series (or even some different increment!). The author, then, has to structure their chapters accordingly, moving things along to keep the reader interested while also controlling the ebb and flow of the story. Note how when the chapters end, they’re engineered to keep you wanting to read more!

Anime is similar in that respect, except the crew has 20-22 minutes to fill over the course of 12 to 24 episodes depending on the series order. Plunderer, ftr, had a 2 “cour” order from the get-go. They have to plan out the series as a whole, figuring out certain things like, where will the season end? What are the big beats, when will we hit them? Etc. It’s no coincidence that the “school” arc started right around episode 12, which is the halfway point of the series; note how there was that filler episode with Hina and Lynne cooking, after all. 

When I started watching the anime after reading the manga, I assumed they’d end the season with, roughly, the end of chapter 36. It’s a nice “resolution” to a lot of things that had been building up over the series. Hina and Licht are finally together, Licht has resolved to keep his mask off and face the future, Jail has a new direction, Lynne -> Licht is basically resolved, and Pele’s layers finally get peeled back just a bit. 

I saw some predictions online that they’d leave off at the cliffhanger in chapter 39 and while that’s a good guess, in terms of narrative ebb and flow for an anime, it doesn’t really line up. They’d really have to rush some stuff (Charles!! i love you, charles) to get there and in terms of a product that they want to be able to market in several territories, it makes more sense to give it some feeling of resolution. That said, what’s more likely along that vein is us potentially getting some sort of stinger at the end of episode 24 with one character talking to That Certain Character, and us getting a brief, shadowy shot of said character to make people go “ohhhhh shit, dude.” 

but idk this anime has made some strange choices.

Going into that! I’ve mentioned this here and there and talked about it with a friend, but the choices the anime has made in terms of adaptation is, uh, pretty strange at times. When changes get made, my instinct is to try and think through why they were changed and, ultimately, if it really affects the story in any way. If I went through the entire anime, it would be an extremely dull read; please know, however, that I am forever sad we missed Jail’s computer antics and Pele being the ultimate shit when it comes to Nana’s video, even if I understand why they were cut. 

That said, episode 22 is a perfect example of this, so uh. Let’s dive in, shall we?

The chapters that episode 22 covers are chapters 33 and 34. The events leading up to it are pretty much the same, but episode 22 contains some divergences. Going through them quickly:

We see more of Pele and Hina trying to stop Douan from going after Lynn.

Sonohara doesn’t show up during this confrontation. Hina gets her “the body was too clean” line instead.

Because Sonohara doesn’t show up, it’s Douan who attacks Lynn instead, causing her injuries with rocks. In the manga, Sonohara shows up, is drugged by Douan, and shoots a couple of bullets at Lynn.

Nana is just randomly lurking around?? In the manga, it’s clear she got caught at the same time. I’m really not sure what was up in the anime. Douan just yanks her out from behind a wall.

Douan sits with Nana, Hina, and Pele until morning, telling them he’ll kill them at dawn if Licht doesn’t show up. In the manga, he sits back and lets Sonohara terrorize them with a game of Russian Roulette, and Hina promptly (without words) calls Sonohara’s bluff.

Jail doesn’t show up in this episode at all. Instead, Hina gets his “did you check?” line.

We actually see Nana leave with Pele when he takes Lynn off. It looks like we’re going to actually see Doctor Pele in action, maybe? Hina is later sent off to help them.

Sonohara shows up towards the end, already drugged. Based on Douan’s line, it’s assumed that she was drugged off screen by the Secret Service. In the manga, he forcefully injects her.

The end of the episode sets up episode 23 to be Licht vs. Douan and Sonohara, with the preview showing Jail jumping into the fray.

whew, that’s a lot. 

I actually get why most of these changes were made! Setting up the penultimate episode of the series to be this big battle is a necessary change for an anime. And narratively speaking, this is much cleaner than it was in the manga, where Sonohara shows up briefly at the beginning of chapter 33, is drugged, and then basically exists to be crazy and antagonize people. It’s less balls in the air for the staff to have to juggle and for the audience to follow.

Douan’s character also gets some more depth. It’s funny because I feel like in the anime, he’s much more cruel than he was in the manga originally -- which is a feat, let me tell you. The anime flipped that in this episode, though, by not having Douan force the drugs onto Sonohara. 

The manga frames it as him doing it because he believes he knows what’s best for her, he’s trying to protect her in his own awful way, but it’s also, you know . . . nonconsensual as hell and gross on so many levels. This takes that off his shoulders which is a good change, honestly. 

But we lose some little character moments for the others in terms of streamlining. I think the thing that bums me out the most is Jail’s stuff. In the manga, after the confrontation with Alan, Jail steps in, calls Sonohara out and snaps her out of her drugged stupor without much of a fight (”without conviction, your bullets can’t pierce me”) and then slaps down the iron throne, telling Douan to shut up because Licht is coming. Chapter 34 ends with him just dead-eye staring at Douan like yeah, it’s annoying, but look. You’re the one who calls him a cockroach. Jail saying “did you check?” is a major mic drop moment and it’s basically when, from then on, Jail does not give a single flying fuck about the barons / aces. 

It definitely should be noted that some of these Jail moments will probably pop up in other ways in the next episode. I fully expect the bit about Sonohara’s bullets to come up, at least.

We lose out on Sonohara stuff too, though. She willingly throws herself into the lion’s den, shooting at Douan to distract him for long enough to allow Lynne to get away. It’s Sonohara who points out that Licht’s body was too clean -- something that makes more sense as someone who’s known him for 300+ years, knows what it means to be a baron / ace, and wasn’t immediately dragged off by the Secret Service. Her then terrorizing them while drugged is also a moment because when she forces Nana to play Russian Roulette, Hina immediately grabs the gun and points it at her head, firing all the “shots.” It’s empty, showing that despite the drugs, Sonohara didn’t want to kill them and Hina knew that all too well.

with all that said, I should note here that it’s entirely possible this scene will show up in some form next episode. Sonohara is still drugged and Hina, Nana, and Pele are all together in the bunker that is right nearby. I kind of doubt it given how the episode is framed and because narratively, it makes more sense to focus on the Licht vs. Douan and Sonohara -> Licht and Jail vs. Douan and Sonohara fight than to have Sonohara split off to randomly terrorize them, but. Like I said, this anime has made some strange choices.

Of course, character moments we get instead are Hina and even Pele being metal as hell. As much as I’m flapping my hands about losing the little character moments for Jail and Sonohara, it’s clear that they thought about how to utilize those moments while streamlining things, and they do work for Hina. And honestly, it’s really nice to see more stuff with her and Lynn? They get some cute panels later on in the manga (think chapter 55), but I like ladies and I like some lady solidarity. And Hina getting those little moments is on the same level as her straight up pointing a gun at her head all “you won’t kill me.”

and on a selfish note, I am actually really excited to see Pele tend to Lynn. The anime has been good about fleshing them out more and giving them little moments. My little shipper heart is delighted.

In the end, does it change much? Not really. These are small things, ultimately, just like how we didn’t lose much with the added filler and cut moments during the school arc. It’s all ultimately in the name of adaptation and while it’s weird, it’s not necessarily “bad.” It’s jarring for me as someone familiar with the manga (and having stared at some of these panels for so long, I’ve gotten really familiar with it), but thinking on it critically, yeah, I can see why. 

they better damn well do the “how did you know I could do surgery?” scene in the last episode though or I will be super bummed, okay. 

[alwaysupatnight]

1, 8, 11, 13, 20, 30, 44, 49, and 53! :p 💜

So this got really long. :P Thanks so much for asking!! :D

20. Post a snippet of a WIP you’re working on. This is from chapter 3 of culebra Seth. I don’t think this will change too much before I eventually post it, but you never know. Also, CULEBRA VISION, Y’ALL. :P

Jesus Christ. Did he really wake up this morning with fangs? Richard, his mind supplies. Because of course, there could only be one explanation for all of this, and this had Richard’s handiwork written all over it. Richie might have gotten all the brains in the family, but that never once stopped him from running his mouth and getting them both into trouble, and last night had been no exception. He had to hand it to Richie though. His brother never did cease to surprise. Something primal rises up in Seth, promising vengeance of the homicidal variety, and from one blink to the next, his vision flashes and the world around him explodes into psychedelic colors, reminding him of the first time he’d tripped acid except without the weird hallucinations. Seth’s eyes rove around the room in every direction. Everything has morphed into neon blues and purples. And then he spots it—movement in the next room. He can see through the wall. The object shines, the light coming off of it glowing brighter than anything he’s ever seen. Like a blinding sunburst of warm colors that compels him to want to grab hold and sink his teeth into it, take all that warmth into himself like he’s sucking down the juices of a ripened peach. Almost in the same moment he imagines it, fangs erupt out of his upper gums, and it’s like he’s back in middle school popping a stiffy in front of all his classmates. He touches the tip of one sharpened tooth curiously, first with his tongue and then with the pad of his thumb. The sudden heat that rips through him shoots straight to his groin and makes him want to squirm. Yup, definitely like a boner. His mouth waters. The fluorescent shape glows all the colors of a sunset, and he tracks it with his eyes, mesmerized. And when Kate’s voice drifts out of it, the shock of it is so loud it sets a drumming of blood in his ears that swallows all the sound. Kate. It’s Kate, the evolved part of his brain shouts at him. His whole body gives a jerk, the fangs retreating back into hiding, and Seth stares in horror as Kate’s luminescent shape makes her way to the back of the house, trailing behind the dimmer silhouette of his brother.

Ask me questions about writing!

1. Favorite place to write. I do most of my writing on my desktop computer. But sometimes when I’ve turned it off for the night I’ll type up ideas and dialogue in the notes on my phone. I’ve just discovered the google docs app which has made transferring those notes into my word docs a hell of a lot easier.

8. Favorite trope to write. idk anymore. I feel like every story and fandom I’ve written for has its own things going on so I don’t have many tropes I can think of that I write consistently. I do always try to have the ladies making their own decisions though. They’re the ones usually calling the shots in my fics. :P

11. Describe your writing process from scratch to finish. haha okay let’s see. I usually come up with dialogue randomly, or a full scene will pop into my head. It rarely comes with a plot, so I’ll spend the next several days excited about my new idea and trying to type up all the notes I can think of and getting down as many ideas as possible so I can build a story around it. And then I’ll drop it once the initial excitement wears off, but it’ll always be at the back of my mind. And every now and then I’ll return to it and get excited about it again and add more ideas to my notes. Over the next few months if I’ve thought up enough scenes and have a specific ending in mind, I’ll attempt to write the first chapter. Then I’ll spend the next several weeks to months stressing myself out over writing that chapter while second guessing myself every moment. I’m a slow writer and I edit while I write so I almost never get any actual writing done and end up discouraging myself to the point where I want to give up. I might “give up” several times before I get so frustrated with it that I stop giving a fuck whether it’s actually any good. I’ll FINISH the chapter. Post it. And then I’ll spend the next 3-10 months complaining about the NEXT chapter. And so on until the fic is done. Are you surprised that I’ve only finished one multi-chapter fic btw? lmfao This has been my process so far. I’m so sorry I haven’t updated culebra seth, y’all. I know it’s been eight months. I PROMISE I AM TRYING.

13. How do you deal with writers block? I complain for months about being stuck and then decide to quit writing forever. And then I read a book and decide to come back to it.

30. Favorite line you’ve ever written. So one of my favorite lines I’ve written was this one from the trashy one night stand fic:

The gold cross at her neck catches the light and winks up at him like the punch line to a joke he doesn’t find at all funny.

Also this isn’t just one line, but I was really proud of myself for the ending I wrote for that fic too :P

He opens his mouth like he’s got something to say. She thinks she knows what, but the words freeze in his throat. “Kate,” he says instead, his voice cracking. It’s not an I love you. But when he looks at her like that, whiskey brown eyes free of poison and so clear she thinks she can see the future in them… …it’s only a matter of when. “Go,” she says, unable to resist a smile. “I’ll be waiting.”

44. Best piece of feedback you’ve ever gotten. Hmm... I almost never receive any so...? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ BUT IF ANY OF Y’ALL HAVE FEEDBACK FOR ME I WOULD LOVE TO HEAR IT. PLEASE. I AM BEGGING.

49. What do you find the hardest to write in a story, the beginning, the middle or the end? THE TITLE OMFG. ALSO THE MIDDLE. WTF. If I have an ending in mind, I can write anything once I get the beginning out of the way. Beginnings can be really frustrating for me too, but the middle is 100% what kills me. It’s so hard to hold onto that motivation to keep writing. Especially when you feel like no one gives a crap about what you write.

53. What does writing mean to you? I mean, I mostly do it for fun. When’s it gonna be fun? lmfao No, I really do want to improve my skills at crafting stories. It’s literally all I want to do and all I ever think about.

[wigglebox]

for that author asks thing: 1, 4, 6, 13, 25, 27

AH! Thank you!!!! [writing questions] 

1: Where do you typically get your ideas?

I feel like this is always a hard one for writers to answer because when an idea happens we usually don’t trace it backward. But, for me, sometimes an idea will come from a real-life event (passing someone on the street, a creepy building, some event in a town I heard of –). Sometimes, it’s prompted, like with my holiday fic (prompted off of two dialogue lines, and then chapter two was prompted by a comment on chapter 1). Sometimes I’ll just see a scene in my head and want to just work straight off of that, no matter where it falls in the story (With “The General”, the one scene I always kept in my head for nearly three years now was John walking in on Dean and some other guy. When we got the news that there was an ‘old friend’, I took that opportunity. That scene doesn’t happen until the end of the story, so I built it around that). 

Ideas really just manifest differently for a lot of people, so I guess in some ways, we’re all in the same boat: Prompts, music, IRL, random scenes popping into our head, random dialogue exchanges popping in our head, the need for a certain ambiance or event in a fic that we just want to write (holidays, birthdays etc etc). 

But typically, I suppose, they just pop into my head usually sparked by something else. Sometimes it’s not sparked by something else, and it comes anyway. If anyone were to ask me how they can get ideas, I’d say go through other books, music, TV shows, your local news/news papers, ask for prompts, find a prompt list yourself and randomly choose one. 

Rest of the questions are under the cut!! 

4: How do you know when a chapter is “done”?

It’s hard to pinpoint when a chapter is ‘done’ because everyone has a different expectation from chapter markers. For me, it’s a ‘now what’ situation. I’ve only just recently started actually dividing my chapters instead of embedded them (each section marked off by a numeral), and what’s prompting me is someone asking “now what?” after Dean and Cas first kissed and Cas still has a broken car. So, I wrote chapter 2. Chapter 2 has them kind of talking about their fears of relationships and going too fast. They end on the same page – so now what? Where does that take them? 

But again, I’m different from everyone else, and as I continue to write chaptered fics, I can’t tell you if that’ll change or not. 

6: Where do your titles come from?

Titles for me are very special and hold a lot of meaning and I thought for a while on. My titles usually come from something thematic or referenced in the fic (Code 314, General, Inspiration Point)

Other times I’ll take them from a section of poem or the title of a poem or other reference I use to either inspire me or as the summary (Wishbone, con-fi-dant,  Time in a Bottle, Brood Your Heavy Hours)

Sometimes I just use a location (20 Hours in Lebanon, Crooked Pine, Kennebunk, To Rochester from Boston)

And just mostly, whatever phrase comes to my head, or my just yoinking around on Thesaurus.com and seeing what another word is for something. Sometimes it’s just the ‘feeling’ of the fic as well (Frozen, Wave after Wave, Glow, Knock Knock, ‘and again,’, Assiduous)

My titles come from a lot of places, and it takes me a while to decide them. 

13: What grammar tends to cause problems when you’re writing?

Unnecessary commas and TENSE. MY GOD. FUCKING /TENSE/. Also, I don’t like using a lot of adverbs and sometimes it’s hard to work around. 

25: How do you create an original character?

OOFta. You’re talking to someone who at one point in her life, could NOT stop making original characters. 

First off, you can’t force it. You can’t go into it and start pulling random things to hobble a protagonist together. You want to love your character, not have it be some random ~*thing*~ that only exists to drive your story. 

If you have an idea for a story, an OC will probably spring up automatically. Group of teens stuck on a space station - you can envision who your leader is. Two people meet in a coffee shop - you can envision who’s POV you’re taking and automatically see them as they flirt, or how they react to being flirted with. Your protagonist is a detective - you envision how they’d organize themselves and begin to think what their moral principles are.

When that happens, it’s just a blob of a person, not completely fleshed out, but you have something to work with and your story will also help you develop them. 

I personally do not do indepth character sheets. I used to when I was drawing my OCs a lot and thought I was going to do a comic with them, but now, I don’t do it. However, I don’t think it’s a bad thing if you WANT that, but if you come across a question about your character you don’t know yet, don’t write something random, just skip it and go back to it because other answers may unlock that one. (Favorite Food: I don’t know. Scrolling down a bit and you get a question, What is a Stand Out Moment For Them: Their very first meal where she felt like she was part of the family. Oh, what were they eating? Burgers? Alright, her favorite food is burgers)

Your mind will also sometimes spring an OC on you after you see someone IRL, or hear a song, or watch a movie or something, so make sure you grab that spark to develop later. 

