#i told her my body image issues were starting to mimic the ones i had in middle school n everything

[afro-elf]

oh it's getting real bad lmaooooooo

[uncloseted]

I wish people weren’t so black & white in their view of skins. Yes teenagers do go through these issues and it needs representation but you can acknowledge that and also see the show does glamorise some aspects of serious topics. (Drug abuse, eating disorders) it’s kind of evident in people’s anonymous confessions that I see a lot. People seem to wish they were more like Effy/Cassie or feel like they missed out if they haven’t had drug filled teenhoods. The Cassie ones are sad because a lot of people seem to echo the statement that Cassie worsened their ED’a or encouraged it because they wanted to be like her.

So I think there's kind of a larger question in here that a lot of media has been struggling with recently- should media portray life as it is, or as it should be, and what should media do to protect those who may be vulnerable?

It might not be obvious to people who are newer fans of Skins, but Skins was incredibly groundbreaking and controversial when it came out. Up until then, shows that dealt with "teen issues" were basically like Degrassi; ones where "real life problems" were discussed, but the "bad thing" the character did was always punished, and there was always a lecture about why the Bad Thing was Bad and they shouldn't do it ever again. That rang hollow to a lot of people who had seen the people around them do Bad Things without any serious consequences. So when Skins came out and started showing things as they are (albeit in a heightened kind of way), it was huge. I don't think they knew what would happen, or really had any guidelines for what "safe depiction of dangerous activities" might be. They were trying to tell stories that were authentic to the teenagers they knew, and all the writing was informed by actual teenagers' experiences. I bring this up because in retrospect, I think it's very easy to say that they should have known better. But there wasn't really any point of comparison for them to learn from. They were going into this blind, and I think one can make the argument that mistakes were made because of it.

Back to the original question I posed, I'm honestly not sure if there's a good answer. Maybe we need both Skins and Degrassi, to show the ways in which things arguably should be (a person tries drugs, immediately gets in trouble, never does them again), and the ways things actually are (sometimes people try drugs, use them in party settings, and nothing particularly bad happens), to provide a balanced look at the issue. Maybe we should be trying to mimic real-life statistics as much as possible in our representation. We certainly need to be thoughtful about which stories are being told and which are being left out of the conversation, which in a weird way, brings me to my next point.

Eating disorders are an especially complicated thing to show on screen. By and large, media representation of people with eating disorders is a Thin, Pretty White Girl who just doesn't eat. Usually at some point, someone will tell them that Not Eating is Bad, or they'll faint, and then they'll recover and it's never talked about again.

Cassie was groundbreaking, because she was a Thin, Pretty White Girl who just didn't eat, but she talked about how she got out of eating, was shown putting weights in her pants to pass a weigh-in, and was hospitalized for her eating disorder (although we never really saw what that was like for her). Instead of telling her Not Eating is Bad, Allen told her You Want to Eat, Actually, and even after that, she struggled with her eating disorder before eventually recovering (I guess??) and then never talking about it again. There's not actually a huge difference between Cassie's portrayal of anorexia and the "very special episode" portrayal of anorexia that we were used to before that. But she was (and still is) controversial, because her portrayal shows some of the (less graphic) ins and outs of what life is actually like for someone struggling with an eating disorder.

My issue with the approach the Skins writers took with Cassie is that it's simultaneously too much and too little. It shows just enough of her life that some people tore it down for being an "instruction manual on how to have anorexia" (which, 🙄, in my opinion), but it didn't show enough of the grossness of the reality of actually having an eating disorder, which would help people to better understand what having an eating disorder actually looks and feels like. Other eating disorders, like bulimia, almost never get shown on TV, because there's not as pretty to show, and I think that's a real problem. We also rarely see men with eating disorders, or fat people with eating disorders (or even average weight people with eating disorders), or people of color with eating disorders, or LGBT people with eating disorders, which reinforces this idea that eating disorders are just anorexia, and anorexia is a Vain Straight White Girl Problem.

The reason I find the concern around Cassie's character a bit eye-rolly is that I think it's not an honest depiction of what's actually happening. I do absolutely believe that Cassie's character acted as a trigger for some people with eating disorders, but I think that's the key- some people with eating disorders. Cassie's character wasn't inspiring anorexia in perfectly mentally healthy teenagers as some sort of social contagion; she was impacting people who were already struggling.

And that's where this becomes complicated, because some people with eating disorders will purposely and compulsively seek out triggering material in order to further their disorder. I don't think removing Cassie from the equation would have actually made a difference in that regard, because triggering material is easily accessible and literally everywhere. I think the argument can be made that Skins should have added a trigger warning to episodes where Cassie is explicit about her disorder eating habits (and I do think they should have), but I think on the whole, she created more good than she did harm. She helped people who don't struggle with eating disorders to understand some of the internal logic of the disorder and to see what it's like to actually live with, and she helped people who do struggle see themselves represented in a way that they hadn't been before.

I guess I just think that instead of wringing our hands about what we can and can't show on TV, we'd be better served by adding warnings so that people can avoid potentially triggering content (and so that, in turn, that content can be more honest in its discussion of eating disorders), and providing support for people who are struggling so that they can recover. We should make it mandatory that any image that has been retouched must acknowledge it, and we should show more diverse body types in media and in advertising. But it's easier to wring out hands in a "what about the impressionable children" kind of way than it is to make systemic change to support people who are predisposed to mental illness. Instagram influencers are a much bigger culprit in shaping body image issues than Cassie ever could have been.

I feel kind of similarly about the drug usage of the Skins kids. Should Skins have shown teenagers doing illegal drugs at parties? Probably not. It did definitely make doing drugs look cool and fun. Did Skins need to show that kind of thing for realism, or to get its target demographic to tune in? Maybe. At the end of the day, I think teenagers would be (and are) doing illegal drugs with or without Skins' influence. It's not like we saw a giant spike in teenage drug usage from 2007-2012 that immediately disappeared after episode 10 of series 6 aired. Art imitates life and life imitates art. To me, the bigger questions here are, "what other factors (home life, peer pressure, curiosity, a need for novelty, anxiety, depression, etc) are leading teenagers to want to do drugs?", "if teenagers are going to do drugs, how can we make sure that they do drugs in the safest way possible," and "how do we help teenagers who struggle with addiction recover in an evidence-based way?"

I'm not trying to say that media plays no role in people's life choices and perceptions. We know that it absolutely does. But I think Skins as an individual TV show has a tiny, tiny impact, even if it's your favorite show and you watch it constantly, when compared to all the other factors that contribute to eating disorders and drug use. We absolutely need to be thoughtful about how we tell these stories, and we have to make sure that they're tailored to the audience who's watching them. But we also need to be thoughtful about our media consumption as a whole- which stories are being reinforced over and over again, which stories are entirely missing from the narrative, and which forms of media we're being exposed to all day, every day. We need to be thoughtful about the way we talk about and teach about difficult issues in our day to day lives. We need to have comprehensive support systems for people who are struggling. Those types of actions will do much more than taking even the most graphic portrayals of drug use or eating disorders off the air ever would.

[lin-dorie]

Cuties/Mignonnes, from the project to the meaning and international public interactions

OK Let’s talk about it. 

Let me tell you what Cuties is really about, the meaning behind it and what you need, as an international public, to understand it properly.

/!\ Spoilers needed. 

So Mignonnes/Cuties is French-Senegalese movie produced by Bien ou Bien Production in collaboration with Netflix for international distribution. Maimouna Doucouré is an award winning director, she’s french-senegalese, 35 years old, grew up with a dad and two mothers surround by a big religious family. Nothing wrong, just a little girl having thoughts and dreams like any others. 

Mignonnes, her very first long metrage, is based on a study she conducted for the project. She interviewed hundreds of young people with her team (pedopsychologist included) to collect a lot of infos and ressources to built a movie dealing with young people anxiety, sexual discovering, bullying, social media and young black people representation in movies. 

I. Story telling from someone who watched it.

Amy is 11 year old, she came in France with her mom and little brother. While hidden, she discovered that her dad is in Senegal and will soon come back with a second wife as it is authorized by Islam and accepted in Senegal. Her mom and aunt don’t tell her anything but she saw her mom crying about the topic, not knowing what’s happening, she ressents her dad and her condition as a refugee, the typical “it was better where we were before”. 

Her family is muslim, she wore a hijab to her religious ceremonies and practice like she was told to, without the opportunity to do otherwise. In her building there’s a girl, Angelica, she has a rebellious side in opposition to her workaholics parents and she dances hip-hop style which Amy has never saw. She befriend her and her circle of friends and decided to dance with them at a local championship. In order to learn the dance and prove to them she was “cool”, she stole her cousin’s phone, got herself instagram and started relooking herself as a young woman instead of the pre-teen girl style she got before.  But, she gets her periods. She’s afraid, she’s anxious, but most of all she doesn’t understand because nobody told her. Her aunt take care of her telling her “you’re an adult now” and how she wish she’ll live a beautiful life like they are. This is a problem as Amy doesn’t know what it is to be “an adult” nor does she know what it is to grow up, and the only roles model she has at home are her sad mom and her ultraconservative aunt. So she starts acting out, comparing herself to more developped girls, tries to be like them and starts mimicing them for their dances. While fighting for the phone she stoled with her cousin, she locks herself in the bathroom and posts an intimate photo of her on instagram as a last proof she’s a woman. Obviously, she’s getting bullied in school for that, her mom come, slap her across the cheek, call her names and ground her.  Amy became depressed and in her anxiety, tries to reach out for her friends who turned their back on her so they won’t be associated with her.  Nonetheless, she succeed into entering a championship with her former-friends and are disqualifies due to highly innapropriate behaviour on scene.  She go back quickly to her house during a panic attack, her mother comfort her telling her she doesn’t have to attend her father’s wedding if she doesn’t want to. Reassured, she skip the wedding and go play with kids her age. -END-

II. Producing and interpretation. 

DISCLAIMER : Self-made interpretations as someone who’s into thoughtfull movies. It may changes from one person to another. 

As sais before, it was produced by Bien ou Bien Production which a french production corporation based in Bordeaux. They are producing movies dealing with diversity, social issues, minority representation and religious debunking. They also produced Doucouré’s award winning short film “Mom(s)” that was dealing with the topic of polygamy in Senegal, and was based on her own life. 

Being produced by them again for her long metrage was a financial security and a very good deal. She got a France TV (public channels organisation) financial deal and scored that spot into Netflix international catalog making her one of the only black french-senegalese woman director into the international catalog. 

Obviously, as it is not a movie for children/teenagers, there’s few meanings behind the already well written script : 

Growing up without ressources : Amy is a stereotypical 11yo girl who doesn’t know anything about relationships, sexuality and woman body. It is well know that parents tends to have “the big talk” with their children when they are around 15-17yo, but puberty starts around 13yo and with that : sexual desire discovery, gender identity crises and body changes. Innocents idioms like “you’re a big girl now” or “you’re not a child anymore” shortenned childhood, leaving young girls without ressources to develop themselves and, often, shame to ask for answers.

Female representations and social media : We can’t criticize this movie without putting a context around it. Our society has been developped around certains standards, weither they are socials, professional, personnal... Social media and main stream TV promote a way of life that is unattainable for 90% of us but they give us the opportunity to act “as if”. In this movie, Amy is just like one of us except that she is way too young to understand the behaviour she is immitated. You can see it when she doesn’t understand why her friends are lying about their ages, when she’s pushing a girl into the water (possibly drowning the girl), when she cries on stage in front of those parents judging her... What Doucouré is trying to show us is that little girls are little girls, they aren’t tough enough to be shown anything just because it’s socially accepted. 

Children education :  To me, this is the main purpose of the film, showing that it is important to educate children. Predatory behaviour, public image, false advertisment, relationships... There is no “right time” to talk about it, and most of the parents are too late, the fact is protecting your children is also making them understand why this behaviour is dangerous, why this outfit is innapropriate and never blame your children for mistakes they can make. Amy is the exemple of what could happen if you don’t educate your children, and she is brave enough to rise when her my mom take a step toward her to comfort her. 

Religious family and sexual education :  As an atheist, I won’t talk about metaphors behind the prayers or anything, someone who believe in their God the same way her family does will be more adequate to talk about it. But it is one of the main critic and thus, I have to share facts : The movie isn’t centered around it, the only reason it is here is because they needed a traditional figure such as the aunt, they needed a strict environment such as a religious family and they needed a twist that would put the little girl into a negative feeling, they needed her to ressent her situation as a refugee in order to criticize how it is to grow up without help. So why Islam ? Well, in France, we have two main religions : Roman Catholics and Islam. Using Islam as the main religion of the film helped them showing the good sides of this religion such as love, family devotion and loyalty.  Added 22/08/20 : Islam has a lot of branches like any other religion. In Senegal most muslim practice Soufism, find differences between the way you practice and theirs mights come from that. Especially regarding the hijab, it’s common for young people to wear their hijabs only during ceremonies.

III. Streaming plateform and international public : 

If you’ve read all this, you know now that it isn’t about girls twerking or pedo porn normalization, in fact, until Amy came into the group, the girls are doing basic hip-hop dance (well, at least they try...). So how a movie mostly acclaimed by those who saw it can be the center of such a scandal ? 

Well, first let’s talk about culture appropriation.  As a 25yo white european woman I’ve had my share of culture appropriation story, did I mean anything bad when I did it ? No. Was I ignorant ? Yes. As everybody with a little bit of dignity I reflected on myself and stopped whatever the f*ck I was doing that was innapropriate as a white woman. That said, we can’t denied that the world has absorded some part of the black africans culture when it got popularized.

Twerking is actually a mixed between dances from African diasporas (especially Mapouka and Soukous from Ivory Coast and Congo), it is known nowadays a sensual hiphop dance and there is nothing wrong with doing it when you’re a grown up in your right mind doing whatever you want to do. So why using this dance in the movie ? First, it’s part of the heritage of Amy, a 11yo girl who hasn’t lived in a occidental culture before. Second, it is a way of telling you, public, that what you do has consequences. Suggestive dances on TV, sexualized hiphop dances in the streets, rated r music video available on YT... Adult contents are available anywhere, anywhen by anywho. Children included. It is what the director, who study the subject of the impact of oversexualized content on young girls, is trying to tell you through the film. 

Now, Netflix and the art of communication. Netflix has first released a trailer, a poster and a pitch that aren’t the one used to promote the film in the first place (France included). After the start of the backlash they released another set that are stil not the one used to begin with. Why ? Because Netflix is an industry, they aren’t cinema professionnals, they aren’t critics, they are a company like any others. They didn’t watch the film, didn’t understand it and didn’t advertize it as it should : A movie for adults who want to know what they could do to help the younger generations. 

Because a movie isn’t just for entertainment, there is no film just made to amuse you, everyone is trying to tell something thanks to their art. Yes, those same young girls who acted in the movie won’t be able to watch it because they are too young, not because it is inapropriate but because the subject is too thick for them to understand it fully at such a young age. The way Netflix handle the promotion of this movie was also bad because international public can’t resonnate with it the way we do. And I include myself because I was the age of Amy not long ago, in the same country she came to. Cinemas from every country is proper to this country, we have the chance to be able to watch films from other places made by people whom don’t speak our language, have their own religion or not at all and try to reach us with their own issues and traditions. 

I’m not saying this movie will be the best of this year, and I’m not saying that everything inside of it is perfect, what I’m trying to say is that it’s easier to agree with the majority than to forge your own opinion but if you take the time to watch you’ll be able to understand others and empathize with them. 

I hope it will help some of you understand the purpose of the film, that some will be kind enough to watch it before throwing their critics and that most of you will still enjoy movies for watch the director is trying to say instead of what the politics want you to see. 

[border-spam]

AU Troy Character Timeline

Right, so I saw an incredible breakdown of Troy’s mental journey/state of ego last night ( that I’ll see if I can get permission to post at some point ) that really kicked my confidence into overdrive for writing out a definitive timeline for the version of him I write about in drabbles/fics etc as it was so amazingly similar. This isn’t complete, it couldn’t be because man I have a lot of stuff for this guy, but I hope it’s interesting for people maybe looking for a somewhat logical bunch of HC content that works well with the info we were given ingame. 

Writing this was like doing a jigsaw puzzle. Except ten pieces are missing, and you have 2 dominos and a Mrs Cupcake card instead. If you like any of this, feel free to use it. I’ll eventually expand on it in my own works.

Pre Pandora Era - 28  years pre BL3

Severe self esteem / image issues from very early childhood. Leda’s death left Typhon both terrified of Tyreen and desperately paranoid about her safety, leaving Troy to feel far less valued and loved as he found himself constantly failing to compete for attention from his remaining parent. 

Typhon never outright called Troy a freak, but he overheard plenty of discussions with his mother and with Tyreen explaining why he was so sick all the time, why he looked the way he did, why he was broken. He never discussed these, they festered in the back of his mind for the rest of his life. 

Strived from an early age to be useful, being useful gave him the belief he was valued, and a “Great job kid!” from his father felt good enough that it could almost replace feeling loved.

Misses his mother intensely from the day she died, for the rest of his life. Had no one else to have platonic intimacy with bar his sister, which never felt as freely given as with his mother. 

Developed an extremely crippled sense of social behavior and rules. The only people the Twins could interact with till they landed on Pandora ( which I HC was between 18 -19 ) were each other, and their Father. 

Left alone on a giant empty planet with no one to tell them no, or instill an understanding of social rules to them regarding others, left them with only a feeling of personal value for each other. This is an extremely dangerous state of mind for any person who will need to function in a social structure, especially a person in power. 

Had it hammered into them over and over by their father that the galaxy outside their home was filled with murderers. Animals. Bandit filth. Not like them, not like their parents, horrible, vicious things that would kill them the second they could. 

Internalised that to the point where it was a crucial part of their development of self as children. The twins would genuinely struggle to comprehend any other human they met was a person, because they were told their whole developing lives that no one they would meet bar their father would be.

 Pre COV - 8 years pre BL3

Lands on Pandora with Tyreen. Woefully underprepared and worried sick, didn’t want to leave Nekro but had no other choice but to go with his sister or die. Misses his father immediately, but avoids talking about it, knowing it will cause an argument.

Disliked that their father had kept them on Nekro intensely, but not enough to hate him the way Tyreen did. This never changed and the regret for leaving him only rotted inside him over the years. 

Very excited to finally meet new people, but his social skills are learned through watching old echos and while he can mimic them, he doesn’t understand social intricacies as well as he’d hoped. This sabotages their first few attempts to communicate with Pandoran non bandit natives. 

Comes across as weird. Stutters, not good with eye contact, awkward in body language and very unnatural in appearance. Extremely tall (6″7), very thin and sickly looking with sallow skin and dark under eyes. His missing arm and quarter of his shoulder draw far more attention than he had ever expected and he becomes instantly self conscious of the damage to his right side, strongly disliking how it’s pointed out every time they try and interact with one of these idiots.  

The twins only had the clothes they had travelled in and at this point they are pretty much rags patched together over nearly 2 decades. Didn’t understand how much appearances were going to matter, Troy had been sure he’d be able to “Mingle with the locals no problem.”, and now feels like he’s letting his sister down by failing to perform the way he’d been so sure of. They move onto the bandit clans once they get laughed out of the first small town they try to impress.

Their first few interactions with bandits have very bad results. They both get mocked a lot, Troy gets insulted even more. This is the first time in his life he’s met other men bar his father and the harsh reality that he is not like other men is really starting to hit hard. He’s monstrously tall, he has no muscle, he’s bony and sick and the bandits make very clear to him that he’s a freak.

Unable to defend himself verbally to people that don’t seem to speak a coherent language, he feels impotent and emasculated. Troy’s gift with words has always been his strong point, something he was proud of, and the bandits barely even understand what he’s saying. Any interest he’d had towards them as other people gets quashed. They clearly aren’t the same as he and Ty, they are beneath them. Savages. They aren’t people after all. His dad was right.

This is the point where he fully switches to seeing almost all others as non-persons. They aren’t people, they aren’t what he and Tyreen are, or they wouldn’t act like this in response to the twins. Any possible empathy he could have developed over time is aborted at this point, and he begins to craft the God King persona he understands he will need to disguise his shortcomings under if he’s going to be in the public’s eye.

Begins to create it piece by piece. Designs their outfits, designs his tattoos and mods, his monstrous arm, their name. 

The Calypso twins are born, and the COV with them.

Early COV Era - 7 years pre BL3

As he learns how to communicate with bandits and craft a persona for Tyreen that they will be drawn to, the COV starts to form. While the huge majority of their followers are people they see as not even being the same species as them, they do also begin to fill the higher ranks with people they are meeting over time that they see as having value. 

People with skills in categories they don’t, engineers, media experts, accountants, are drawn to the COV for the same reasons as the bandits. Opportunity, just a different sort.

Joining in the early days means having the twin’s ears, and those who have excellent ideas, or bring talent to the upper echelon that the twin's don’t have themselves, eventually end up as high priests and Saints. Department leaders (eg: Mouthpiece ). These are the kind of people he sees as people, though still not on par with himself or his sister in value. These are the few he would be capable of having functional conversations with, building simple relationships. 

He has found value in his ability to be very useful within the COV. Leading the Media and Propaganda department has given him a huge amount of power, even if he still physically feels extremely frail. 

He’s settled into living in Tyreen’s shadow, she’s the star, but he’s the puppeteer, and he’s happy for it to be that way for the most part. While she can sometimes step out of line or treat him like he’s not equal, he’s quick to remind her of her place during these outbursts, and their relationship is relatively stable.

Troy is fiercely loyal and surprisingly gentle with people he has a bond with. Despite his desperation to have meaningful connections, to be cared for and liked as himself, they don’t stay around him long.

No matter how hard he tries to give them what he thinks they want, they eventually leave, and he doesn’t understand that they are distancing themself because of how he treats other people, not them.

Troy’s complete inability to view the vast majority of people as people means he has a total lack of empathy towards almost everyone else, and this is a terrifying thing to experience first hand. He doesn’t understand this is why his “friends” leave, why they stop being friendly with him, or request to be transferred to another district.  

“Why did you do that to them..?” - “Huh? Ohhhh, relax haha, it’s just a bandit.” - “What do you mean, just a bandit, they felt that Troy, what’s wrong with you?’ - "The hell? No, it’s a b.a.n.d.i.t. It’s not like us, it’s not like you, it’s just.. you know, a bandit! Doesn’t matter what I do to em.” -shrug- - “-horrified silence-”

He blames himself each time this happens and damages his already fractured self esteem further. He can’t comprehend that his actions are the problem, because he simply has no way to understand his actions are bad. 

Each time someone close to him leaves, it’s another hit to his already crumbling self worth. He has absolutely no strong bonds with anyone bar his sister, who at times seems to barely like him, and he is genuinely desperate for validation and care from someone who likes Troy, not Calypso, not the God he pretends to be.

Every time another one of his “friends” vanishes, another of his little connections to his own humanity breaks. He gets angrier, and sadder, the God King a little more snarling and quicker to snap. It’s a sore point Tyreen tends to dig in during arguments too.

She doesn’t need anyone else, but she’s seen the near manic excitement and happiness he has when he connects with another person over a shared interest or they show actual genuine kindness towards him and not his title. If that person then becomes upset with his lack of empathy, or scared of it and abandons him, it’s another open wound on the already dying soul inside him that’s barely still breathing.

He has a complete and defined understanding of right and wrong, but those rules only apply to people, and his social development from infant to adult left his comprehension of other people so stunted, he cannot fathom that the vast majority of others are people. 

God King Calypso is a fucking nightmare to anyone bar the select view he sees as “people like him”. A feral, cackling monster, as likely to airdrop a million dollars onto a tiny village and record the reaction, as he is to rip a bandits arms off during a raid and live steam them bleeding out. All the same to him. Just background NPCs in his game. Placeholder actors in his life. They don’t matter. All that does matter is how they make him feel, or how they further his sister’s goals.

Every year that passes by leaves the God King more polished and defined, more in control a persona, while inside its impenetrable shell Troy DeLeon is slowly being suffocated by the weight of his own sins, without having the ability to understand he had been sinning at all.

God King Era - 4 years pre Bl3

By this point, Troy’s isolation is now deadly. He is a deity, worshipped by billions, with absolutely no points of human contact in his life to anchor himself to reality. No one to help him understand how to apply his sense of right and wrong to his followers, only his sister, who is even more toxic and vicious than he is.

Every day since starting the COV, he’s distanced himself further from the worshippers, the bandits, the acolytes. They are screaming war meat now, they are chips to barter with, numbers on a viewer count, flesh to tear into when he wants to feel something.

His relationship with Tyreen is crumbling. She’s quicker now to imply he’s not as important, he’s not the Siren. She’s called him a parasite in front of a merger board, a burden during a discussion with department heads. Each new crack at his inner ego only strengthens the persona further. Makes it more attention seeking, more willing to lash out at others, more vicious.

His “friends"are long gone, either fled from the behemoth the COV now is, or far away in other districts, planets, cities. The people he is close with now in working relationships are held at arms length. He doesn’t let anyone near him anymore, he’s afraid they will leave too if he does. 

The isolation pushes him further into the God King persona every day. If he’s Troy Calypso, he doesn’t NEED anyone else. The further he sinks into it, the more aggressive, the more twisted his actions become, but he doesn't see it that way. This is what his followers want, so it must be fine. Why wouldn’t it be fine to ravenously tear into heretics on livestream if 8 billion people are tuning in to watch?

He’s becoming cruel, he’s becoming vicious, but the man he was before he reached Pandora is still whispering that Tyreen is treating him wrong. That this isn’t how it was meant to be, that he’s not weak or a burden.

But listening to that voice means also having to listen to the one telling him he’s warped into something disgusting that his mother would be so let down by, that his father was right about him being a broken monstrosity. He continues to ignore it, and he loses himself further every day.

The deeper he recedes into the God King, the more he starts having nightmares, the more those whispers in the back of his mind get louder. He does what he can to ignore them, but sometimes something will set him off.

An argument with Tyreen, a momentary feeling of regret for leaving his home, a pang of loneliness. He often can’t sleep, and he knows if he starts to wonder why, clarity for the horrors he’s done could crush him.