You want an OC you feel completely connected to, even if they are the complete opposite of you. They also do not have to be carbon copies of you, but, it’s not the end of the world if they are -- just don’t get complicit with writing them because while YOU know what you’d do in a situation, WE the audience don’t.

Also keep in mind what you want for this character in terms of development, lessons, and endgame. They can’t exist without a goal or a desire in life. Say you create a knight OC to protect a prince. Well, what’s that knight’s motivation? Why is he protecting the prince? What’s his own moral compass and voice that you can’t stray from? Does he believe in love? Will he fall in love with the prince? Does he believe he’ll never end up with anyone and closed himself off for good? 

OC’s are like spirits you created out of thin air, so honestly, the TLDR of this is: Don’t force the idea, let them knock around in your head a little, use a character sheet if you must (or write them down), and work with them in the story. If they wouldn’t do something, and you get to a point in the story that would make them do that thing they don’t want to or just wouldn’t want to, then you have to reevaluate things. Create their voice, and stick to it. 27: Do you try to do most of your research ahead of writing (when research is necessary) or do you do it as things come up?

I do it as things come up. I do basic research on things, mostly locations and a town’s history or what something would look like in the 1940s or whatever -- but I usually just wait until I get to it. If I know the research will take me a while, I type in a place holder like [RESEARCH ME] and go back later.

[paradoxidolatry]

Brotherly Love

@birdhole , @beatconductor a lil bit

TG: hey TG: sup

TT: Hey. TT: Not much.  Lunch break at work. TT: Sup?

TG: oh thats sweet TG: sucks theres no free pizza in it when you work as a cop huh TG: i guess its overall kind of a step up from the pizza gig tho

TT: Right? Free donuts though. TT: But nah, yeah, not so bad. TT: Didn't get a chance to tell you about it but I figure Dave or whoever's already spilled those beans. TT: Kinda weird, right?

TG: yeah dave told me TG: donuts just like a real cop huh TG: still cant quite wrap my head around this cop thing tbh TG: i can see you working as a LOT of things but a cop? thats wild

TT: Yeah. TT: I mean, I figured.  Got all that military experience, right? TT: But I didn't want to go back to the military. TT: Plus, working as a cop is an equal mix of 'keeps me active' and 'allows me to work around certain roadblocks in regards to the acquisitions business', so it was a good compromise. TT: Better than fast food and skin flicks again, at any rate.

TG: i mean i guess that makes logical sense n all TG: still fucking wild as shit to me TG: guess you can still wear a uniform even its obviously not as sweet as the fast food ones

TT: Yeah, I really miss that old greasy apron. TT: But what can you do?

TG: the grease just made your eyes pop in that special way ykno TG: chicks love it

TT: They fuckin do, don't they? TT: But somethin tells me you didn't message me to talk about the chicks missing my pizza funk.

TG: you sure about that? its a pretty great topic you could write a book on it become rich quick with your pick up tips

TT: Hey, I'm already on chapter 7: the Sausage Party. TT: But really though. TT: What's up, boss?

TG: nothing TG: i was just TG: thinking about you is all

> Heart, squeeze. TT: That right? TT: Cool, cool. TT: Was thinking about you earlier too, actually.

TG: oh? any reason or

[Dave txt @ bro] im watching u [Dave txt @ bro] > that chicken image

TT: Just, y'know. TT: Was outside on a smoke break and I saw a couple of pigeons hanging out, eating some sandwich or some shit on the sidewalk and like. TT: Got me thinking about you, and like. TT: I spent the past 13 years thing you're dead or some shit, and now you're alive and it's. TT: Just fuckin buck wild. TT: Pardon me for sound fucking sappy but it's kind of like a dream come true.

[TT > Dave: I'm behaving, dad.]

TG: ...am i a pigeon now? tho i do admit i would eat that floor sandwich(edited) TG: yeah its...its fucking wild huh? TG: kinda thought id never see you again even after TG:  i got away and shit TG: idk why not like you up and died but? after looking for you and you werent there i dunno i guess TG: i thought you just TG: werent going to come back TG: ...you didnt even see my wings yet you dont get to relate me to birds just yet dude

TT: I mean, I saw them in a picture. TT: One of you and Dave and a bunch of trolls and some old dude in front of a candy cane dildo? TT: But also you post about birds and shit all the time, so I figured that was sort of your Thing now. TT: And ... well.  I dunno. TT: Almost didn't. TT: I was just gonna stay on Earth, maybe pop in to visit every so often. TT: But then all that shit happened and Dave wasn't answering my messages, so I thought he was dead too, and...well. TT: I guess I'm, uh... grateful to the apocalypse for.  I guess bringing you back to me? TT: Well, no. TT: But like, at least letting me know you're alive.

TG: oh...yeah thats TG: thats my sisters actually and uh..shit what even is grig? grandpa i guess TG: already know mr d after all TG: i mean... im not sure how i feel yet TG: i guess im sorta glad because TG: i mean it has been my embarrassing dream to play family with you again for a while TG: i want to be a family again TG: a lot TG: its just TG: hard

TT: Sisters, huh?  Well damn, you got the whole family package with these folks, huh? TT: Nice.  How long you been with them? TT: Yeah, I figured. TT: I didn't, and don't, make it easy. I know. TT: A lot easier when you were a baby, even if our folks were shit, just cuz, y'know. TT: Everything hadn'tt happened yet. TT: Hadn't started to completely fuckin lose my mind and treat you like dogshit. TT: But I mean.  I dunno. TT: I'm not gonna force you or nothin. TT: But if you ever wanted to come backto the apartment and chill for a day, see how you feel about it? TT: That'd be uh. TT: That'd be really nice.

TG: 3 years TG: as long as ive been TG: away from scratch... TG: i..yeah i guess maybe TG: can you even handle seeing me get gay with dave tho

TT: God.  You were with Scratch that whole fuckin time? TT: Fuckin sonnuvabitch refused to tell me what he did with you. TT: Anyway. TT: Handling y'all and your homogay is a small price to pay at the end of the day. TT: Even if it's still. TT: Kinda really weird from my perspective. TT: But I respect y'all and he takes good care of you, so I can't complain too much, right?

TG: ...yeah like ten years TG: kinda fucked up huh TG: ill..ill think about it TG: okay so im gonna be real with you here for a sec okay TG: i TG: messaged you because i was talking to dave and i realized i missed you and TG: that i TG: kindawantahugiguess

TT: ...Yeah? TT: I can do a hug, yeah. TT: Where are you?  I can meet you, if you wanna.

TG: ...workin TG: at [coords] TG: dont arrest me mr officer these drugs are prescription

TT: I'll leave the cuffs in the car. TT: What happens off-duty stays off-duty, though, so. TT: See you in five.

TG: kay > Try not to freak out. Freak out anyways.

> Pull up by the curb a short walk away and park. > Look, you even pay for the parking meter and everything. > Step out of the car in your full uniform and approach Sock, one hand in  your pocket, the other raised in a wave hello.

> Oh god, he really fucking is a god damn cop. That's so damn weird. God. > Not as weird as randomly meeting up with him for a hug though. Damn it that was the dumbest idea. > You wave back, trying hard to look cool and not like you are dying on the inside and failing miserably.

> You stride up alongside him and... ...well, now what, actually. > Neither of you are very good at this kind of planning, are you. > Damnit, Striders. "Hey." > Now just to... > ... > Open your arms up? > Yeah.  That's how hugs happen.

> Oh god, he's going right for it.Oh god. Not even small talk or anything really bro? > Maybe that's better anyways because god know you don't know what to say. "Hey." > You take a deep breath and you...Go for the fucking hug. Squeeze that big bro tight.

> Aww shit here it comes and here he is.  All up and hugging you. > Actually, that's uh. > That's real nice. > You wrap your arms around him and pull him in for a good, tight hug. > It's probably not the most comfortable thing, what with your radio strapped onto your chest and name plates aand shit, but. > At least for you?  This is a fucking good hug. > (Don't you dare tear up in public.)

> You don't really care about the cofort level of this, it's something you've been craving for 13 years now, a little radio isn't going to stop you from enjoying it. > It's nice. It's familiar, like all the good parts of Bro you've been missing wrapped up for you in one big huggable form. Easy to forget all the shit for a moment. > But the moment does end and when you pull away you have to wipe at you eyes like an idiot. "Uh...Th-thanks."

> Aww, shit goddamn.  He's teaaring up too under those glasses. > You swipe one knuckle under your shades, and you take a steaadying breath. "Hey, yeah, no problem." > Breathe easy, Strider.  You glance up for a moment as you see a fatass snowflake come drifting down, then you look to Sock again. "Hey, you wanna maybe grab some lunch with me?  Haven't eaten yet and it's still my break, so."

> Well at least you are both sappy motherfuckers now. > Oh. You didn't expect that. You think about what Dave told you earlier "Stay in control" and promptly decide to fuck that advice because shit. You are already here. You already went for it like an idiot. "Yeah sure. Gonna have Donuts like a proper cop?" > You make such a face at the snow. Ugh, you didn't really prepare for that kinda weather, fuck.

> You snort a laugh and give your flat stomach a pat. "Gotta work on that signature cop gut, don't I? C'mon." > You gesture behind you with a jerk of your thumb. "Hop in up front.  You can pick the place."

"Hell yeah you do. You look like a fake ass striper cop dude." > You get into the car and immediately get the seatbelt. Doesn't feel safe otherwise. You don't really like cars still but you can't pin point why. It's just a weird personality quirk yeah? But you are used to being in one at this point of your life. > Just drive carefully. Please.

> You hop in and buckle up too, both pleased and a litttle saddened that you didn't even need to remind Sock to put on his seatbelt. > Poor kid. > Luckily, you are an impeccably safe driver, and the drive to Wherever is smooth and uneventful.

> Old habits die hard. > You feel kind of awkward in the car with him, it's too silent for our tastes. > You get out of the car at whatever this amazing food place he's taking you is. Fingers crossed for fast food- "Y'know kinda funny. Always figured my first frive in a cop car would be because I'm getting arrested."

> You snort a laugh.  It's Sock's old favorite pizza place. > God you hope he still likes this shit. > Also this wasn't a Pizza Pimp before, was it?  It was Gino's-- > Wait. > Ugh, well, maybe Dave's not at work. "If you're planning on getting arrested, you're doing this pushing thing wrong, kid."(edited)

> Oh the Pizza Pimp. Fucking score. Maybe Dave is there, that would be rad. "I didn't say I was, I said I didn't think I'd ride a cop car otherwise. Your hearing getting bad?" > You immediately freeze after saying that. Oh man, actually sassing Bro though? Please don't hit me.

> Dave is unfortunately not there, but he sure would love to.

> You catch that freeze, and you... > You snort a little, before pointing to your ears. "Too many concerts and phat-ass beats.  Knew I shouldn't have gotten all up and personal with those speakers.  Who knew the grown-ups were right about that?" > You smile, and it's a little awkward cuz you sure as hell have never been the smiling type, before you hold open the door for him. "C'mon, before we freeze our asses off."

> Oh. Okay. It's cool. It's chill. In a quite literal sense even so you get your silly ass inside. > A smile though? You haven't seen your brother smile in...far longer than you haven't seen him for sure. > That little scare knocked the speech right out of you though so you just awkwardly sit down at the next best table, suddenly really not sure how good of an idea this was.

> You take a seat opposite him, and when the server approaches, you order yourself a water instead of a soda. > Who are you, even. > You glance over the menu, humming softly.  Some of these item names... fitting for a place called Pizza Pimp. "You wanna split one, or do individuals, or?"

> Who is he indeed. You order a black coffee instead of apple juice though, so maybe the traditional Strider beverages are just staying outside today. "Uhhh..Not super hungry honestly I don't mind sharing one." > You haven't been able to eat a whole pizza at once in a while but you don't say that.

"Alright.  We'll split a medium and you can take the rest home if you want." > You let him pick the toppings too.  This really is a strange Strider day.

> The strangest. Do they have nuggets as topping because you want that.

> They might have like, baked chicken, which is kinda like nuggets and also? Is Carro-approved.

> Do you think the pizza pimp doesn't have a nugget topping what kinda fool do you take Dave for.

> A big one. >:3

> LISTEN Nuggets have been added like at least two months ago. Cock Special.

> Goddamnit, Dave.

> Sock loves Dave and the Cock Special Pizza. Prepare ya taste buds Bro.(edited)

"One Cock Special with extra cock please" > Yes, this is exactly how you order.

> Oh your face. > You're so fucking proud.  Dave sure is your little brother, and so too is Sock. > Bless these fucking kids.

"Hope you like it, it's my fav." > Both the pizza and you know.

> Yeah.  Yeah, you know. "Sure I will." > Snort a laugh. "This sure isn't Gino's anymore, huh.  You remember that place?"

"Oh yeah. Man..That's been a while. Clover gifted the place to Dave what? 2 years ago?" > Back when you were on a no homo basis. Memories.

> [Clover: nya face]

"Used to be your favorite, but maybe that's because it was free when I worked here. ...Clover?"

"I'm always a slut for free food but I still digged their shit later. Oh uh..Yeah. Little green guy? 4 of the Felt?" > Should..You now have mentioned that?

> [Dave] Oh no.

> There's this shift in your face.  It's not a frown, but a certain tightening of your lips as you're hit with the full brunt of what Sock just said. "...Dave's...doing business with the Felt?"

> WHOOPSIES >Oh. Oh, oh, oh shit. You fucked up. You didn't really think about that when you said it. At all. Shit. Fuck. Damn. "Hahaha whaaaat? Noooo. Of course not! He'd never uh...Clover is just y'know his uh... Sugar daddy yeah. Cash money man, can't say no to that even from a greenie right?" > Well it's not entirely a lie. You are sweating though.

> You paw at your face and you sit back in your seat, eyebrows knit together tightly. > Looks like you're going to have to have a little talk with Dave when you get home. "...No, guess not.  Desperate times and all that, right?"

"Yeah exactly! Haha..." > God this is uncomfortable. You are going to warn Dave but you already feel like shit. Fuck. "Don't...Don't hurt him okay?" > There's fear in your eyes now. Not for you but for your boyfriend, which is so much worse in your eyes.

> That snaps you Right out of your bad thought spiral and you quickly wave your hand. "Hey, no, no.  Not gonna hurt him.  It's chill." > There's that smile again, even if it's uneasy and a bit green around the gills.  Your brother and the Felt... "Really.  Just surprised he hadn't mentioned it before now."

> [Dave] GUESS WHY.

" 'kay..." > He probably hadn't mentioned it for a reason. You couldn't have known Dave wasn't supposed to do business with the Felt but you still feel like shit. It makes sense in hindsight and considering your history of course but...You just plain didn't know. > The Pizza arrives but you suddenly don't feel very hungry at all, sipping on you coffee awkwardly instead.

> You're, similarly, not hungry, but you've got to salvage this.  Not telling when or if Sock will agree to see you again after this. "Sorry, I just... Y'know, getting offered a gift by those guys.  If they had snatched Dave too..." > You shake your head, and sigh it off.  Out with the bad. "But they didn't, and that's that.  So." > You take up a slice of the pizza and you point is casually at Sock, an eyebrow quirked. "What're you out there peddling?"

> Oh. You'd really rather not follow that line of thought, yeah.  Smooth topic change. "Dude, don't think I should be discussing that with a cop in a pizzeria. Mr D would murder me man."

"Hey." > You make a show of taking off your badge and laying it upside down on the table. "Off-duty, not a cop.  So is it the good shit, or is it like, oregano in a dimebag being passed off as weed."

"We're still in public man." > And you don't want to piss off your Dad on top of the shit you just pulled.

"Yeah, yeah.  Weren't you in public anyway?" > You chuckle a little and you point toward the kitchen area. "Your big bro used to sell shitty dimebags out of there, way back.  Dealt to all the line cooks."

" Course you did." > You roll your eyes behind your shades. "What you want an inventory list? Okay I'll just tell you my favorite product aight? Kinder Überraschungseier......The surprise is Cocaine." > Huh, sure did slip into your mother tongue there. Welp..

> Okay.  You actually laugh then. "You're selling Kinder Überraschungseier full of Cocaine.  Shut the fuck up, seriously?" > You're nodding approvingly now. "That's a fucking great idea.  Where the fuck'd you get the chocolates, though? Make them yourself?"

> That makes you feel..really proud? Huh. You can't stop the big dorky grin from spreading on your face. "Best idea I ever had, honestly. I'm importing them from earth, duh. Along with a bunch of other banned sweets and shit. Who the fuck thought peeps are illegal anyways?"

> You balk at that and you laugh again. "Peeps are illegal here-- wait, shit, right." > Smack your forehead. "That's my job to know that now.  Wow, fuckin fire me now."

"Maybe I should show you my stock, just as a reminder. A fucking lot of dumb shit is. Fucking Lattes were banned man. Until the King unbanned them just for Jude which is honestly so fucking stupid. Way to play favorite, just like royalty should am I right? Not that I'm complaining, love me a big fat Latte." > Man it's...Nice to be able to make that kind of shit tier level german dick joke and to know you're gonna be understood just fine.

> You snort your water and you pull a face,but you're clearly goofing around a loving it. "Fucking nasty, dude.  I don't need to hear about your love of big hot fuckin Lattes."

"Aren't you glad the prospitian monarchy digs a steaming hot Latte too? What a life that would be otherwise." > You snort yourself.

"Jesus christ.  Fuckin whities, dude." > You stuff some pizza in your mouth and you talk withyour mouth full like the fat nasty trash you are. "Can you believe I have to work with them?  Like what the fuck."

"The Queen gives me the creeps with her I love everyone bull. And the King seems like a huge fucking idiot so...Congrats man. Jackpot."

"Not had the chance to meet either, but this is the closest I've gotten to infiltrating the corrupt government yet.  Maybe if I keep my shit up, I can finally overthrow them from the inside." > You are entirely dead seriouus.

"What's the masterplan? Shoot them in public?" > You aren't but you also don't mind the topic. Not a fan of these guys.

"Nah, nah, nothing like that.  Too messy.  Besides." > You gesture at the scar that runs oveer your eyes. "Never been a fan of guns."

"I know." > Hell maybe you should be grateful he ain't. Swords fucked you over bad enough. "Seems like a popular approach is all. Like historically or whatever. But I guess you gotta go for something less stale huh?"

"Of course.  Flashy's the only way to be when you're taking out a corrupt system of government."

"Looking forwards to the show Bro." > Except you hope he's fucking joking.

> You totally fucking aren't. > You toss him a wink, which of course he can't see all that well behind your shades. "Hope it's a good one.  You gonna eat any pizza, lil bro?"

"Oh, right." > You finally grab a piece too. "How's the Cock Special?"

> Stuff the rest of your piece into your mouth and brush the crumbs off of your fingers. "It's not big hot Latte, but it's nice and tasty all up in my mouth, so it'll do."

"I mean we can grab a Latte next time-" > Did you just say next time. Did you just imply you want to meet up like this again? Shit. > Stuff your mouth with Pizza real quick.

> Oh. > Oh... That makes yourr heart do the smiley emote. > You grin a liittle bit about that and you say, voice kinda soft, "Yeah... alright.  I'd like that."

"Me too...I think." > If you don't hurt my boyfriend tonight that is, is what you think.

> Don't you worry, Sock.  Not gonna hurt your boyfriend tonight. > You're not gonna be home, so Dave gets to go unhurt for another night.

> Or any other night Bro.(edited) > Or day, or ever:

> Well, at least you'll try to keep your cool when you talk to Dave about it later.

> That's a good start.

> Fuck yeah.  Before you all finish up here, you nod back to the streets now lightly coat with snow. "You going back to your corner, right?  You need a jacket?"

"I mean, I'll live..." > But it's pretty obvious that you don't have any especially warm clothes on you, you know like an idiot.

"Yeah, and you'll get sick, doofus." > You shrug off your jacket--it's a plain black windbreaker, while you wait for your city issue polcie jacket to come in--and you ball it up, handing it over to him. "Here."

> You open your mouth to respond but the Jacket is already in your hands. Oh. That's..Oh. > Is that what it's like to have a caring older brother? "Thanks..." > The Jacket is far too big for you and smells like Bro. It's a weird feeling to put it on. Like a hug you can wear. > Your heart is doing several emotions.

"Hey, no sweat. No good to go out there to work if you're just gonna freeze to death, yeah?" > You have the server bring you all a box for the leftovers, and you give those to him, too. > You stand from the stand and stretch. "Alright, my lunch is about over.  You ready to go?

"Uh, yeah." > You are still trying to sort your feelings over all of this. It's weird. It's nice. > It's what you wanted all along. > Except for the part where you are scared about Dave. > You get up too feeling like a huge fool.

> You, very very carefully, put your hand on his back and lead him out back into the cold. > Look to him, then to your car. "Back to tthe same corner? Or you got anywhere else you need to be?"

> You tense up just a little at the touch but let it happen anyways. "Y-yeah same place." > You just get into the car quickly to cut off the awkward moment. Not without putting on your seatbelt of course.

> Always seatbelt first, kid! > You buckle in and drive him back to the street corner you found him on, putting the car into park but not getting out. "Alright.  Don't get into any trouble, alright?  Oh, and patrol comes past here in about 30 minutes, so be cool when they pass, yeah?"

"Oh uh..Okay. See you, I guess." > You wave an awkward goodbye, overwhelmed by a lot of conflicting emotions.

> You're about to drive off, but then you open the door and, hanging halfway out, you call to him, "Hey! Love you, Sock."

> That just leaves you starring for a moment. Did he just-? Does he? What. Can not compute. "L-Love you too Bro..." > You are not sure if he heard that with the way you mumbled that. You are not sure if you want him to or not. > It's only getting weirder. > But it also warms your birdy little heart.

> You heard it--you've actually got pretty good hearing still, despite all tthatt music and shit. > You smile and wave again before ducking back into your car and driving off.

> The patrol driving by half an hour later doesn't find a drug dealer, just a crying kid in some back alley. > This absolutely kills the bird.

[stillgeekingout]

so uh... guess who’s back that’s right, it’s the ultimate aaron milverton crossover fic! sorry it’s been so long I’ve been very busy. pls accept my deepest apologies in the form of this chapter

(tw death mention) previous chapters:  1 here, 2 here, 3 here, 4 here, 5 here, 6 here, 7 here, 8 here, 9 here, 10 here, 11 here, 12 here, 13 here

-----

For the second time, Aaron picked Chad up at the airport.

Picking up a boy he had been crushing on who had sworn off dating was worlds different from picking up his long distance boyfriend. He had nothing to be stressed about this time, only excited.

The Orlando airport was full of people flying home after Christmas. Aaron navigated through clumps of families towards Chad’s gate. His heart was pounding.

He watched as wave after wave of people exited the gate before finally…

“Chad!!” He didn’t care about the people around him who looked when he yelled out. Chad rushed to him as fast as the crowd and his luggage would allow, then flung his arms around Aaron’s neck. Aaron wrapped him into a tight hug.

“It’s so good to see you, man,” he said into Chad’s ear. “I missed you.”

Chad pulled back and gave Aaron a quick kiss. “I missed you too, babe!” Aaron looked around, flustered. He wasn’t embarrassed, exactly, but kissing in an airport seemed weird. But he grabbed Chad’s hand anyway and they walked to his car together.

------

Rachel spent Christmas morning with her parents and then went to a party with her cousin who lived in town. It was nice. Her cousin’s friends were cool, she always meant to hang out with them more. Her cousin had tried to film her for a youtube video she was making, but Rachel asked her to leave that part out. The last thing she needed was to be in more vlogs.

Blair had deleted Hamlet’s videos without asking questions, for which Rachel was immensely grateful. (She suspected it was less that Blair respected her privacy and more that she genuinely didn’t care, but the outcome was the same regardless.) It was such a weight off her shoulders knowing she wouldn’t go back and obsess over them during moments of weakness. And, more importantly, she could feel secure knowing no one else would find them. She asked Blair to leave up only one video: the Wonderwall montage. It made her more nostalgic than depressed, and she wanted one way to remember her friends that wasn’t tainted with everything that had happened.

According to Zoe, she had taken Alex and Blair to her mom’s just for Christmas day and then back to DC immediately after. Rachel had been hoping to see Zoe while she was in Florida, but apparently she had to go right back to work because between the convention and Thanksgiving, she had used up all her vacation time. The convenience of being able to teleport, Rachel supposed. (Which apparently didn’t extend to popping into Orlando to visit… but it was fine…)

She did think it was strange that Zoe never visited her, considering how often Blair was around. But she didn’t want to be upset with Zoe. Maybe she felt weird about it too-- after all, Rachel hadn’t asked Blair to take her to DC for a visit, when she knew Blair would probably be more than willing. Whatever the reason, she had accepted that she wouldn’t be seeing Zoe any time soon, and she wasn’t going to give her a hard time.

That didn’t mean they didn’t still talk constantly. They’d had several more actual non-texting phone conversations, and Rachel ended all of them with “I love you”. It started just to continue the joke, but after a few times, it just felt natural. They stopped commenting on it-- it became normal.

Just as she was thinking of Zoe, her phone buzzed with a text.

Happy NYE! Have fun at aaron’s party :)

Thanks-- hope he and chad don’t kill me with the PDA lol

awww cut them some slack, long distance sucks

bright side: one night of not hearing him whine about it before he goes back to whining when chad leaves!! haha (nah jk I’m happy for them)

She put her phone down, thinking about Zoe’s “long distance sucks”. She couldn’t help wondering if it wasn’t just about Aaron and Chad. Blair had stopped mentioning her offer to move Rachel to DC. She wondered if Zoe had just accepted that they weren’t going to be anything besides friends.

She wondered if she herself had accepted that.

------

“Talking to Rachel again?”

“Hmm?” Zoe looked up from her phone to see Alex standing near her.

“You talk to her a lot,” said Alex, sitting down next to her. “How’s that going?”

“Um. Good,” Zoe said. She had texted Rachel immediately after leaving work (as she did most days lately). It was New Year’s Eve, but Zoe had nowhere to go. She was off on the first but she didn’t really have any parties to go to. Her only local (human) friends were Violet, Eliza, and John, and they were out of town. So she was sitting around feeling sorry for herself, wishing she were at Aaron’s party with Rachel.

“I love New Year’s,” Alex said, letting the subject drop. “It’s so human. When you only have a few years to live, it makes sense to want to count and celebrate them.”

“We have more than a few years,” Zoe protested, but Alex had a point. What use was counting years for an immortal?

“Not enough to not be spending them how you want,” Alex said. “So are we going to Florida?”

“What?”

“Are we going to Aaron’s party? Blair doesn’t have to come if she doesn’t want to be around B4B. I think Dionysus is doing something.” They pulled out a mess of a knitting project they had been working on and started weaving the needles randomly through it.

“Alex, what makes you think that--”

“Oh, sorry, I just assumed from how much you’ve been talking about it. Did you not want to go?”

Zoe laughed. Alex was getting better at picking up hints, even when she wasn’t trying to drop them. “No, you’re right. Of course I want to go,” she said.

Alex beamed. They loved parties.

-----

“RACHEL!”

Rachel had barely made it in the door of Aaron’s apartment before being engulfed in an enthusiastic hug. She laughed.

“Hey, Aaron,” she said, but it came out muffled from inside the hug. Aaron let go of her and she looked up at him. She didn’t know it was possible for one person to radiate so much happiness. He was practically glowing.

“Everybody, this is my girl Rachel,” Aaron said. “Everybody” turned out to be a couple local B4B friends and Chad. Rachel waved awkwardly. Chad got up off the couch and came to shake her hand like the good networking former frat boy he was.

“So nice to finally meet you, Rachel, I’ve heard so much about you.”

“Likewise,” said Rachel. “I mean I saw you through a car window that one time but it’s nice to officially meet.”

Chad laughed.

“I’m so glad you’re here, dude,” Aaron said. “We have snacks in the kitchen, help yourself.” He grabbed Chad’s hand and walked back over to the couch. She watched them go, smiling. She was happy for Aaron-- she knew how much it had been killing him not having Chad around.

She grabbed a few cookies and sat down in the living room, vaguely listening to the conversation. It was always awkward to be at a party where you only know the host. She wanted to text Zoe but didn’t want to be that person on her phone.

As the night went on, Rachel managed to integrate herself into the socializing well enough. They played a few board games. As she had predicted, Chad and Aaron displayed an obnoxious amount of PDA (that she forgave only because she knew it was short-lived). At one point, Aaron’s friend Kate facetimed from her own B4B party in San Francisco and insisted on being introduced to everyone. Overall, it was a pleasant experience. Rachel managed to resist livetexting the event to Zoe, but she definitely spent all night crafting the next morning’s messages in her head. She would text Zoe at midnight, at the very least.

She realized then that she had thought of texting Zoe at midnight before her parents or anyone else she knew. But that wasn’t that weird, right? It wasn’t like she knew very many (living) people, and one of them she would see at midnight. Kissing his boyfriend, no doubt.

A persistent knocking pulled her out of her thoughts. Aaron looked around, as if making sure everyone he had invited was still in the room.

“Everyone’s here already,” he said. He looked at Chad, who shrugged. The knocking continued. Aaron got up and went to the door. Rachel hoped it was some drunk person with the wrong door. She was finally feeling comfortable with the people who were already there, she didn’t want some random other friend of Aaron’s to show up uninvited and throw a wrench into the group vibe. She heard Aaron open the door.

“Zoe! Alex! Wow, can’t believe you guys are here! Come in!”

Rachel’s head jerked up. Alex was greeting Aaron enthusiastically. She stood. Why was Aaron so tall? She couldn’t see around him. The other people at the party must have thought she was odd for jumping up so quickly, but she didn’t care. Aaron moved to let them in, and Rachel locked eyes with Zoe, still in the doorway. She stared, still in shock.

A second later, Zoe was pulled into a hug from Aaron and they broke eye contact. Rachel’s head spun. She couldn’t believe Zoe had come, and on top of that, how happy it made her just to see her in person again.

She remembered again how Zoe had been the first thing on her mind all night and realized maybe that last part wasn’t so hard to believe.

-----

Zoe had tried to tell Alex that you didn’t need to keep knocking until the person answered the door, but they sometimes got overenthusiastic and forgot. She hoped Aaron wouldn’t mind her showing up unannounced.

It had taken them longer to get there than she would’ve liked. Alex went through about 4 human forms before Zoe remembered they’d have to use the same one as the last time they saw Aaron. She still hadn’t explained to Aaron that Alex was also a god, and even if he knew, she remembered how disorienting it was to think of Alex as the same person(?) for the first few months she knew them. She had long since gotten used to it, but better not to complicate things. After that, Alex spent far too much time going through every wardrobe option.

“Can I borrow that pink jacket you have?” they had asked her at one point. “Don’t you think that’s a good party accessory?”

“Um.” Zoe had forgotten that she kept the Goodwill pink ladies jacket so prominently displayed in her room. Alex definitely couldn’t wear it, but she didn’t have a good explanation for why not. She could say it was because she wanted to wear it, but she wasn’t sure she did. Nobody but Rachel would appreciate the joke, and she felt like even Rachel would see it as a strong statement. She had been trying so hard just to be there for Rachel as a friend and not put on any perceived romantic pressure. If Rachel wasn’t comfortable with it, she wasn’t going to push it. Especially not when their friendship was going so well.

By the time her brain started to formulate a response, Alex had already moved onto a different idea. Good.

When they were finally both ready (Zoe gave Alex a hard time but it did take her a while to do her makeup to her satisfaction), Alex teleported them to Aaron’s house. She still didn’t entirely understand how that worked. She hoped it was the right door. Did gods just know these things?

Aaron opened the door, and immediately she knew she shouldn’t have been concerned about surprising him. His face lit up.

“Zoe! Alex! Wow, can’t believe you guys are here! Come in!” He reached to shake hands with Alex and pulled them into a hug. Zoe laughed. He was so enthusiastic. She tried not to crane her neck around him to look inside. She would see Rachel when she saw her. No big deal.

Then Aaron moved and she saw her, standing in the living room behind him. They made eye contact. Zoe’s heart pounded. Before she could read Rachel’s face, Aaron was hugging her next. Would Rachel be happy to see her? Was this too strong of a move? Maybe they shouldn’t have come.

Aaron let go of her. She didn’t look back at Rachel.

“Everybody, these are my friends Zoe and Alex!” said Aaron. Zoe looked around and saw Chad and a few others she didn’t recognize. She smiled and waved halfheartedly.

“Hi, sorry I’m late,” she said. “Also, you know, sorry I didn’t RSVP.” She continued to avoid looking at Rachel. She was suddenly very nervous to talk to her, which was weird. She talked to Rachel constantly, and she wasn’t a nervous type.

“Dude, no worries,” said Aaron. “I’m thrilled you’re here. I didn’t even know you were in town! Rachel, did you plan this?” Zoe finally looked at Rachel, but Rachel was looking at Aaron.

“Um, yeah! Surprise!” Rachel smiled. She was an actor, Zoe remembered.

“Well, there are snacks in the kitchen, help yourself!” said Aaron. Alex bounced over to the group and started introducing themself to everyone.

Rachel walked into the kitchen. Zoe took the hint and followed her. She wished she could tell what Rachel was thinking, but her back was to her.

When they got into the kitchen (which was barely a separate room from the rest of the apartment), Rachel turned around.

“What are you doing here??” she demanded.

Zoe shrugged. “Surprise?”