Drugs, sex, bloodlust, he tries anything to take his mind off the intrusive thoughts that grow day by day. That he’s a failure. He’s a freak. He’s a cold blooded murder, but every now and then he’ll wake up in a cold sweat and hate himself so much that he wishes he’d never been born. 

The feeling passes very quickly as the God King shifts back into place and swallows it down, but while it’s there it’s horrific. He see’s himself from other people’s eyes for just a moment and god what has he turned into. What has he done. He’s a fucking monster.

The man he had been is so damaged under the mantle of this vicious God he’s wearing as a skin that it’s barely alive anymore, and it’s what begs him to kill it in those fleeting moments where he sees past his own facade, where he just for a second realises how many people he has hurt.

He tore his throat out a couple of years before the start of the game story in a moment of lucidity after being sleep deprived for days on end. Tyreen reached him in time when his implanted vitals tracker each twin keeps for the other alerted her to his condition, but it was close enough that he was bedridden for days after her energy transfer closed the wound.

She had been furious with him and made sure it was was kept hushed, the rest of the clergy believing he was on reprieve. Only the twins know the truth of what happened.

He never takes the collars off anymore now, the scars are still there. Convincing Tyreen that it had had happened during a nightmare when he’d left his prosthetic on by mistake was easy. Convincing himself to try and forget he’d been lucid and how it still feels like the right thing to do, is not. 

By the point the story begins, Troy is in a constant state of exhaustion, and knows deep down everything he has been through and done to others was for nothing. Tyreen doesn’t care about him the way he does her. She may never have, or she changed, he doesn’t know anymore. 

What he does know, is that he won't ever be a real God, and that the only reason he’s still alive is because he is useful. 

Maybe he should never have tried so hard to be useful.

 Phew.

I guess in a nutshell, my Troy’s greatest downfall is the God King persona.

As long as that shit is active, as long as it’s being worshipped, he’s never going to snap into reality. The reality that other people are there, that he’s been hurt so badly as a person, it’s all impossible long as he is being treated as, and believes, he is a God. 

The manic moments of clarity he has in the later stages of the COV rule are few and far between, but they eat him alive as he can’t understand why he suddenly feels so terrible, why he’s filled with such consuming remorse.

Peel the God King off the broken man underneath it and you leave him bare, confused, scared. You make him have to deal with reality, with people, with himself. That’s when you get him to show regret, and understand what he’s done, and understand what Ty has done to him.

That’s the redemption.

When he realises the game he was playing was real for billions, and suffers for it. It ends where it ends as my Troy ain’t dyin�� :P I’ll get to my rewrite eventually.  I hope to keep exploring these ideas in the future. Just desperately wish I’d as much to work with for Tyreen as I do Troy. GB YOU HEAR THAT? YOU HEAR THATTTT??

[softsweetsuffering]

OC LIST (New)

Trey:

Has an ability to mimic or amplify abilities/powers of others, as well as telekinesis

Was previously part of a group of people who also had abilities, however after mistreatment and other issues within the group, he left.

He's got a good wealth behind him.

Extremely gentle

Handsome ;)

Loves photography

Has lavender hair

Respects all

'Secretly' Plays violin

Lowkey a sugardaddy

Hamrish Benat:

Has four eyes!

Pink and blonde hair

He loves parkour (as in climbing buildings and leaping around in gyms)

Has PTSD (There are two AUS of which I default as to how he obtained it)

Ready to deck a bitch

Trained nurse

Loves teddy bears and fuzzy pink socks.

Also goes by Hami/Hayden

Andy peters:

Strong, kind.

The quiet Big Type, doesn't always talk, but his heart is in good places.

Wishes he could do more

Buff + Tall

Wears a pair of dogtags.

Has red streaks in his hair for the fun of it

Is extremely brotherly to Adrian

is friends with Hami

Adrian Géarán:

Nervous Malnutritioned anxiety filled tired mess

Has emotionally linked fire abilities (does not like having them)

likes to make little robots!

Easily bullied

Missing an arm

Struggles with normal life

Blames himself for Andys death

Looks unintentionally vaguely like Fry from Futurama

Chris:

Leader of a summer camp for kiddos

Huge fan of the outdoors

Loves to garden

Red head with freckles

Healthy!

Good build, a little on the below-average male height

Likes to hike

Loves kids

Strong but pacifistic

Great smile

Surprisingly a little shy around other adults

Bisexual

Himbo energy

Douglas Connelly:

Just a regular chubby guy

His chub is only important because this man gives some of the best hugs, he's like a marshmallow

He is outwardly confident about his size, even if it sometimes worries him internally

He loves music, loves to groove in the kitchen while making snacks

Always open for roommates and new friends (one of his roommates is a hot bartender called Donovan)

A bit awkward but he tries his best.

Tucker:

Badass

Bunny hybrid (ears :3)

White hair

Likes to wear denim jackets

Fast runner

Has had experience working in the force

Izekiel Iris:

Bruised and abused in a facility

Was turned from human into A being of made of Paint (Useful? no. Fun? yes. Rainbow blood anyone?)

Loves painting

Wallflower

Easily anxious

Loves to draw on his own arms

Matthew Libelle:

Aka Matty Very delayed development wise as well as Autistic

Very much a texture lad, soft blankets are his thing.

Doesn't like loud sounds ( who does honestly).

Tries his hardest to function normally but it's hard.

Watermelon colours are his fav. Green hoodie is his fav.

Has watermelon pink hair.

Gale:

Eldritch bab

Was cursed by a group of guys who were messing with magics they didn't understand

Did in fact murder said group of guys and is traumatised by the idea he has become a monster

hears voices

Has Tendrils that have burst out of his back

Has the ability to move from this realm to the Eldritch planes and back. (is terrified of said planes)

Doesn't have a home

Black curly hair- frizzy- shimmers like Slick oil

Shy type kinda, tall Pale. cold.

Kinda wishes he could just go back to normal.

Would really like to eat some fresh warm bread.

Rowan maverick

Was abandoned as a teen

Also known as Rogue/Red.

Lost some of their tongues making them mute

Trained Assassin.

Previously part of a cult

Addict to painkillers (Caused by the mental issues from the cult and the loss of tongue.)

Bad with Physical affection

Could use a friend

Jace

Cop/Ex Cop.

Laid off after an incident

Has a pubby called Otis

Likes the occasional beer

Dad energy

Issac Merewen

Was previously a Teacher - grade 11/12s

Kidnapped and kept Drugged the hell up.

Was given the new name: Jess/Jack. AKA The Jester

Now has Amnesia problems .(Anomic aphasia)

Was stored Cramped in box.

Needs glasses. (Long sighted. Cant see Infront of him for shit without glasses. He specifically likes round ones :3)

Natrually Blonde

He was very inspired by the Chitty Chitty bang bang scene, “Doll on a music box”.

- He naturally has two different coloured eyes :D

-He likes podcast n occasionally audiobooks. Its good for learning/remembering words, and way easier than straining his eyes. Although it is upsetting occasionally when he can remember more of a book/podcast he’s into more than real words or real-life things.

Tyrone Li

Incubus.

Wise, Patient, caring.

Brown tattoos wind up his hips and torso, curling around his chest around his heart, and around his back, flaring at his neck.

Glasses.

Loves plants and flora

Sex lost meaning when he was younger. He wants true intimacy again but he wants to find the right person..

Glamors hide the following features:

Tail, brown that gradients into Green, Leaf like tip.

Horns, curled. (green tipped :0)

Glamors break usually after a certain period of time regardless of feeding, however, during bad situations/fight the body may unglamour to reserve the last of its energy.

Caspian:

Basically immortal but can die (Reincarnations)

Not a pacifist, but not instantly into violence

He was blessed by the Heart of the Ocean (Shes wonderful <3)

Can control water, can do minor healing with water

Can make water bubble/ boil when angry

Glowy veins when powers are active

He has had many many lives

Soft..caring..Doesnt remember alot of his past..

Doesn't know how many times hes died

Doesn't have alot of family or friends

Goes on many adventures

Elio Solren.

Nickname: Sunshine

Good lad.

Is a shapeshifter Dealt with being told he was happy and always upbeat. People leaving or ignoring him whenever he wasn't started building this sense of need to be happy all the time for others.

Lots of struggles with self image. Being perfect. Appeasing everyone. Poor self body love/self body image.

Is scared about The hate from humans about shifters. The jealousy and fear about them being able to hide behind other faces.

Smiles to hide the pain

Punk/hipster vibes

Intricate golden tattoos

Doesn't open up easily

Doesn't like to admit to being in pain

Kotori

AKA Corey

Owl lad!

Bright yellow piercing eyes. But is totally blind. (Face scars)

Loves music.

Plays the uke.. hums..sings sometimes.

Big wings- like barn owl.

Likes to perch in trees

Jeremey Caulfield

Winter baby

Was left bleeding in the snow at some point

Father Lovely old man (John)

Mother died (Ellie)

Birthday December 23h

Blue eyes

Black hair

Russel

Box boy

Glasses

Red hair

Real sweetheart

Really needs more dev ; ;

Jules

Loves tofu n chicken

Touchstarved

Stubborn af

Kicks ass!

Has Sass

Wears binders/sports bras for Lotsa running n such

Black hair big messy pigtails

Dark brown eyes.

Has a navy bear sleeps with it ‘doesn't care’ about it but does

Gymnast/kickboxing. Bandages around hands

Loved swinging bars since being a kiddo

Trampolines!!

Participates in Underground fight ring to make easy money

Sleeps on just a mattress

Has a laptop for study work but she's slowly giving up on bothering.

(She's not one originally but Werewolf Jules is one of my fav things)

Miles

Part mole, part orphan

Lives underground

Very light-sensitive

Is colourblind

Absolute nerd

loves tinkering with things

is scared of humans

very foggy memories of his parents.

Leilah/ Lei

Can make/control shadows.

Owns a Magic skull(Speaks to it)

Lives in the woods

Wears a skull to spook off people from her woods

Has Tattoos that are shadow/absorb shadows

Kinda bad at maintaining friendships

Emotionally Distant

Wears a cloak.

Bao Ketsuyki

Blood magic bab

Short

East Asian.

Pink/red medium length hair

Big pretty red flower scar from blood magic use on her shoulder/ back.

Little bit foolish, little bit reckless.

Has almost died a few times from her magic use.

Oran Audun

Pale

Punk

Irish

Plays Guitar

Writes in journal, occasionally song lyrics, occasionally little messy ink drawings.

Easy to aggravate (On edge) however is trying to learn how to meditate and be calmer

Covered head to toe in scars but still tries to find confidence in himself. He doesn't find it unattractive, but he feels like others have no need to witness his scars.

loves wearing leather/fabric wrist bracelets

Unwelcome hands have used his body as a research object

Very very against physical contact, needs to break into it.

Ray

Social worker works mainly with kids.

Has a Shy guy tattoo.

His family consists of a Good ma, younger sister, and super baby brother

Dad died but dad was good.

Dirty blonde hair, kinda messy

Short, 5’

Socks the pupper is his helpful lil buddy (hes so round and white and fluffy)

Super dad vibes.

Owen

a hockey player n gymnast.

His mother died when he was about 9.

has an older brother who is a bit of a big jock type

quite protective and caring of his two much younger siblings.

ended up in a nasty scuffle though at some point during his more competitive years in Hockey

This leads to following his passion for Gym

Pole vault, the rings, trampoline.

Still plays hockey among mates or strangers on the weekends in the cold months tho

Ends up taking a position as a gym teacher for kids after taking a childhood course since he was so good at it.

actually a really sweet guy

Soft but likes his sport and jokes.

He can hold his own somewhat more than he appears.

has blue tips/stripes in his blonde hair.

He often wears varsity jackets or baseball tees. As well as a couple other sport wear shirts. (A. Good few are from his bro ofc. Free merch)

He's short but he's got a fairly decent build on him.

He's got a surprisingly good tackle if you aren't careful. And a good grip strength.

Nohea

but everyone calls him Noah.

Works at a Boba tea cafe..

likes to surf.

has an Epic board.

Back and shoulders all littered with lines and tic tac toe-like scars.

he's the type to brush off any questions and change topic while smiling. But not super bubbly. Just. Go lucky.

has a few friends who like to hang out at the cafe

Was in a surfing accident that involved a lot of rocks.

Ila

4’8 Soft. Short.

Ready to protect.

Loves to bake!!!

Smells like a vanilla cupcake most of the time

Isn't afraid to fight although isn't trained

likes Yoga ( and yoga pants)

Needs glasses but doesn't wear them (tsk tsk, unless tryign to read recipes)

Dyes hair silver/white

Jake

Homeless

Snake hybrid can transform his lower half from human legs to tail

Also has fangs, and therefore venom

He's got a lot of sass

Can be a bit of an asshole but soft around the right people

Isn't used to kindness

doesn't cry easily

Steals food

Mac Hiato

Also known as Caf

5’6

Very Grumpy.

Very often has bags under his eyes.

Hoodie is life

Insomnia has serious trouble sleeping.

Has nightmares of strangulation

Occasionally sufferers sleep paralysis

Scared of dark- night lights

Owns a mouse called Bean

Does freelancing webdesgisn/coding as job.

Sits like a gay.

Lives on coffee

Minorly Lactose intolerant

Has One bad eye

Neema

Egyptian

Mechanic

Her dad's a mechanic and used to bring her to work all the time

dead mum: which affected her ability to emote.

Works part time at the garage

Dad likes to bring gifts on their small catch-ups that happen every once in a while.

Sheeee. Suffers a bit of resting bitch face.

she's kinda stunted emotionally because she was raised by her dad, who, isn't great with emotions himself being a man's man and all.

She's very much a tomboy gal. Doesn't exactly get dressed up. because she finds it tiresome and not "her".

Also if she did/does have friends the nickname Nemo 100% crops up because it's sadly alll too fitting but also kinda sweet.

She's actually really into cars and mechanics. Which is one of the few good reasons her dad and her are close.

She's hard to get to know, very quiet. And if you're someone who dominates the conversation she won't speak up much, but you'll be surprised to how much she's listened.

Just because she looks tired and done doesn't actually mean she feels that way.

Samson (Lemonade boi)

His name is Samson, but he prefers Sun/Sunny. (Other more affectionate nicknames include Lemondrop and Sunflower.)

He really likes going out to markets and stuff like that, little stalls or knick knack shops to find the odd kinda items.

He also really likes wandering big forests. (Hes got some o that fae energy) He collects various cool stones/rocks/plants from some of them. He also has some small vials from waterfalls and ponds he’s encountered)

He wants to practice magic to become a witch! He loves the candles and rocks and other cool things that come with the craft. (He inherited things from his father)

He really likes loose fitting shirts too, like flowy things, ones with sleeves that drape past your fingers, or has extra fabric on the bottom that dangle down past hips. (Sometimes they come from the ladies section just because they’re softer and have more variety. Others from op shops and other niche little stores.)

He bought a cologne from a witch that looks cursed but the only curse is that it makes the one who puts it on smell like citrus..so not much of curse. (The bottle looks fuckin neato tho)

He looves fizzy drinks. Doesn’t mind his alcohol either, however it takes a surprising amount to get him on his ass despite looking like a serious lightweight.

He’s pretty average in build, bit of muscle in his arms, some fat on his thighs. Slight pouch of a tum (cause no ones flat and thats unrealistic :<)

He’s about 5′4. So not tall, but not the shortest of the short.

He kinda likes to backpack about. Not staying in places long if they get boring. Which means he is kinda jack of all trades when it comes to work, offering to fix things for pay, lots of casual work doing various things.(One of his favorites was helping a little old lady run a paint shop.)

He occasionally snorts when he laughs and tries not to.

He has his ears pierced, and he has a little yellow gemed stud in his nose.

The ring around his neck he found in the middle of a patch of mushrooms.

He has a couple other tattoos. One of them is of bubbles up his wrist :3 He also has some stars on his ankle, and a sunflower on one of his fingers on his left hand.

He’s not super in to gardening but he does have his lemon tree. He also wants to grow some mandarins

His eyes look silver in a lot of lights, but occasionally there’s some strange hints of yellow, and other times blue.

He has freckles!!!! that look alot like bubbles ;)

He has a twin brother called Fraser.

Scrunches his nose

Hides his laughter behind his hand

[etherealwaifgoddess]

A Good Night’s Sleep, Pt.1

Main Characters: Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Bucky has been plagued with nightmares since he left HYDRA and the Avengers all have been trying to help him overcome them. Bucky meets you by chance on a coffee run and finds that the solution he was avoiding might be exactly what he needs.

Warnings/ Content: brief mention of PTSD

Word Count: 3.6k

Author’s Note: Hello lovelies! So this little 3 part series came from an idea that @marinaaniseed had a few weeks ago. I absolutely couldn’t get the idea out of my head and so, while I should have been working on my many WIPs, this little fic was born. Parts two and three are going up immediately after this, it’s all done and I don’t feel like dragging it out. Hope you all enjoy it as much as I have. Especially you @marinaaniseed, thank you so much for the idea!!! XOXO- Ash

A Good Night’s Sleep, Part One

“Come on, Buck.” Steve calls out while banging on Bucky’s door, “You gotta wake up, pal.”

Bucky wakes with a jolt, his body rigid and his throat sore from screaming. He’s panting hard, trying to adjust to the world around him. He pulls himself out of bed on shaky legs, wobbling down the hall to open the door right as Steve goes to knock again. “Sorry. Again.” he rasps. 

“Want to come get a cup of tea with me?” Steve offers with sympathetic eyes.

“Nah, I’m gonna grab a shower. Go back to sleep, Stevie.” 

“You know you can talk to me about it if you want to.” 

“I know. I’ll be okay.” Bucky insists, closing the door to end the discussion. 

Under the burning hot spray of the shower Bucky lets himself breakdown. 

After Wakanda Steve had convinced Tony to let him live at the tower with the rest of the team and everyone had been leery of the former assassin joining their ranks. As they slowly came to know him though, he became a welcome addition to their little family of Avengers. The only issue was the nightmares that woke not only Bucky, but everyone else on their floor. Bucky hadn’t slept through the night since he escaped HYDRA, plagued with visions of the destruction he’d wrought as the Winter Soldier. It was an endless stream of death and terror every night when he closed his eyes. When he was on his own in Romania he’d accepted it as his penance for what he’d done. After Shuri and her team pulled him out of Cryo in Wakanda he hadn’t been hopeful the nightmares were gone along with the trigger words. And he had been right - they persisted. 

Bucky warned Steve when he invited him to live at the tower with the team. He told him he had nightmares and was prone to have low days where he just needed solitude to work through his own mind. Steve had promised he’d have his own living quarters and the team would understand. They all had their demons, afterall. The team was very understanding the first days but after that the concerned glances turned to long, worried looks and the team started speaking up.

Bruce had been the first to speak up, suggesting therapy to help him work through what was causing his nightmares. Bucky went and as much as he liked his therapist, nothing they tried stopped the nightmares. Even the meds blew through his system too fast to be of any use. She did give him some good tips for managing his PTSD and depression during the day though, so Bucky considered it a win and still went to see her once a week. 

Nat gave him a spicy Russian tea she swore would knock him out enough that no dreams would come. Nat was wrong, all Bucky got out of the tea was heartburn. She grumbled something under her breath in Russian that sounded a lot like “cursed’ the next morning over breakfast. 

Steve took him for a long run before bed one night, thinking the endorphin high and exhaustion would help Bucky sleep soundly. It helped Steve sometimes with his own dreams of war. It didn’t help with the nightmares, it only made him more exhausted the next day after getting little sleep. 

Tony offered to get him drunk but it would take entirely too much alcohol to overcome the serum in his veins so he declined the offer. 

Wanda suggested she try popping in his mind while he was having a nightmare to see if she could reshape it and try to correct whatever in his mind was causing him to have the dreams. Bucky threw up at the idea of someone meddling in his mind again.

The care and suggestions from the team were sweet, and Bucky knows they have the best intentions at heart, but it’s all still a little overwhelming. Bucky wants to stop having nightmares, he would do anything to sleep for more than three or four hours a night. A small part of him still thinks it’s punishment from some higher power for everything he’s done, but rationally he understands it’s just his PTSD. 

After his shower, Bucky trudges out to the team kitchen for coffee. If he isn’t going to sleep he might as well start on his caffeine routine. Sam is already in the kitchen whipping up a smoothie for himself while Natasha stares at him over a cup of tea, the human embodiment of heart eyes on her face. 

“Mornin’.” he rumbles as he crosses the kitchen, rummaging for his favorite cup in the dishwasher. 

“Another bad one, huh.” Nat asks, but it really isn’t a question.

“Yeah, sorry.” 

“You’ve got to figure these out, James.” 

“I know it.” 

“I know what you need.” Sam interjects causing both Bucky and Nat to whip around to stare at him. Sam just shrugs, “You need to get laid, man.” 

Bucky chokes on his coffee. “What?” 

“You. Need. To. Get. Laid.” Sam repeats slowly. “Seriously, man. Find yourself a nice girl, or a guy, and get some. You’ll be all happy and cosy and you’ll nod right off. No nightmares if you’re wrapped up in the arms of a good woman, or man.” 

Bucky shakes his head, the last thing he needs is to terrorize some poor person trying to spend the night.

“It’s not a bad idea.” Nat agrees.

“Not happening.” Bucky says with a warning tone. He fills his cup and retreats to his bedroom, unwilling to continue the conversation. Adding another person to his mess of a life is not the solution. 

Sam’s suggestion spreads through the team like wildfire. Everyone seems to have a friend they could set him up with. Tony even hacks into his smartphone and adds apps for Tinder, Grindr, and Match.com. Bucky deletes them quickly before chewing Tony out about privacy rights. It becomes a bit of a running joke within the group and Bucky is less than thrilled about it. Bucky hasn’t had a date since 1941 and he isn’t sure how to navigate dating in the 21st century. He knows the times have changed, people are more free with their sexualities and casual relationships are normal instead of taboo. Eventually, he thinks, eventually he’ll get back out there. But certainly not just for the sake of random sex. 

Bucky has another particularly rough night. One where he doesn’t dare sleep because the second his eyes close the images start up like a motion picture. He’d spends the night alternating between pacing and reading, trying to not be disruptive while everyone else sleeps. Sam and Steve get up for their run just before dawn and find him pacing in the common room. 

“Did you sleep at all?” Steve asks him.

“I will later. Probably.” Bucky grumbles. 

Sam shakes his head, “Let’s go get coffee. You look like hell.”

Bucky can’t argue with that and instead goes to grab his shoes with a nod.

The city is bustling despite the early hour and the line at their favorite coffee shop is almost to the door. It’s worth the wait though and Bucky likes the thrumming energy of the shop, the blur of muted sounds around him oddly comforting. The woman in front of them is fidgeting with her leather bag, it must have something heavy in it the way she keeps adjusting the strap on her shoulder. Bucky tries not to let his gaze linger too long but the way her long hair falls in soft waves all the way down to the small of her back is distracting. The even softer looking rounded curves of her body are even more distracting, he admits to himself. She reminds him of the women in Renaissance paintings, when lush curves were still revered, before these modern stick thin bodies became the ideal. Bucky wishes the Winter Soldier could go back and pay a visit to whoever started the “thigh gap” craze. 

The woman adjusts the leather strap again and a small white card flutters out onto the floor behind her. Bucky reaches down to pick it up, noticing the card has business information on it. Sam and Steve are chatting and distracted when Bucky taps the woman on the shoulder, “I think you dropped your business card.” he says hesitantly. 

You’re cursing yourself for lugging everything along with you in your enormous bag when you feel a tap on your shoulder followed by a warm masculine voice. You absolutely do not have business cards, you’re a freelance writer and market yourself entirely online. It has to be another pick up line, probably from some smarmy Wall Street asshole who wants to slum it with an artsy girl for a change. You’ve been burned by that type enough times and won’t let yourself do it again, no matter how long it’s been since you’ve had a date. “Does that line work a lot for you?” you reply, turning around with an unamused expression. 

Bucky’s face falls, upset he’s offended you when all he was trying to do was return what you’d dropped. “I wasn’t. I don’t. You. Um, you dropped this. It fell out of your bag.” Bucky fumbles for words, blushing brightly and drawing the attention of Sam and Steve who wear twin smirks of amusement watching him flounder. 

Your irritation dissipates when you see the gorgeous, stuttering man in front of you. He’s tall, though not quite as tall as his companions, his dark hair falls around his shoulders in a way that is either true bedhead or carefully crafted styling to mimic it. His grey blue eyes are wide and honest, clearly not some smarmy pick up artist like you’d assumed. He’s wearing a black hoodie and dark grey sweatpants so it’s unlikely he was the business card type either. You force yourself to stop ogling the poor man and look at the tiny card in his outstretched hand. Recognizing it immediately, you realize you’re the asshole in this scenario. “Shit, that is mine.” you curse, “I’m so sorry. I don’t usually have business cards but my friend gave me this one yesterday for a new bakery that went in over on 2nd Avenue.” 

Bucky looks at the card for a second before you take it from him. “So you’re not Beth Yardley?” 

You raise an eyebrow at him, wondering if that’s now a ploy to get your name. You really need to be less suspicious but after living in the city for five years you’ve become jaded. He’s cute though. “Nope, Y/N. Nice to meet you…?”

“Bucky.” he offers quickly.

The name doesn’t ring a bell, but he looks familiar for some reason. “Nice you meet you, Bucky. Thanks for saving that card for me. I’m dying to try these cinnamon buns my friend keeps raving about.”

Bucky is smiling again, hoping his face doesn’t betray how eager he is to keep the conversation going. He wasn’t trying to hit on you a few minutes ago but now that he’s seen your face and heard your voice, he sure as hell is. “I love cinnamon buns.” 

You stifle your laugh at the way his cheeks burn bright pink after his admission. He has to be flirting at this point. And he really is cute. Damnit. “We should go try them, then.” you decide, giving him a chance to make a move. 

Bucky feels like he’s swallowed his tongue, “As in, together?” 

“Yeah, sorry if I wasn’t clear. This is me hitting on you now.” you smirk at him as his blush spreads.

Sam is leaning on Steve as they fight for composure, trying not to erupt in laughter and ruin their friends moment. Bucky glares at their backs for a moment before realizing he still hasn’t answered, “Yeah. Yes. Let’s do that.” 