They stood there looking at each other for what was probably 5 seconds but felt much longer, then Rachel rushed forward and hugged her. Zoe hugged her back, relieved. For several moments, they didn’t let go, then finally they broke away at the same time.

“I’m so happy to see you,” Rachel said. “You have no idea. I’ve been wishing you were here all night.”

“I’ve been wishing to be here all night!” Zoe said. “And Alex noticed, I guess, so… here we are.”

“Remind me to thank them later,” Rachel said. “Is Blair not coming?”

“Nah, she didn’t want to be around the midwives.” Rachel laughed. Zoe had told her about Blair’s weird aversion to B4B.

“Well, tell her I said hi when you see her. She’s missing some good snacks.”

“I will, but don’t be offended if she doesn’t know who you are,” Zoe said. “I mean I mention you a lot but I don’t know if she’s ever actually listening to me.”

“Oh yeah…” Rachel looked thoughtful. “I guess we did only meet a couple times.”

Zoe laughed. “Did you forget?”

“Well from how much you talk about her, I feel like I know her.”

“She should really get to know you more,” Zoe said. “I think the two of you would get along.”

“I feel like we would,” Rachel said confidently. She paused, then gestured to the other room. “Did you want to go hang out with everyone?”

What Zoe really wanted was to keep talking to Rachel alone, but the kitchen wasn’t very private and they couldn’t exactly leave the apartment, so she nodded. They walked into the living room together.

-----

Rachel had already been relatively enjoying the party, but it felt like her happiness doubled as soon as Zoe arrived. They hadn’t seen each other in person since the beach, and they had grown so much closer since then that it felt both very exciting and very natural to be hanging out. Every time Rachel felt the urge to text Zoe, she could just exchange glances with her instead. It was amazing. She suddenly felt she understood Aaron’s overwhelming sunshine attitude.

At one point, though, she realized she didn’t know the next time she would see Zoe in person, and in person felt like the right time for a much-delayed conversation.

She cornered Aaron in the kitchen and asked if he would mind her talking to Zoe in his room for a few minutes. He gave her an exaggerated wink-wink-nudge-nudge that she chose to ignore.  

“It’s not like that. I just have to tell her something.”

“Okay dude, whatever you say,” Aaron said, winking at her again. Rachel sighed.

Once she and Zoe were alone in Aaron’s room, Zoe looking confused but not unhappy, Rachel sat down at the edge of Aaron’s bed.

“Zoe, I-- do you remember when I told you I had some stuff in my past that I wasn’t ready to talk about?”

“Mhm…”

“I think I’m ready to talk about it now,” Rachel said slowly.

“Okay,” said Zoe, sitting down next to her.

“I just want to preface this by saying it’s much worse than whatever you think it is.”

“Okay,” Zoe said again.

“And you might not believe me.”

“Rachel. I trust you. Whatever you tell me, I believe you.”

“Ok.... I don’t know how to start.”

“Take your time.”

Rachel took a deep breath. “First of all you should know that when I was in college, my best friend’s name was Hamlet and I also lived with her and I was also in… I also had feelings for her. Um. Very strong feelings.” Somehow that was less painful than saying she was in love with her.

Zoe just nodded supportively. She was so good. Why was she so good?

“So, almost two years ago, my friend Marci and I saw the ghost of Hamlet’s dad in a parking garage. And it turns out his business partner murdered him and then married his wife after he was dead.”

“Gods, that’s awful. I’m sorry.”

Rachel sighed. She hadn’t gotten to half of the awful parts yet. “Yeah. So I told Hamlet about the ghost, and she went back to talk to it, and then she started acting really strangely and broke up with her boyfriend and a bunch of other things happened and-- this is really hard to explain.”

“You’re doing fine,” Zoe said. “You don’t have to keep talking if you don’t want to.”

“I want to,” Rachel said, and Zoe nodded again. “So Marci and I tried to help Hamlet but long complicated story short, her asshole stepdad tried to kill her and then she killed him and also died and also Marci died, and also Hamlet’s ex-boyfriend Alex died, and so did Hamlet’s mom and two of our other friends. And also Alex’s sister Laura is in jail now because of shooting Hamlet, but she was kind of being manipulated by Claude. That’s the asshole stepdad. Oh and Laura looks exactly like Blair and that’s why I freaked out the first time we met.” Rachel exhaled. She was fairly certain that none of that made any sense.

Zoe just stared at her.

“I told you it’s worse than you thought,” Rachel said.

“It… is definitely worse than I thought,” Zoe said. She reached out and took Rachel’s hand. “Are you ok?”

“Kind of,” Rachel said. “Usually. I mean, I was really bad for a long time but now I’m doing better. Mostly thanks to you and Aaron.” She paused. “And my therapist.”

Zoe smiled and squeezed her hand. “That’s good.”

“There’s something else though,” Rachel said, pulling her hand away. This was the part she really wished she could leave out, but she felt she owed Zoe the whole truth. Zoe just looked at her patiently. “I wasn’t exactly a passive bystander in the whole thing. Or, I guess I kind of was, and that was the problem? I was right there the whole time and I didn’t save any of them. If I had just--”

“Hey,” Zoe said, interrupting her for the first time. “You can’t blame this on yourself. You didn’t do any of that.”

“I didn’t stop it, though,” Rachel said.

“Sometimes there’s just nothing you can do,” Zoe said. “Sometimes things are just out of your hands. You can’t sit here torturing yourself about what you could have done differently.”

“That’s what my therapist says too.” Rachel looked down at her lap.

“Rachel…” Zoe offered her hand again, and Rachel took it. “Thank you for telling me all that. I know it must be really difficult for you to relive and it means a lot to me that you told me.”

“Oh, um, no problem,” Rachel said. “I figured it was time you knew.” Inside, she was reeling. Zoe knew everything and wasn’t backing off. She was still there, holding Rachel’s hand and smiling at her.

They sat there for a few moments in silence before Rachel figured she should say something. “So, uh, that’s why I’m so messed up about dating. Considering the last person I had feelings for before you was… murdered.” She realized halfway through the sentence what she had just said.

Zoe blinked. “Yeah,” she said slowly, then, “Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure,” said Rachel, fully expecting Zoe to call her out on admitting she had feelings for her. Because she did, she realized. Of course she did.

“Did you say someone you knew looks like Blair?”

“Oh!” Rachel blinked. “Yeah. Laura. She’s… yeah, they’re basically doppelgangers.”

“So weird.”

“That reminds me, you know Sherlock?” Rachel had honestly almost forgotten her weird triggering episode with the mysterious detective.

“Yeah…” Zoe said cautiously. It was no surprise-- Rachel had asked her not to bring up Sherlock.

“She and Hamlet look exactly the same.”

“Geez. I had no idea that was so common,” Zoe said. “No wonder you don’t want to talk about them.”

“Is it them? Aaron always said ex-girlfriend so--”

“You know, I’m not entirely sure.”

There was another silence. Rachel realized they were still holding hands.

There was a knock. Rachel jumped up, letting go of Zoe’s hand. Aaron poked his head through the door. “It’s almost midnight! Come be in the countdown!” He looked at Rachel and raised an eyebrow. She rolled her eyes at him, then followed him to the living room.

-----

“Three! Two! One! HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!”

Zoe had never kissed anyone at midnight. Aaron and Chad were kissing. She looked over at Alex, who grinned and gave her two thumbs up. “Happy New Year!!” they said again.

“Happy New Year, Alex,” she said back. She looked over at Rachel, who was looking at Aaron and Chad. She never would have predicted everything Rachel had gone through, but then again, her own life should have taught her that life was hard to predict.

She didn’t blame Rachel for not having told her sooner. It was a lot to take in, and she knew it took a lot for Rachel to share it. But at the same time, she couldn’t help wishing she had known earlier so Rachel wouldn’t have had to harbor all that fear and guilt. She could tell Rachel was nervous to tell her, and it made her sad to think about it. Nothing Rachel said came anywhere close to tarnishing Zoe’s opinion of her-- if anything, it made Zoe admire her more. To have gone through all that and come out the other side.

Rachel noticed her staring. She had conveniently placed herself across the room (so as not to make things awkward at midnight, Zoe assumed. But then, she could have sworn Rachel said she had feelings for her...).

Rachel walked over to her and gave her a hug. “Thanks again for everything,” she said. “I love you.”

“I love you too,” Zoe said, the phrase no longer embarrassing. “Happy 2019.”

“Happy 2019.”

Zoe heard clinking and pulled away from the hug.

“Everyone!” Chad said, tapping a noisemaker against a champagne glass. “I have an announcement!” They all quieted down. “I’ve decided to move to Orlando!” he said, smiling at Aaron. “Surprise, babe. I found an apartment, I just have to get my car and all my stuff.”

Everyone cheered. Zoe wouldn’t have been surprised if Aaron fainted right then and there, but he just grabbed Chad and kissed him again. She looked away, feeling weird watching.

“Thank god,” Rachel whispered. Zoe had forgotten how close she was standing. Aaron’s other friends were busy congratulating him and Chad; she didn’t think anyone else could hear. “I never have to hear him whine about distance again.”

“The last person I had feelings for before you...” Rachel’s words were still ringing in Zoe’s head. She decided to take a risk.

“Well that’s good,” she said, “but now you’ll have to listen to me whine about distance instead.”

“I guess you’ll just have to get Alex to bring you back more often,” Rachel said. They were still talking too quietly for anyone to hear. “Bring Blair, get some froyo…”

“I’ve had enough froyo,” said Zoe. “Blair needs to wake up and realize that ice cream is way better.” Rachel laughed. “But froyo cashiers are cuter,” Zoe added.

“They’re tired of froyo too,” Rachel said. “Every froyo cashier spends all day secretly wishing for ice cream.”

“I still have feelings for you,” Zoe blurted. Rachel blinked. “I did on the beach, and I do now. Much more now, even though I’ve tried not to, because I know it’s long distance and I know you said you’re not ready for a relationship and I 100% understand that. We don’t have to do anything about it, I value your friendship way too much to mess with it, but I just felt like it was dishonest to not tell you. And I wasn’t going to, but then you said… what you said in Aaron’s room, and I guess I got hopeful.” She took a deep breath. Rachel was just staring at her.

“Are you sure?” She didn’t know what she was expecting from Rachel after that declaration, but that wasn’t it. She nodded. “Can we go outside?” Rachel asked, glancing around at the other people in the room. Zoe nodded again. Everyone was still too excited about Chad’s announcement to really pay much attention. They slipped outside quietly and shut the door. There wasn’t much room on Aaron’s doorstep. Zoe held her breath.

“Can I kiss you?” Rachel asked.

-----

Alex watched as Zoe and Rachel snuck out of the apartment. They weren’t always the best at reading humans, but something told them the two girls wouldn’t be back inside for a while.

[captainschmoe]

I Will Survive [Beta] - Chapter 13: Shut the Fuck Up

[A/N: This is one of those chapters where a completely off-the-wall idea popped into my head, and I’m like, “I have to add that. I can’t not add that now that that thought exists.”]

[Summary: In which Sean talks to Mark and then a whole bunch of mood whiplash happens.]

[Previous] [Next]

Knock knock knock.

Sudden silence.

“Mark?”

“Huh?” There was a strong sense of shock in his voice. “Who’s there?”

“What, did you forget my voice already?” Sean opened the door. “Hey, man. It’s me- whoa.” This room was way tinier than the others - in other words, fairly standard for the real world - and so pretty. It was an ocean vista. Bamboo floors and walls, save for the back wall, which opened out to the right and vibrant blues and whites of the sea and midday sky. It even made the sounds of beach life - the ebb and flow of the waves, the calls of seagulls overhead - and yet it didn’t produce the crisp sea breeze, emphasizing the staleness of the indoors Sean hadn’t noticed before that point. He even wondered if it was even a real opening, and not just a really HD projection.

Bamboo cabinets and dressers lined the walls, and in the middle of the room was a single, creaky hammock. And on that lay Mark, face pink and puffy, shaggy hair dangling in his eyes and damp at the tips, arm bandage crusted over with heaping amounts of dried, brown blood. Not at all refreshed from what this room could have potentially been. He sat upright, propping himself on his good arm and resting the bad arm across his lap. His hand looked limp. How much muscle did Anti bite off?

“You okay, buddy?”

“I started thinking you were never gonna show up again.” His voice cracked a bit.

“And I thought the fake you was the real you right up until I got sent here.”

“He puppeted me good, huh...” Mark rubbed his eyes.

“No, he didn’t. I was just a fucking idiot. Looking back on it now-”

“Well, obviously, now that you know, of course it’s gonna make you feel stupid, but it’s fine. It’s fine, everyone else thought it was me, too. Don’t worry about it.”

He sure said that a lot, didn’t he?

“I saw what happened to Ethan,” Sean said. “And I know you’ve already been having a super-rough time of it here, to put it mildly. So I just... wanted to check and see if you were all right.”

Mark sighed, disappointed. He gazed off into the deep blue. “You know, it wasn’t even Ethan that got me.”

Sean was confused. “It wasn’t?”

"No.” Mark turned back to him. “You want to know what I just randomly realized?”

“What’s that?”

“I just...” Sean could practically feel the tears coming back to stain Mark’s face again. “When I was in the clinic, and I saw Ethan... And I saw Amy and Tyler and Kathryn all together, in that r-room... It made me think, th-they’re all down here...” He started shaking so much the hammock posts creaked a bit. “...so that means none- o one’s up in the real world to- to take care of Ch-” He doubled over, hand covering his mouth.

“Oh... I know, I understand.” Chica. God, he loves that dog as if she were his human child.

“And- and on the one hand, like, why did I not think about that earlier?” His voice cracked and squeaked even more. He was almost yelling, as if to force the intermittence away. “Like, why did it take me so long to realize that? I feel so bad for just completely forgetting about her like that. But, but on the other hand, on top of that, why is that the thing that got me? Like, why is it that none of all these human relationships I have, and what’s happening to them, made me get this upset, but the dog did?”

“Mark, that’s normal. You just let it all build up all this time and you hit a breaking point.”

“I know, I just...” Pause. He turned quiet. “I thought I could help.”

Oh, boy. Here it comes.

“I thought I could be someone that people could turn to if they were feeling scared.”

“You thought you could be a hero?”

Mark flinched.

“Signe told me Anti said that, and that you could never be one?”

“Yeah... and I think I see where he’s coming from.”

“Mark, no.”

“I mean...” He shifted and crossed his legs, and swallowed to clear his throat. “That’s all I’ve been trying to do this whole time, is be some kind of positive force that would help keep everyone from falling into total despair and to keep fighting until you showed up. But, like... time just kept going on and on and on and so many more people - our friends, our fans, random strangers - they just kept coming and they just kept waiting, and I think they were starting to catch on that maybe I was full of shit.”

“Mark, stop. What do we always tell you?”

“About what?”

“About doing this to yourself. This...” Sean gestured to his whole body. “This whole degrading-yourself thing.”

“It’s not degrading myself. It’s just giving myself an asskicking.”

“Well, you don’t need an asskicking right now. If you did, trust us; we’d do it for you. You’re not full of shit; you’re full of... normal human emotions.”

It was clear to Sean that Mark wasn’t really absorbing what he was saying.

“Why do you think you need an asskicking for being human? Why do you think you’re overreacting to the thing about Chica? Why do you need to make things so much harder for yourself than they need to be?”

Mark calmed himself with a yogic breath, rubbed his eyes again, and went into his soft, deep voice. “I have two goals in life: to be the best friend I can be to others, and to make myself proud. Those goals are so much more important now than ever before. And I realize now that I’ve completely failed in that regard.”

Sean stared at Mark for a few seconds. He stepped up closer to him, in good range, and turned him by the shoulder. “Mark, look at me.”

“Huh?”

Slap.

The ringing silence practically drowned out the rumble of the waves. The stillness, untouched even by Mark’s breathing. He hadn’t cringed back from it. Hadn’t even grunted or yelped in pain or anything.

He finally spoke: “I guess I deserved that, didn’t I.”

“That wasn’t so much to punish you for anything,” Sean clarified, “as it was to help reset your brain a bit. Your mind’s in a bad spot right now and I can’t have that when I need your help.”

“Help with what?”

“I’m going to be piecing together information about Anti and this world. I’ve already got ideas circulating around just from hearing Signe’s summary of what’s been going on. And I need your help to do that, but I need you to stop being... stop being you for a moment. Know what I mean? Mark, look at me.” Sean tilted his downward-drifting head back up. “If there’s any time where you absolutely need to kick this habit of being this hard on yourself, this is that time.”

Mark nodded, but suddenly caught sight of something behind Sean, scrunching up his face in confusion. “The hell is that?”

Sean looked at the spot next to the door, seeing a mass of bright colors coming through from underneath it. A swirling, seemingly magical, mist of red, green, and blue swimming and darting through the air towards them. Just like how Anti moved around. But Anti’s mist was black and green. That couldn’t be him. Right?