Getting a better look at his companions you realize why he looks so familiar. Of all the people to meet in a coffee shop, you muse. You’re still interested though. “Are you free after this? I was going to get my coffee to go and then head straight there for breakfast.” 

“I’m free. These idiots can find their own way home.” 

“Great. Now, the deciding factor is: icing or no icing? Think hard Bucky, there are two camps of people and if you fall into the wrong one I’ll be forced to shame you for all eternity.” 

Bucky’s eyes widen, worried he’s going to mess up two seconds into what could potentially be a date. “Icing?” he tries.

“Right answer!” you announce him happily. Then, in a conspiratorial tone, you whisper, “It wasn’t really a deal breaker but it’s good to know you’re not some sugar hating monster.” 

Bucky’s grin widens, “No, I have a serious sweet tooth.”

“We’re gonna get along just fine.” you assure him. 

After you order your coffee, quad shot latte with whole milk don’t judge me, and Bucky orders his, the biggest white mocha frapp you have please, you swipe your card before he has a chance to get his wallet out. Bucky balks at you paying but you tell him he can get it next time with a flirty smile that has his brain shutting off, unable to continue complaining. 

Steve and Sam give Bucky small waves and thumbs up, not interfering when Bucky leaves with you. “Your friends seem nice.” you say kindly as you step out onto the busy city sidewalk.

“They’re the best.” Bucky agrees with a nod. 

You make idle chit chat on your way to the bakery, keeping the topics light and superficial. Bucky tells you he grew up in Brooklyn, moved away for a bit, and recently moved to Manhattan with his friends. He seems hesitant as he explains it and you realize he’s trying to not be obvious about who he is. Like you couldn’t have already guessed.

You snort a laugh into your latte. “So what was Brooklyn like in the 30s?” you ask bluntly.

Bucky’s eyes practically bug out of his head, “How did you...?” 

You give him a half smile and shrug, “The hand is a good clue, plus your face was everywhere for a while. It doesn’t help that your best friends are Captain America and the Falcon.” 

Cringing, Bucky figures this will be the end of his almost date. “We don’t have to go get breakfast. I’ll understand if you don’t want to be seen with me.” 

You stop in the middle of the sidewalk, shocked by his response. “Whoa, hold on. I knew who you were before I asked you to join me. I don’t care what other people think about you or your past. You seem like a nice guy and I want to get to know you. The real you.” 

Bucky takes a moment to process your words, finding it hard to believe someone is willing to look beyond his past. He can't find a shred of deceit in your expression though, so he answers your question. “Well, there were less cars and it smelled worse if you can believe it.” 

You huff out a laugh, resuming your walk to the bakery. “I can’t. Tell me more.” 

Bucky tells you stories of the Brooklyn of his youth as you make your way across town. You aren’t in a hurry and Bucky is happy to spend extra time out in the warm sun with a beautiful woman. 

The bakery is a little glass fronted shop sandwiched between two larger brick buildings. You would have walked right past it if you hadn’t been looking for it. Bucky opens the door for you and you smirk, amused by the old fashioned gesture. The scent of vanilla and caramelized sugar hit you the second you’re inside. “Oh my god.” you groan the amazing smell. 

Bucky’s steps falter at the sound you made, trying desperately not to let his mind go where it was headed. “This place smells amazing.” he says, inhaling deeply.

“It had better taste as good as it smells or I’ll riot.” you joke. 

The line is short and before you know it, Bucky is ordering two iced cinnamon buns plus an assortment of other pastries he picks at random out of the display case. 

“Are we feeding an army?” you question as the tray piles higher and higher with plates of baked goods.

“Sorry,” he blushes, handing over his card to the waiting cashier, “Um, my metabolism is pretty high and I have to keep up with it or I get cranky.” 

“Ah, okay. No hangry super soldiers on my watch.” 

Bucky chuckles and nods. 

There’s a sunny spot in the window of the bakery with an unoccupied cafe table, Bucky motions towards it and it’s your turn to nod, following him over to it. The tray takes up most of the table and you perch your coffees on your respective sides, eager to dig into the spread in front of you. You go for the cinnamon bun first, knowing one of them is yours and not wanting to presume you’ll be trying any of the other treats. 

The taste of caramelized sugar and cinnamon explode on your tongue, eliciting yet another moan that makes Bucky fidget in his seat. “Okay, that’s it. I can die happy now.” you announce dramatically. 

Bucky takes a swipe of the icing off the top of his cinnamon bun and his eyes widen slightly. “Oh wow.” he lifts the entire bun up to take a large bite and closes his eyes happily as he chews. “This is incredible.” he says once he’s swallowed, quickly taking another large bite. His cheeks puff out adorably and you grin around your own bite of cinnamon bun. 

“I can’t believe you just bite it like that.” you tease. 

“Well, what else am I supposed to do with it?” 

You demonstrate the way you’ve been peeling yours apart from the outside in, “You uncoil it, like a normal human being.” 

“Takes too long.” Bucky scoffs, “My way is faster.” 

“But then it’s gone. My way you can enjoy it more.” 

“Pfft. I enjoy it plenty, and I would have time for two of them while you eat just one.” 

“Not all of us have super soldier metabolisms, one bun is enough.” 

Bucky looks at the four other plates on the tray and shakes his head, “Then I guess it’s good to be me.” 

You laugh at his antics as he takes another big bite, smiling while his cheeks chipmunk out again. The look you’re giving him almost makes him swallow wrong. He knows this look, he remembers it from the dance hall girls in the 30s. Attraction. Desire. You’re flirting with him in your own, unique, modern way. And Bucky is shocked to realize he’s been flirting back. He didn’t intend to get back out there so soon but here he is, enjoying breakfast with a beautiful woman. He wonders if you’re the type who would appreciate being asked out on a date, or if you’d rather exchange numbers and call him up when the mood strikes. A booty call, Sam had called it. Bucky still doesn’t get how there’s such a big difference between a booty call and a butt dial but thankfully Sam had corrected him when he got the reference wrong. 

Bucky finishes his cinnamon bun and starts in on a vanilla bean scone, enjoying the way the light glaze crackles as it gives way to the soft, buttery dough. You’re still enjoying your bun, about half way through, so Bucky tears the other pointed corner of the scone off and deposits it on your plate. “It’s really good.” he insists, not wanting you to miss out.

You glance from the bite of scone up to Bucky who’s looking at you hesitantly like he’s waiting to see if he’s done something right or wrong. You pop the bite of scone into your mouth, chewing slowly before nodding, “Yeah it is. Thanks.” 

Bucky practically beams. Maybe he can figure out 21st century flirting. He’s not sure if flirting via baked goods is a thing or not, but it absolutely should be. Bucky methodically works through all of the plates on the tray, offering you bits of each different item. You snag two bites of the cream puff but decline when he offers to buy you your own. The conversation shifts to the best meals you’ve had in the city. Food is an easy common ground for you both. You explain to Bucky that the small town you grew up in was pretty limited restaurant-wise and you’ve tried a lot of different places since moving to the city. You’re great in the kitchen but some days, after spending hours alone working at home, you like to get out and around other people for a while. 

“There’s an Italian place, Sapori, near the tower you would love.” Bucky tells you, “I don’t know what the big deal about the place is but Stark always gets reservations when we’re celebrating something. They make everything from scratch and it’s damn good. There’s these little pillowy pasta things. Starts with a g but you don’t pronounce it. I don’t know, but they’re amazing.”

“Gnocchi,” you say, stifling a laugh. 

“Yeah! Those. Best meal I’ve had in the city by far.” 

“That’s only because you haven’t had the food at Xián Tián.” 

“Well, you should let me take you to Sapori and then you’ll understand.” 

“Did you just ask me out?” you raise your eyebrows at him in surprise.

Bucky blushes and nods, suddenly feeling more shy. “Yeah. I did. This is me hitting on you now.” he says, paroting your words from earlier. 

“Well done, Barnes. When are we going?” 

Read part two HERE!

[telli1206]

The Wedding Date - Chapter 4

Snow White is getting married. Let the week-long festivities begin! Evie can’t wait to celebrate her sister’s upcoming nuptials. There’s only one little problem: she’s supposed to bring a date, and her mom's expecting a MALE date. Evie hasn't told her yet that she prefers girls (ok, she's afraid to tell her)! She’ll be damned if she lets Snow’s wedding be the moment that her mom finds out her secret and ruins Snow’s special day. So to avoid the issue, Evie convinces her friend Jay to join her and pose as her date/boyfriend to keep her mom off her back. That should be easy enough to fake for a week, right?

And it is, until two distractions show up. Namely, Mal and Carlos.

Chapter 1 on Tumblr is here

Chapter 2 on Tumblr is here

Chapter 3 on Tumbler is here

Also posted to AO3:  http://archiveofourown.org/works/23281867

The Picnic

“Evie, I’ve missed you SO much! I’ve been waiting all morning to see you and I’ve been watching for the horses to come in and YOU were the first one in so I found you SO easy! You look so pretty!”

Dizzy’s talking a mile a minute and won’t stop smiling. She’s hugging Evie so tight at the same time, and Evie can feel her tiny fingers digging into the base of her ribs, but it doesn’t matter. She can’t stop smiling. This little girl, her cousin Dizzy, is her whole world.

“You’re so sweet, Diz, thank you.” She beams at her, rubbing circles into her back. “I’ve missed you too, beautiful girl.” 

Dizzy pulls back quickly and grabs her, leaning her body weight forwards as she drags Evie along. “C’mon! Snow asked me to save her a blanket, I have a place for us!”

Evie jolts forward and instinctively grabs Mal’s hand to take her along. They let Evie drag them, giggling quietly as they stumble along together until they’re standing in front of one of the blankets closest to the water. Evie stops to take in the beautiful image of the radiant sun beating on the water, sparkling on gentle waves. She closes her eyes for a moment, listening to the soothing swell of the ocean, and letting the gentle breeze tousle her hair.

“It’s so beautiful and peaceful here,” she breathes quietly, eyes still closed. But the silence is gone all too soon, when a nasally screech sends her and Mal spinning on their heels.

“Maaalllll!” 

Audrey’s huffing and stomping her way over to them, cheeks pink and flustered. She stops right in front of Mal, who has her mouth clamped shut while watching her cousin approach them. Evie can see her cheeks puffing up, and she snickers when she realizes how hard Mal is trying to stifle a laugh.

“I told you to go save her, not disappear and not come back!” Audrey exclaims, arms flying up in frustration. “We had no idea where you went! Mom and dad have barely seen you all day.”

The smile fades from Mal’s face as she shrugs her shoulders. “Sorry Auds, I didn’t realize you guys were missing me. I was just making sure Evie got back safe.” She gestures to the bluenette, who smiles sweetly at Audrey.

“It was my fault Audrey, I’m sorry. She really saved me today, so I asked her to take me back and give me some tips on my form so that wouldn’t happen again. Thanks so much for letting me borrow her.” Evie smiles her kindest smile, complete with teeth and a flutter of eyelashes.

Audrey exhales loudly and rolls her eyes, tilting her head to the sky to make her gesture obnoxiously obvious. “Whatever.” She looks directly at Mal, hands firmly on her hips. “Are you going to eat with us then? Mom and Dad want to see you at least a little bit this entire trip.” She points over to the food, noting the line starting to build. “They’re already waiting, let’s go.”

As Audrey storms off towards the food, Mal turns to Evie, sighing sadly. “Sorry, I guess I’ll catch you later?” She grabs Evie’s hand and gives it a gentle squeeze.

Evie’s breath hitches as she basks in the soft grip of Mal’s hand on hers. She fights the urge to look down and gaze at the interaction like a lovesick dope. Instead, she turns the corners of her mouth up slightly and nod, exhaling sadly as she feels Mal’s hand slip when she turns to walk away.

“Evesie?” Evie’s lips curl up when she hears Dizzy use her nickname. She turns to look at the bright-eyed girl. “I didn’t get to meet your friend.”

“I know, Diz. It’s ok. I’ll definitely introduce you soon. You’ll really like her,”

“Oh, for sure! Her hair is so pretty! So purpley and fun! She’ll fit in great with us.” She giggles as she grabs at her colorful t-shirt, pulling it out to show off the patches of fabric that cover it, all different colors and patterns.

Evie just laughs, shaking her head. “You know it, Diz.” 

Loud chatter erupts from behind them. Turning around, Evie sees all the guests conversing as they walk towards the blankets, having returned from the ride and dropped off their horses. She spots Jay, walking with Carlos, Doug, and Chad. While three of the boys seem to be having a casual conversation, Chad is hanging to the side, only glancing at them briefly. His eyes are glazed over and he looks painfully bored. She does notice a flicker of excitement in his eyes the moment he looks up at the group, until she realizes he’s actually looking over Jay’s shoulder at Audrey. She and Mal are grabbing plates in line. With the way she’s shoving a plate into Mal’s chest, Evie can guess she’s probably still irritated with her.

She rolls her eyes at the thought, then turns back to study Chad. He’s gazing at Audrey with his head tilted and mouth hanging open, not hiding his longing for the brunette even a little bit.

Seeing Chad like this spurs an idea in Evie’s head, and she just can’t ignore it. It's too good. She normally doesn’t like to exploit feelings, but desperate times call for desperate measures. 

That is, a desperate need to be with Mal, which, to Evie, is good enough reason for just about anything right now.

Just beyond Chad she spots Snow walking towards her, arms linked with their mother. Grimhilde has a sour look on her face, like she just sucked down a lemon. Evie cringes when she realizes it’s meant for her. She’s definitely not in any rush to face that scowl. 

Now seems as good a time as any to set her plan in motion.

“Diz, I’ll be right back. Save a place for me, ok?” Dizzy nods, still smiling happily.

“Of course! I’ll grab food with Snow and Auntie Grimhilde and meet you back at the blanket. See you soon!”

Dizzy sends her a haphazard wave as she walks away, first stopping briefly in front of Snow and Grimhilde.

“Hello mother. Snow,” she says with a polite nod. “I’m going to grab food and see about my boyfriend, and then I’ll join you to eat in a moment, ok?”

“Of course!” Snow says, smiling sweetly.

“Excellent, dear,” Grimhilde agrees, nodding curtly at Evie. “You should check on Jay, that poor boy’s been abandoned for much too long today. You should spend more time doting on him. Better he get that from you so he won’t have to seek it elsewhere, hmmm?” Grimhilde smiles through pursed lips, and Snow mimics the smile to Evie also, eyes crossing quickly before their mother notices.

Evie fights back a smile to Snow and tips her head at Grimhilde. “Yes mother, I agree. I’ll see you shortly.” 

With her back turned, she crosses her eyes back at Snow as she leaves, elliciting a quiet snort from her sister. She grins to herself, thankful for her sister’s presence in moments like this.

Evie saunters up to Jay and hooks her arm through his, leaning over to give him a peck on the cheek. 

“Hey baby. How was the ride? I missed you.” She turns to face him and fakes a precious pout, complete with a full bottom lip. 

“I missed you too, Princess. The ride was fun, I had a great view. ” He says, saving the implication just for her. She grins and subtly tips her head toward Carlos with a wink to Jay. She then turns completely to face Carlos, Doug and Chad.

“How about you boys? Did you enjoy your horse ride on the beach?”

Doug just nods, but Carlos beams brightly. “It was really fun! I don’t get the chance to ride horses much, and I never have on a beach! It was beautiful! I would love to be able to do that again sometime.” He bounces giddily as he talks, and Jay can’t hide the grin on his face as he watches the boy’s bubbling excitement. 

Chad stays rigid and stone faced as they talk, and Evie looks over to him curiously when she notices his disinterest. 

“Chad? You’re not enjoying yourself?” He glances at her and shrugs, not making a sound.

“That’s too bad. I know someone that would have had a better time too if you had ridden with her.” His head shoots up to look at Evie, eyes wide. 

“Wait, who? Who wanted to ride with me? ?” The poor guy sounds SO desperate.

Evie keeps a straight face, pushing down all urges to smile, and waves a finger to gesture in front of her. “Audrey. She was just saying how she’s barely seen you this week. She’s really hoping you get to spend more time together.”

The way Chad scrambles to stand up straight, smooth his hair down and compose himself is so laughable the chuckle escapes Evie’s lips before she can even think to suppress it. Luckily, Chad’s too lost in looking at Audrey to even notice. He gives Evie a wink before he marches towards Audrey, pausing when he notices his awkwardly eager walk, and then dropping his shoulders to relax, trying to act more cool and casual in his stride.

Evie's smile turns smug as she watches Chad approach Audrey. She looks to Jay, who has his eyebrows raised at her in a confused stare. She pulls at his arm to get him to start walking.

“Come on, let’s grab some food.” She leans towards Carlos and Doug. “He’ll be back in a moment boys. You should get something to eat too, before the line gets too long!”

 “So, do you wanna tell me what that was all about? With Chad?” Jay asks as they walk to the buffet line, eyebrows still perked in curiosity. He picks up plates for them and hands one to Evie. 

“You’ll see,” she says with a wink. “You could say I might be using him, just a little bit, but it’s all for a good cause.” She motions to her right, where Chad and Audrey are talking. They watch Chad’s meager attempts to be suave, as Audrey stands tense and annoyed in front of him. She finally relents and waves for him to join her and Mal as they get their plates. He practically skips behind them joyfully, and Jay lets out a chortle when he sees Chad’s goofy grin. But when he spots Mal’s irritated face glaring at Chad as he wedges himself between the girls, he deduces Evie’s plan and turns to her with a wicked grin.

“You are devious, Eves. I had no idea you could be so calculating!” She gives him a playful nudge and shakes her head. 

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me, my handsome jock,” she giggles. “But let’s hope this plays out in my favor.”

They fill their plates quietly, in awe of the amazing spread in front of them. Jay piles his plate with a few different sandwiches, chips, and even adds some fruits and vegetables at Evie’s prodding. Evie happily fills her plate with salad and fruit. They both sneak a cookie, which Evie shovels in her mouth quickly, leaning into Jay and keeping an eye out for her mom. Jay leans back to keep her shielded as she gulps down her treat. 

“It looks like Christian and Snow are dividing and conquering,” he points out to Evie. She glances over to Dizzy’s blanket and spies Snow and Grimhilde with her, while Christian is a couple of blankets over, waving at Doug and Carlos to join him.

“Are you suggesting we part ways again, sweetie?” She ponders coyly. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were interested in someone besides your girlfriend .”

He chuckles at that, shaking his head. “I might say the same about you, Princess,” he quips. Jay dips in close to her ear then. “Besides, best if I’m not around if and when your plan plays out, right?”

She nods in agreement, turning back to look at Mal, who’s now following behind Audrey and Chad to sit at her blanket with her Aunt Aurora and Uncle Phillip. She still looks very perturbed, and Evie’s stomach tightens with hopefulness for her plan at that sight.

“At least I can explain that away to mom since Christian is separate, too.” She drops a peck to Jay’s cheek and smiles close to his face. “Go have fun with Carlos, you smitten little dork.”

Jay just sticks out his tongue and touches her cheek with it, making her coil back in disgust and start rubbing her face with the back of her hand. He chuckles as he walks away, leaving her standing there red-faced and glaring at him.

 -----

 The first thing Evie hears is Dizzy’s high pitched chatter as she walks back to the blanket. The sweet girl is always so passionate about everything, and Evie finds it to be nothing less than completely adorable. 

Right now she’s vigorously describing the rest of her school year to Snow, who is nodding as quickly as she can to each of Dizzy’s stories while Grimhilde keeps her lips puckered tightly, poking a fork lazily at her salad.

“And two weeks after our final tests, we’re going to have a graduation! For junior high. Which I know is not as big of a deal as high school or college, but we get to wear robes and they’re going to call our names and we’re going to each walk on stage and get a diploma! And I really want you and Auntie Grimhilde and Evesie to come because you mean so so much to me, and it would be so so special to me if you were there to see me walk...oh, Evesie! There you are!”

Dizzy screeches happily as she launches herself off the blanket and latches to Evie’s side for another hug. Evie balances her plate to avoid dropping it as she hugs the auburn-haired girl against her.

“We were just talking about my graduation! I really really hope you can come!” The girl squeals as she drags Evie down to sit. 

Evie’s eyes light up as she looked at the girl’s eager expression.”Of course, Diz. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Dizzy beams at Evie, but jerks her head around suddenly when she feels a firm hand grip her bicep. “Dizzy, darling, outbursts like that are NOT appropriate. Let’s please act like ladies and keep our shouting to a minimum.” Grimhilde’s pinched mouth and flared nostrils do little to hide her contempt at her niece’s actions.

Dizzy’s demeanor turns sheepish as she curls in her shoulders and drops her head. “I’m sorry Auntie,” she whimpers quietly. Evie huffs as she wraps an arm around Dizzy’s shoulder. She avoids her mom’s eyes, and instead offers Dizzy a warm smile.

“Evie!” Snow declares, drawing attention back to herself. “Mom and I were just talking about all the wedding plans for this week. I told you what her and I talked about for the ceremony, remember? With the flower arches and matching bouquets?” Evie flashed a smile at Snow and glanced back to her mom, who...was... smiling . Grimhilde’s teeth, not sneering? That’s a rare sight.

“You girls do both have lovely taste,” she told them, practically beaming. “It will be an absolutely beautiful ceremony, I’m sure.”

Grimhilde turns to Snow, placing a hand over hers. “Snow, I’m delighted for you that you’ve found such a gentleman like Christian. Now that he’s taking on leadership responsibilities at the Naval Academy, he will be very well set to provide for you both. I’m sure you’ll have a wonderful future together.”

“Thank you, mother,” Snow replies, putting her other hand on top of Grimhilde’s.

Grimhilde turns to face Evie “I do hope the same for you, darling. You deserve a man capable of taking care of you properly. I think Jay will have real potential to be that for you. Tell me, what is he studying in college again?”

Evie’s grin spread wide. She couldn’t even be frustrated with her mom’s own archaic ideas of men at the moment. She was so damn proud of her friend, she loved to brag.

“Sports Sciences. He’s on a football scholarship right now, so he’s hoping to play professionally and then move to coaching once he retires from doing that.” She peeks over to his blanket where she can see him gesturing wildly at Doug for some reason, smiling to herself as she watches him.

“Very impressive,” Grimihlde replies, following Evie’s eyes to him. “Camelot’s team has been doing very well this season, and Jay has been their star player. I have no doubt he’ll easily go professional.” She narrows her eyes, still watching Jay. “And with his skill level and charisma coaching will come naturally to him, I’m sure.” 

She finally pulls her eyes from him and looks back to Evie. “You’re a very lucky girl, Evie, if you can keep his interest. You’ll both have a very lucrative future together.”

Evie can’t deny that the thought of her and Jay growing up and being successful together in their respective careers gives her a warm feeling. Now that they’ve both decided the futures they want to pursue, they’ve been nothing but supportive of each other, and she’s so thankful they have that together. 

But Evie has a feeling that’s not exactly what her mom was thinking when she made that comment. She keeps her eyes on Grimhilde, smile frozen in place, to wait for what’s coming. Her mom has not been nearly as critical of her life as usual in this discussion. Though it’s possible that the prospect of Jay could be distracting to her, Evie somehow doubts it.

“You know, darling, if you are able to snag him as a husband, you’d do best to drop that silly design business so you can focus on Jay’s career, and what you can do to please him.”

There it is . Evie is prepared at least this time. She fights back the tension in her jaw, does her best to unball her fists. There’s no point in trying to argue with her mom, she’s set in her mind of the need for her daughters to have a man to submit to, with no desire to see them succeed on their own. 

Snow knows too, which is why she sits and remains painfully quiet, watching Evie and trying to radiate support through her looks, willing her sister to remain calm under Grimhilde’s scrutiny.

Evie exhales slowly, her smile never faltering. “Yes, mother. I’ll definitely consider that once Jay’s career progresses.”

Grimhilde’s mouth spreads into a smug grin, pleased with Evie’s response. “Very good, dear,” she replies, sitting straighter, chin tilting up in mild satisfaction.

A shriek has everyone’s gaze shooting to the next blanket, where Audrey is embracing Chad tightly. He’s hugging her back, face lit up with sheer joy. Dangling from her fingers is a shiny gold bracelet, a gift from Chad in an attempt to win her favor. Aurora and Phillip are smiling warmly, and they’re all chattering excitedly over the reunited couple.

Except, that is, for Mal. While she’s trying to mask her sneer, Evie notices her annoyance, arms crossed as she stares through the sickeningly affectionate pair.

She’s jerked away from the sight when a loud clap startles her. 

“Oh!” Grimhilde exclaims with delight. “Audrey and Chad, they’re together! How wonderful. Aurora and Phillip must be so pleased. I have to go offer my congratulations. If you’ll excuse me dears, I’ll be back shortly.”

Grimhilde stands gingerly, carefully brushing off her pants and smoothing her blouse. She tucks loose hairs back into her bun with her fingertips, tipping her head at her daughters and Dizzy before sauntering away.

Evie breathes a sigh of relief, turning to Snow with a smirk. But she’s surprised to see a stern look on her sister’s face, aimed at her. Evie furrows her brow in confusion, meeting Snow’s gaze.

Snow leans forward to pat Evie’s hand. “You know I understand why we let mom go off on her tangents, but I’m starting to think maybe you shouldn’t let her.” 

Evie’s mouth hangs open in shock. There’s no way she heard her sister correctly. Did she?

“W-why would you say that? You know there’s no point in arguing with mom. She’s never seen us as anything but future trophy wives, and she never will.”

Snow shakes her head, waving her hand as if to shoo away her sister’s point. “I know. But it doesn’t matter what she thinks. You really are amazing Evie. You’re already a successful fashion designer. Your clothes are so impressive. YOU, are impressive” Snow gently squeezes the hand she was patting, lifting it up to hold to her chest. “And I want so much for you to be happy. To be with the person that makes you happy, whoever it is. You deserve that. I don’t care what mom says, and neither should you. You should feel proud of who you are.” 

Evie opens her mouth, eager to dismiss her sister, not wanting to face the excruciating debasement of her mother. But a tiny, desperate voice cuts in.

“Evesie? W-why can’t...you be happy?” Goodness , Dizzy looks so heartbroken it makes her stomach knot.

“It’s, complicated, Diz,” Evie explains, twitching a smile as she reaches out to run a hand through auburn curls.