The mist solidified into a white eyeball - a Sam!? - with those same colors patterned over its body. Marvin-themed?

“Sam?” Sean asked. Aw. It was actually really cute.

“The hell? Where’d that thing come from?”

“Hey, don’t talk about my little Sammie boy that way!” But it was a good question.

The Sam looked rather nervous, twisting and turning itself around as if searching for something. It dissolved into the mist again, flying and landing atop the hammock, re-forming itself next to Mark’s thigh.

“You, uh, you looking for somethi- aiiii-yi-yi...”

Sam darted up the leg of Mark’s shorts, making him squirm.

“Ahahahaha!”

“What- What are you doing. Why. Why. Why are you doing that.” He frantically started kicking, to no avail. Standing up didn’t help, either, only making the hammock tip Mark onto the floor - and making the traveling bulge more awkwardly apparent when he did eventually, successfully, get back on his feet.

“Oh, my fucking God...” Sean started coughing, he was laughing so much. What the absolute fuck was it doing?

“Ohhh, God, it tickles. Jack, make it stop. Jack!”

“Wha- How? How. What do you expect me to do, Mark? Reach into your pants and pull it out?”

“It’s out of control, Jack! I figure: it belongs to you, maybe you can get it back in control!”

“Get it out yours-”

Grrrowl!

Slam.

Any remaining laughter in Sean’s belly was obliterated as Anti burst through the door. Both of them froze perfectly still as Anti, beads of blackness momentarily floating from his body like the dots from the ghosts, stared them down from the doorway. Hunched over like an ape, arms dangling by his sides, eyes black and beady, hands with long, lightly-curved claws waiting to sink themselves into someone’s flesh or eyes, knife sheathed through his belt at the hip.

“Hello, y̷̧͜o̷͠u ͢t̵wó̶.” The last remaining dots disappeared, and Anti straightened himself out, a little more like a normal human, with normal white sclerae. He pulled the knife from his belt, giving it a quick twirl between his fingers, and slowly advanced towards them, body swaying as he did so. “I thought I heard your r҉aùc̵ou̴s ͘l̶au͝ght͝e͡r in here.”

“Hey, Anti.” Sean stepped forward, slightly in front of Mark, mimicking Anti’s laid-back posture. “Whatcha doing here?”

“Looking for a little S̢̢a̡̨m͝ flying around the place. I know he’s įn͠ t͏h̛is̛ ̷h͡o̡u͡sę somewhere.” Anti’s voice was somewhat more distorted than Sean remembered from last time.

“No idea what you’re talking about.”

Anti raised an eyebrow. “ S̸a̶m? You know who Sa̢m is, right?” A few of his words sounded like they were getting “jammed” somehow.

“Of course I fucking know who Sam is, but no, I have not seen a Sam anywhere.” Sean made use of his head shaking and natural conversational movements to sneak a peek at Mark’s face, checking to see if he was accidentally giving away Sam’s location. His face was as straight as could be. Guess Sam had settled down and stopped wriggling. He couldn’t tell if it made a visible bulge, and for multiple reasons, Sean wasn’t about to look too closely to find out.

“Let me clarify.” Anti bolted for Sean, grabbing and body-slamming him to the floor, pinning him face-up - and Sean felt that immense pressure once again keeping him from moving. One clawed hand clasped his throat, choking and poking him. Anti’s hot breath seared his face. Sean’s nerves became jittery, his breathing rapid and shallow and needing more effort. “I saw S͘a͢m come down this corridor. Whȩre͟ di̕d h̢e ̴go, S͟ea͜n? I know he’s at̢t͘ách͞ed to us. I know he’d wa͡nt̷ ͡t̕o͞ find͡ ҉y̡ou.”

Sean couldn’t think of an answer. Even if he could, he couldn’t think of a good lie. Something in his gut told him he needed to keep Sam safe at all costs.

“W͜h͝͡e̕r͘͝è̛͟ ̸i͜s͠ ̢h̕͡e͠?͏͘” Anti’s hand crushed Sean’s throat, and his nails dug in further. On instinct, Sean’s arms tried to shove him off, and his legs flailed. All he got for his efforts was a knee slamming down on his groin. “Ơne ̶way ͜or ͠a̵n͠oth- You fuck off!”

Anti released him - oh, sweet air! - and turned around to slash at Mark’s face. “I’m sure you’d l̀o̵ve̡ ͝t͠o͢ p̢lay hero again, wouldn’t you? Did you le͠a̧r͝ņ n͟o͞th̸įn̨g͟ from last time?”

Without Anti paying attention to him, Sean looked to where Sam should have been. Didn’t even look like Mark was hiding anything extra in there. Weird and awkward, but at least it seemed to work. At least he didn’t have to worry about Anti finding him.

He... didn’t really want to think too deeply into how it might have been working.

“I learned that you have this fascination with attacking me and no one else,” Mark said. Four dripping red streaks crossed his cheek. The nightmare. “What did I ever do to you, anyway? You ever gonna answer that for me, buddy?”

“The Dark vs. Anti thing,” Sean said, remembering the texts with the fake Mark. He sat up, feeling too dizzy to stand, and needing to use his arm for balance.

“What?” Mark’s tone suggested confusion rather than surprise. Like it made no sense to him. “No, no, no-”

“Anti literally said to me that the reason he attacked you and me first was because of the Dark vs. Anti thing.”

Anti merely watched the verbal tennis happening between them. Sean swore he saw the faintest of smiles creeping across his face, like he knew something they didn’t - except, unbeknownst to him, they’d already figured it out. Sean kind of wanted to play this mind game with him for a bit; maybe it would make him feel cockily confident enough to leave them alone with their own supposed ignorance. Now if only he could telepathically communicate to Mark his plan, or hope and pray that he would catch on.

“But literally none of the other people who were in that video are down here, and we’re pretty sure none of my egos exist.”

Goddammit.

Whatever smile might have been trying to come onto Anti’s face was immediately flattened. He definitely thought they hadn’t caught on. Yet.

“Unless he needs those people up in the real world, I guess?” Mark added. “I don’t know.”

Sean tried to subtly tell him what he was trying to accomplish here. “Hey, Anti, it’s nice that you’re just standing there letting us try and figure out why you’re doing what you’re doing right in front of you.”

Anti scoffed. “Yòu'̵re ̨l̸ucky I’m not ŗip̛ping͟ y̕ou͡ t͢wò áp̶a̸rt.” His voice grew in pitch and volume. “You have no͘ ҉i̵d͘ęa how i͢nf͜u͢ria҉tinǵ it is that I ͢c͞a͠n'͞t͞ d̷o̸ that!” The knife slashed the air, creating an audible whoosh.

“What’s stopping you?” Mark asked.

“Don’t antagonize him!”

“...The fact that I'l̷l͞ ̷nev́e͟r ͏g̶et͡ w͘h̕a҉t͞ ͘I͘ ̷w͢a̛nt if I do.” Anti gazed down at the knife, holding each end in each hand, sighing. He rubbed his thumb along the edge of the blade, hard enough to cut it and cover it in blood, which he smeared between his fingers. His whole body swayed; his feet carried him in small, irregular shapes across the floor between them, always in constant motion.

Mark looked to Sean, baffled at the sudden shift, pointing to Anti while he wasn’t looking at him, and mouthed What’s his deal?

And when Anti’s fidgeting turned him back around, Sean shrugged and answered, I don’t know.

“Oǹe o̢f ̶thes̕e̴ ̧d͘a̛ys̸...͝” Anti muttered. He scanned the room. The mostly empty room, save for the hammock, which obviously held no secrets. He checked around, violently flinging open all the cabinet doors and dresser drawers - one so hard, he actually lost his grip on his knife, which he retrieved in a split second, sheathing it back in his belt to prevent it from happening again. Sean and Mark silently let him search for Sam. It was more fascinating than anything, seeing him this distraught and calm, and trusting of the fact that neither of them would take the opportunity to get the jump on him while he had his back turned, despite the injuries he’d inflicted on them and their friends. Knowing the truth about his motive, Sean’s heart panged with profound sorrow. Anti was a facet of himself, technically, as much as Jackieboy Man and Chase Brody and Dr. Schneeplestein and Marvin the Magnificent, all of whom he envisioned had perfectly good hearts and the capacity to lead happy lives, even with their personal struggles. Then again, he did say to himself that Anti had a good heart, too, right? He kind of joked when he said that. But... he wanted it to be true. And if he wanted it to be true, given the nature of who Anti was, could he will it into truth? Did he have the power to make Anti happy?

He sure hoped so.

With everything opened, Anti gave up, leaning on the last dresser, head hanging. “I guess there ŗea͟l͡ly̸ is̕n͝'t͠ ̵a͡n͡yw̛h͟ere else͠ to hide in here, isn’t there?” He let out a small whine, and straightened himself out. “I still want to r̨i̛p̡ y̶ou͠ ̕two ͟àp̕a͏rt͡.”

“We love you, too, Anti,” Mark joked.

Growl.

“By the way, have you lost weight or something?”

“Shut up!” A pulse emanated from his body, and he snarled in response to it. “F͟u̸̡c̢k͢͠ ̵̷̢m̢e̶͡͠!̡́ I͝ c̴an'̢t́ ge̕t ̕ánything̸ ͘do̧ne around here!” He made a move for the door, then shuffled back a step. The way he was twitching in place, and throwing glances between the door and the two of them, it suggested that he didn’t really know where he should go next. Eventually, he decided the door, throwing his fists downward and grunting in a childlike fit, dissolving into the mist, and disappearing underneath the door. They waited several seconds, engulfed by the sounds of the ocean “outside.”

Was he really gone? Sean tried to stand up, feeling a wave of lightheadedness as he did so. The sharp pains in his groin were gradually converting to more-bearable aches.

“Here.” Mark held out his hand to help him up. Sean took it, holding on for dear life as the dizzy spell intensified, and only let go when he grabbed hold of the hammock post. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I just need a few.” Already he was starting to recover, at least from the lightheadedness. “Also, the fuck was that last thing you said to him?”

“I know it sounded like the dumbest joke I could’ve cracked, but I swear he actually looked skinnier than the last couple times I saw him. And good God, your throat is bruising.” He brushed a couple fingers over his Adam’s apple.

“Really?”

“Yeah, you’ve got some serious pink going on there.”

“No, I mean: really, Anti looked skinnier?”

“Oh, yeah, like his pants fit looser, stuff like that. Did you get the sense that he’s been getting a lot weaker in general?”

“I don’t know, I’ve only just met him in person for the first time, like, a couple hours ago.”

“Oh, yeah, duh. I knew that.” He laughed a little. “But yeah, I remember the first time I met him...”

Sean’s ears perked up at the new info.

“...he was, like, lightning fast, faster than he was here. Like, speed of light, it was crazy. He could grab me and lift me up with no effort whatsoever. He could pin me to the ground without even touching me. All he had to do was stand near me, and then I felt that- that pressure, you know what I’m talking about?”

Sean nodded. Of course.

“Just standing near me, that pressure would cause my knees to just buckle underneath me. And...” He lifted his bad arm, by the shoulder rather than the elbow. Must not have been able to move his forearm very well. “I’m sure Signe told you about this bullshit that happened the second time I saw him?”

“She sure did.” Ew. He could see the indentation in his arm where the flesh was ripped out. The bandage was turning an old brownish color. “Probably should change that soon.”

“I know I should, but I hate it though, ‘cause it itches so bad. Oh, great, now I’m thinking about it.” Mark resisted the urge to scratch it, sharply putting his arm back down by his side. “But anyway, Anti just seemed more... human this time around? You know what I mean?”

“I think so, yeah.”

“Yeee...” Mark started to squirm again. “Ho, boy, he ’s a-wrigglin’.”

Sam wormed his way to the bottom of Mark’s shorts, flopping down onto the floor.

“Oh, ew! Now I feel all slimy in bad places. As if it weren’t bad enough having him pressed firmly and uncomfortably up against my balls for several terrifying minutes.”

“I... didn’t need to know that.” Wait. “Oh, God, don’t tell me he was inside your underwear, too.”

“Nah, he wasn’t.”

“Okay, good. I was gonna say.” Sean looked down at Sam - tendril whipping around like a cat’s tail - with narrowed eyes. “Are you proud of yourself? You look proud of yourself for causing this conversation to exist.”

Sam didn’t give an answer, only bouncing towards the door. He bumped against it a couple times, looked back at Sean, and bumped it again.

“You want me to open it?” Sean quietly, carefully did as Sam directed. Not too much so - didn’t want to look too suspicious just in case Anti was merely hiding in ambush. Where did he go, anyway, if he wasn’t? For someone so hell-bent on trying to find Sam, he sure gave up pretty quick.

“Coast is clear,” Sean said after scanning the walls and ceiling. “We should probably head back to the top side soon.” He looked back to Mark, who seemed a bit out of it. “You, uh, you okay?”

“Huh?”

“You okay? Like, mental-wise and...” He touched near the scratches on his face. The blood had started to congeal, the thinner streaks crusting over. Were it not for that nightmare Sean had, he might have called it badass.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“You’re not just saying that to...?”

Mark opened his mouth to say something, but seeing Sean’s face, he simply sighed instead. “I’m sorry, I just kinda impulsively said that.”

Sean was so disappointed. Not even annoyed with him anymore. Just... like a disappointed father. “Why do you keep saying you’re fine when you’re not?”

“I guess I just don’t want to...” His hand groped the air, searching for the right word.

“Bother people?”

“Kind of? But, also, like... Mainly, I just don’t like when people worry about me. I don’t know why.”

“Most of why we worry so much is because you keep telling us everything’s fine when we can just sense that it’s not. And I, for one, have a very keen sense of how other people are feeling,” Sean said firmly. “You’re just bottling up everything until it causes you to burst. And this, especially...” Sean’s hand motioned around the corridor. “...is not the fucking place or time for that shit.”

Mark’s gaze drifted to the floor. To Sam.

"Listen.” Sean leaned in a little closer. “Don’t take this as me suddenly hating you or anything.”

“No, no, I didn’t figure that was it.”

“I mean, it’s not like I haven’t done stupid shit myself these past few days.”

“You mean thinking Anti was me? I mean, even Amy told me she didn’t know until it was too late, so don’t feel bad.”

“You know what he said that really bugs me, though?” Sean started slowly walking down the corridor towards the balcony, Mark and Sam following.

“What’s that?”

“I quote, ‘Some people don’t deserve redemption.’”

“Yeesh.”

“That alone should have been the thing that screamed to me, ‘That’s not the Mark we all came to know and love!’ That is the single most un-Mark thing you could’ve said.”

“Sean.” Mark clasped his good hand onto his shoulder, stopping their feet. “If you can forgive me for being an idiot down here, I can forgive you for being an idiot up there. That’s all we are. Is idiots.”

Sean couldn’t help but chuckle at that. “All we’re known for being...”

“Exactly. Now don’t be a hypocrite and tell me not to kick myself in the ass and then turn around and do it to yourself.”

“Okay, but you also have to promise that you’ll look after yourself as much as you look out for others.”

“You sure you want good ol’ Markiplier to make a promise on that one?” he asked with a smirk.

Sean wasn’t amused.

“How about this: can we shake on it?” He extended his right hand - the bad one. It was painfully obvious that he had little use for that hand anymore.

“Can you even move that hand properly?”

“No. Anti took out enough of the muscle that I can’t really move my wrist or thumb much.”

Sean took the hand, anyway, frowning when he felt the weakness. Especially jarring coming from this guy. “Feels weird shaking a limp hand. You know what? How about this instead?” He went in for a hug. It seemed to catch Mark by surprise, judging by the initial freezing before returning it.

“Okay, that works, too, I guess.” Mark gave him a soft pat and rub on the back. Felt nice.

“We good?”

Nod. “We’re good.”

Sean withdrew from the hug as he felt Sam bumping into the side of his shoe. Hmm. “Just in case Anti comes back, shouldn’t we hide Sam somewhere? Somewhere other than your pants?” he remembered to add.

Mark looked down at Sam and shrugged. “The playroom, maybe?” He pointed to the pair of doors they’d just passed, the one next to the vista. “Could camouflage himself pretty well in the ball pit.”

Sean’s jaw dropped. “There’s a motherfuckin’ ball pit?”

“Yeah, there’s a ball pit.”

“Going there now!” Sean made a mad dash for the doors Mark had pointed at, throwing them open. “Holy shit!” he screamed as he took in the new room, laughing. “This is fucking amazing!” Tube slides! Trampolines! Tree houses with suspension bridges! Obstacle course around the edge! Ball pit! And all of it brightly colored and big enough for a kid his age to romp around in! Never in his wildest dreams could Sean have imagined a pocket of unbridled childhood delight to exist in this world.

Sam was eager to play, too, diving straight into the pit, and swimming through the balls. The sight and sound absolutely tickled Sean, and that was before Sam popped back up and looked at him with a little shimmy in his body. Instant heart melt.

“Aw-ha-ha... He’s so fucking adorable!”