“But, I don’t understand,” Dizzy looks up at her, brows knitted together. “You’re so brave and strong, and, you’re...creative and smart and so nice and good to people. You’re not afraid to be whatever you want to be! You’re...who I want to be like when I’m grown up. W-Why wouldn’t you...be happy?”

Evie quickly wraps Dizzy in a hug, tears pricking at her eyes.

“Oh my Dizzy, you don’t need to be like me! You’re going to do so many wonderful things because you are so brave and strong. You don’t need a role model, especially not a mess like me.” 

Snow wraps them both in a hug, resting her arms on their shoulders. “You are a good role model Evie. Just, let yourself be happy. For you, for me, and for Dizzy. Think about it, ok?” Evie bobs her head in silent agreement. 

They pull away from each other at the sound of a loud cough above them.

“Am I, interrupting?” Mal says, smirking. “I was hoping I could join you. I need a break from the... happy couple.” She looks over her shoulder at Audrey and Chad, her lips curling back in disgust. “I can’t even get a word in with Aunt Rory anymore since Grimhilde joined us.”

“Of course!” Evie shouts, louder than she wanted to. She shrinks back a little as she withdraws from Snow and Dizzy, patting the blanket next to her. “We’d love that.”

Dizzy perks up as Mal plops down on the blanket. “Hi! I’m Dizzy,” she smiles brightly, waving a hand at her.

“Oh! Mal, this is my cousin. I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to introduce you.” Mal smiles as she shakes Dizzy’s hand.

“It’s nice to meet you Dizzy.” She lets go of her hand to point at Dizzy’s hair. “Your hair clips are beautiful.”

Dizzy raises a hand to her head and smiles, touching one of the bejeweled flower clips twisted into the crown. “Thanks! I made them myself. I’ll have a collection of them in my hair salon one day when I start my own.” Her eyes light up with excitement as she talks.

“Oh really?” Mal inquires, quirking her brow. Dizzy nods her head furiously, wrapping an arm around Evie to pull her close.

“I’m going to be a famous hairstylist, and Evie will be a famous fashion designer! She makes the best clothes and I can make anyone’s hair look pretty. Everyone will be begging us to style them.” Evie smiles and leans into Dizzy.

“Wow. Well don’t forget us little people when you become the glam team to the stars,” Mal quips, looking to Snow as she starts to snicker. Evie shakes her head and smiles at them.

“Oh, oh! You need to model for Evie! You and Snow! Wouldn’t they be great, Evie? Mal’s SO pretty.” Dizzy points to both, shaking her fingers eagerly. 

“Yes, she’s very pretty Dizzy.” She smiles at Mal, throwing her a wink. A blush creeping up Mal’s cheeks leaves Evie tingling with satisfaction.

Snow, Mal and Evie listen intently as Dizzy continues to chatter about her hair salon plans, until a loud booming voice captures everyone’s attention.

“OY! PARTY’S HERE!”

A tall, muscular young man with tousled brown hair and piercing blue eyes is being greeted by Christian. They come in and hug each other broadly, finishing with firm slaps to the back. He’s dressed...almost provocatively, considering the occasion. Cotton pants grip firmly to muscular thighs and a tight rear end, while his red short sleeved button down doesn’t do much better to hide the rippling muscles in his chest and arms. And in case the implication of his build wasn’t enough through his clothes, he left the first 3 buttons of his shirt undone, exposing some of the cut definition in his pectorals.

Evie’s mouth hangs open in shock, but not from the young man’s borderline scandalous appearance. She already knows his face, very, very well. He was a big part of her life only three years ago. While she wouldn’t say their last encounter ended badly, the thought of the potential awkward encounters this week has her sucking in her breath, constricting her lungs to the point of practically bursting.

While she quietly curses, lamenting her luck, the man draws a girl to his side to introduce her to Christian. When Evie lays eyes on her, her brain starts shutting down. She can’t focus as she hears a low rumbling in her head, drowning out the sounds of the world around her.

The girl is beautiful, slim and strong-looking, with shiny, long dark brown hair with vivid teal streaks all over, pulled into tiny braids throughout her head. She’s wearing a dark teal v-neck shirt that complements her striking hair and dark jeans, which prompts a tiny smile from Evie. She used to tease the girl nonstop about her obsession with jeans. Well, at least she did, when they were still speaking to each other.

Evie is fixated on the couple, quietly watching as they follow Christian to his blanket. When Evie sees the girl start to look around, she freezes, waiting for her eyes to trail the crowd. She gasps faintly when deep, inky black eyes lock onto hers. The girl’s recognition has her smiling, showing perfectly white, gleaming teeth. She leans in to whisper to the young man, and then starts heading...to Evie’s blanket.

“Is that...who I think it is?” Snow looks at Evie, eyebrows raised. “Wait, both of them. They can’t be..?”

She jolts when she hears Snow’s voice. Evie almost forgot about everyone she was sitting with. Words weren’t coming to her, so instead she nods slowly, eyes never leaving the new arrival almost upon them. She’ll have a LOT to explain to Snow, but most of the story will have to wait until later.                                          

“Princess.” the girl states flatly, as she stands right in front of where Evie is sitting. “It’s been a while.”

“Uma.” Evie tries her best to keep her voice steady and even. “It has been. You look...good.” She forces herself to swallow quietly, but the lump in her throat is SO dry.

Uma smiles cordially, exposing more perfect white teeth. “So do you. I guess this year’s been pretty good to you.”

“Yes. I mean, so far so good,” she says, urging a smile to her lips.

They both start to snicker, eyes locked on each other for a few seconds, allowing the sounds of their laughter die down to an...uncomfortable silence.

Luckily, Dizzy’s not one for uncomfortable situations.

“Hi!” She practically shouts, jumping between the girls. “I’m Evie’s cousin Dizzy. Are you her friend?”

Uma glances down at Dizzy and shakes her hand, chuckling as she turns back to Evie.

“Oh, yes! Dizzy, this is Uma.” Evie then twists behind her to point out  the rest of the guests on the blanket to Uma. “And you know my sister Snow, and this is our new friend Mal.” Both girls wave cordially.

“Yes, hi Snow, it’s good to see you again. Congratulations.” Uma tips her head and smiles. “And Mal, it’s nice to meet you.”

Evie patted the blanket next to her, gesturing to Uma, who drops down to sit. “Uma and I met at Camelot freshman year. We had the same statistics class, and we joined the same study group. She was pretty much hopeless with statistics, so I had to spend a lot of time helping her.” Uma smiles and shakes her head. “But she paid me back with rides to class on her bike. We got to be...really close...friends, really fast.”

She hears a giggle as a hand grips her arm, and Evie shifts her legs to properly face Uma. Uma’s leaning towards her, and Evie balks back when she sees how close they are to each other already.

“Of course, Princess. The closest of...friends,” Uma agrees, smiling as her eyes dart over Evie’s face, concentrating on her as if she’s drinking in every feature.

Evie clears her throat nervously, averting her eyes from Uma’s examination. But once she turns, she catches Mal studying her and Uma, eyebrows perked. Evie’s unsure if her expression is one of feigning interest, or if Mal is genuinely confused as to what’s going on between the two girls. 

“So Uma, how’s school going? Evie told me you transferred to the Auradon Naval Academy this past fall, correct?” Snow inquired, pressing her hands into the blanket to bring herself closer to the brunette.

Evie breathed a small sigh of relief, blinking up at Snow and offering a grateful half smile.

“Yes, it’s great!” Uma beams at Snow. “My major is Oceanography now. I love it. I’ve met SO many people at the academy that love the ocean, like I do. Like Harry.” She waves over to Christian’s blanket, pointing out her wedding date. “He’s been really great. And he really loves assisting Christian. Actually, meeting them in the Introduction to Oceanography class is what helped me decide on my major. They really love what they do.”

“And so now you’re dating Harry?” Evie scoffs, almost under her breath. It surprises her a little that she lets that slip, but she tries not to show it, forcing a cool expression as she looks up at Uma.

“Yes, I am.” Uma’s smile fades a little. “In the...loosest sense of the word.” She chuckles to herself, then puts her attention back to Evie. “Neither of us are really into...labels. We’ve tried that, and you know what? It’s never really worked out. For either of us.”

Uma’s look now has Evie’s face burning, and she drops her eyes to the ground as the flush creeps up her neck.

“Maybe we’re just not relationship people?” Uma cracks. “Well, whatever the reason, we’re doing really good. Just like this. If you want to call it something, what we have is...casual. We enjoy our time together, but we don’t get jealous. He can spend time with whoever he wants, and so can I. We’ve both had enough disappointment with regular relationships. We just want...to be happy. That’s all.”

Evie still refuses to look at anybody. The whole blanket is quiet, waiting for any response from her. Finally, Uma just sighs and stands up, brushing off her jeans.

“Well, I was told there’s not much time to eat, so I’m just going to grab something quick. I’ll be right back.” She gives a friendly wink to everyone, peeking at Evie quickly before walking away.

Snow, Mal, and Dizzy all continue to watch Evie as Uma leaves. After a minute of painful silence, Snow breaks it with a question she’s been dying to ask since the new couple arrived.

“Evie, that Harry...is it the one that, you...I thought he looked familiar, but it’s been a few years--”

“It IS,” Evie groans, burying her face in her hands. Snows puts a hand on her shoulder, rubbing gentle circles.

“Wait a minute.” Mal puts a hand up, trying to collect her thoughts. “Are you saying you know HARRY too?” Snow nods, Evie’s face still not visible. “How?”

Snow shrugs, still rubbing Evie’s shoulder. “That’s not my story to tell. If Evie wants to share her past, that’s up to her.”

Evie exhales deeply, dropping her shoulders. She turns her gaze up, meeting the looks of confusion and concern. 

“I dated Harry.” She blurts out. Mal and Dizzy drop their mouths in shock, looking at each other before spinning back to Evie. 

“Well, I didn’t see that coming.” Mal starts to snicker, but the distressed look on Evie’s face stops her abruptly.

“It was in high school, for two years. He was my first real boyfriend. My f-first...romantic, relationship...a-at all, actually.” Evie stammers out. She knows why she felt the need to make that clear, but she hopes Mal gets it, too. 

She makes no expression of acknowledgement, but Mal is listening intently to Evie, chin resting in her hands as she keeps her eyes locked on the bluenette. She’ll take that as a good sign, for now.

“He wanted to stay together, after graduation. He asked me if I wanted to...to try it.” She sighs, glancing over to where he was seated, next to Christian. “But, I knew I didn’t love him. And he didn’t love me, not really. He was just...trying to be something h-he really...wasn’t.”

“What, was he trying to be?” Dizzy implores. Evie smiles at the girl’s wide eyes. Her naivety when it came to relationships has made her oh so curious.

“Monogamous,” she says with a smirk. “Honestly, this...casual relationship thing. With him, I’m not surprised. It seems like his...style. I’m just surprised he’s doing it with her .”

Evie chews her lip as she feels Mal studying her. Is it possible she’s figured out what Evie’s afraid to say?

Evie can feel a deep sense of longing creeping up into her chest, and she realizes, secretly, she wants Mal to figure it out. Maybe, if she found out the truth, it will save Evie from making any confessions that her mom might hear or find out about.

“So, why does that surprise you? About Uma?” Mal lifts an eyebrow, obviously curious. Evie starts to twist the sleeve of her red sweater between her fingers, clenching her teeth before she answers.

“Uma and I were really close for almost two years. We knew everything about each other. The Uma I knew was not about being... casual . She wanted--” Evie shuddered out a breath. “--love. She wanted to find love with... someone .

Mal was staring at her, silent, as if she was thinking. Behind her, Snow was biting her lip and looking on with concern. Evie straightens herself, shaking her head quickly. Sharing anymore at this point could be trouble.

“What do I know though? We haven’t talked in almost a year. She could be completely different by now.”

“You haven’t talked? What happened?” Dizzy’s shocked tone surprises Evie. “It just...she seems really nice. Why would you stop talking?”

“It was...we decided…” She huffs in frustration. “We had a fight, when she was deciding if she wanted to go to the Academy. I didn’t want her to leave m--. To leave.” Evie stutters. “When she did anyway, I was hurt. She was too, I think. Because I wasn’t being a-a good...a good friend. To her. Supporting what she wanted to do. So when she left, we just...stopped. No calls, no visiting. I don’t think either of us wanted to be first to apologize.” She laughs quietly. “And...here we are.”

Just then, Uma returns with a wide grin and a plate piled high with food, already shoving a roll into her mouth with her free hand. She chews her bite quickly and swallows it down with some effort.

“So, did I miss anything?” She asks, dropping down with her plate as she looks around the blanket.

“Nope!” Snow interjects loudly, popping the ‘p.’ “I’m just boring everyone with wedding planning talk. This week has been SO stressful.” She laughs and pats Evie on the shoulder. “My sister has been so patient, but now I’m dragging her friends into it too! If you don’t want to hear it anymore, please, stop me!”

“No, that sounds great!” Uma says, throwing a hand up. “Tell me, I’d love to hear what this week has in store.”

Me too , Evie thinks, flashing Snow a grateful smile.

 -----

 Jay watches the young man curiously as he approaches with Christian. He recognized the girl he was with right away, but he doesn’t seem familiar. Uma had walked off, probably towards Evie, and he was dying to know how she was handling it. 

But before he can even glance her way, blue eyes are staring down at him, accompanied by a playfully wicked smirk. Christian comes up from behind and claps a hand on the man’s shoulder. “Guys! I want you to meet Harry. He’s a student at the naval academy, and I’ve been mentoring him this past year as a student teacher.”

Harry turns back to Christian and drops a hand to his shoulder. “And it’s been a wild ride, hasn’ it?” He speaks with a thick accent, that Jay decides must be either Scottish or Irish.

Christian shakes his head, smiling at Harry. “It has been, and with its fair share of trouble.” He laughs as he directs his attention to the rest of the blanket. “Harry’s one of my best students. He’s a quick learner. Now, if only he didn’t get into so much trouble.” He slaps Harry on the arm and laughs. “There’s not a rule he hasn’t broken at this point, I swear!”

Harry barks a laugh so loud Jay startles, quickly having to scramble to compose himself. Fuck, everything about this guy is starting to feel intimidating for some reason.

“I can’ help it now, can I? Ah’ve been gettin’ inta trouble since I was just a lil’ thing. It’s just a habit!”

Christian chuckles and waves for Harry to sit with him. He plops down on the blanket close to Jay and across from Carlos and Doug.

“Harry, this is Snow’s cousin Doug,” he points across from Harry, and Doug leans forward to shake his hand.

“Nice ta meet ya,” Harry smiles, giving his hand a tight squeeze. Doug winces and pulls his hand back, shaking off the sting. “So, ya must be Evie’s cousin too, right?”

Doug looks up at him surprised, nodding his head. “Yeah, you know Evie?”

“Oh yah, Princess and I go way back.” He smiles, waggling his eyebrows. “Ah’ve known tha’ pretty since high school.”

Doug bristles, taken aback byt Harry’s abrasiveness. He points a finger harshly at Jay. “Well then, maybe you should meet her boyfriend then. That’s Jay.”

Harry looks over to Jay, his brow raised in surprise. “Boyfriend, eh?” Jay nods. “Well then, good for you.” He grabs Jay’s hand, giving him the same tight shake. “Yer a lucky one. Yah’ve got a great girl there, lad.”

“Thanks…” Jay answers slowly, still wary of Harry’s reaction. “I know I do. She’s the best.”

Harry keeps staring at Jay for another moment after he drops his hand, eyes softening in thought. He smiles to himself, and Jay wonders what he could be thinking about, and if it had something to do with Evie.

Harry shakes himself out of his thoughts quickly, and looks up to seek out more new faces. His gaze lands on Carlos, and the wicked smirk returns to his face as his eyes slowly rake up and down the boy. 

“An’ who is this adorable gent?” He locks eyes with Carlos, a fiery spark laced into his look. Jay can feel himself tensing his jaw, his lips involuntarily curling into a sneer.

Doug puts a hand on Carlos’ back, and Harry’s eyes flash to the movement. “Doug, is this yer beau? He’s lovely.” Harry hisses, leaning closer. Carlos starts to blink rapidly, stiffening his posture, but not moving away just yet.

“Harry, this is Carlos,” Doug seethes at him through clenched teeth. “He’s my roommate . I am very much straight.”

Harry nods, eyes never leaving Carlos. “I don’ think persuasion makes a difference with someone so pretty. How can ya not find tha’ sweet face appealin’?” 

He extends a hand to the white-haired boy, who visibly swallows at the gesture. Slowly, he puts his hand in Harry’s to give him a friendly shake.

Carlos yelps when his hand is pulled and twisted over, Harry smacking wet lips over his knuckles, dragging his mouth over the skin as Carlos squirms and tries to wriggle away.

Jay starts to lunge at Harry, but Doug has already instinctively reached forward to yank Carlos’ hand away and pull him back, wrapping his arms around him as he sits him back upright. Carlos gapes at nothing, remaining motionless and painfully silent.

“It’s a pleasure ta meet yeh, Carlos. Very much so.” Harry’s wicked smirk is back, but he straightens up and puts space back between them.

“Harry.” Christian interjects, grabbing at his bicep. “It’s probably a good idea for you to grab some food now, if you’re hungry. They’re going to start setting up for the bonfires soon, and the buffet will need to be put away.” He gestures to where the food is set up, noting that servers were already starting to pack up some things.

“Aye chum, thanks fer that.” In one swift movement, Harry pushes himself to standing, taking a moment to adjust his pants slightly. “I’ll see you gents in a moment.” He tips his head, stealing a glance at Carlos again before walking off.

Christian chuckles lightly as he watches Harry leave. “That boy is a character.” He shakes his head, looking to Doug. “I know Harry can seem pretty...brazen, but I think you guys will really like him if you give him a chance.”

He shifts his glance over to Jay. “Can you all be sure to include him in stuff? He doesn’t know too many people here, and I want to make sure he and his date have as much fun as the rest of the guests. I just don’t want him to feel, left out.”

Before Jay can answer, Doug growls softly. “Only if he starts to respect people’s damn personal space .” He still has an arm draped over Carlos protectively.

"Doug, chill .” Carlos speaks up, shrugging off Doug’s arm as he stands up. “Harry’s harmless, and I can take care of myself. I’m not going to let him feel left out. This weekend would be the worst if I didn’t have you guys,” he adds with a wave around everyone seated with them. “Give me your plate, I’m going to clear out our garbage so they can start setting up for the bonfire.”

Doug hands him his plate with a huff, and Carlos collects the rest of the plates and garbage to run back to the cleanup crew.

Jay perks his head up when he hears Doug exhale loudly, and is surprised to see he’s already watching him with furrowed brows.

“I really thought YOU were going to be the problem this week,” he mutters.

Jay can’t stop the snicker that bursts from his lips, which only seems to anger Doug. He stares at Jay with narrowed eyes, but before he can jump down his throat Jay shakes his head, looking at Doug with a softened smile.

“I get it man, you want to keep him safe.” He peaks over at Carlos, who’s smiling brightly as he waves to the staff and starts his walk back to the blanket. “I want that too, trust me. I want him to be happy.”

Doug nods, mutely, shocked by Jay’s response. 

“Look, I know you still think I’m trouble. I have NO problem proving you wrong, dude. You’ll see.”

Carlos arrives at that moment and drops back down next to Doug, grinning at him. 

“Wait till you see how much CHOCOLATE they have to make the S’mores! And marshmallows for roasting! This is gonna be so fun. I can’t wait!”

“Oy then!” Harry’s voice bellows from behind them. He sits down with his plate of food, already shoveling bites in with his fork. He snaps his teeth at Carlos, earning a flinch and a squeal from the boy. “Carlos is ready, let’s get this party started!”

[shirlleycoyle]

Why This Teen Walked Away From Millions of TikTok Followers

This is part of a special series, The Future of Fame Is the Fan, which dissects how celebrity became so slippery. It’s also in the latest VICE magazine. Subscribe here. 

Sixteen-year-old Ava Rose Beaune was hanging out at a friend’s house on an otherwise unremarkable mid-July afternoon when her cell service briefly shut off. She tried to text her dad, but it wouldn’t send—definitely odd, she thought, but not alarming.

Then people started messaging her: Did you see what’s on your Twitter? Your Instagram? What’s going on? She logged on to her social media accounts and saw that her new Facebook status alluded to suicide—but she hadn’t posted it.

“My whole family thought I was going to kill myself,” Ava said.

Suddenly, a man she’d never met was calling her parents, demanding to speak to her. He had control of all her contacts, texts, emails, and social media accounts. The next day, he texted her: I just want to talk to you. (Spoken and written quotes from Ava’s alleged stalker are italicized to indicate they are not necessarily direct quotes but are as she remembers them.) He called her, and she answered, begging him to do whatever he wanted to her Instagram account, if that’s what he was after. “Delete it. Delete it and leave me alone if that’s what you want,” she told him. You don’t want that, he said. “I do,” she replied. I just want to meet up with you and have sex with you, he said.

“That’s when I hung up the phone, and I was like, this is getting weird,” Ava told me. This stranger had managed to hack her accounts using a method called SIM swapping, in which he contacted her wireless service carrier and convinced them that he owned the account and needed them to transfer access to the SIM card to the phone in his hand—effectively taking over her digital life.

In screenshots viewed by VICE, the hacker can be seen posting a Story to her Instagram about being Ava’s new boyfriend, issuing rape threats, and writing things like “I can’t wait til I impregnate you and marry you. you only live 5 MIN away from me.” She got her social media accounts back in her own possession and resolved the problem with her carrier. “OK, this is, you know, the end, whatever,” she recalled thinking.

With more than 2 million followers on TikTok, Ava was a minor celebrity in her own circles. So, she said, she was used to men being creepy, or even hostile. This was extreme, she thought, but it was over.

But it wasn’t. This was only the beginning of weeks of daily harassment so severe it would uproot her life entirely.

As of this year, TikTok likely has more than 1 billion monthly active users, and the market research firm Statista estimates that adolescents between 10 and 19 years old make up 32.5 percent of those users. The spiritual successor to Vine, TikTok is a micro-video sharing platform that favors an off-the-cuff, do-it-yourself style: People of all ages lip-sync to movie clips and songs, mimic elaborate dances in their living rooms, and use filters to edit the 60-second videos into tiny works of art. It’s also something of a fame lottery.

All this manic, frenetic energy combined with massive audiences is addictive in the same way any social media platform is: with casino-style scrolling and a notification system and the looming chance at virality. Normal teens like Ava—who signed with a talent agency in January 2020—become voracious consumers as well as unstoppable creators, hoping to strike it big, get discovered, or at the very least, make it to the For You feed, where one video plucked by some mysterious algorithm from a user’s feed can get in front of millions of eyeballs instantly.

“I’d rather not give those people the satisfaction of being noticed.”

Despite all this, cyberbullying experts say that TikTok isn’t the worst social media app for harassment. “The way that TikTok is built reduces the likelihood of cyberbullying when compared to other apps,” said Sameer Hinduja, the co-director of the Cyberbullying Research Center. Features like direct messaging that only allow mutual followers to contact each other, and the inability to add images or videos to comment sections, set it apart from other apps. “To be sure, cyberbullying can manifest itself in hurtful TikTok videos directed towards others, as well as in comments and in livestream chats—but these possibilities are no different than on any other social media app,” Hinduja told me.

According to TikTok’s transparency report from 2020, 2.5 percent of videos the platform removed were for bullying or harassment. But there are some features unique to TikTok that make it prone to a different, more personal kind of harassment. “Duet” allows other users to repost your video with a split-screen video of their own. Most of the time, it’s used innocently, for singalongs or miniature skits. But some users say it opens a portal for disturbing abuse. In 2018, BuzzFeed News reported that people—often young children—would duet their videos with a video of them acting out suicide, putting plastic bags over their heads or belts around their necks, to show their disgust at the original post. And a Duet from a more popular account can send a wave of attention from their followers to your page, not all of it positive.

Nick, who runs a TikTok account with his five-year-old daughter Sienna (the family goes by their first names publicly, to protect their privacy), told me that they experience Duet-based harassment on top of the usual comment section cruelty. “Some users would duet our videos and say mean, nasty things that were just not true,” he said. “In the beginning, it made us second-guess the path we were going down.”

It hasn’t stopped since they started the account, in October of 2018—and they’ve since gathered more than 14 million followers. But they have gotten better at managing it, Nick said. “Sienna is luckily very intelligent and knows that this is not OK. I made sure to sit down with her, emphasizing how special she is and that people may not see that right away.”

Nick believes TikTok does a good job of handling harassment, and giving creators the tools to handle it themselves. “If there is consistent harassment from a specific account, I block and delete their hateful comments,” he said. “For the negative comments in general, I tend to just ignore them. I’d rather not give those people the satisfaction of being noticed.”

TikTok does allow users to opt out of Duets. But these are the features that foster that slingshot fame; opting out of them means opting out of your chance at going viral or just growing your audience.

Fatima and Munera Fahiye, who are sisters and TikTok creators with around 3 million followers each, told me that they also find the platform to be responsive when they need support. “There were multiple accounts on TikTok impersonating me on the app, and TikTok helped me by verifying my account to let people know that my account is the real one,” Munera said.

Whatever harassment they do receive—which often means racist comments—they say is outweighed by the support of fans. “I have been on TikTok for a year now, and I have not experienced any harassment, but after gaining some followers I have seen some mean comments about my hijab every now and then, but I try to not give it any attention, because the love and support that I am getting from my fans is more than the little hate, so it does not matter,” Fatima said.

The harassment that happens on TikTok doesn’t stay there, however. On Reddit, whole communities are devoted to catching women and girls on social media in the middle of wardrobe slips, where you can see down their shirts, up their skirts, or anytime they shift and move and reveal a glimpse of more skin. Standalone websites are made for this purpose, too, and for doxxing and harassing women who might have a TikTok in addition to an OnlyFans or other separate adult platform.

In 2020, a server on the gaming chat platform Discord took requests for TikTok creators to be made into deepfakes—AI-generated fake porn. Although child pornography is against Discord’s terms of use, even in the form of deepfakes, one of the most requested targets was only 17. A request for another deepfake noted, “by the way she turns 18 in 4 days.”

Creators also find their content, clothed as in the originals or deepfaked, reposted to porn sites. In concert, the people on each of these platforms work together to create an overwhelming environment of virtual assault for many young women.

Until TikTok, Ava had never really been into social media, she told me on a Zoom call in her parents’ house. She was taking a break from high school distance learning; this was her senior year, spent over video chats because of the COVID-19 pandemic. “I always told myself I’d never make a TikTok because my friends all had it and I was like, that’s so cringe,” she said. “Like, I’ll never start that. But they were like, ‘Come on make one,’ so I did.”

She said she made her first account when she was 15, and posted the usual stuff: trend dances, makeup videos. Within a few days, her audience went from the friends who talked her into joining to 150,000 followers—a leap in popularity that she still doesn’t entirely understand. The sudden attention startled her; she deactivated the account.

She accidentally reactivated the account later, and at this point, having gotten over the initial shock of attention, decided to give it another try.

A rock smashed through her mom’s car window with a threatening note tied to it: I want to take you and impregnate you.

Once Ava started posting new videos, the hateful comments started. “I thought that was like the worst it could get,” she said. “It was like, body shaming and hate—the body shaming especially never bothered me, and the normal hate comments were just like, whatever.” A few users created accounts to post rape threats about her, and this did disturb her, but she took it as par for the course as a young woman online.

That is, until one of her followers started stalking her and her best friend, Gabriel. That follower messaged Gabriel, mentioning her home address and demanding to know who she was dating. “So, we’re both kind of like laughing like this guy’s obviously just some weird fan,” she recalled.

I have something planned for Ava. You’ll see in the next three months. I’m planning something big, Ava says he told Gabriel. He hacked her phone three months later, on Gabriel’s 18th birthday. After that, the man texted Ava every day.

“It was stuff about how he wants to rape me, how he’s going to get me, how I can easily stop this—he was texting my dad saying, She’s not allowed to hang out with her friends, if she goes out I’ll know. Saying he’s watching over us and stuff like that.” Every time Ava thought the situation was as bad as it could get—that this man she’d never met was going as far as he could go—he went further.

Then a rock smashed through her mom’s car window with a threatening note tied to it: I want to take you and impregnate you.

Cyberbullying has proven long-lasting effects on teens and young adults. As Hinduja noted, studies show that it’s tied to low self-esteem, depression, anxiety, family problems, academic difficulties, delinquency, school violence, and suicidal thoughts and attempts.

“So at this point I was like, ‘OK, this is getting a little serious.’”

“Most important to me is how negative experiences online unnecessarily compromise the healthy flourishing of our youth at school,” he said. According to his and his co-director Justin Patchin’s research at the Cyberbullying Research Center, over 60 percent of students who experienced cyberbullying reported that it “deeply affected” their ability to learn and feel safe while at school, and 10 percent of students surveyed said they’ve skipped school at least once this past year because of it.

“That cannot be happening,” Hinduja said.

“In general, I hope people will remember that everyone is a human being just like them. We are all capable of feeling hurt and disappointment, and just because there are numbers and a platform attached to our lives doesn’t mean we are impervious to hurtful words or harassing comments,” Nick said. “TikTok is a space where everyone should feel safe to express their creativity, and in order to do that we need to be kind to others.”

Maxwell Mitcheson, Ava’s agent and the head of talent at TalentX Entertainment, told me that he’s seen harassment take a direct toll on young people. “A lot of creators are growing up in front of millions of people, and that involves making mistakes and learning and growing from them,” he said. “The hateful rhetoric definitely weighs on them; some don’t even look at their comments section anymore just to try and stay positive.”

“It’s the inability to make mistakes, being attacked for being authentically yourself, and the sudden lack of anonymity,” Mitcheson said.

Ava’s experience was on the extreme side, he explained, but creators at his agency have had instances of hacking and stalking, or fans randomly showing up at creators’ homes. “We’ve had to involve security and PIs before, but Ava’s was a situation that could have ended in tragedy if it weren’t for the Toronto police intervening.”

After the window-breaking threat, Ava said the police told her that she couldn’t stay at home. She went to stay at a friend’s house, but he still reached her there, she said. “He just kept going saying like, look at what you’ve done, this is all your fault,” she said. He sent her a private message that would delete after it was opened, so she recorded it using a friend’s phone:

I need you to accept the fact that I’m extorting you right now, you need to accept that this isn���t going to end no one’s gonna catch me, the police haven’t ever caught me when I did this before, accept it, give me what I want, I want you to meet up at this park right behind your house I want to do this this this this to you

if you don’t I will kill your parents in front of you in your living room and take you.

“So at this point I was like, ‘OK, this is getting a little serious,’” she told me.

She said she sent the message to the police, who told her whole family to stay somewhere else, hours away. They did, for two weeks. He kept texting her: are you going to be there Saturday you’re making the wrong decision you better answer me.

Eventually, Ava recalled, he was caught. He left the VPN he was using to mask his location off for a half a second, according to her—just long enough, she remembers the police telling her, for the investigators to capture his location data and pinpoint where he was texting her from.

Ava said that the police told her that when he was caught, they found six separate phones and a bunch of SIM cards in his possession—full of pictures and videos of Ava that he’d taken from her accounts. According to the Toronto area detective Ava and her family worked with, the case is still in the courts.

Talking to me now, over Zoom, in between classes and facing midterms, Ava seems fine. She’s able to recount this story in delicate detail, without flinching. She understands the gravity of what happened to her, and how it upended her life. Her family decided to move away, “to the middle of nowhere, pretty much,” she said.

But she is different now. She stopped posting to her TikTok to focus on her friendships and family, though she still posts sporadically on Instagram. She would like to be more active on social media, but she’s not pushing herself. She has anxiety that she describes as “really bad.”

“It’s really affected me, like, you know, just like not being able to live in your own home, and like, even when you are at home, not being safe… It’s really hard, especially when I was only 16 when this happened,” she said. “It is hard, and knowing that my parents were always stressed out and not being able to go outside and walk without feeling kind of scared…”

Before she stopped posting new TikTok videos, she tried to open up on the platform in videos about her mental health and her experiences. But people weren’t receptive to it.

“Especially when they’re like, Oh, a TikTok girl that all the simps love, or What are you complaining about, all these boys love you, kind of thing,” she told me. “I’ve been trying to go to therapy and trying to get over it, but when that kind of thing happens you’re not really the same afterwards. You have a different outlook on social media. You’re kind of scared of if it’s going to happen again. You don’t think those people exist until it happens to you, and then you’re like, wow, this is crazy.”

Online harassment has a silencing effect on people of all ages and genders, but women have it especially bad—and young women are pushed offline, out of the center of conversations and control of their own narrative, at earlier and earlier ages. As adolescents, harassment online makes them do worse in school, seek riskier behaviors, and contemplate or even attempt and follow through on self-harm and suicide. As grown women, this looks like anxiety, a lack of self-confidence, not sleeping, and stepping out of the online conversation altogether to protect their own mental health, and, in severe cases, the safety of themselves and their loved ones. When harassment is allowed to carry on, and women are shamed for seeking help, the damage digs deeper—and we lose those voices.

I asked Ava what she wishes more people understood—about her, about what it’s like to have a big social media following, about how it feels to have millions of eyes on you at such a young age. “I just wish they knew that just because you have followers, doesn’t mean you have this perfect life,” she said. “Just because boys love you, that doesn’t complete your life. When these kinds of things happen, you should be able to be open about it.”

Follow Samantha Cole on Twitter.

Why This Teen Walked Away From Millions of TikTok Followers syndicated from https://triviaqaweb.wordpress.com/feed/

[sending-the-message]

Something is badly wrong in the Ky wilderness by KyBluEyz

I'm a park ranger, who is a retired Navy Gunnery Sergeant. I enlisted on my eighteenth birthday, and was in basic training twelve days later. I quickly rose through the ranks, making several times the number of enemies than friends among my peers. See, people don't like a young man being in charge or in command of an older man. Its cliche but true.

I rose to my current rank, and was satisfied to remain there. I was happy. I knew what I was doing, why I had to do it and knew my men would follow orders. I didn't need to know what other squads were doing, and didn't want to. I was content. That is until I got a personal visit from the Secretary of the Navy.

It was late, and I was already drunk. Halfway through my fifth of Jim. A knock from the opposite side of my quarters door, drew a slurred " Whaddayawant?" From my numb head. The door opened, revealing the SecNav in his dress uniform, medals shining almost as bright as the lights glaring into my eyes.

"Is that anyway for you to address your superior, Gunney?" He said with a half hearted attitude.

" Sir, no Sir!" I said, snapping to a staggering attention, hand raised in salute to my boss's boss. I knew I was fucked for being drunk in quarters and for the disrespectful manner in which I addressed the fucking Secretary of the mother fucking Navy. The boss of the entire NAVY. I stood in a drunk salute awaiting his wrath. He wasn't known as a kind or forgiving individual.

" At ease. Gunney. Are you going to pour me drink, son? I think I could use one. I think you'll need another too. You will when I tell you what I am here to tell you."

" Please sir, won't you have a seat?" I asked as I rushed to grab a shot glass and pour the man a shot of whiskey. I poured the shit, and handed it to him. He promptly drained the glass, and proceeded to pour another as he gestured for me to sit down on the small sofa with him.

I sat down, but didn't sit back. I stayed as straight backed and stiff necked as I could. Trying to mimic the respect that I was far too drunk to pay.

" Gunney, do you watch the news?" He asked pausing long enough to look at me and register my shaking head, " Ah, I don't blame you. This world is in a bad way. We know that more than most, don't we? The world is full of disgusting violence. People killing each other, hell kids killing kids and themselves. Then there's the recent rash of suicide bombs and shit. The old wives tale of a woman holding a baby that turned out to be a suicide bomber? True, it happens. A lot. And then, as if that's not bad enough there's this." He removes a manilla folder from his coat, and lays it on the coffee table.

I reached for the folder, but he grabbed my hand, and looks into my eyes and says, " Be careful, son, once you see what's in there, you can not unlearn it. It can not be unseen. Are you sure that you want to know what I am talking about here? No hard feelings, no negative career impact, just a drunk conversation, that didn't happen?"

"Sir, whatever is in that folder, if its something that can be stopped, that I can help to stop, then I owe it to the US to at least try."

"Gunney, its bigger than the United States. What is in there is bigger than us all."

Shit. Now I had to know what was in there. I didn't have a choice. I opened the folder, and gasped. It was a picture of a little girl, just a standard child. Maybe seven or eight years old, pig tails and a flowered dress. But her eyes, they were solid black. If that wasn't creepy enough, the flies were. They swarmed everywhere in the picture, seemingly coming from the child's mouth. Like a living black speech bubble. Dead bodies littered the floor, and blood ran down the walls.

Behind that picture, was a picture that wasn't too scary, but was odd to say the least, a grainy picture of a big black box in the woods. It looked off. The trees weren't visible behind it, the ground wasn't visible under it. But what was climbing out of it was. The closest thing I can even think of to describe it was a skinned person, organs and muscles still wrapped around the bones and threatening to spill from the rib cage. The eyes were huge, glaring and red. Not just the whites. The entire eyes were red. The hot searing red of molten steel. And they looked directly at me. Just the sight of those eyes made my skin crawl.

Behind that macabre image was something almost unexplainable. A picture of a small peaceful creek, in a secluded area. A small wooden bridge crossed the babbling brook in the background of the photo. In the foreground was something climbing out of the water. It looked like it might have been human at one time. It had the head, and torso of a man, but that's where the similarities ended. It had six legs, emanating from its torso, three on each side. They resembled spider legs, but at the tip of each hairy black appendage was a human hand. Eight large eyes adorned the rotting peeling face. I shuddered and flipped to the next and last photo.

It was actually six small pictures printed on one page. In the first was a playground of a school. Normal with the regular equipment and toys. The next one was of the same area, but this one was wrong. I couldn't see it at first, then it dawned on me. It was the equipment. The damn jungle gym and swing sets were built from bones. Human bones. In the next a head of a young boy hung from the cord of a tether ball post. Blood still dripping from the jagged remains of his neck. The fourth was even worse. It showed a group of around twenty kids, all of them covered in blood tearing at a lifeless body on the ground in front of them. The fifth was a close up of the lifeless body. It could have been, probably was, the body of the tether ball boy. Huge chunks of his flesh were missing, and his intestines poked through a large hole in his abdomen, like a hellish worm. The last picture was disturbing on a new level. It simply showed the same group of kids, but this time, they all looked at the photographer, it was clear that they wanted to do to that person what they had done to that poor boy. Blood and viscera clung to their chins and ran down their necks.

I shuddered and flipped the folder closed, raising my eyes to the Secretary, unable to talk. He poured two shots of Jim and shoved one toward me. We both drank and sat there for a while. After what seemed like hours, but was probably minutes, he spoke again, " I have been asked by the POTUS to set up squads and offices in all 50 states and one in each international US embassy that will be responsible for controlling this type of thing. I would like to know if you would run the Kentucky office. If you choose to do so, you will be in charge of fifty men, you personally decide what cases to send men to, and what cases can wait. If anything needs more than your office can offer, you can, and are expected to call me personally. Of course this would all be classified, Need To Know, and anyone under you doesn't need to know anything except what to expect when their team is deployed to an anomaly. You will be compensated nicely. And will be given any and all weaponry you request. Will you accept?"

I sat there for a second. Thinking. I would be in charge of an entire field office. Me. " Yes sir. I think I will accept. When do I leave here sir?"

" Well Gunney, you will fly out of here at 0400 tomorrow, a transport helo will be arriving soon, and after a pause to refuel and load the men you request you will be off. I can spare you ten men from this ship, no more no less, and the rest I will assign based on my information. Is that going to be an issue Gunney?" . " No sir. That's fine. Can I please have a moment to go through the crew roster? I know one member I want in my team is my 2IC, sir. I feel I owe it to him. He has always liked to tell me ghost stories, and I think he actually already believes in this stuff. The rest I will pick out and notify of their assignment by 0330. Thank you for your confidence sir." I was somehow already on my way to sober.

The next four hours were a whir of commotion, as I called and knocked on the doors of, the men I had chosen to accompany me. I didn't tell all of them every detail, most I simply told, " You have been re assigned. Pack up and meet me on deck at 0400"

Some were shocked and happy to get back to land, a few were in disbelief, and a couple didn't want to go. Those were the ones that I told a few details. I had only kept the folder for proof on the flight out, for those that weren't ready to accept the truth. One man I picked calmly asked me to please pick another member for this team, because he would rather die at the hands of a true evil human, than to be shredded by an unseen evil. He looked me dead in the eyes, and said " I can't deal with that again sir. I can't. Respectfully declining your offer sir. I am sorry." I agreed to leave him behind, and added a backup name to the flight manifest as the chopper started to spin up.

At exactly 0400 the rotors spun up and the heavy bird hoisted us into the air. We raced over the ocean, to an undisclosed base in Texas where we were flown in an unmarked navy jet to the air strip in Powell County Kentucky. It wasn't a large airstrip, and the guy in the "tower" ( that was actually a two story block shed..) tried to decline the pilots request to land, arguing the strip wasn't long enough to accommodate the small jet. About thirty seconds after the pilot radioed base the ATT guy squelched back in to the radio," Clear to land in runway..well its the only one."

The jet came to a halt, just feet from the wall of a steel hanger, as four black Hummers roared through the field to stop at the end of the runway. We all loaded our belongings into the backs of the Hummers, and off we went. Not speaking a word until we arrived a short while later at a unmarked cement block building in the middle of the woods in Wolfe County. We silently unloaded the Hummers, as three of the drivers exited their perspective vehicles and climbed into the last one. Before they pulled away, one of the soldier, a reserve Guardsmen named Paul, said " Sir, I have a message for you, its simply a few odd words that I don't have clearance to understand. Ready?" He paused, looking at me, I nodded in agreement, " well sir Remainder enroute you will soon be armed."

I nodded and excused the young man, as I turned to look at my new "base" of operations. It looked like an old abandoned factory from the outside. A grey block building, with a rusty steel roof, surrounded by chain link fence and razor wire. It was only when we entered that it became clear that this was all a facade to cover the true purpose of this place. It was full of computer equipment, large touch screen monitors as wide a I am tall hung from the beams. In one wing of the massive building there were twenty black Hummers, like the three outside. Each had the same appearance, black, tinted windows, and a turret mount on the roof, placed in a way the gunner could stand from the backseat and reach the gun when mounted. There was a locked room, with a post it note stuck to a key pad next to it. The note read as follows: " Gunney, your Navy ID will open this door. Only you and your chosen 2IC are to access this room, and each item has to be issued and recorded , SecNav G. Carsons"

I entered my ID number and stood in awe when the door opened. Inside this very large room was every weapon you could imagine. Claymores, shock bangs, gas bombs, dynamite, C4 detcord canon fuse AK-47s Glock 9mms etc. There was an entire armory in here. I could fight a war with the contents of this room. With a smile, I turned to my men and said" Welcome home boys! Everyone find a rack, and be making it your own while I find out when the rest of us will be here. Dismissed!"

The men scattered, some pausing to throw a lingering stare into the armory, others spun on their heels and walked toward a sign with an arrow and the word Bunks written on it. In a few seconds, I was alone. I walked into the armory, and picked up one of the several dozen burner phones. I punched in the number Carsons had given me, and asked him when I should expect the rest of the men to arrive. I was told that in fact the budget only allowed for the eleven of us. That's it. The entire department consisted of eleven men. I was told that in my quarters, which was attached to the bullpen was a laptop with contact info for the other forty nine bases in the country.

I yelled for my 2IC. " Keith! Front and center! We need to talk!" He walked back from the bunks and looked at me sideways and said " Sir, no disrespect, but the bunk house has ten rooms each with a single rack. How are fifty of us going to live here?"

" Well, Sergeant," we were equal rank, though I held a much higher clearance level, " that's why I waned to talk to you. Let's walk." I walked him to my quarters, where I was sure nobody would hear what I was about to say. We entered my room, and I closed the heavy steel door.

" Keith, let's not military this up. I'm not your boss, you're not my second in command. Were just friends. Is that alright with you?" I asked, and he agreed, saying it would be refreshing to not have to call me Sir.

" Keith, we've been duped man. The Secretary lied, or was lied to or whatever. What I mean is there is no more guys coming. We are the department. I have contact info for the other bases like this a crossed the country so if we get held down or need help or whatever I can call them. But, for now, I need to find a way to tell the guys I lied to them. We're all used to the politics of the Navy, but being told you are a team of fifty, then finding out you're a team of ten, its going to be bad. They're already scared, most of em would go back to the ship if I offered that choice. They were okay thinking we had a small army, but now.." I trailed off.

Keith shuffled his feet, looked at the floor and said" well, Steve I think they're gonna be pissed, but you picked a solid team of guys. I know five of them were SEALS and a couple have several commendations, they'll be fine. They all follow orders like they should, and we have enough fire power to kill a small country, so it should be fine."

I looked around my new chambers and seen a P.A. microphone on a desk. I walked to it and broke the news to the men simply by saying " Attention, we are alone. There will not be any more men coming to this base. The budget has been cut and we are capped at ten men and the supplies we have. I have been told the National Guard Armory in Breathitt county has been ordered to give us whatever we need, so we will be fine. Today we rest, and get our land legs. Tomorrow we start work. If anyone has any questions, come find me. I can't promise an answer, but you can ask. I am ordering you all to remain at ease, no calling me sir, no salutes to me or anyone else that's living here. If a superior comes on base, you return to military respect and procedure. That's all. At ease."

Fast forward seven years. Six of my men have been killed. One at a time they were eaten alive by our first case. A small town had gone mad. Every resident with children had murdered and eaten their children. The ones without kids, have taken to eating their pets, or spouses. When I was alerted to the situation, I ordered the power to be shut off, I had men place cellular interrupters throughout the town, and shut off all other utilities. The cannibalistic townsfolk now had no running water, no heat, no AC, couldn't cook indoors, and they had no way to communicate with anyone. The town was thankfully small, and had one main road that went in and out . we closed the roads, and tried to contain the sick fucks.

The first day all went well. The next morning as I sat on the bumper of my Humvee at the road block, drinking stale coffee from a thermos, the first one attacked. A tall, lanky man, in torn clothes with shaggy hair approaches. " They..they all went crazy. They started eating each other and then they wanted to eat the pets! My wife ate our newborn daughter. She was six days old for fucks sake!" The man cried, falling to his knees sobbing.

I knew what was happening, but I was frozen in thought as a low ranked member approached the crying man. He reached to help the man up, and the bastard grabbed his arm and took a bite from his flesh. Before anyone could get a shot off, the crying man had stood, shoved the soldier down and climbed atop, and began chewing. He ripped the young soldiers throat out with one big bite, blood running down his chin as he chewed and screamed out " Yes, you were right! Its so fucking good! I feel it now! I will obey." that's when he stopped talking and sat still, a small hole appearing in his forehead as Keith put a round in his brain. The cannibal fell over and was dead instantly, the soldier, wasn't as lucky. I tried to stop the bleeding. I did. Even as I told the boy, because face it, he was 19 he was a boy, anyway, I told him he would be fine, but knew better. He gurgled and choked as he laid there and died.

That's when I heard the gunshots from across town. I knew that the other road block had been attacked as well. The radio burst open, with static and gunfire " They're attacking us! There's more than thirty of them. I've lost three men already! They came from" the soldier was interrupted by a woman screaming at him, to " Hold still and come to your new God!" They soldier yelled and another gunshot, this one loud in the radio rang off. The soldier was breathing hard and continues " they came from everywhere. Somehow the managed to surround us and they all attacked at once.

I stood up, wiping the young boys blood from my hands into my camo pants. I triggered the radio and gave my hardest order ever at that point. " Light em up. No survivors. If it breaths kill it. Any kids left are not to be harmed, contain them. Leave one adult alive and in custody. I want to know what's going the fuck on. Fourteen hours and another dead grunt later, the town was silent. Bodies laid everywhere and blood was running in thick nasty rivers through the streets.

" Listen up! Take a Humvee and toss the bodies of the towns folk in the back, load them up and bring them here to the hardware store. We're going to burn them. I will set it up so the media reports it as a unavoidable accidental, gas explosion. Head out!"

I called to Keith, and told him to find the main natural gas valve and turn it on. As he did, I walked into the empty hardware store and loaded every propane tank and flammable liquid I could find into a cart, pushing it outside. Keith returned a short while later, and told me he had turned the gas on, and that it was flowing fine. He and I went to the small fire department and took the only water truck they had. A 1400 gallon rig, and it was completely empty. Good. We started at the Shell gas station on that side of town. In all, the small town had four stations that sold gas and diesel. We pumped all of the fuels into the tanker truck and went back to the town center. The rest of the men had finished the cleanup and all the corpses were piled in front of the small hardware store. I ordered the remaining men to find the lost soldiers, and respectfully load their bodies so we could give them a funeral. So their families had closure.

I drove the tanker truck slowly through the entire town, stopping here and there, as Keith sprayed the fuel on as much of the blood as he could see. I then called the Armory in Jackson and told them to send as much water and foam as they could. I was soon informed that within an hour I would have close to 50 thousand gallons of water and almost as much fire retardant foam. I waited till the fire fighting crew was only ten minutes out, then ordered my men to head out. I opened the gas valve in the hardware store, and opened every propane tank I could, before walking to the tanker truck that still had fuel in it I opened the valve slightly and lit the tiny stream of fuel, the truck was running, aimed at the hardware store, so I ripped it into gear and let it roll into the store, dragging fire behind it.

I managed to make it to my Hummer before the gas caught, and sent an explosion reeling in every direction. I reversed as fast as the diesel would allow and whipped into a drive way shoving the shifter into first and tramping the accelerator. I felt the explosions going off like gigantic firecrackers as the local homes caught and their gas supply's then caught.

The town incinerated in my rear view mirror as I radioed to the National Guards to keep the flames in the town, and not to let it spread. I told them to appear to put the flames out, but to really just contain it and let it burn out. I stopped and turned the main gas line off as the town burned. I wanted to watch it, but I had something to do. There was still one single resident or that now non existent town. I wanted to know what happened, so the rest of my crew had taken him and the bodies of our fallen brothers back to the base. The survivor was placed in to a small room, with no windows and only one door. He was left there for two days before I even bothered to question him.

The bodies were sent home, their families told they perished in a tragic helicopter training accident, and that they had all served their country well. The standard government line. A flag was presented to the next of kin of each soldier, a 21 gun solute given as well.

Two days passed in a blur of funerals and crying families. Folding that flag, and me handing it to the sobbing widow, or mother. I had to look these poor people in the eyes and lie to them about the death of their loved Ines. By the end if the second day, I was dead inside. I was alive, but numb. I didn't understand how a bunch of fucking civilians manages to ambush a small group of armed soldiers...

I walked to the small holding cell, and could hear the man inside screaming in pain. I thought maybe one of the men had taken out some aggression, but the camera showed the man, emaciated, nearly dead, the food and water that had been given to him were laying on the floor, untouched. He had shit himself as well as pissed in his pants, vomit clung to his chin. I opened the door, and gagged. I couldn't handle the smell. I had a soldier bring me a set of sweat pants and a white tee shirt. I hosed the man down, with a small fire hose, cleaning the worst of the nasty off of him. I yelled and told him to strip naked or I would have my men cut his clothes off. The thing that used to be a man listened and stood there naked, feces caked to his legs and other body parts. I hosed that off and as he spun around, I noticed he was covered in what looked like bug bites. I finished hosing the poor bastard off and threw him a towel. I told him to dry off and get dressed. He dried off, and tried to put the old nasty rags back on. After yelling at him to stop, and put on the new clothes, I noticed how he was moving. His motions, looked. .wrong. Jerky, and rough. Like his joints are frozen and he's breaking them loose.

He got dressed, and I had four armed men cuff and shackle the man and bring him to an interrogation room where he was locked to the floor and just had enough room to sit up and place his hands on the table. I walked in and took a seat across from him.

His eyes were turning white, like they were dead, I could hear the death rattle coming from his chest, as he struggled to breath. I could smell the death and rot pouring from his body. I tried talking to him, but he couldn't make words come out, his voice was gone, from screaming and because the man was rotting from the inside out. He could still write though. He wrote answers to my question, and at the end of the discussion, I ordered him returned to his cell. I looked at the scribbles of words on the sheet of paper, and shuddered when I read the answers.