“Well.” Jack momentarily uncovered his eye and clicked his tongue. “That happened.”

“What did you see?” Chase asked like an excited young boy.

Jack just shook his head. “Don’t... Don’t fucking ask me that right now. But, good news: Sean is in this world.”

“He is? Yes!” Chase yelled with a fist pump. “Now Sam just has to lead him back to us, right? And we’re good to go!”

“Right!” Jack covered his eye again. “Hopefully they can find a better hiding spot for him.”

“Tsch.” Jackieboy let out the tiniest, snarky laugh. “What did you see, Jack?”

“What? No!”

“What, yes. D͜o̕n'͏t ͝m̛ind͝ m̕e͝.̢ I won’t shake things up too much. I’ll just be sitting here, pa͘ti̢en̸t̷ly͜ wa҉iti̵ng̛, just as you are.”

[sun-flower-siren]

Behind the Mask pt.5

Hi again! I’ve got some stuff to tell you this time!

So, just to start off, this chapter does have some trigger warnings! If you don’t feel comfortable with reading about a little bit of torture?? i don’t actually know how to properly tag it if you have a better word or way to tag burning, let me know so I can fix it), but we’re gonna find out what happened to Marvin’s eyes.

Also a lot of angst, but I’m sure you’ve already figured that bit out.

Another thing I’m gonna say just for the sake of you guys not being confused, I’ve got flashbacks/past events in italics!! Also, Marvin’s thoughts are in bold.

It’s another long chapter since I’m not updating daily, but I hope you enjoy it!

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4

“So, tell me everyzhing, Jackie.”

13 Years Ago

The City was dark today. Darker than normal, anyway.. It always seemed so grey and dull with the cloud of smog constantly clinging to the sky. Of course, the people didn’t help either. But it was darker to Marvin… he missed his brother.

Marv, just a kid, wandered through the streets, watching everyone around him. So much grey and brown covered the town. He was sick of it. He wanted some color. He wanted some red.

He loved red.

He missed his brother.

Marvin didn’t know exactly what happened to him. One day Chase was there, the next he was gone. It wasn’t unusual or anything—people died, people got sick and went away. But every once in a while, someone just….vanished. There was nothing wrong with Chase. He’d been healthy. Marvin was always the sick one…

Marvin held in a sneeze the best he could as he trudged the dismal dirt roads. He sniffled after failing, wiping his nose on his dirty sleeve. He eventually made it back into the house he and Chase lived in. It was really quiet without him. Of course, it had been like this for about a month now.

Maybe he found a way out.

Yeah, that’s what Marvie kept telling himself.

What if *he* found him?

Marvin didn’t want to think about that. Their leader  was known for being even more cruel than the police force. Marv didn’t know why someone so evil was in charge; he wished he could just forget about his life. He sighed to himself, pulling his bit of bread out of his pocket. He didn’t know what to do with the other half—he always split it with Chase.

Marv looked around the empty room, particularly at the old mattress on Chase’s side of the room. After finishing his bread, he slowly moved himself over to sit on said mattress. He hadn’t slept on his own side of the room for a week. But… wait.

Something was different this time.

There was something lumping up the bottom corner of the mattress. He slowly pulled the corner back—the mattress was ancient and soft enough that it just rolled like a piece of paper—and stared at the little jar that had randomly appeared. It was a glass jar, but the glass was black.

Marvin pulled it to his lap, staring at the jar.

What was inside?

Where did it come from?

He shrugged it off and opened the jar, eyes widening when he saw the contents. Red paint.

Red paint?

He dipped his finger in and back out, staring at his now red fingertip in awe. Had this jar been there this whole time? Why would Chase have had red paint?

Marvin pulled his sleeve back with his fourth and fifth fingers, then smoothed the paint from his finger onto his wrist. He grinned a little to himself, pulling out more paint and making a red design all the way up his arm.

He didn’t remember falling asleep like that.

Not until it was too late.

“I didn’t know he would paint himself with it… Chase worked so hard to make the paint for him and just wanted him to have it so bad… I couldn’t tell him no, Doc. He was just a kid..” Jackie sighed.

Henrik did end up bringing the liquor back out. Jackie had a higher tolerance than most of them, anyway. He poured another shot in both their teacups.

“Could he not vash zhe paint off?”

“No… There’s a shift once a month that we have to do a midnight patrol.. And that… it wasn’t my night. One of the others found him. And the people around town were talking about how his eyes glowed sometimes. How he looked like me. They were figuring him out… the paint was just the last straw, I guess.”

Marv was scared. He was terrified. Nothing good came from being dragged to the capitol first thing in the morning.

“So, think you can break the law, huh? Just cos you’re a kid?” an officer spat at him, grabbing Marv by his hair.

The boy yelped, trying to push his hands away, but the brute had too strong a grip on him. Marvin still struggled to get away. Until…

What was that hissing?

Marvin paused in his useless flailing to try to crane his neck toward the sound. Another man in black was carrying an iron pot at his left side, holding it as far from his body as he could manage. Whatever was making that popping, sizzling sound was in that pot.

A slimmer officer strolled up in front of Marvin, leaning down to look him in his tear-welled eyes.

“You like colors so much, you little shit? Maybe now they’ll be all you see,” he sneered.

Jackie paused again. He wanted to cry, but… Maybe he had just cried himself dry. Maybe he didn’t have any tears left. He felt numb at this point. He took in a last shaky breath.

“I took that hot oil and poured it across his eyes. I don’t know how he wasn’t completely blinded… but… then the others took him inside.”

Marvin couldn’t focus. He couldn’t feel anything anymore. Well, his eyes had swollen shut. He’d shut them as tight as he could when he knew what was happening.

He thought he was moving or… well… being moved. He wasn’t sure, though. He couldn’t focus well enough. His ears were ringing.

A voice.

Two voices.

Then one again.

“Look at me.”

He wasn’t sure why that came so clearly. But he couldn’t.

“Did I stutter, you shit?” It was angry.

Marvin tried his best to force his eyes open, and the stinging hell forced the numbness away. He cried out, giving up on that. He thought he could hear footsteps.

The original voice was closer now, and the door opening and closing filled his ears. Marvin was shaking, but the numbness was starting to return. He felt fuzzy, like he was going to pass out. He wanted to just sleep. He really wanted to wake up and this all be a nightmare. He just wanted Chase back.

“I said fucking l͟͜ớ͞o͏͢͠k̢ a҉̨̢t̶͘͠ ̢̕m̷ę!”

Marvin cried harder as he felt fingers shove into his cheeks and eyebrows, forcing his eyelids apart. He took in ragged breaths, wheezing and whining in between half-sobs. He couldn’t see anything. He knew his eyes were open. He knew very well that his eyes were open.

The voice, though… It was rough and scratchy… Like this man hadn’t had a drink in two weeks. And oddly… separated? Like it wasn’t just one person.

He should have known.

“Hell͡͡o̡,” the voice sang. “Oh, you c̀an'͟t ͠s͜ee͏ me can you? That’s too  ̶b̷a͟d̕..̨.”

Ḭ̶̼̥ͅ'͖̳̘̥̺̻̀l̵̗͖l̴̘ ͎̹̮̘h̛̬a̢v̩̹̹͕̱e̻̥͕̞͖̖͘ ̧̘̰ͅt̷̫̣o͓̻͔͍̯̦̣ ͇̜͓̩́f̵̰i͍̳̗̖̜̰̠x̹̞͍ ͓̙̠̘̺̣͘t̹̰͉̥̫̥h͉̪̻̣̦̥̟a̴͈̞t̫̫͉̀,̜̺͙͜ ̪̖̹̱ͅw̺̟o҉̮̼͔̲̖͎ͅn̞̟̮̗̩'͚̥͓͇̘͖̤͝t̜ ̸I?̝̰̕

 Marvin didn’t hear that. He knew that the man said it, but he didn’t physically hear it.

I̷'҉m ̵in yo͢ur̶ mįnd n͡òw͞,̷ ͞M͢a̕rvi͟e̶ b̷̧͇̗̰͉̠̘͚̭̣͈͖͇͜͟͝ǫ̶͡҉͈͉̻͎͔͎̩̩̳̣y͟͡҉̴̧̮̣͖͉

Marv was terrified. He tried to back away from this… whatever it was. But he ended up tripping over his own feet and hitting his back.

“W-Who are you?”

For some reason, a face showed up in his head. It was a man with dark brown hair and a maniac smile. He had dark veins and… his eyes… One was just black, sclera and all. Just unending oily black… The other, though, was blue but… The white of his eye was tinted a sickly green.

M͠y ̛n̵̸͟a͜m͞e ̨͢i͝s̸̨̨ ̶̷̨Ś̨̕ea̶͢n.

Marvin woke with a start, gasping for air and heart racing. He knew he’d had a nightmare. He didn’t remember much about it, though. But he would never forget those eyes. He restarted the phonograph and laid back once again.

The doctor held a hand up to silence Jackie, listening as the music started again. These walls were enough that Marvin wouldn’t hear them but he wanted to be sure that the youngest ego was still in his room. When he was sure, Henrik let his hand back down.

“Zo you don’t know vhat happened in zhere?”

“No, Doc. Nobody but him knows what happened when he went inside the capitol. If he remembers… That kind of trauma… He did forget a lot of things.”

“Like Chase?”

Jackie stared at his feet. “Yeah, like Chase.”

The doctor sighed after a long silence.

“Jackie, you must forgive yourself. You chose zhe oil so nobody vould realize he was an ego, correct? To change his face? Und if it vas too soon to get him out of zhe City, i zhink you did vhat you zhought vas best. Horrible as it may be, you did zhe right zhing.”

Jackie cracked a half smile, though he wasn’t sure he would ever be able to forgive himself.

The next morning was louder than breakfast usually was. Jack and Marvin were making pancakes while Henrik, Jackie, and Chase all sat at the table chatting away. Every once in a while, the doctor would notice a morose glance from Jackie, but he never let it stay long. Chase was too busy catching him up with stories of all the cool little toys he’d been making. He was close to one that flew.

Suddenly, though, Chase paused and leaned back to listen into the kitchen. When he was sure the others were too busy to pay attention to him, he continued his animated story and slipped a paper-wrapped parcel toward the doctor.

‘Already?’ the doctor mouthed to him. He’d expected it to take longer.

Chase merely smiled and nodded.

The doctor could hardly contain his joy, and he definitely couldn’t contain his smile. He immediately immediately undid the string tying it together and lifted the paper. They were perfect. He only hoped that they would really help, but he wouldn’t be sure until Marvin tried them. He tucked them into his pocket, smiled still plastered all over his face.

“Go on, Doc. I’ll be here a couple more days,” Jackie coaxed him.

The good doctor stood quickly, fixing his jacket and striding into the kitchen.

“Marvin? Vould you come vith me a moment, please?”

Marvin glanced over his shoulder at the doctor, then went back to Jack.

“Can you handle this for a bit, Jack?” he asked, flipping a perfect pancake with the skillet.

Jack noticed the way the doctor’s eyes were lit up and he knew. Of course, he’d been in Chase’s room the last night helping him interpret the doctor’s writing. So he knew that the glasses were finished.

“I’ll be fine!”

Marvin nodded to him, following the doctor back toward the… stairs? He was surprised when they stopped in the stairwell landing.

“What’s up?”

“I hav somezhing for you, but.. close your eyez. Surprise.”

Marvin gave him a skeptical stare, but did as he was asked. It was odd that Schneep would have a gift for him… Actually, it wasn’t.

Schneep had given him all the books he wanted, he’d given him Jackie’s mask… Schneep was even the one that suggested putting the phonograph and a few records in Marvin’s room. It wasn’t unusual at all. Marvin supposed it was the way he was going about it.

Marvin couldn’t help but smile as he waited. Of course he was excited, and he could tell the doctor was excited. That was a rare sight, an actually oddity.

Schneeplestein wondered, knowing what he did now, how Marvin found it in him to be so trusting. He wondered how Marvin kept smiling.

Marv felt the mask being pulled off his face gently, to be replace with a weight on the bridge of his nose and his ears. He reflexively scrunched.

“Alright, und open.”

Gasp! Did the glasses work??? We’ll find out next time!

Also, I’m sorry this chapter is so long! I was gonna end it earlier, but I didn’t feel right leaving you with all that angst! Cute things to come, I promise!

Thanks for reading!

@poddlelover162

@magic-marvin-protection-patrol

[chiimei]

A New Path - Chapter 13

I got now beta’s for my fanfic @chatlovingshipper and Tjikicew (of AO3), so I hope it would read more pleasant. x3 Also for those who didn’t know by now or to avoid disappoint later on. This would be a nathclo fic. I’m really sorry for those who doesn’t ship them. For those who won’t read my fanfic because of that, thank you for reading till now. 

C.1 | C.2 | C.3 | C.4 | C.5 | C.6 | C.7 | C.8 | C.9 | C.10 | C.11 | C.12 | 

FF | AO3

To think she, Chloé Bourgeois, had to sit next to this red-haired arrogant rude artist the whole day. This was pure torture. Not only that, even her phone was confiscated. Now she needed to do her assignments, but like Nathaniel said, she didn’t understand anything. Just looking at the first problem already gave her a headache. She glanced at Nathaniel who seemed to work seriously on his assignments. She didn’t want to admit it, but if she wanted to go, she might need his help. Or should she try to, fill everything out and make it look like she did her best. She could attempt to guess everything or maybe, even write something random.

“You seem to be troubled. Want my help, drama queen?”

Nathaniel grinned as he watched Chloé intensely. She on the other hand, pouted and looked at her paper instead. She won’t admit defeat, not to him.

“Stop that. At least leave out that ‘drama’ part. And no, I don’t need the help from someone like you.”

She would prove herself, she would make him go away. He would admire her if she finishes everything before him. With that mindset, she started to write whatever came in her mind when she read the questions.

Nathaniel was surprised how serious Chloé appeared. What do you know, she really worked on those assignments on her own. Maybe she could do it if she put her mind to it. Well, not that he truly cares about her. He would just finish his own work, hand in those assignments and get his sketchbook back before Chloé is done.

“Well, I’ve finished. So, I’m leaving. See you tomorrow, queen.”

He grinned one more time, just to show off he wrapped up the tasks this quickly. There was no way that Chloé would be done by now as well. So, he didn’t even glance back and just went down to deliver the assignments to miss Bustier. He did feel quite bad leaving Chloé alone, maybe he should wait for her or help her after all? Nah, Chloé said she was fine doing it on her own. She didn’t need his help, so hey there was no need to reach out to her and help her.  

“Wait! I’ve completed them too!”

Chloé had instantly risen.  She smiled brightly and proudly at Nathaniel.  Even though she might have made a lot of mistakes, she still had finished it. Her hand hurt excruciatingly, but she wouldn’t complain about it. It was worth it to see that dumbfounded face on Nathaniel.

“I told you I could do it. I’m Chloé Bourgeois after all. I only let Sabrina do all my work so she would get smarter and rest my brain. It’s good for her to learn new things, when I know everything already.”

Nathaniel was still speechless. He never thought she would be this fast. He thought she wasn’t but some stupid rude selfish spoiled evil queen, but maybe she wasn’t that stupid. The other characteristics would always be part of her though.

“Show me… Show me your assignments then.”

He held his hand out, so Chloé could hand them over. She might have just blurted it out, bluffed even, because she didn’t want to be left alone. However, that would be, strange. She might not want to spend more time with him, so maybe she didn’t lie this time. Though he still wanted to confirm it and check if she didn’t just answered it randomly.

“No way, you can’t command me, tomato boy.”

She almost hissed at him. There was no way she would hand them over. She was sure Nathaniel would check them and maybe even correct them. She got no time for that. So, she pushed Nathaniel aside and ran downstairs. Step by step, she would get closer to miss Bustier. She would hand those papers in and then, then she could finally get her hands-on Nathaniel’s sketchbook.

She could hear Nathaniel calling after her, but she ignored him. She would just run full speed to the teachers room. No one could stop her. No one. She will get her hands on that sketchbook, no matter what.

“Oh Chloé. Is there something the matter? Any questions to the assignments?”

Miss Bustier glanced up from her desk. She was checking the homework of her students. She was already in a good mood to see that everyone was doing well on their homework, even Kim improved. Maybe Max helped him. Max, Sabrina and Adrien were the top students in her class and she was very proud of them. However, she wished that everyone could do as well.

“No Miss, I’ve resolved all of them!”

“As in, solved, Chloé?”

Miss Bustier expression became as dumbfounded as Nathaniel’s had been, which offended Chloé immensely. Did they think she was that stupid? She was also smart, so smart she didn’t even know.

“Let me check.”

Miss Bustier smiled brightly, she was so proud of Chloé working so hard. Maybe she just needed a push to work seriously on her schoolwork.  She started to review, but soon her face fell. In the end, she sighed slightly.

“Chloé, I’m going to red pencil all your answers by tomorrow. I will return them to you and you should correct your mistakes. You can’t just write what pops up into your head. You should put some thought in those questions. And if you don’t understand, search it up in your books.”