Q: What started all this?

A: Meeeaaaattt

Q: Who was in charge?

A: Boney maannn

Q: Why did the children have to die?

A: Meat for the boneee maannn

Q: How did your people jump my crew?

A: boneee maannn told usss two[sic]

Q: what's your name sir

A: Meeaaattttt

The rest of the answers were just nonsense and broken words.

I sent the man back to his cell, hoping his death was fast. What happened next changed my life forever.

[iblogwithgrace]

Hey guys! How are you doing? What'your week looking like? Personally, I can finally tick "Visit Ibadan" off my buck list.

In last weeks post here my former roommate Chidera discussed some of her experiences as a student of the Nigerian Law school. This week she shares her experience with her law school roommates, her study pattern, fellowship and so on.

Continued from last week.

...it became very necessary. We had been pre-forwarded our task for the day. After the morning session of lectures, we went on a break and came back for the afternoon session to solve the task. This session was handled by Mr Kanu, a very brilliant lecturer who added humor to his teaching. Each group came out to present and answer questions. How this process went varied. If Mr Kanu was the one asking questions, then you had to be ready to give your 100 because his questions were brain twisting. This was basically the routine for the 17 weeks of lectures. 

Tuesday was for civil litigation. Now, there are teachers and there are TEACHERS. Mrs Odukoya, that woman broke down the life out of civil litigation. During our first lecture with her, she stood for four straight hours, teaching, explaining, giving the best examples. It was always a great time in her class. Her favorite word is ''circulate.'' She always said that after making corrections to a group tasks and instructed them to circulate the answers to other groups.   

Wednesday was for Property Law Practice. Now Wednesdays were probably my most dramatic days in law school. The combination of lecturers for that course was an embodiment of perfection and at the same time trouble. They seemed to be a good fit for one another. Mrs Odusote, tall, beautiful, stern and intimidating. Mr Udemezue, jovial, intelligent and rather talkative. Mrs James, the absolute image of small but mighty. Her petite frame didn’t do justice to all the energy she had in her. It was in this class that I first heard the term ''committee of friends'' used outside the context of a social event.  If you came in late to a property law class and Mr Udemezue was there, you would come to the front of the class as a member of the committee of friends and would have to answer a question before you were permitted to go back to your seat. Everyone desperately avoided this committee but many times, we fell prey at one point. I remember the day that even the Student Representative Council Chairman, Garrick Nosa John fell a victim. On some days, Mrs Odusote would start calling random registration numbers to answer a question. My heart was always in my hands. I can’t even lie.  It was always a dramatic day because some students would refuse to own up to their numbers and answer the questions they were asked. She would then instruct Mrs James to take down the numbers. This was a mild threat to make you own up or be issued with a query. Or they would start calling hostel room numbers and tell you to call your best or worst roommate to answer the question. 

One fateful Thursday in law school, I met a young man who is arguably the most intelligent person I have met: Kenneth Okwor Ononeze. This young man was still 24 when he became our lecturer. He is tall, handsome, well spoken, with a good fashion sense (even though some people I know may disagree) and most importantly, he was willing to teach everything he knew no matter how long it took. This young man actually taught alteration of a company’s memorandum from beginning to end without any guide. He taught straight from his head with his CAMA in his hand (he didn’t open it once) and taught walking around the class not missing any section. The course didn’t thrill me one bit. It might have been my nemesis at the end of the day. Who knows? But watching him teach it was everything.

Mrs James also taught this class. You see, I’m sure in my own way, I loved Mrs James but I didn’t appreciate her lectures for one simple reason; she always asked me a question. Which meant I had to put on my microphone and talk. Have I already mentioned to you that hard as I tried, while my body was in class, my mind was hardly there. But I have been like this my whole academic life. Once it was 11am or the very maximum, 12noon, my mind shuts down for that day but law school has failed and continues to fail to understand that people have different attention spans. So rather than letting us thrive as we should, they make everyone sit in class all day whether we are learning anything or not. You can imagine that everytime Mrs James asked me a question, I fumbled and flopped. Maybe she could see what lay ahead. I always suspected that she could see something in me that wasn’t good. When we get to the end of this story, we would all know. 

It is important to explain why Mrs James bothered so much with me. I was an official in the campus recognized fellowship, CLASFON(Christian Lawyers Fellowship of Nigeria) for which she was the staff adviser. She made it a point of duty to ask as many officials questions whenever she was in class. 

Finally, Fridays. On Fridays, we had Professional ethics and skills class. I can just hear Mr Udemezue saying “Prof Ethix.” This course had two main lecturers, Dr Hameed and Mr Orimunguje but from time to time, different lecturers came in to take one topic or the other. I hated this class because I found it extremely boring but I loved one thing about it; it always ended early. That was music to my ears when by 1:30pm or 2pm we are told that we are dome for the day. It was a blissful way to begin my weekend.

My Law School Roommates, my family

The first place the weekend started was in my room. I had three very interesting roommates. Viola (who by the way was Best Graduating Student in my university and in law school), Kelechi who I met through Viola and finally Beebah. Viola and I had been friends in university. Good friends actually. But I wasn’t sure if being roommates with her was going to be a walk in the park. To cut a long story short, I had the best time with her. We would mimic lecturers all afternoon after class, sleep and gist later. Obviously we read too. I mean she was BGS back to back. We also had mutual friends from university and in law school. The closest being Marcus, Bolanle and Moyo.  

Kelechi was my hissing roommate who always had a new chiker every day. She is beautiful, slender and my birthday mate to add to the mix. Three of us were already roommates and were not in need of a fourth one. 

The reason is simple. The law school made provision for four beds in the room and three wardrobes. Like, what is the plan right? Well law school is what it is. We got Beebah as a fourth roommate. We were not welcoming at first. We made it clear that we owned the room and clearly didn’t want her. With time, we got over our childish ways and mixed nicely. Beebah and Kelechi became bestfriends. They did everything together. Went to class together, studied together, bought indomie from ‘’man of god’’ together and as is the next thing, always got into an argument of some sort with each other. However, I spent the most time with Beebah. During our externship, we remained in our room. The easiest way to describe what we had going was sisterhood. We became sisters. It didn’t matter that I was Igbo and she was Yoruba or that I am Christian and she is Muslim. We learnt to love and live with each other. We had a few misunderstandings. We had to. When I decided to participate in the hallelujah challenge by Nathaniel Bassey, she made sure she woke me up to participate every time it was 12midnight and I had fallen asleep. 

My fellowship

Remember how my roommates came into this discussion, we were talking about my weekend. My weekends in law school were far from your ideal weekend. I didn’t start with “it’s Friday and we must chill” or anything like that. A good Friday night involved a good laugh with my rommates, a show on youtube and a peaceful sleep. I remember so many times in law school when this sleep was interrupted on a Saturday morning. That brings me to a part of my law school experience that will forever remain with me; my fellowship.

One lovely day after lectures, Mrs James made an announcement that if you were a CLASFON executive in your university, you should wait behind after the class to meet with her. I did as I was an executive in university and I loved CLASFON. A few of us met with her and that was the beginning of it all. We had our first fellowship the next week, filled out data forms and were eventually invited to interviews one faithful Saturday morning. The following Sunday, I was made the drama co-ordinator of the fellowship. 

That was a shocker but I could handle it, at least I thought I could. It was a big responsibility to take on with the intensity of the work load. We had fellowships on Thursday and service on Sundays. I had all kinds of fears. Would I be able to handle it? Will I serve well? Will I please God? Was it God’s will for my life? Was I good enough to have been chosen by God? 

Those were my initial troubles until I had my first executive council (exco) meeting and I was sure I didn’t want to work with a few of the people I had been appointed with. That weekend went by very quickly and we were faced with our last week of lectures for the term. It was yet another Friday and I had a lot of backlog of note forming to do. I was glad it was coming to an end today but I was met with the shock of my life, a snap test. 

See eh, nothing prepares you for it. And I certainly was not prepared for it. I was so worried that I had disgraced myself and that the results were going to be uploaded to the website for everyone to see. Later that evening, we had a meeting as excos with Mrs James. It was a prayer type of thing. She prayed and prayed with us. I saw some things go on that day that made me in awe of her in some way, yet in another way, I held a type of resentment against her. I may have been intimidated by the fact that even though she wore no earrings and make up and didn’t fit into my definition of beautiful, she had an amazing sense of confidence and what I perceived to be a strong relationship with God which I coveted. That meeting went on and another was rescheduled for the next day by 6am. I’m like “whatttt.” To cap up my misery, the next day was a Saturday. We were to have a prayer walk before our meeting. At this point, let me introduce you to my CLASFON president whom I despised in the beginning who later became one of my best friends in law school, Nonso Egbumokei. He is a perfect description of “spirooooo”. That’s where I’ll leave it. At the end of that meeting this precious “Saturday” I was drained. More often than not, as time went on, I had one meeting or program scheduled on Saturday. 

School was done for the term and boy was I grateful. My birthday was a few days away, my family and I were travelling to celebrate my aunts 50th birthday. It was an amazing time for me. But like the song writer asks “why do all good things come to an end?”. Mine came to an abrupt end and I was saddled with take home assignment that I hadn’t done. Thankfully, I had Marcus as a friend so I just dubbed his for the most part. 

My study pattern…

What is this story if I don’t tell you how I burned the proverbial midnight candle?

Before starting law school, I spent about two months with a friend in Enugu. While staying at her place, I woke up very early every morning to pray and do a little reading before stepping out for the day. This pattern seemed to work very well for me. And as the person that I am, please don’t judge me, I believed God had given me a pattern for law school. Yes. I believed it. And so I lived it out. I woke up between 4:30am and 5am prayed, got dressed and went to class to prepare for the day. 

On some days, I was great following the lecturers and all but on others I was just tired and trying to sleep. After class, I would sleep and wake up and study in my room for as many hours as I could or I would go to the library. I don’t want to deceive you into believing that I read like there was no end to it during the 17weeks of lectures. I tried my best but the truth is, it was difficult for me. After a while, I stopped waking up so early. One of the main factors was because I had to attend my compulsory group meeting by 6pm everyday which sometimes lasted till 7:30pm or 8pm. This was after ending lectures by 4pm or later every day. After that, I’m not a robot now, so I had to eat. While getting dinner, you may meet a friend or two and engage in a discussion and before you know it, all your time is gone and it’s time to go to bed and start the whole process again. I considered it wise to make a few changes. Wisdom is profitable to direct right. I stopped my morning routine and just made sure that I went through the task for the next day either the night before the class or in the morning before the class. Most of the time, I went through the already solved task which my group had submitted. 

I don’t do well just reading my textbooks. I am a note former. I tried forming most of my notes in class while the lectures were going on. This process had an appeal for two reasons. First was that it helped me stay awake and follow the class. Second was that in the evening when I was going through my textbooks, I only had to add a few things here and there. I strongly advice anyone in law school to do this. Form your notes while in class and please follow the corrections to the tasks while the lecturers are going through them. You will discover that law school is more of what you listen to and understand in class than what you read later. There was a lot to read, there was little time to read it. What I simply did was follow the lectures as much as I could, solve the tasks for the next day and read after class. There were days when I was too tired to do any of these things. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to, I was discouraged. 

One thing you need to know is that law school, at least the Lagos campus is an institution that thrives on fear. The lecturers claim to be encouraging you but the truth is, they tell you all kinds of stories about how people fail, how people who did well in university come to law school and flopped (this was my worst story), how you shouldn’t offend them, how you are to know everything because you don’t know where the questions would come from. 

On a normal day and in a reasonable environment, these things don’t seem insurmountable but the Nigerian law school has an extra twist to it. You are graded by your lowest grade. If you make all A’s and one B, you leave the institution with a 2.2. There’s no focus on all your strengths, just your weakness. 

I am one of those strongly against the law school grading system. People may think I am bitter because I was one of those affected by it. They might be right. My take on it is that, if you want the first class grade to remain as sacred as it, then to make a first class, you must make straight A’s. Anything short of that will be determined by the average into the other categories. I have always been against the grading system and the fact that I am a victim of it only gives me more standing to speak against it. The sum total of 9months in one institution should not be determined by a mistake or two in one course. Your strengths and your weaknesses should be used to judge you. Not your weaknesses alone. 

At some point, I told myself that I will start my reading afresh during the externship. I made it through the 20weeks of lectures with God on my side. I was determined to make the best out of my externship period. There were books to read, multiple choice questions to solve, past questions to answer, unformed notes to form. I chose to stay in Lagos. I believed I would study better here since I was in an academic environment. My mates were here with me so we would do a lot together. Fortunately, I didn’t have to pay to stay on the hostel. I was in the law clinic and it was free for its members. 

Externship is made up of Court placement for six weeks and law firm placement for another six weeks. I was posted to the High Court of Lagos state. Specifically to Hon Justice O.A Adamson’s court, court 52, commercial division which was also a fast track court. If you’re ever in the high court of Lagos state area, I beg you, look for his court. I promise you will learn a thing or two in his court. His assistants and registrars are also the nicest people ever. I found the first week of my court placement interesting. The cases were good, the judge was very knowledgeable. It was a wholesome experience. I also needed to fill my log book which was actually steesful. You would think that recounting what you did in a day should be easy to recollect and pen down right? Well, when you have to write out your activities and reflect on them in accordance to a rule of law or something you have learnt, it isn’t so easy after all.

 By the second week, all I wanted was to leave court early enough to study. I started reading in court sometimes with my tablet. Some of our predecessors had some lifesaving notes that I advise everyone to get. I am of the strong view that notes like that of Kenneth Okwor, Adaji Rose, Gabriella Ndu and Adaeze were better than most of our textbooks. 

Our lecturers would disagree with me but maybe one day, they should take a look at those notes for themselves. They might change them to their new lecture guides. I decided to read a course for about 6-8 days first without forming my notes. I called this just reading to understand. I did this for every course but professional ethics. By the time I was done with this, about 25days were gone out of about a 100 and I began regretting this decision. I am a planner. I am not a good executor. I struggled with my plans but God had mercy on me. I really needed help with my MCQs. A book had been introduced to us in class which contained MCQ questions, answers and the reasons for the answers done by a corporate law lecturer in Enugu. It was during my search for where to purchase this book that one of my best friendships in law school developed. I was told that the SRC chairman, Garrick Nosa John had copies he was selling. I didn’t like him very much at the time but whatever, I needed the book. After contacting him for days, I was finally able to reach him and purchase the book. He obviously noticed my keen interest in doing well at the bar exams. Later that night, I got a text message from him asking if I wanted to solve MCQ questions together. I was definitely in need of the help and so I said yes. Garrick became my reading partner. For 3 hours every day, we made sure we solved the MCQ questions and timed ourselves. We even made little shading papers to use as practice papers. After we were done, we would use the answers at the back of the question book to score ourselves. After that, we would take each question one by one and try to determine the real answer and why. We would search our textbooks, compare the laws, argue and argue till we came to a perfect conclusion. 

On some days, we were fortunate to have Oliseh with us. After this, we started drafting. I got the list of all the drafts required topic by topic and we solved as much as we could every night and made corrections. I’m not sure how long we did this for but it was a refreshing way to learn. 

At the end of May, we started law office placement. You see, you have to fill that form carefully. I got posted to a law firm not too far from law school. So did 11 other people and the law firm took only 10 persons. By my calculations and forehand information, two people were going to be left roaming the streets of Lagos looking for another firm to accept them and really that couldn’t be me. Beyond looking for another firm, you had to report to the externship coordinator who was in charge to either find you another place or approve where you had found for yourself. It doesn’t like a big deal right now, but when 10days later you still don’t have a firm but you’re to attach yourself somewhere so you can fill your logbook and stand the risk of not being called to bar because you don’t meet the criteria for portfolio assessment, you suddenly realize that you are actually in boiling soup, you are on fire, the pot is on fire and so is the gas cooker. 

The law firm is not one of the big names you know. All ten of us were kept in their conference room. It was the only place that could take us. Four out of ten of us knew each other very well. We were in the same drama family in school. 

Permit me at this point to introduce my drama family to you. Surely, you remember that I was an executive member of my fellowship and that I was the drama coordinator. Being drama coordinator meant that you had to create awareness about the fellowship. I had been told that we could even do skits in class you know. I thought this was a brilliant idea. We did a few skits in class. The first was an attempted spoken words. I didn’t go well. Someone actually put on his microphone and asked if it was a Nigerian movie. I was so hurt and discouraged. But I was encouraged because three people who I had just met in law school for the first time believed in my idea and agreed to go with it: Ife, Fiyin and Tobi Babalola. We needed to do more skits for the different departments and their different activities. Two stand out for me. First was one done for the music department and a program they had coming up. Believe it or not, the whole class broke out singing and clapping. I was thrilled, shocked and worried that we would get reported. The second was an invitation to draft day. It was done by Blessed and all I can say was, he killed it with his acting. The turnout for the event was beyond massive. On the program of events for the fellowship, the drama department had its own service. Every single member brought their A game. We had spoken words, a dance, a drama and a dialogue. It was so good we were invited to a church to minister. You’re probably wondering what type of law students we were but this was us and I loved every single one of them: Ife, Fiyin, Williams, Izunna, Vivian, Chdinma, Uche, Demola, Chike, Elizabeth, Korede and Chima. They were the best family and my greatest joy is that we all made it to the Bar.

Yes, so four of us were posted to the same law firm with six other incredible people. There’s this belief that where there are a lot of girls in a place, and less guys, it is catastrophic. Our case was different. We were seven young ladies and three young men and for the most part, we got along really well. Getting along really well had its down sides. We were always talking. We had to consciously decide to take time to stop talking and read. At this point, I still hadn’t finished making some of my notes but there was nothing I could do about that now. It was the middle of June and MCQs were close by. I decided to read and read the topics I hadn’t formed and tried to write out what I could remember instead of forming a note. That way, I was sure I had read the topic at least once. I was still solving MCQs, I had started drafting as well. A few times, I got to look at past questions. MCQs were scheduled for the 21st of July and I had to as much as possible, get 20/20 in all the courses.

To be continued next week.

For the non lawyers MCQ means multiple choice questions. It's a compulsory part of the bar part 2 examinations, and is usually administered in July/early August every year.

I hope you truly enjoyed this weeks post. Please leave a comment. 

See you here next week.

xx,

Alexandra for Lily of Nigeria.

[sarcasticgaypotato]

Don't know if you've already done this: android! Glados teaching Chell to kiss

(( Ahaha…ha…ha.  Yeah this is definitely going under a read more. There will be some chelldos-y makeouts, so if that makes you uncomfortable, please just keep on scrolling and ignore this. ))

This was an unfair fight from the beginning.

From the moment Chell walked into the chamber, her expression sheepish, to the moment where GLaDOS had her tongue in the girl’s mouth, her actions wolfish.

But perhaps that was getting a bit ahead of things, GLaDOS wasn’t one for random acts of passion. The feeling was always present, but one need only prompt her to set it off.

Chell managed to do just that.

GLaDOS’s android body had made affection easier, though it had never passed the boundaries of bear hugs and late night cuddling.  GLaDOS knew of other forms of affection- she had a vast knowledge of any and all human behavior instantly on hand at all times after all- but never pressed the matter. She had no idea if the human was simply uninterested, or not ready. Besides, the AI was far from being in a rush. Living forever tends to give one a bit more patience than your average mortal.

And so, the thought was labeled as unimportant and pushed to the back of the core’s mind, and she focused on more pressing things, like science.

That was exactly what she had been doing when Chell silently shuffled into her chamber.  The core hardly even needed to look up, her attention still mostly grabbed by her current project.  This wasn’t abnormal, Chell visited her from time to time. Often they would set aside time to do things together, and if Chell knew that GLaDOS was busy, would settle for climbing in the core’s lap while she worked and cuddle in silence.

Yet this time, that didn’t happen.  She slowly walked up to the core, stopping about five feet away from the AI’s throne-like chair, and just sort of… watched.  Like she had something she wanted to express, but either was unsure how, or could not muster the courage to do so.

This got GLaDOS to do two things. Firstly, she looked up at the girl, making sure she wasn’t injured or otherwise in distress.  The second was to check the time.  Time was almost non-existent to the Queen of Aperture, and it had been that way only up until recently.  Having a human around meant they wanted real sleep and not adrenal vapors, so that also meant keeping track of time and letting said human adjust to what would be a ‘normal’ sleep pattern.

It was, at the moment, far past the time Chell usually went to bed. At least an hour and a half past, actually.   For a moment, GLaDOS wondered if the girl hadn’t been able to sleep, and studied her human’s face for any signs of the nightmares that occasionally plagued her.

Thankfully, she found none. Instead, she only found the slight traces of a blush, and Chell gently biting her bottom lip, as if in thought.

“…Well? If you feel the great urge to simply stare at me on a daily basis I can arrange to set up a photo in your room, as it would be mildly less creepy than doing it in person.”

GLaDOS smirked a little as she spoke, watching Chell’s head shake a small bit as she snapped back reality, the light blush now turning much darker.  Yet the human still didn’t respond. Instead, she only shuffled closer, until she was standing directly in front of the core.

This prompted GLaDOS to stand, and the two of them were nearly touching.

“If you’d like something from me, I’d advise being upfront. While I’m working on it, I haven’t quite developed the technology for mind reading.”

She crossed her arms, eyebrow raised slightly as she tried to read Chell as best as she could.

“…Iwaswonderingifyoucouldhelpmewithsomething”

Chell’s voice- as rare to hear as it was beautiful- came out as a very quiet, jumbled mumble that took even GLaDOS a moment to understand.  The AI blinked, slowly putting the sentence together.

“You want my help? With what? If this is about the giant spiders, I told Orange and Blue to handle them, so they shouldn’t have escaped.”

That earned a slight double take from Chell, who’s eyes widened in horror for a brief moment before GLaDOS’s laughter made the statement clear to be nothing more but a joke.

The core allowed herself a small chuckle, remembering to save the image of Chell’s face on the camera feed to look at on a later date.  But for now, her expression had softened somewhat, letting Chell know that she was in fact listening, and ready to be serious if called for.

“…mmph…”

Chell shifted in place, letting out a small noise that sounded closer to a grunt of reluctance than anything resembling human language.  The former test subject seemed to agonize over this for another few moments, before taking one, deep breath, and meeting GLaDOS’s gaze. Instead of speaking, she signed, her hands shaking a small bit as she did so.

‘I… I want to kiss you.’

To say that GLaDOS was slightly taken aback would be an understatement.  She stood in place for a good, long moment, processing what she had just been told.

“I give you permission?”

She tilted her head somewhat, her tone questioning.  She had told Chell before that she was not squeamish with human affection, and that, at least in her android body, Chell was free to try forms of affection that she saw fit, and GLaDOS would tell her in the moment if she had any issues with it. A kiss was far from the strangest thing Chell could do, so the core was confused with the girl’s embarrassment over the request.

However her reaction was not the one that Chell was hoping for, as the girl gave her an exasperated expression and a deeper blush, clearly not happy that she was going to have to elaborate on a point that she felt was embarrassing enough to talk about in the first place.

‘I can’t…I don’t…know how.’

The last words were signed very slowly, and Chell had long since broken eye contact, and seemed to have taken to examining the floor with great interest.

However she was missing out on a rather interesting reaction on GLaDOS’s end, who’s eyebrows nearly raised off her forehead, and her optics widened for a moment, before a very slow, and deeply satisfied smirk crossed her face.

Perhaps it was just a narcissistic robot being a narcissistic robot, but there was something deeply satisfying to the core about realizing that, at least in this field, she was more experienced in being a human than the actual human. How very ironic.

“And so you’ve come to me to teach you? Honestly Chell, if I wasn’t the super computer I am, I would’ve called you a lunatic for making an android your first choice for kissing lessons. Lucky for you, I like to think I’m a jack of many trades, and a master of all.”

Her smugness was not missed by Chell, who huffed, turning her head away in hopes of keeping GLaDOS from seeing her flustered expression.  She wasn’t taking a shot in the dark, she knew full well that GLaDOS possessed the ability to master almost any skill she desired, able to access information and adapt herself to learn the ability in mere moments.  Humans didn’t have that luxury, unfortunately.

‘…If you don’t want to, just forget I said anything-’

Chell started to sign this, about to turn away and hurry out of the chamber, ready to bury her face in her pillow and try to remove the burning blush from her cheeks.  GLaDOS wasn’t having that.

She grabbed the girl’s wrist gently, but firm enough to make her intention known.

“I never had any intention of saying no.”

Chell looked up as GLaDOS spoke, meeting the AI’s eyes once more, despite how difficult that seemed. Her silver eyes gave many things away, GLaDOS discovered.  Surprise, embarrassment, and…excitement.

Excitement that GLaDOS knew was no doubt mirrored in her own, golden gaze.

If she had a heart, it would no doubt beat a little faster at the growing, heavy feeling in the air between them.

“Just how much explaining do I have to do? Or… would you rather I simply show you?”  The core surprised herself with her tone, as she felt some of her natural edge melt away, sounding far too… human for her tastes.  For a moment, she wondered if Caroline had ever been in a situation such as this.

That thought was quickly chased from her mind, as that was just about the last thing she wanted to think about right now.

Instead, she distracted herself, moving her hand from Chell’s wrist, to her waist. She hooked it around and pulled her human in closer, using her free hand to guide Chell’s arms into a more natural position, instead of hanging limply at her sides.

“…Calm down. I can feel your heart racing.”

GLaDOS murmured this, taking her tone down a few notches, keeping herself quiet for the sake of keeping the mood from feeling too stiff.  At her words, Chell gave a quick, nervous smile, and mouthed the words, ‘I can’t help it.’

This moment could’ve gone on for seconds, or maybe minutes, it was hard to say. GLaDOS could’ve checked the time, but never did. Chell had her full interest now. Her project, the rest of Aperture, and yes, even the current time, became a passing thought in the back of her mind. Somehow, none of it seemed as important as the lunatic in her arms.

Slowly, acting on instinct that she wasn’t supposed to have, GLaDOS leaned forward, and closed the gap between her and Chell.

She might possess the knowledge and ability to do this, but this was still her first time properly trying it.  And it did not disappoint.

Her lips, artificial as they may be, fit perfectly against Chell’s.  She pressed, pushed, and molded the girl’s mouth against her own, loosening her up and keeping her from being as still as a statue the whole time.

Chell, to her credit, wasn’t too bad at keeping up.  She seemed quite nervous at first, simply letting GLaDOS move against her instead of making any motions of her own.  But with the core’s gentle prodding and wordless persuasion, she slowly moved to mimic the AI, trying to copy her movements and kiss back as best she could.

However, humans did tend to need air, so GLaDOS pulled away after a few moments. Chell took in a deep gasp of air the moment she could, yet at the same time, let out a small whine at the loss of contact.

GLaDOS let out a low chuckle at the reaction, the sound soft and rumbling.  She brought a hand up to Chell’s face, brushing a stray hair aside, and running a finger over the girl’s lips.

“…According to the data I have access to… You are not… the worst kisser that the human race has known.  Though I do believe you rank at least sixth place.”

Chell smiled.  It was warm, and gentle, and made GLaDOS’s chest ache.  She didn’t have to think this time, as she quickly pulled the girl in for another kiss.  Her hand moving from the human’s waist moved to the small of her back, pulling her closer still. She could not get enough of the feeling, and from the, albeit inexperienced, enthusiasm that Chell was giving her, she could tell that the girl felt the same way.

It did not take long for GLaDOS to start testing.  That’s what she was made to do after all, testing. She looked for positive reactions. She tilted her head left, then right. She took the former test subject’s bottom lip between her teeth as delicately as possible, tugging it softly. She took the girl’s hair from its ponytail for the sheer purpose of better tangling her hand in it. She explored.

And if nothing else, Chell could walk away from all this knowing that the world’s smartest supercomputer, the most advanced android in existence, had her tongue practically down her throat.   So at the very least, there was the bragging rights of the matter.

But based on the noises of approval coming from the once mute girl, GLaDOS assumed that she was enjoying more than just the bragging rights.

[freudensteins-monster]

Full Metal Bitch

Whilst not directly inspired by it, if you’re interested in reading an Avengers x Edge of Tomorrow fic (set in the Avengers universe, featuring Mimics and time loops, starring Steve and featuring multiple ships) then I recommend When You Wake by sevenfoxes. It’s pretty devastating at times but I couldn’t put it down. I read it ages ago and this idea just popped into my head out of nowhere this morning [edit. the morning I started writing this… back in November], something about Barnes being a ‘full metal badass’ and then *click*

My fic has Avengers/MCU characters in an EoT-type universe, except I gave them Chitauri  to fight instead of Mimics  (no alphas, omegas, or time loops here) to go for a whole alternative version of the Battle of New York. And I gave them a pretty stupid weakness because I couldn’t help but put in a reference to Darcy and her taser.

Title from the nickname of Emily Blunt’s character in “Edge of Tomorrow”. Check out this link to see her / to get a mental picture of the exo-suits.

Darcy would be straight up lying if she said that the recruiting posters hadn’t influenced her decision to sign up with S.H.I.E.L.D., but she was far from the only one. She had yet to meet a single new recruit who didn’t say “I wanna be like the Avengers.”

The leader of the Avengers was Captain Steve Rogers. He started out as an actual poster boy, and with his all-American good looks and genial personality (even when battling hordes of Chitauri) he’d had been dubbed ‘Captain America’ by the world’s media. He was just some ridiculously handsome artist the PR department had discovered trying to sign up with S.H.I.E.L.D. after the Invasion. They convinced him he’d be doing more good helping to boost recruiting numbers, and if he did he’d be given his own squad to lead if he did his part, and he believed them, for a time. But as the war dragged on, and too many recruits came home in body bags, Rogers decided to put his up-til-then ornamental Captain’s rank to good use and snuck onto a transport to kick ass alongside his fellow soldiers. Rumour had it he had been forbidden from damaging that pretty face of his and when Rogers made it back from his first battle he had told the PR department where to stick their latest recruitment campaign. The powers that be weren’t going to let it go, and were ready to court martial Rogers for his insolence, until the story of the corporate pretty boy turned war hero started making news. He used the publicity to finally gain command over his own unit and hadn’t stopped flashing those pearly whites since.

His first official recruit had been the Iron Patriot, the most advanced exo-suit around (the damn thing flew!) originally piloted by a decorated army colonel, James Rhodes. He got the choicest tech because of his friendship with the creator of the exo-suits, Tony Stark, and he used the famed exo-suit on dozens of missions until a severe injury forced him to retire from the field. The PR guys wanted to keep the symbol alive so Colonel Rhodes selected the most promising candidate, Sam Wilson, a paratrooper who went by the call sign ‘Falcon,’ to take up the mantle.

The Black Widow and Hawkeye had managed to keep out of the public eye, even if soldiers had been telling stories about their amazing exploits around the barracks since the war started, until they took out a whole squadron of Chitauri in front of some quivering mess of a war correspondent.

The Black Widow had apparently gotten her moniker well before she even set foot on a battlefield - the Russian recruit utterly destroyed every sparring partner she ever stepped in the ring with – but the way she effortlessly dropped from a transport ship on a wire like a spider cemented it. Her suit was terrifyingly minimalist (the harness painted blood red) and lacking in protection, which allowed for smoother, faster movement. Watching her slaughter alien hordes was akin to watching a prima ballerina on centre stage.

Hawkeye, a rambling former carnie from Iowa, disliked guns and had jerry-rigged his exo-suit to shoot more vicious projectiles instead, and never missed a shot. When news of Hawkeye’s customisation reached Tony Stark he had been appalled at the craftsmanship but intrigued by the idea and had soon designed a new suit to accommodate the marksman’s more paleolithic interests.

The last member of the Avengers was Darcy’s favourite; Sergeant James Barnes. He was just a soldier drafted into doing his duty, but he was Steve Rogers’ best friend and one of the main reasons the poster boy had been so desperate to join the fray. They made an impressive pair, their fighting styles well synchronised after a lifetime together, until the Sergeant lost an arm during a skirmish somewhere in Europe. After an injury like that most soldiers would have accepted their pensions and retired, far away from the battlefield. But not Sergeant Barnes. He had Tony Stark design him a metal arm and then rebuild his exo-suit to accommodate it. If that wasn’t the hottest thing ever, Darcy didn’t know what was.

So, yes, it was because of her ridiculous crush on the legendary Sergeant Barnes that Darcy had enlisted and tried to be the best soldier she could be. She wanted to impress him and had imagined a thousand scenarios wherein the Sergeant saw her kicking ass and became instantly enamoured with her. It was stupid – she knew it was stupid – but she couldn’t help herself; she wanted him to notice her.

She’d once had the privilege of watching the Avengers walk out to their transport ship together – she swore everything moved in slow-motion - and her best friend had to hold her back lest she lick the shiny appendage attached to the dark and broody Sergeant Barnes. But it was the death of this same best friend that made Darcy finally see the war for the brutal battle for survival that it was, rather than a ‘bloody eye candy parade’ as she’d often joked.

They’d met in basic training and everyone in their squad agreed that Jane Foster was too smart to be crawling around in the mud with the rest of them. They made her their squad’s medic and tried to keep her out of the fighting as much as possible, but Jane was nothing if not determined, even if she freely admitted she’d rather be studying the alien invaders than killing them.

She’d thrown herself in harm’s way to protect their newest recruit, a barely legal kid named Peter without sense enough to take cover. Darcy hadn’t noticed until it was too late. She’d been too busy trying to catch a glimpse of the Avengers in action a few blocks over and would never forgive herself for letting her best friend die alone.

** *** **

Darcy woke with a start, the image of Jane’s blood as it left her body filling her dreams. She threw off her itchy standard-issue blanket, laced up her standard-issue boots, and wandered around the base until she found herself nearing the Avengers’ personal – and off limits – training area. It was barely 2am but there were noises coming from inside drawing her in. There, twisted into some ridiculous yoga pose in the middle of a room, surrounded by metal claws programmed to dart around violently to mimic Chitauri movements, was the Black Widow. Darcy watched on silently until the Avenger pressed a button on a remote strapped to her wrist to stop the training claws. She effortlessly unfurled from her complicated pose and levelled a cold stare at the interloper.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded in her lightly accented English.

“Would you spar with me?” Darcy looked as surprised as the Black Widow to hear the request. “I mean, I’m not really good, pretty terrible actually, but I want to get better.”

The Black Widow took in Darcy’s haunted expression and nodded just once, beckoning the green soldier closer. Darcy was on her back in three seconds flat, but she got back up and did it again, and came back every night for more punishment. By the end of the month it took the Black Widow a full ten seconds to get her opponent on her back.

** *** **

Darcy stepped into her exo-suit and went through the standard system checks, ignoring the furtive glances sent her way. It was going to be her sixth battle without Jane by her side, and each time it just got harder and harder to get strapped in as her squad was filled with new faces to replace her ever-growing list of dead friends.

Word of her midnight sparring sessions with the Black Widow had spread like wildfire through the base and her fellow cannon fodder now regarded her with a mix of respect and fear, so much so that they made her the unofficial leader of their squadron. Officially the title went to a Swede by the name of Thor, as he was the only one in their squad to serve before the war (and looked like the Scandinavian god of lumberjacks to boot), but he had been quietly nursing a crush on Jane since their first meeting and her death had hit him particularly hard.  

“A-Squad! The transport ship leaves in five minutes and you better be on it, or so help me you’ll all be on latrine duty for the rest of your lives.”

Darcy bit back a growl as an obnoxious Major by the name of Sitwell, who had never suffered more than a papercut in the name of his country, strode into their barracks demanding they march themselves to their deaths in an orderly fashion. Darcy stepped down off her prep station, the threatening whir of her exo-suit doing the talking for her.

“Lock and load,” Sitwell bellowed, breaking eye contact with Darcy first and hustling out of the room to go bother another squad.

“You heard the douche canoe,” Darcy called out with more confidence than she felt. “Lock and load!”

** *** **

They were dropped in the middle of a battlefield and Darcy got to work, her exo-suit spewing forth a hail of bullets as she pressed forward, trying to find some cover for her squad. They were doing well, all things considered, and had taken the high ground as they continued to push the Chitauri back, when Darcy did a quick head count and realised Thor was unaccounted for. She spied him half a city block away doing battle against a horde by himself. She ordered her squad to hold their positions and raced to Thor’s aid, cursing his stupid and inappropriately timed berserker rage. Darcy screamed out as Thor took a hit and the last standing Chitauri went in for the kill. Darcy riddled it with bullets but the damn thing kept coming back for more. In an act of desperation she reached down for a mostly empty exo-suit, hurling the sparking and bloodied tangled mess of metal at the alien. She continued shooting at the shrieking creature as she raced to Thor’s side, unable to process what she was seeing until well after the battle. In the moment she had been more concerned with dragging Thor back to their squad by his beard than checking out the fried corpse of one Chitauri.

** *** **

The Black Widow (“Call me Natasha”) was waiting for Darcy in her usual sparring room. As the minutes and yoga poses ticked by the Avenger started to worry that her new acquaintance wasn’t coming back, but then she heard the tell-tale shuffle of Darcy’s boots on the concrete flooring and let go of the breath she’d been holding. Darcy stood in the doorway, lost in thought.

“What is it, sestra?”

“You know Tony Stark, right?”

** *** **

Darcy strode through the weapons warehouse, forcibly ignoring the sight of mechanics hosing down bloodied exo-suits and welding the brokens pieces back together. She followed Natasha’s instructions and took a poorly marked freight elevator to a basement level.

The sounds of utter chaos coming from behind the bunker door would have scared off a less battle weary soldier, but if Darcy could face down swarms of Chitauri she could damn well talk to one eccentric scientist. She pushed opened the door and was felled first by a wall of sound (“Shoot to Thrill” – AC/DC) and then by a cloud of smoke.

“Did something explode?” Darcy coughed as she stepped inside the junkyard masquerading as a well-funded workshop.

A shock of black hair popped up like a meerkat from behind a huge exo-suit prototype, startling Darcy. She took in his hair, his singed clothes, and the fact that he was still carrying around a fire extinguisher, and declared the mystery solved.

“Dr Stark?” she called, trying in vain to be heard over the music. Oblivious to her presence he pulled down his industrial safety goggles and disappeared into the cavity of the suspended exo-suit. Darcy moved to where he had been standing and wondered how she was going to get his attention without scaring the life out of him. The music suddenly dropped in volume but before Darcy could say anything a hand shot out from within the mass of metal.

“Wrench – quarter inch. Now,” he added when the required tool didn’t appear instantaneously.

Darcy scrambled, located the required wrench, and passed it too him.

“Mallet.”

Darcy passed that over too, wincing as he put it to work.

“Donut.”

“There’s no donuts,” Darcy replied, looking around the lab frantically.

The inventor froze at the unfamiliar voice and backed out of the suit. He pulled his goggles off, leaving rings of soot around his eyes, and stared curiously at Darcy.

“You’re not Pepper.”

“Pepper quit last week, Tony.”

Stark turned to the new voice, a man with glasses, fluffy hair, and pristine white lab coat who greeted Darcy with a nervous smile as he stepped into the workshop.

“Huh… She’ll be back,” Stark shrugged. “Hey! Dum-E! No!” he shouted at a mechanical arm in the corner of the lab. “What did I tell you about playing with fire?” he grumbled, wrenching a blowtorch out of its grip. “Fire bad. You keep malfunctioning and I’m going to turn you into an exo-suit, I swear to God. Do you want that?” The machine whirled sarcastically, if such a thing was possible, and waved its arm in a way that suggested being an exo-suit was probably more desirable than the abuse Stark inflicted upon it daily. “Yeah, yeah, keep whining. And stay away from fire,” he ordered.

“Tony,” the scientist sighed, directing Tony’s attention back to Darcy.

“Oh, right. And you are?” he asked before promptly turning his attention to something more interesting.

“This is Private First Class Lewis. Romanoff sent her. Apparently she has a theory about the Chitauri.”

“Oh, a theory,” Stark cooed. “Banner and I love a good theory. Hit me.”

“I…” Darcy stammered, completely flabbergasted by the inventor. Chitauri were definitely easier. Right… Chitauri. “I got into a firefight with a particularly stubborn Chitauri yesterday. Bullets weren’t stopping it, and it was about to kill a friend of mine, so I picked up a short-circuiting exo-suit …”

“Hey! My suits do not short-circuit, alright? They are works of technological genius. And what do you mean you ‘picked up’ an exo-suit? What kind of idiot would disengage his suit in the middle of a warzone?”

“He didn’t disengage it exactly,” Darcy replied, biting back a sigh. “He was still inside it but missing most of his extremities. And his middle. The cause of which probably also caused the exo-suit to short-circuit.”

“…Continue,” Stark nodded, appearing as sheepish as a narcissist such as himself was capable of.

“Anyway, I threw the exo-suit at the Chitauri and it just sort of… freaked out,” Darcy said for lack of a better word. “Then the exo-suit started sparking even more – I might have helped it along by emptying the rest of my clip into it – and I think… I think it got electrocuted.”

The two men shared a look.

“Are you sure?” Banner asked over the rims of his glasses.

“Well, by the time it stopped twitching it looked like a piece of burnt calamari, and smelt half as appetising, so I’m pretty sure.”

“You didn’t happen to bring us back a sample of this burnt calamari, did you?”

“Sorry, I was busy making sure my squad got back in once piece.”

“Right, right… warzone…” Tony mused as his mind wandered.

“I know it’s not concrete evidence, and I don’t expect you act on half-assed intel, but I was wondering… I was hoping you might be able to make me something to test my theory.”

“Like?” Tony prodded.

“Some sort of flash grenade?” Darcy shrugged. “Or maybe, like, a military grade taser? Honestly, I don’t know. You’re supposed to be the genius. Do you have any ideas?”

“Of course. I’ve got a million of ‘em. I can even spare you a few,” Stark teased.

“Okay, then. My squad’s got to have boots on the ground at 0600 Thursday. Do you think you could put together something for me to test out by then?”

“Absolutely,” the inventor replied distractedly, already pulling up a holoscreen to start on a new blueprint.

“I’m in Building 12, across the compound.”

“Uhuh…”

Darcy rolled her eyes and turned to the more responsible looking scientist who gave her a sympathetic smile.

“Private First Class Lewis. Building 12. 0600 Thursday.”

“Thanks,” she muttered as the music returned to ear-splitting levels.  

She left the lab, leaving the two geniuses to argue over the specs, passing a familiar face as she stepped into the elevator. She tried not to react as her arm brushed against his metal one. She had more important things to do, like get her ass handed to her by Natasha.

** *** **

Sergeant Barnes meandered down to Stark’s lab to get his arm checked out, accidently brushing said appendage against a stony-faced female recruit when he stepped out of the elevator. He turned to watch her leave, almost stumbling into the lab.

“Who was that?” he asked in the silence that fell between two songs.

“Who was who?” Stark asked obliviously.

Barnes turned to Banner as he pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation.

“That was Private First Class Lewis. A friend of Romanoff’s.”

“Romanoff has friends?”

** *** **

Darcy paced in front of her exo-suit, watching the minutes tick by. It would take her ten minutes at least to get suited up so if Stark, or the more reliable Banner, didn’t show up soon she was going to have to suited up in her old gear. A wave of hushed voices rolled through the building and Darcy stopped panicking.

“Private First Class Lewis!” Tony Stark called, strutting in like a damn peacock, revelling in the attention his appearance garnered. Behind him Dr Banner and a few mechanics were pushing two new exo-suit stations towards them. “I come bearing gifts,” he smirked.

Darcy walked over and examined the first exo-suit and couldn’t help feeling a little bit disappointed. It looked pretty much like her current one, at least like her exo-suit did when it first came off the production line.

“What changes did you make?” Darcy enquired, trying to keep from sounding unimpressed.

“Hop in, I’ll give you a tour.” Darcy did as requested, ignoring the dozens of eyes watching the scene unfold. “Okay, it’s pretty much your standard Mach 5 exo-suit,” he explained, strapping Darcy in and taking over her wrist mounted control panel. “But I shed some unnecessary weight and powered it with arc reactor tech, so no more lugging around extra battery packs. Now to your toys. For every standard weapon you’ve got an electrified version. Ten Nebula grenades, patent pending. They’ll light up everything in a five yard radius. And ten clips of Nebula bullets, patent also pending. Do not waste those by firing on automatic. Shoot one, give it a second for the charge to detonate, shoot another if you need to. Got it?”

“Got it,” Darcy nodded, testing the movement of her new suit. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” the inventor replied dismissively. “Now, where’s your Norse god?”

“Huh?” Darcy blinked.

“Sergeant Odinson!” Tony called out, reeling back when Thor stepped out of the line-up. “Sheesh, Romanoff wasn’t kidding. You’re a friggin’ giant. How do you even fit into the Mach 5?”

“With difficulty,” Thor replied, glancing at Darcy for answers.

“Well, you don’t have to worry about squeezing into that exo-suit anymore. I got you a new one. Step on in. Pretty much standard, but obviously it should fit you better,” Tony rambled as Thor tested the suit out, smiling to himself when he discovered he didn’t have to hunch over quite so much. “You’ve got your standard weapon on the left arm but on the right,” Tony drawled, pressing a few buttons and revelling in the surprised gasps from his captive audience as the enlarged right fist of the exo-suit shot out and landed with a loud thunk five feet in front of them. He pressed a few more buttons and the fist, connected to the suit by a several chains and wires, retracted quickly.

“Oh, I like this,” Thor beamed, raising his hammer shaped fist up to inspect it.

“You can also use it to electrocute the bastards. Hit your target then press this button right here to light ‘em up. But, and I can’t stress this enough, make sure you’re gripping these handles when you do. They act like grounding wires and stop the exo-suit from roasting you like a turkey. Got it?”

“I understand. Thank you, Dr Stark.”

“No big deal. A little spider said you were having some anger management issues. This should help you work through them.”

“Thank you,” Darcy repeated.

“Uhuh, just bring them back in once piece – I’m gonna want to retrieve all their hard drive data.”

“Sure thing, Stark.”

“And now that I’ve made my monthly public appearance, I’m going back to my lab to work on the Hulk.”

“The Hulk?” Darcy enquired, her mind flicking back to the oversized exo-suit the genius had been working on when she met him.

“Tony, the PR guys said you can’t call it that,” Bruce sighed wearily.

“It’s my baby, I can call it whatever I want,” he argued as they wandered back to the weapons warehouse.

The mechanics left but the silence remained as they were replaced by the Avengers themselves, all geared up and ready to go.

“Alright, A-hole-Squad!” Hawkeye shouted out, making Darcy roll her eyes. If she ever got her hands on Quill, the leader of L(oser)-Squad and coiner of her squad’s irritating moniker, he was going to end up in the infirmary. “You’re riding out with us today. Lock and load, we leave in five. Last one on does my laundry for a month.”

Darcy didn’t bother waiting for the Avenger to be out of earshot before she addressed her squad.

“You heard the douche canoe. Lock and load!” She ignored Hawkeye’s amused expression and fell in step with Natasha. “Not that I’m complaining, but what’s with the royal treatment?”

“We’re friends. The others seemed to think it was appropriate.”

“We’re friends?”

“Everyone says so.”

“So it must be true,” Darcy finished for her, flashing her a smile. “Stark pimp your ride too?” she asked, eyeing the new additions to the arms of the other woman’s exo-suit that seemed to glow blue at full charge.

Natasha pressed a button on her control panel and two short metal prongs appeared at the end of her fists, sparks flying between the two points.

“Stark dubbed them ‘Widow’s Bites.’ Patent pending,” she smirked.

Darcy just shook her head, “I’ll never understand why you’d wanna get up close and personal with these bastards.”

“What can I say?” Natasha purred as they got locked into the transport. “I’m a hugger.”

** *** **

The transport ships had barely crossed the Hudson before the proximity alerts went off and the bravado her squad had shown in the Avengers’ company started to falter.

“A-Squad!” Darcy shouted over the alarms. “You land clean, you stay together, and you work your way downtown. We’re gonna push those extra-terrestrial fuckers into the Bay, do you hear me?!”

“Sir! Yes, sir!” her squad shouted back.

** *** **

Sergeant Barnes couldn’t take his eyes off the avenging angel across the row, even as the bottom dropped out of the transport ship, wind and the sounds of battle whipping around them.

“What are you smiling about, jerk?” Rogers asked, shouting to be heard, glancing knowingly at Natasha’s friend.

“It’s just good to be home, punk,” Barnes shouted back, grinning from ear to ear. “Hey!” he pointed down at the familiar cityscape passing them by. “You always said you couldn’t wait to get back and for a run around the park,” he laughed.

“Yeah,” Rogers grumbled as the call to drop sounded. “This is exactly what I meant,” he said, pressing the release switch.

** *** **

The battle was already well underway when A-Squad landed. Darcy raised an arm to lay down some cover fire when bullets began to rain down from above. She risked a glance up to see Natasha swinging from her wire in a wide arc, not disconnecting until the immediate perimeter around her team was clear.

She landed gracefully next to Barton, smiling as she began emptying a clip into the next wave of Chitauri.

“Why do you gotta make us all look bad, Tasha?” Barton whined, before shooting a projectile behind him, smirking as it exploded on impact, taking five of the initial targets buddies with him.

“Avengers! Assemble!” their captain shouted over the noise of the battlefield. “Falcon! Clear a path to down towards Columbus Circle. Hawkeye, take to the rooftops and keep an eye on the park. Xavier and Lensher’s teams should be clearing it and I wanna know if any survivors come our way. We don’t want any surprises. The rest of you, follow me!” he called back, more to A-Squad than Natasha or Barnes. He pressed a few buttons on his wrist display and metal plates shifted on the left arm of his exo-suit to form a shield. He marched forward, protecting his now iconic American flag helmet from damage with his left arm and taking out Chitauri with his right. Barnes watched his back and Natasha kept an eye on both of them. Overhead Falcon made runs up and down the street, firing down on the Chitauri, never giving them a chance to regroup. They continued downtown for several minutes without too much trouble but then Falcon’s panicked voice came in over their comms.

“We’ve got skiffs incoming!”

“Shit,” Barnes spat, his eyes shifting to the skies.

“They are on my ass! I could really use a little help here!”

“Yeah, yeah… I got you covered,” Barton drawled, aiming his arm in Falcon’s direction. A projectile shot out of his customised barrel, right between Falcon’s wings, taking out the skiff behind him in a fiery explosion.

Free of his tail, Falcon landed in from of his team, his metal wings folding back.

“I’m a sitting duck up there, and I can’t get high enough to get the drop on them,” he advised as he caught his breath.

“You just need some back up,” Natasha smirked, eying an incoming skiff. “Cap?”

Rogers looked between Natasha and the skiff and sighed. “You sure about this?”

“It’ll be fun,” she assured him, getting a run up as Rogers planted his feet and held his shielded arm out. The rest of the Avengers covered them as Natasha used Rogers’ shield to launch herself at the skiff as it passed over them, swinging herself up and taking out the pilot with her Widow’s Bites.

“Remind me to thank Stark,” she said to no one in particular as she got a handle on the alien craft and turned it around. “Falcon, you coming or what?”

“How the hell do you make this look so easy?” Falcon grumbled as he took to the skies again, flying under Natasha like a Remora fish. Together, with Barton watching their six, they kept the skiffs occupied and away from the ground troops.

The Avengers were a finely tuned machine and any soldier would have felt honoured to watch them work, but Darcy had more pressing matters to worry about, namely not letting her squad get killed.

Upon landing and taking up the rear behind the Avengers her squad was joined by L-Squad. For all Quill annoyed the shit out of her, he was a decent soldier and cared about his squad as much as she cared about hers. Thor and Drax from L-Squad teamed up, going at groups of Chitauri like a goddamn battering ram. Crude but effective. Parker had miraculously survived their last few battles, and though he had become a better soldier since Jane’s sacrifice Darcy kept him close. He’d been making eyes as L-Squad’s Private Watson and Darcy wasn’t about to let Parker run off and make the ultimate sacrifice for some girl he’d never spoken too.

A pack of Chitauri were fleeing the park and making right for her squad so Darcy took the opportunity to test out one of Stark’s grenades. She lobbed the blue-glowing cylinder towards them and waited. Time slowed. Darcy could swear she could hear the soft tick-tick-tick of the timer over the battle. She watched anxiously as the Chitauri made to scatter, but then they were enveloped in blinding flash of blue light.