What? How dare she talk like that! She did very well! At least she finished it on her own, instead of asking for Nathaniel’s help. She wouldn’t bent that low as to ask for help.

Miss Bustier quickly scanned all the papers and smiled slightly to Chloé. Every question was answered, so maybe she had worked seriously on this. She opened her drawer and took Chloé’s phone out.

“Well, you finished everything, so that’s good. You can have your phone back and go home, Chloé.”

As soon as miss Bustier held out her phone, Chloé almost snatched it out of her hand. She just missed her phone so much. Though, her phone wasn’t the only thing that caught her attention. She gazed down at Nathaniel’s sketchbook and smiled, in what she hoped to be a convincing way, to her teacher.

“Can I have Nathaniel’s sketchbook as well? I will return it to him.”

“There’s no need for that, Nathaniel is already here.”

Miss Bustier nudged her head towards Nathaniel’s direction and smiled kindly to him. Wondering why Chloé would be interested to have Nathaniel’s sketchbook. However, she understood the displeasure it would cause Nathaniel.  She doubted he’d allow her to hand the sketchbook over to Chloé.

“Are you done with your assignments as well, Nathaniel?”

Nathaniel smiled graciously back to his teacher and nodded. He placed the assignments on her desks and she glanced at them. Her smile didn’t disappear, instead, she seemed rather proud.

Just looking at the first few answers, she could already see that Nathaniel got the gist of the questions. He did very well. Maybe this time he would get a better grade for the test as well. She couldn’t stop beaming as she took Nathaniel’s sketchbook out of her drawer.

“Well done, Nathaniel. Here’s your sketchbook. You both can leave now, be safe going home okay?”

Chloé glared at the sketchbook before nodding. She would get her claws on that sketchbook.  After all this time, she didn’t want to give up. Even though she could just go to another artist, there are many freelancers anyway, she absolutely needed to see what’s inside the sketchbook.

Nathaniel noticed that Chloé was still gazing at his sketchbook. Even after they walked out of school, she kept ogling his schoolbag from time to time. He put his treasured sketchbook in his bag so it wouldn’t get snatched out of his hands. However, he was forever afraid Chloé would try to steal it. He sighed and pointed to the park. He didn’t want her irritating him again about this tomorrow. If he understood her well enough, she wouldn’t give up so easy. She was a crazy, stubborn girl after all.

“Let’s go to the park. I will show you my sketchbook. Only this once, okay?”

Chloé crossed her arms and glared at Nath, as if he said something wrong again. Then she averted her eyes by moving her head to the right while Nath was standing on her left.

“Hmpf, as if I want to thumb through your stupid sketchbook. However, since you’re offering it so nicely to me now, I will just peek a little bit. It will only happen today! I don’t need to see it again in the future.”

Nathaniel rolled his eyes and walked to the park, without even waiting for Chloé to follow. He sat on the bench and got his sketchbook out of his bag.

“You know, I still don’t get why you want to view my sketchbook. Can’t you just tell me the reason without lying?”

“I’m not lying. I just want to see it okay.”

Chloé snatched the sketchbook out of his hands and leafed through the pages slowly. She was being careful when she flipped page to page. She didn’t want to rip anything after all… Not that she cared anyways.

“They’re… quite good.”

“Thanks, I never though you would praise me.”

Nathaniel smiled sincerely and was quite happy that even Chloé admitted he was good at drawing. That was a pleasure to hear. She always insulted him, so this was nice. If only she could be friendlier and do this more often, then people would like her more.

“So, what do you actually want? You don’t just want to browse through my sketchbook, right?”

Chloé blushed a bit, realizing how stupid she had been to praise this guy. Though… seeing his smile wasn’t so bad. It gave her a good feeling. She liked that.

She knew Nathaniel wouldn’t believe her whatever she said, which was quite annoying.  She rolled her eyes before sighing.  She got no choice but to tell why she wanted to view the drawings.

“Fine, I just wanted to request a drawing. I want you to draw Vulpino.”

“Vulpino? Why do you want me to draw him?”

Nath felt a mix of flattering and confusion. Why would Chloé want him to draw Vulpino?  Had she a hidden agenda?  He glared suspiciously at her and wondered about her intentions.  But could she be, his first fan?  That would be quite sweet, maybe… if Chloé stopped being clingy and just be kind to him, then he would be glad, very glad.

“Not telling you! It’s a secret and something personal. So, are you going to do it or not? Considering I want you to show the real deal, if you do draw him.  His abs, the different shades of his suit, his tail, his ears, ... all of what defines him!  What makes him, Vulpino!”

Did it really matter to him?  He might ask her as Vulpino. Who knows. Hopefully Chloé wasn’t planning any mischief. That had him a little worried, but drawing himself is a pretty funny idea actually.

“Well fine. You’ll stop bugging me if I draw it, alright?”

“As if I ever irritated you.”

Chloé crossed her arms again and gazed forwards, neglecting Nathaniel. She acted annoyed, but was actually quite happy to hear that he was willing to do it.

“You even gripe me now.”

Nath sighed and grabbed his sketchbook back. He would just try to finish it today, so Chloé would leave him alone soon. It was getting late though, he hoped he could finish it anyway.

“You should be honored that I spend my precious time with you, instead of treating me so disrespectful. Besides that, how much?”

“How much what?”

“How much do you want to get paid, you idiot. Nothing in this world is for free. You’re an artist, isn’t that some kind of a job or something. We’re not even friends, so I bet you weren’t going to draw for free. So? How much? I have enough money to pay you, poor tomato. Aren’t all artists broke? I will be your patron, so you can feed yourself.”

In all honesty, Nathaniel never expected to be compensated for his work. He hardly suspected that Chloé would treat him this seriously, all business-like when she talked money. Maybe she would become some bossy company woman in the future. Though she was still insulting him.

“I don’t receive pocket money, so you’re not wrong there. I also don’t work yet, so yes, I’m broke.  However, I’m still a kid and I’m not sure if I’m allowed to accept your payment, without my parents’ permission. So, it would be for free.”

“Age doesn’t matter when it comes down to business. Though you are right about getting authorization by your parents. However, as I’m Chloé Bourgeois. Your parents will consent after hearing my name. So, don’t worry. I suggest 30€. You’re fine with that?”

What?! 30€? That’s a lot. He never got money from selling his art, so he wasn’t sure if that was over- or underpaid. However, he considered it a lot of money. Should he just accept this? It was kind of a business agreement. He would work for Chloé, by drawing Vulpino.

“Okay, suck up and accept.  Regardless, I don’t take no for an answer. I’m heading for home now, I expect that drawing soon.”

Well, well, wasn’t she seemly today? Maybe she wasn’t so bad after all. Though should he even consider this decent or professional? He didn’t know, but he’d bet that she must’ve handled some business or something? Or perhaps she just shopped a lot.

“I still wonder why she wants me to draw Vulpino…”

[ Next Chapter ]

[kinardstits]

that ffxv review I owed y’all

I know I told y’all I’d have this up before the end of 2016 but honestly, I’ve just haven’t been in the mood. today tho /inhales deeply/ today is a perfectly salty day for this.

(spoilers ahead, of course)

tbh, I don’t even know where to start. ffxv was shock full of potential but somehow, square managed to fall short in pretty much EVERY front.

I’ll start with maybeee the easiest part, characters: this need to be broken down into two distinct groups tho cos holy crap, people.

main characters: despite ignis’ lack of everything during the game (he was definitely the least worked character), the main bros are great. I loved their bond, I’m forever grateful that we never actually got a no homo moment and honestly, there isn’t a single one of them that is just straight up unlikeable - tho I DO have my issues with Gladio. oh boy, DO I HAVE THEM.

point is, yeah, they’re great. they are also in need of more background, except noctis.

‘but bekas, we had brotherhood!’ yeah we did, but would it have hurt to have some banter with prompto, wondering if his parents’ made it out okay of insomnia? we know they weren’t at home when prompto went to try and show them his crownsguard outfit (which we also only know from ANOTHER extra piece of media that is not the bloody game) but they could have been in the city, still? prompto literally never worries, or is never given the chance to. at this point, I’m guessing the argentum family (who adopted him at age 1) is made up of ghosts. that or prompto doesn’t care, which is laughable, since that little ball of sunshine cares about everything. so it’s just missing info. plus, the MT plotline? an UTTER MESS but I’ll get there further down the post.

what about gladio? ‘but bekas, he’s the royal bodyguard, he needs to have his head in the game!’ royal bodyguard didn’t have his head in the game twice during the campaign and is given NO opportunity to open up about WHY. example: he could have shown the tiniest bit of concern/mourning over his father during the titan chapter. I mean, it couldn’t have been too hard to shoe in a line or two, just anything to let the less eagle eyed players know that one of the reasons why he’s flying off the handle is because he’s also dealing with his father’s passing, right? chapter 10 is another can of worms: would it have hurt to have gladio actually tell us WHY he’s being a giant mountain of salt instead of having him nearly punching noctis out of his boots and being an absolute ass to ignis (and no, I don’t care about possible excuses you might send my way: when he answers ignis’ “that proved to be a challenge” with a salty/rude “what did you expect” to which ignis can only sigh, all understanding I might have felt just went completely out of the window cos WOW. NO, YOU ASSHOLE.)? ‘but bekas, we kinda know why, everything went to hell?’ true but we never get to hear gladio open up. EVER. THAT’S WHAT’S MISSING HERE, an oportunity to show that gladio is more than the bloody shield, he’s a human with feelings too. this way, it’s really hard to sympathize with him and that’s where square screwed up.

ignis then, he needed a lot more. he’s always there, he’s the group’s pillar but he barely has any exposition? I mean, we barely know anything from his early life (yeah yeah, trains to be advisor, learns how to cook cos of noctis but what else? there has to be something else, right??) and he barely has an actual part in the game besides being the advisor until shit hits the fan? I mean, he gets blind in chapter 9 and then blows up at gladio and noctis in 10 so we get a peek at what is going on with him but that’s literally it, he doesn’t get to express it any more. it almost as if his role was to be yet another victim of ardyn to fuel noctis’ rage cos post chapter 10, it’s almost as if he didn’t need to be there. ignis scientia deserved better 2kforever.

side characters: /BURIES FACE IN HANDS, GROANS FOR FOREVER/ YOU KNOW, WE GOTTA BEAT THE DEAD HORSE A LIL’ MORE. WE GOTTA. F E M A L E S.

gentiana was just. there. in a couple scenes. to be a plot device. explain some lore to young!noctis/the players, give him the oracle’s trident, become one of the summons and pop up in a couple photographs cos why not?

iris is the little sister, too smol, too cute, too in love with noctis to be anything else in the main game. THEN they give her a badass rank off screen and lmao, never mention her or show her ever again. nice.

aranea has more characterization than luna AKA the main lady and that says everything tbh. still, her change of mind is never given the proper attention it deserves and so it ~just happens~ and the players have to roll with it cos of course they have. also, she pops up randomly to help you for some reason. wherever you might be in the globe as well, cos she has amazing tracking abilities. /snaps fingers/ just. like that. aranein, araneout, no small talk.

LUNA. oh my GOD, luna. girl shows up more times in FLASHBACKS post-death than in life. her lines could fill up a whole page, if it was written in arial, size 18 and with extra distance between words. she was the plot device to end all plot devices, just THERE to give noctis strength and then fuel his hate against ardyn, just like ignis. except she dies to save noctis. cos of course she does. oh, and she was dying already, apparently. the covenant price and all, which I honestly only realized was a thing after browsing through tumblr. A+ STORYTELLING /JAZZ HANDS/ also, she’s what connects noctis and ravus, two characters that were supposed to be parallel to one another (AKA who noctis could have become had his life gone to hell as a kid and he had made all the wrong choices) but that never actually realize it was supposed to be that way cos they meet up twice and ravus is barely non existent oops~

‘but bekas, kingsglaive---’ kg!luna and xv!luna are two entirely different characters, not to mention that one should not have watch kingsglaive to understand the main game’s HEROINE. H E R O I N E. do y’all see my problem here?? luna was hailed as the heroine to end all heroines, that one character all the other heroines strive to be but can never reach but in the end, you can count the scenes luna has in the game before her death in one hand and one of them is OPTIONAL. OPTIONAL.

but then again, the males are also ??? ravus; what exactly is his deal, again? what is he trying to do, what is he even thinking?? ‘... bekas, square said they’ll add to chapter 13 soon---’ they SHOULDN’T HAVE TO. in what world, in what company meeting, do they come forward and say ‘x character needs to do thing in order to achieve that other thing cos their motive is that third thing’ and people just think it’s a-okay to skip straight to the ending cos lmao, it isn’t important? only to have fans tell them afterwards that err YES, IT IS? and only then do they get off their asses to let us know? it’s bad writing, TERRIBLE writing. one thing is not to act like your costumers are dumb but another to act like they an read your mind??

excuse me, but this just--- fast forwards to the main problem this game has and honestly, I’m done beating around the bush: it’s incomplete. final fantasy xv doesn’t know what the hell it is doing until chapter 11.

we start with the bros leaving insomnia to catch a boat to altissia, but everything goes to hell when insomnia falls and the king dies. then cor shows up, tells noctis he has to step up and, that to have a fighting chance, he needs to grab the royal arms and complete the armiger. okay, so far so good but THEN, surprise, luna has been going around the globe creating covenants with the gods so that they give noctis a chance to receive their marks (which couldn’t she have told noctis about in their notebook?? instead of having the guy GUESS why titan’s ugly ass mug kept yelling at him in his head?? umbra is a divine messenger, I’m pretty sure your message wouldn’t have been intercepted????) so off we go to accept ramus’ mark and then leviathan’s, COMPLETELY FORGETTING ABOUT THE PREVIOUS PLOTLINE OF THE ROYAL ARMS. It’s like it vanishes, forget the arms!!! we got gods, people!! then altissia goes to hell, luna dies, ignis is blind and they set off to gralea to grab the crystal, as if all of their other goals didn’t matter any more. they just grab the royal arm at the tomb cos it’s convenient, not cos it’s necessary.

only when we leave the mines and set off towards tenebrae does the game actually start to play out like it knows where it needs to go and how to get there and even then, it has hiccups: the entirety of ravus’ character arc, prompto is one of the people who were bred to become MTs (which lmao, happens so that prompto manages to open up a door, we have a few pats in the back and then is never mentioned again. EVER. no banter/scene in which these guys, who have been talking of MTs as soulless and machines and monsters, discuss the fact that prompto was to become one of them. if there was a chance he might be particularly affected by the scourge, given the experiments. how did he reach insomnia. if ardyn had done something to him that could have a problem given said experiences. NOTHING. ‘bekas, but is it really needed to, it’s meant to look like it’s really not a problem’ gladio fucking off for a chapter is not a problem, it’s just weird; prompto being revealed to be a niff and a test subject IS something that we need to discuss. it’s kind of a big plot point???? you don’t drop a bomb like that and vault over it.)...

then there’s 10 years that somehow square thinks it’s a-okay to cover with talcott filling noctis in and no?? no, it’s not? gladio is apparently engaged, ignis apparently still cooks for cid I guess??? prompto has been hanging around hammerhead for 10 years doing nothing besides hunting and we’re supposed to be fine with that offhand info? we needed at least one catching up scene and I mean, AN ACTUAL CATCHING UP SCENE. not noctis telling the others that they need to catch up, ignis suggests we go inside and we have a fade to black before you’re back in control of noctis and your mission objective is to leave for insomnia.

the fact that we never have a scene in which noctis tells his BROTHERS that his duty is to die and their duty is to make sure he gets there is unforgivable. it took him 10 years to come to terms with his duty (which brings me to another point which is--- nobody thought to tell the chosen one what exactly he was meant to do when he reached maybe 18 years old? so he could come to terms with it in time? noooo, just let him know he’s chosen for lord knows what and let the hammer fall when it has to, I’m sure the knowledge that everyone was hiding that important tidbit is not translated into betrayal somewhere in noctis, which totaaaally won’t make accepting his fate harder, I’m sure /SHRUG), are we supposed to believe that the bros would have been a-okay with it? no objections, no outbursts, nothing?

gladio I can see keeping his cool, maaaaybe ignis as well but prompto? he may have matured but I’m sure he had something to say about his bestfriend returning after 10 years and then telling him ten minutes later ‘I have to die’. and no, the final campsite doesn’t make up for it. at all. that’s an after-the-bomb-drops scene, we needed to watch the actual bomb dropping, in my honest opinion.

then when it comes to the actual game--- the sidequests are boring (it’s literally fetch x rock for dino/dyno/whatever, fetch tag for dave, hunt for frogs for frog lady, do hunts, fetch berry for diner lady, fetch x for takka, fetch x for cid and cindy, fish x fish, take x photo, help x chocobo... did I actually miss any sidequest??), the post game dungeons are literally copy paste of each other (except maybe 3 at most), pitioss is smart but mostly a nightmare for a lousy accessory, the game’s big ass boss is nothing but grinding (there are monsters in the dungeons that inflict more damage than the adamantoise and it’s ridiculous)...

all in all, the game IS fun to play. it is, I have nearly 150h in it, but in insight, it’s seriously lacking. you can tell the team was rushed to finish it and honestly, I understand why, but 6 more months would have done miracles in maybe 49% of all I mentioned here.

here’s to hoping the dlc that is to be released fixes some of these issues.

ps: if you think I forgot to mention anything, let me know cos at some point while writing this, I just lost track of my point in the salt valleys!

/bekas out

[gray-anxiety]

No Sympathy Facts/ the chaos of my brain

I kept forgetting the damn name

Legit

Like “No… no wHAT????? Oh”

Aella is a name associated with storms and wind, so I gave her that name because I wanted someone who really did embody that

I kept wanting to spell Aella’s name allen smh

This book started when i finally got off my ass and convinced myself to do a mafia au. The entire plot was pulled out of my ass in a period of brainstorming that kept me up until 5:30 the next morning

I actually sketched out the apartment’s layout so I could see it better.

later I actually designed a messy version of what it’d somewhat be like in the sims

Karanese is actually a district in the Attack on Titan universe :)

Each chapter takes me like 2 hours to write simply because I play out each and every ending in my head and choose the best one I’d want to see in a story

Other times I legit just have a feeling like I absolutely know how a chapter plays out like Chapter 3’s murder fight scene. It just came to me and all I had to do was describe it like I had just watched a movie

Chapter one took a total of seven hours to write

The plot twists were created when I asked myself what cliche can I change?

(Except I kept a few just to make fun of it I.E. roommates and badboy x nerdy character because that shit is hilarious and can really show the dynamic of how different each character really is)

Chapter two bore me to death to be honest

An actual example of my brainstorming while writing down facts:

I have no idea what the fuck to do after chapter 3 help

I pretty much said fuck it to planning out a plot and just wung it

Where am I gonna place Hange and the others

What about Eren lol

OH SHIT I JUST HAD THE IDEA THAT HANGE AND AELLA WERE FRIENDS BEFORE AELLA WAS KICKED OUT AOUFHALIUEHFALIUEHF

THEY’D TOTALLY BE LESBIANS FOR EACH OTHER

How’d you come up with the name for No Sympathy?

hilarious answer, actually. I spent two damn hours laying on my bed googling “what’s your mafia nickname” to just messing around with broken languages on google translate until it just popped in my head. Pretty much I was like “oh shit that sounds lit and fearsome lets do it bois” and yeah

I’m actually making this list of fun facts while writing each chapter. I’m going to start working on chapter 4 tomorrow and hopefully get my shit together to make a somewhat good plot??

Lmao I lied I got really fucking lazy and wrote the chapter at 11 at night and published it at midnight

I wrote everything about no sympathy in one iCloud note and titled it “No sympathy; the complete chaos of making a book”

The true main character of No Sympathy is actually Levi since I feel like I understand him completely since I relate to him so much; making Levi the easiest character I’ve written about ever. Though, his true character (in my opinion) doesn’t necessarily shine through in the beginning chapters as Levi don’t get along with new people, but you can see him warm up to Aella by doing her homework, dragging her out of the party, etc.

I’ve realized I have a distinct writing pattern while writing No Sympathy: comma, semi-colon, double dash. (Chapters two and three really showcase it as I wrote those two back to back in the car)

Had I actually had the inspiration and the motivation to write this almost a year ago, I would’ve been writing about the mafia at 13, which is an absolute hilarious thought to think about when I look back to my previous fanfics. Then again, my dumbass 14-year-old self is just as clingy as my dumbass 13-year-old self lmaoo

I gave Aella the same birth day (not year lmao) as mine (September 10) so she’d be 17 during the first month of school and 18 for the rest of the book

Going off of that fact, Levi is exactly 1 year and 8 months older than Aella (I kept his original birthday)

My cat demanded that I gave him cuddles and attention so I had to stop writing for one entire day because he wanted cuddles

Normally my cat just lays on my chest while I write b u t n o he wanted cuddles

If Levi never came into the picture Aella would probably date Hanji (for all of those fellow LGBTQIA+ readers and readers that really love Hanji)

While writing chapter 1 I listened to Ghost by Halsey on repeat and I think if you read while playing the exact song it somewhat shows in the pace I set for readers.

The term ‘block class’ is actually derived from what my own high school (even though I’m not even fully considered a freshman yet jfc) uses when referring to a 90 minute class

The book Technically begins on a Saturday with Levi — the actual power duo meet that Monday (because unlike dumbass schools in real life, their first day of school was on a Monday instead of the Friday before.) on their first day. That Tuesday was chapter 4, Wednesday being chapter 5, Thursday being chapter 6 (we skip Friday because it doesn’t fucking matter in the story lmao), and Saturday being the day of the party.

Writing an x reader but without the reader was really fucking hard, honestly. I couldn’t just randomly say ‘Levi looked over at the H/C girl working on her homework across from him’ as it’d just be weird, so I thought of the next best thing and never described Aella — making her free for interpretation of her looks.

I was going to have Aella have a name reveal like ‘my real name is Y/N…’ but then I was like “No what? Fuck it. Levi already knew from the beginning after looking at her documents.”

No Sympathy was actually going to be an original story, but Levi’s character fit so well I decided to make it a fanfic.

I actually wanted to stop writing after chapter 3 because I didn’t know what to do with the plot, but I asked my friend for help coming up with the plot using the paragraphs of ideas I had to make an actual plot. So, I can successfully say I owe it to her for helping and the one sentence that kept me going in my head: “I want to make a story I’m proud of.” So I fucked up my (nonexistent, really lmao) sleeping and eating schedules and started working on this book everyday even when I didn’t post a chapter that day.

Though, it’s not really specified in the early chapters, Aella was bullied into being hated by the entire school — leaving her to be all alone, which actually happened to me and gave me PTSD after transferring.

Ironically, I gave Aella a ton of reactions and characteristics I would/ just generally have, but I see myself more in Levi, which is probably why I prefer writing about him over Aella.

As of writing this, chapter 5 is currently my favorite chapter as it is a mix of a filler chapter and a regular important chapter still just as important as the rest.

Depression and PTSD actually got in the way of writing so many times I actually am surprised I’ve written so much

As writing has always been my go to for letting out everything (as I have z e r o close friends lmao) I actually don’t realize when I’m done with each chapter until I realize I’m out of ideas for said chapter.

I don’t even realize I write about 2,000 words until it’s like “oh,,”

No Sympathy wasn’t just any fanfic for me, it was like I was actually Aella seeing the entire story unfold from beginning to finish

I tried to push myself to describe more, as I’ve noted while rereading my previous shitty fanfics — I struggled describing everything.

I tried to not have the basic “tch”, “brat”, and just random cursing from Levi unless it was at the exact wrong time (or I just put it in because I could totally see him saying that in said situation)

I tried characterizing Hanji as someone who wasn’t the basic overexcited dumbass most fanfics portray her as — instead I tried thinking of her as an actual person with reactions and different moods  and tried to embody that each time I wrote her

Character development is a huge thing Ive been trying to work on ever since I wrote A Valkyrie and a Mischievous God (though that character development and story sucked ass and I cringe at how popular it’s gotten), and a huge target for it was none other than Aella. At the beginning you could see she felt trapped in an endless cycle of stress and fending for herself, but when Levi came in and was like “lmao I have money you don’t have to stress” she felt like she was in an odd spot, and eventually after she reunited with Hanji she started to feel more free

Parents were completely cut out of this story because I genuinely don’t know how to write them as mine are either states away by choice or always working, so I just had Aella get kicked out and had her entire family gone.

My best ideas surface at 4 am when I’m trying to fucking sleep

Help me

But hey I now have a new passion for this book

I generally didn’t know how to end it

buT THEN I D I D

A huge thing for me, and my entire driving motion for writing this was a simple sentence: “I want to write something I’m proud of.”

Am I proud of this?

Eh. It’s not shitty, I suppose. I could always do better.

Characterization was so difficult for me. I wanted to stray from basic fanfics of an overly hyper Hange (though, I couldn’t help in some situations, but after watching an entire season and a half in one day, you notice personality changes) and write and more serious one — except I’m a damn shitty author with so many grammatical mistakes my ex-mentor would literally rip her hair out.

Writing a book has always been my goal, and I know this is the only thing that will ever come close to it.

I have another Levi x reader planned, but I always hate doing the basic ‘_____’ ‘Y/N’, etc because it literally drives my depressed self I n s a n e when writing

Most times for my outline summaries of the chapters I just put my name in place of Aella lmao

I actually struggled a lot when writing this; sometimes I even broke down thinking no one liked this book or I wasn’t a good enough author to write anymore.

My asshole self mainly spent my summer writing this rip

Currently, as it is July 2nd, I am literally hoping to Levi that I fucking get this done before August or else I’m so fucking screwed with beginning high school and shit.

Oh yeah btw, I’M NOT FUCKING READY FOR THE FINAL SEASON. I’LL BE A DAMN SOPHOMORE AND THAT IN ITSELF K I L L S ME

I don’t know if I’m actually going to continue with this book, but have these collected facts I started writing the moment the first chapter was out :,) It’s already September and my past dumbass was right

High school is kicking my ass

I have another story idea/plot written out and I really like it so idk. I think I’d stop halfway again because I’d think that no one would like it

[worthsomethingtoday]

Our interview with SupMikecheck

1. What is your names & what do you play in the band? My names Mike and I sing/rap, produce and song write under the artist name SupMikecheck 2. • How did the band get started? When I was growing up I loved watching Blink-182 and the Warped Tour scene and It was difficult for me to find a rock band where everyone was on the same schedule so I began getting into solo alternative Rap/Pop artists that were associated in the warped tour scene. One of which was T Mills. Another artist was Mod Sun and they made me get inspired to make hip hop music that has an alternative flare to it. I remember getting really into Gym Class Heroes, and of course one of the biggest Alternative Rap/HipHop bands of the time Hollywood Undead. To this day im mostly listening to rock music I was never really into rap that much. I love that twenty one pilots is killing it right now because their sound is something I kind of aim for. Its hip hop and pop but they are well accepted in the Warped Tour scene. 3. •What has the funniest thing that has every happened to you on stage? Over the years ive matured a lot but some of my older lyrics were a little embarrassing and I just remember playing one of my dirty songs and looking out into the crowd and there was a Grandma singing and dancing. And After the show like a 50 year old mom came to me and said she had to calm her mother (the Grandma) down because she was getting too excited. It was gnarly. But Im done with a lot of those dirty songs im trying to keep my music pretty clean now. 4. •If you had 1 million dollars in the music industry what would you use it for? Aw man, well I guess id buy myself onto some cool tours, Id definitely buy some features from my favorite artists. Its probably not much to Blink-182 but id propose a collaboration with them, I would want a Skrillex collab. I was always the biggest From First To Last fan ever. An artist that I listen to all the time who Ive met a few times, Blackbear Id probably hit him up for a feature or something. I feel like contacting artists telling them I randomly got 1 million dollars none of them would really believe me or answer me though lol. 5. • If you could tour with any band or musician dead or alive who would it be with & why? Blink-182, Sleeping With Sirens, Good Charlotte, Twenty One Pilots, Fall Out Boy, Metro Station, Travis Mills, Mod Sun, MGK, Blackbear, Jake Miller, id really be down to tour with anyone. I would probably feel most comfortable with bands I've talked to on twitter or in real life because they atleast know who I am. I know my fans are open minded though and they would come out for anyone. 7. What do you think of the media frenzy over mental illness meaning should we talk about it more in the world? I think its important to have more role models available to talk to. Especially some of these bands that people look up to. It should be natural for them to be there directly for their fans who look up to them and look to them for answers. I think some bands love making music but they don't realize the impact it has on people and what else actually comes with it. Your actions are always being watched and you can't really change that responsibility whether you want that or not. My fans almost become my brothers and sisters, sons and daughters. I know many by name and I always do what I can to give advice. I have strong relationships with my fans some just through DMs but I give advice on all kinds of things, music, relationships, rough family life, etc. and I think all bands should be able to atleast hear someone out, but a lot dont and it sucks. Because getting ignored constantly by your favorite band will only depress you more. Life is weird but sometimes you need to hear everything is going to be okay by someone important to you. 8. Have you ever dealt with depression or any other mental illness & if so how did you handle it? Yes all the time really, most of my depression is from my love life. Its just been a whirlwind. Some other things that upset me is how disconnected I am to my family because they dont support my music no matter how successful and how much money I get they just want me in a suit and tie with my hair parted to the side, working 9-5 with a wife and kids and basically societies views of normal lol and thats just someone I can never be. How Im alive today and handling life is a few things. One, always stay occupied, listen to music with headphones put on a bunch of movies or get into a TV Show with a lot of seasons because it will keep your mind running and not focusing on the bad. Two, is go out as much as you can, its terrible to be home when depressed, try and go to your friends and if your friends aren't around or something, go out somewhere alone where people will be. There's times I'll drive to Walmart alone and buy snacks just to get out of my room. Its actually really helpful! And finally well for myself, I just can see all my followers and Im put on somewhat of a level so I want to be strong for them and live a long life for them. Its kind of like the parent that loves his kids. You wouldn't want to take your life because your love for them overweighs the depression life is hitting you with. 9. What would you say has been the most difficult or hardest part of your life so far? Relationships are really hard, people are cruel and thats just a fact. Also Ive never been in a financially happy place, and just as things are bad they can get even worse in the blink of an eye. Like the other day I paid off all my bills and than got in a car accident and totaled my car. So finances are a big thing that effects my mood. I also don't like living in New Jersey or the town I grew up in so as of now I face living in a place I hate every single day. And then like I said previously my family and I just don't click so I'm alone on that one. 10. What would you tell a fan that is struggling with self harm? Well firstly, I understand why you are doing it. Its important to understand why someone is doing it because its something very serious and they normally have an emotional reason behind it, so I would listen. Id then tell them all my methods I mentioned earlier which is to listen to music, watch long movies, watch sports just keep your mind off things and constantly jogging. And if you need a friend who understands you than try and make it to a concert because the people at concerts most of the time are very much similar to yourself. 11. What is like when a fan comes up too you & tells them your music saved there life or get them though hard times in life? Even being a pretty new and not wildly famous artist I have had this happen before. I just felt great It made me feel like my life has meaning. And that single remark is enough to make me continue music forever. Even if I get a hateful comment now it just doesnt effect me anymore after hearing someone say that I helped save their life. That was one person all I want is to increase that number as much as I can while doing what I love. 12. Does any of your songs talk about anything dealing with depression or self harm or anything along them lines. Yeah definitely. From my last album I have a song called "Life's Not Fair" which is about a personal experience of life being difficult. "One Of Those Days" is a really solid song of me being really honest about my life and having a bad day. "Aint That Bad" is a song of victory and seeing through all the bad going on. "SINGle" is about being single and it sucking. From the first and very old album "Tears At Midnight" was written for a girl going through depression. My serious lyrics have really always been my strong spot. 13. What would you tell some ones that scared to ask for help because they don't wanna be looked at differently. Try an anonymous or behind closed doors approach. Sometimes people are scared because they dont want their name out there and linked to the problems. So find an app that will keep your name anonymous and you might feel more comfortable talking about your troubles. Also if you're shy to do things in the open try DMing someone because DMs or a little more comfortable knowing not everyone can read it. Talk only when you are ready because truth be told some people cope without having to talk and bring things to light. 14. Do you think we as society should be able to have a conversation about mental health without being judge or looked at differently & do you think we should be able to talk about it in our school systems? I think so because its very very common. Its just an emotion that everyone has more than others or less than others. Just like how some people dont get as hungry as easy as others but the difference is those people dont judge those who are hungrier than them so why should mental health be any different? I don't know, but it is. People will always judge until everyone can get on the same page with it. It would be amazing to be in schools, as the band Brand New sang "back in school they never taught us what we needed to know, like how to deal with despair or someone breaking your heart..." And that is extremely true. Because schools just waste our time reading books and answering questions like "What was the color of Mrs' blahblahblah's dress in Chapter 5 (of some pointless book we're reading in class)" 15. Do you think the media should look at mental health in a positive light, more then just jumping to conclusions on the news? I just think a lot of people who suffer from any form of depression can still be really good at a lot of things. You can be depressed and still happy at the same time. I know that makes little sense in text but its true. Its kind of like how I live, im upset about a lot of things but im still functioning and really talented and think highly of myself so what we need is the media to see the strength and bravery of these people like "Wow its amazing that they can still get up there and perform despite suffering from depression" or for someone who is anti social and scared to leave the house a positive thought could be "Wow its nice to see someone who is shy and hurting leave the house, I hope they know how strong they are and how amazing they actually are." we just need to love eachother more and compliment eachother more. Any compliment left unsaid just goes to waste.