“That was amazing!” a dozen voices chimed as their eyes adjusted and the first thing they saw was the charred remains of the Chitauri.

“Use them sparingly!” Darcy shouted as she passed all of her remaining grenades but one off to the nearest soldiers.

A guy from L-Squad that Darcy only knew as Rocket (named for the homemade rocket launcher he took into every battle) made grabby hands for the last available one, a manic grin spreading across his face as he discovered it fit snuggly in the tube of his DIY weapon.

“Oh… Yeah…” he growled excitedly, running down the street and climbing up the customised exo-suit of L-Squad’s tallest recruit (a guy from parts unknown whose grasp of English was extremely limited). Rocket hauled his rocket launcher onto his shoulder, barking at his teammate to hold still as he took aim at group of Chitauri that were charging towards them from Columbus Avenue, cackling wildly as they writhed in the blue light.

Darcy ordered Parker and Maximoff, a new guy from Europe (his twin sister worked out of Medical and the kid did everything he could to avoid meeting her there), to her side, covering her as she tested out the Nebula bullets. It was a hell of a lot harder for her, shooting one bullet at a time. She had to make each shot count, had to hit her target, and accuracy wasn’t something her superiors worried about when their regular weapons can unload 625 rounds/min. And whist they were just as effective as the grenades it was frustrating and slow going using the bullets, so Darcy decided to take up the rear, picking off stragglers, trusting Thor and Quill to keep leading their teams forward.

And just when everything seemed to be going so well it all went to shit. A skiff got past Natasha and Falcon and distracted the ground troops from the horde spilling out of the park on their left. Rocket stole a Nebula grenade from one of his own squad and fired it towards the park. It took out a handful of them but the rest kept coming. Darcy switched back to regular bullets and practically cut them in half. Rocket loaded his bazooka with its standard projectiles but just as he was ready to fire his human tower took a bullet to the knee and they both fell backwards. Rocket’s finger hit the trigger as he hit the ground, sending the projectile straight into a burnout car on Darcy’s right.

Before she could even think to move someone was screaming her name, a blur of black and shining metal racing towards her. He made to tackle her to the ground but the ensuing blast sent the car sailing towards them, knocking the pair of them into the park. Voices called out them, Darcy could hear them as the ringing in her head subsided, but they were all too busy not dying to come to their aid. She staggered to her feet and almost fell on her ass again when she saw that her wannabe saviour was none other than Sergeant Barnes. As he came to and struggled to get to his feet Darcy moved to cover him as several Chitauri that had escaped X and M-Squad’s near surgical purge of the park made their way towards them.

“Shit,” she hissed, thumping one metal encased arm on the other, trying in vain to unjam her weapon. “Get up, Barnes!” she shouted. “My weapon’s jammed! Get up!” she ordered, practically dragging him to his feet by the scruff of his exo-suit.

She practically pointed him in the direction of the oncoming Chitauri and screamed at him to shoot until the fog in his head cleared and he was able to fight under his own power again.

“Quit yelling at me, Lewis. You ain’t my CO,” he growled as he mowed down the first wave.

Darcy’s retorted died on her tongue as the familiar, skin-crawlingly creepy sound of the Chitauri screeching was heard behind her.

“Shit! Barnes, we’ve got company,” she all but wailed, failing to keep her rising panic in check.

Barnes glanced over Darcy’s shoulder, swearing under his breath and he relieved her of a couple of clips, reloading before dragging her away.

“Come on, we gotta catch up with the rest of our squad. Barton!” he called, tapping on his ear. “Barton! Get your ass back here and watch our six. We’re coming in hot. ‘m fine, Steve. I’m fine,” he repeated aggressively. “You’re about two blocks ahead of us. We should be caught up in ten, if Barton can keep these assholes off our backs.” He jabbed at his ear, silencing his worried team leader, before turning back to Darcy. “Come on, we gotta get moving. It’s getting too hot, we’ve got meet up with everyone at the extraction point.”

Darcy stuck to Barnes’ back whilst he took out any threats from the park side, Barton and Falcon had them covered from the street side. Their squad was in sight and the incoming transport ships could be heard overhead when Darcy saw her life flash before her eyes. A lone Chitauri, injured and feral with rage, dropped out of tree right on top of her. She screamed and batted at it with her weaponless arms, and then it was gone, ripped off her exo-suit by Sergeant Barnes. He tried to throw it into the park but it latched on to his own exo-suit and tried to pry Barnes out of it. With the added weight riding him like a damn bronco he stumbled, falling into a pool of water caused by last week’s grenades and last night’s rain. He caught hold of the Chitauri, his metal hand wrapped around its throat, and threw it as far away as he could manage.

Darcy watched as it flailed in the knee-deep water before righting itself. Her hand straying to her last Nebula grenade as it made to charge at Barnes who was struggling to walk out of the muddy swamp. She raced forward into the water, transferring her all available power to her to arm joints before reaching for Barnes’s metal arm, throwing him over her shoulder like a rag doll before tossing the grenade at the advancing Chitauri. Darcy tried to get to get clear of the water and out of the blast radius before the grenade went off… she didn’t make it.

** *** **

It was dark. Darcy’s chest hurt. Then she felt lips on hers and air being pushed into her lungs and she came back to life with a cough.

She woke up in the mud, feeling naked and vulnerable without her exo-suit, with Sergeant Barnes leaning over her almost crying with relief.

“Thank Christ…” he murmured, pressing a hasty kiss on her forehead. “Almost lost you for a second there, doll.”

“Who you calling ‘doll’? You’re the pretty one,” she mumbled hazily.

“Is that so?” he chuckled, helping her to her feet. She made for her exo-suit, which looked like it had been pried apart by a metal arm, only for Barnes to stop her. “Your suit’s shot to shit, Lewis,” Barnes advised her, trying to pull her back towards the street. “Come on, we gotta get you back to the transport ship.”

“Can’t leave my suit,” she argued. “Stark’ll kill me if I don’t bring back his data.”

Barnes sighed and moved past her, ignoring Darcy’s protests as he ripped off the control panel with his metal hand.

“Here,” he said, pushing it into her arms. “You’ve got Stark’s data. Now let’s get you to safety.”

“Alright, Mr Bossy,” Darcy grumbled, following Barnes back to the transport ship as their teams cleared the area of the alien scourge.

** *** **

The war ended overnight, not with a bang, but with a tired sigh. One minute the Chitauri were attacking, the next they were retreating as fast as they could as one by one, literally dropping dead like someone had cut their strings. Nobody could say for sure what happened, none of the soldiers believed the nonsense the media was spouting, but they didn’t take their sudden good fortune for granted, burning all but a few corpses which were sent to Banner’s lab for dissection.

Stark regarded the remnants of Darcy’s exo-suit like it was a drool covered tennis ball his pet dog had laid at his feet.

“So, good news – my Nebula grenades work. Bad news – the war’s over.”

“I’m sure the world’s governments will be back at each others’ throats in no time, Tony,” Bruce offered helpfully.

“You’re right. There’ll always be a new war,” Tony sighed.

“But?”

“But they’re gonna want to take the exo-suits and give them to soldiers, who are going to fight other soldiers. I designed them to fight alien invaders, not to put kids in body bags,” he grumbled, slumping onto a stool.

“What are you thinking, Tony?” Bruce asked warily. It didn’t do to let Tony’s ideas wander around unsupervised.

“I was thinking of maybe channelling my energies into less violent areas. I was thinking about my arc reactor tech, and Sergeant Barnes’ arm,” he admitted.

“Clean energy and prosthetics?” Bruce clarified.

“I realise there’s miles between the two, but just think; I’d be helping build a better world, not just blowing up the old one,” he said, punctuating his sentence by hefting a screwdriver at the now defunct Hulk exo-suit. “You should come with me,” he blurted, avoiding Banner’s eyes. “If high tech, neural interfacing prosthetics doesn’t get your motor running, my tower’s got like, ten R and D floors. I’m sure I can find a place for you.”

“That sounds amazing, Tony,” Bruce beamed. “And you should give Dr Helen Cho out of Seoul a call. She was doing amazing things with cell regeneration before the war.”

“Will do, but first,” he said, pulling up a holoscreen. “I’ve got to delete all my files from multiple government servers, and then I’ve got to call Pepper. You might not want to be here for the treason… or the tearful begging.”

“I’ll go get us some coffee,” Bruce laughed.

** *** **

Darcy, fresh from the showers, was tidying up her bunk when a hush fell over the room.

“Holy shit! It’s the Full Metal Badass!” Private Wilson, the unluckiest/luckiest recruit ever (the guy had more holes in him than a block of Swiss cheese), shrieked excitedly.

“Can it, Wade,” Darcy ordered, throwing one of his obnoxious stuffed animals across the room to distract him. “Sergeant Barnes. What can I do for you?”

“Well, I just wanted to make sure you were okay, and that Medical gave you the all clear. And you know, war’s over. You could call me James,” he said, offering her a nervous smile.

“Oooh, James!”

Sergeant Barnes whipped around to glare at Captain Rogers and Senior Airman Wilson, who were batting their eyelashes and making kissey faces at each other.

“Quit it, assholes,” Sergeant Barnes hissed, turning a bright shade of red.

“Aw, come on Barnes. Don’t be like that,” the less crazy Wilson objected.

“We’re just teasin’, Buck,” Rogers continued to tease. “Lord knows you would have done worse to me if I’d been mooning over a girl the way you have.”

“I wasn’t mooning,” Barnes griped quietly, the blush in his cheeks deepening as Darcy watched on with amusement.

“’Buck’?” she asked with a quirk of her brow.

Barnes threw his head back and sighed as Rogers and Wilson laughed at his expense some more.

“Bucky,” he admitted with a huff. “Childhood nickname that the punk delights in sharin’ with everyone.”

“Cute,” Darcy replied doing her utmost not to contribute to the laughter.

“Well, if you like nickname you should get to know the rest of me,” Barnes smirked, watching carefully to gauge Darcy’s reaction. “Over drinks?”

Rogers howled with laughter, drowning out any response Darcy may have had. “Bucky, that was godawful. I can’t believe I ever thought you were smooth with women!”

Barnes turned to rip Roger’s throat out but Darcy’s hand on his arm stopped him.

“I, um, I could really use a drink actually.”

“Yeah?” Barnes beamed back.

“Yeah,” Darcy nodded before turning her attention to her squad who had been watching the entire exchange with interest. “A-Squad! Get dressed, double time. First round’s on Captain America!” she announced, smirking as her squadron cheered.

“What?!” Rogers squawked indignantly, moving to punch Wilson as he doubled over with laughter.

“You know,” Wilson chuckled, wiping away a tear. “I thought I was going to have to worry about the poor girl that fell for your so-called charms, but that girl is going to run circles around the both of you,” he laughed, slapping Rogers on the shoulder as he led the expedition to the nearest bar.

“You know, I could write you up for this Private Lewis,” Rogers grumbled as he counted heads and tried calculate the damage they’d do to this wallet.

“Whatever,” Darcy snorted. “I’m out of here tomorrow. I’m going back to college, getting my last six damn credits, and finally graduating. And then it will be Lieutenant Lewis, thank you very much.”

“Lieutenant Lewis?” Barnes smirked at the alliteration. “I like it. I think I’m gonna call you LuLu.”

“You most certainly are not!”

“Are too!” he teased.

“Fine. Then I’m calling you ‘Bucky’, since you like it so much.”

“Bucky and Lulu…” he mused, offering Darcy his flesh arm. “Sounds like a couple of cartoon characters.”

“Children’s cartoon characters,” Darcy snorted.

“Nah, they’d be badass superheros. Cutesy names to contradict their grim exteriors, tragic backstories, and their kickass skill sets.”

“Oh yeah? What would our superpowers be?” Darcy asked as he led her out of the barracks, paying no attention to the squadron trailing behind them.

“Well, I’d have my amazing strength - and my incredible good looks,” he smirked as Darcy snorted. “And you… you’d put men under your spell,” he said, gazing at her adoringly until she began to blush. “And then light the bastards up with your lightning powers,” he chuckled.

“Nice,” Darcy grinned. “Maybe we should retire from the military and go to Hollywood with our great idea.”

“Nah, you gotta build the groundwork with a comic book first. Stevie here was an artist before he joined up. He can draw the pictures for us.”

“I’m already buying half the barracks a drink, jerk,” Steve shouted over his shoulder. “I’m not doing another goddamn thing to help you get laid.”

“Oh please, Rogers. Like he needs the help,” Darcy shot back, pulling her favourite Avenger in for a kiss.

[elanorjane]

No Rest for the Wicked [Chapter 1]

Summary: Rumford Gold is tired. He may have just lost his taste for killing people. Which is a problem considering it’s his job. Unable to complete his latest assignment, he's stranded in an obnoxiously chipper small town and continually distracted by the town's captivating librarian.

Belle French is growing weary of her role as Storybrooke's resident good girl. Every day she sits in her empty library, surrounded by the places she’ll never get to see. When a mysterious stranger comes into town, Belle thinks she might have just found her great romantic adventure.

Job undone, Gold’s assassin colleagues descend on the town. Forced to make a choice, Gold has to decide: Tell Belle the truth about being an assassin and ruin the image she has of him or complete the job while trying to protect Belle...including from himself.

Warning: Graphic depictions of violence

AO3 Link

Blood was hell on silk.

Rumford Gold pursed his lips, dabbing at the dark stain currently setting into the light blue tie at the center of his chest.

It wasn’t his blood. He’d be less annoyed if it was.

Abandoning the blotch, he sighed deeply. Letting the cloth fall from his fingers he smoothed it against his chest and tucked it back into his vest. That’s why a good, discrete dry cleaner was indispensable in his line of business.  

Many people thought assassins were ninjas skulking around rooftops after dark, outfitted head to toe in black. He’d always dressed nice for the job, favoring slim fit three piece suits, honoring what used to be the nobility associated with their craft. It was people like him who had brought totalitarian regimes to the ground, started wars, altered the course of history.

Nowadays every kid who plays a violent video game thinks they have what it takes to get into the business. He’d run into the type sometimes. Assassins could usually identify each other - always alone, body tense, eyes cagey. In Luxembourg, there one would be, wearing cargo shorts and a baseball cap. What these pups didn’t realize was that a suit got you places. People didn’t suspect you of anything other than egregious capitalism. In a suit, you looked to the outside world like a perfectly upstanding citizen. The general populous naively believed you were one of them and let you get closer than they would normally.

Assassination wasn’t a game. It was an art in deception, seduction, and gaining people’s trust.  

His eyes followed his soiled tie and continued to the ground, glaring down at his feet. His gaze skipped over the reflection in the shine of his shoes to focus on the head between his feet. The head that was attached to the neck that was currently oozing blood on the soles of his shoes. He sighed again. This is why he didn’t like close range jobs. They tended to get messy.

The mark had been framed between the fixed steel sights of his Walther PPK. Male, 45 years old, long salt and pepper goatee. Gold had clocked all of the physical characteristics in order to get a positive id. Taking out the wrong mark was a rookie mistake that Gold had never made in his twenty year career and wouldn’t start now.

He was in Barcelona but the cosmopolitan capital’s stunning features were lost on him. Gold liked to canvas the town before a hit, get a sense of foot traffic, identify the proper time and place to finish the job. Cities were not looked at for their architecture or historical churches or stunning views. They were analyzed in the sense of sightlines and obstructions and witnesses.  

A breeze from the north ruffled the long strands of his hair. He adjusted his sights accordingly.  

It was evening, so the streets had mostly cleared. The mark was alone, coming out of a bar and taking the back streets, meaning no closed circuit cameras to contend with. Gold could get the job done, a small needle shot into the back delivering just enough serum to mimic a heart attack, collect the evidence, then be back at the hotel inside an hour. Easy mark.

He wouldn’t miss the shot because Gold was nothing if not precise. Grazing someone or relying on hand-to-hand combat left people, more often than not, begging for their lives on their knees in front of him. Those kinds of hysterics offended him. These weren’t innocent people he was hired to take out. They were your dictators, your child traffickers, real scum of the earth. He didn’t check the dossiers he was given on the people he was hired to kill anymore, to study their list of sins. But, chances were, if Gold’s shadow darkened your path, you did something to bring him there. When they had the audacity to plead with him, to ask him for mercy, they were giving in to their basest instincts of weakness and desperation. Desperation being the ultimate sin.  

That’s what his mentor, a man who went by Zoso, had seen in him.

I know how to recognize a desperate soul, he’d told Gold.

Gold had been hopeless, living impoverished and powerless in Glasgow. Zoso had recognized in him a desolation that allowed for a certain moral gray area.  

At Zoso’s tutorage he’d been trained in the art of killing people for hire. A lucrative business indeed. How had Zoso, just by looking at him, known what he was capable of? Of how many lives he could snuff out and still be able to look at himself in a mirror? It didn’t matter. Zoso been the only one to see anything in his wretched soul. The only one to ever believe in him.

He advanced on his mark, coming up silently behind him. The needle affixed to the front of his gun.

Gold’s phone beeped.

Nothing too loud, but just jarring enough in the otherwise silent ally to alert the man that there was someone behind him and cause him to turn around, his eyes directly meeting Gold’s.  

Gold cursed.

Maybe the man had enemies and sensed who he was and why he was there. Either way, in that split second that hung between them, the man decided to defend himself instead of accepting his fate. He ran at Gold, the change in strategy forcing him to abandon the gun in exchange for his long knife, a sinuous heirloom he kept inside his suit jacket, also a gift from Zoso.

People entering the business now carried laptops and tracking devices and sleeker, lighter equipment. Gold preferred the instruments he’d started with. They were antiques, like him.

Despite being outweighed, all it took was one step to the right when the man lunged. In one smooth motion Gold grabbed the mark by the hair with one hand and the hilt of the knife with the other, bringing it to the man’s throat and slicing clean through. Whatever scream the mark was preparing to make came out in a soft gurgle of blood from his trachea.

The death was quick. Gold didn’t believe in torture. He wasn’t paid by the level of pain he dished out, just the end result.  

Regardless, he now had a dead mark at his feet and a mess to clean up before bystanders came by and the body count got out of hand.

He took out his phone to see who was to blame for complicating his night.  

Given any more thought to my proposal?

It was Hades. Another message from Hades. Hitmen liked to use pseudonyms so no one would ever know their real identity. “Hades” thought he was being clever. Gold had never bothered to change his name. He had no one to protect. No wife, no kids, no family.  

He knew what the text was about. Hades was trying to put some sort of collective together. He’d been at it for years. But Gold had never had any interest. He worked alone. Hades was selling it as a sort of union, but Gold strongly suspected everyone would end up working for Hades. This was a man who liked to call himself the God of Death when he was feeling particularly peacocky, after all.

Hades mistook their comparative ages and fondness for impeccably tailored suits for being birds of a feather. Gold flocked with no one.

He hit delete and put his phone back in his pocket. He looked back down at the scene before him.

He took his pocket square out and knelt down, wiping the blood off the corners of his shoes so he wouldn’t leave bloody tracks directly to his door when the Barcelona police made a half-assed attempt to solve the murder of what was most likely a criminal with many enemies.  

Killing people was getting repetitive.

What the fuck was wrong with him? Real people found paying bills repetitive. Going to an office repetitive. Not watching the last glimmer of life fading out of another human’s eyes.

There was a twinge in his ankle when he got up, reminding him of his age. Maybe he was getting too old for this.

Mortality, conveniently enough, didn’t weigh heavily on him. We all have graves waiting for us. Gold wondered where his was. He was already a ghost. Moving through the world but not part of it.

What was the point of continuing on then?

Money was no longer an issue. He had plenty of that stashed away. Egypt had been particularly lucrative this year. But what would he do with it? Giving it to charity made it look like he was repenting, which he wasn’t. He could retire in order to travel, but he’d already done that ten times over. Did it count as seeing the world if you only traveled it to kill people?

He contemplated all of this on his walk back to his hotel.

But all was moot because in his room waiting for him was a thick manilla envelope wrapped in duct tape. His next assignment. Jobs were bid on through the Dark Net and dossiers received via unknowingly complicit courier. Gold always had another job lined up before he finished his current one. No point in taking a break between gigs because there was no “home” to return to.

Gold got out his knife, the same one that had just killed a man, and cut through the tape. Inside would be the identity of his next mark. That’s all it was and ever would be. They weren’t people with names, jobs, families, houses, lives, or dreams. They were a job. That’s what all people were, in reality. Never get close or attached to anyone, they might just be your next hit.

Gold didn’t particularly care who it was. In the envelope would be the name, address, and every deep dark secret of the next person he had to kill. Some people in his line of work like to use those details to psych themselves up. Reading someone’s dirty laundry made them easier to kill. But that had stopped being a necessity for Gold ten years ago.

Right now, he just needed to know where to book the next plane ticket to.

He lifted out the top page of the dossier, just enough to read the location and nothing else.

Storybrooke, Maine.

[vitalmindandbody]

Ellen von Unwerth:’ Let’s photograph girlfriends enjoying life’

Blending old-world charm with a uniquely provoking eroticism, Ellen von Unwerths photographs are a riot of merriment and sly subversion. Richard Godwin sounds why it is also necessary go ourselves less seriously

Ellen von Unwerth cant stop laughable. The German photographer, 63, is ricochetting around the Taschen gallery in West Hollywood in her sneakers, attempting to talk through the images from her latest expo and artwork work, Heimat .

So heimat symbolizes Fatherland or Motherland or where you were born and where your roots are, she tells me. Bavaria is not my heimat , but we wanted to make a lampoon of the whole Bavarian thing.

The whole Bavarian occasion, apparently, involves supermodels cavorting nude in Alpine fields, play-act suggest behaves with sausages, udders and sacred maidens, sledging topless, spanking each other in dirndls and generally experiencing the fecundity and vigour for which the countries of the south German slopes are celebrated. Oh, ja , its extremely sex there, even the clothes they push up the bosoms and there are lots and lots of sausages, ha ha ha, she excuses. But you examine so many personas that are dark and depressing at the moment. All these sad ladies being pathetic! So I figured, tells show girls having fun and enjoying life.

The new Bardot: Claudia Schiffer in Italy, 1989. Picture: Ellen von Unwerth

Von Unwerth has a strange flair for get famous and beautiful girls( Claudia Schiffer, Madonna, Naomi Campbell, Rihanna, Kate Moss) to remove their limits and routinely their underwear while retaining control. Her portraits are often provocatively sexual, but its frequently her themes who are doing the excite. I ever give them something to do, she discloses. When person not moving I get bored. I take two videos and I reply: Great, I have it now. But I affection the body in action. I like the nude organization in movement.

The fashion world adores her for this. You could tell from the raucous launch party for Heimat , where Arnold Schwarzenegger improbably scratched shoulders with Yolandi Visser, and most of the simulations from the kill culminated up leap in a wading pool. Von Unwerths Instagram feed is among the few that stimulate fad weeks actually ogle fun. On International Womens Day, the fashiony angles of Instagram were awash with tributes to her: You raise fun, sex, craziness to place. I always enjoy pushing my boundaries, embracing my femininity/ sexuality and of course my personality ever thunderous and proud when we work together, wrote one representation, Alexina Graham. Ellen von Unwerths playful and entitling photos are such a elation to be a part of and I am so happy she is there to represent women in such a male reigned professing! wrote another, Syrie Moskowitz.

I ever give the representations something to do: Ellen von Unwerth. Image: Steffen Kugler

It is clear that everyone had a whole lot of laughters in Bavaria. Von Unwerth gestures towards an image of three women topless on a sled: This pattern is Miss Russia and she brought a lot of vodka to the shoot. So the latter are boozing behind my back in the snow. Von Unwerth is not much given to analysing. When I allude to the male gaze she has no idea what Im talking about. When I find myself comprehending for the word porn she shoots back: Have you ever seen a porno? Well, one of your pictures does literally depict two people having fornication in a hayloft. Its more motivated by a B-movie sense of clique. I wouldnt announce porno.( After our interrogation, one of her aides announces me to make sure that I dont think its indecent .)

Of course, the word I should have reached for was erotic. Or perhaps simply German. Appear at the scandal there was with Janet Jackson over here, she enunciates referring to the Super Bowl nipple decline of 2004. It was a boob! Its something you should be proud of and not conceal. Specially if its nice. Ha ha ha ha! In Germany it is not like this. Even if you go to a park in Berlin in the summer, everybody is naked and playing frisbee. You would get arrested if you did that in LA.

Leg pulling: Bumpy Slide, from Heimat. Photo: Ellen von Unwerth

Von Unwerth was endure in Frankfurt in 1954 and grown up in an orphanage and a succession of foster homes. She has no recollection of her parents and not much inclination to reflect on their absence. Its what stirred “peoples lives”, she enunciates. I was free from force and I was able to take the best from everywhere. I dont truly have a heimat . So her heimat is wherever she happens to be? Exactly.

She moved to Bavaria aged 16 to join a commune and later went to study in Munich. On her first day at university person replied: Hey, would you like to do a modelling profession? And I turned around and never went back to university. That led to a shoot for the German publication Bravo , which in turn led to her being signed by Elite examples in Paris. I kind of hated modelling, but somehow I did it for 10 times. I was not really the exhibitionist category. Its hard psychologically to be a model. And predominantly parties told me not to move when I was constituting. I just wanted to be like the girls in my visualizes now.

Your Turn,( Rihanna ), 2009. Picture: Ellen von Unwerth

It was simply in 1986 that she firstly started taking picture herself a boyfriend lent her his camera on a way product in Kenya and she went into a nearby village to hit neighbourhood juveniles. I came back home and presented them to my friends and they were like: Theyre really good, Ellen! Because prototypes are supposed to be stupid. I was astounded myself because I wasnt very interested in photography. I had never learnt how to do it.

Her personas were published in the French publication Jill , and she went on to shoot for i-D , the Face , Interview and Vogue , in the vein of her greatest affect Helmut Newton. It was a shoot with the then unknown Claudia Schiffer for French Elle in 1988 that realized both of their occupations. She was a sweet girlfriend and I didnt think so much of it, but when I looked at the pictures, I announced my husband[ music producer Christian Fourteau] and read: Doesnt she look like Brigitte Bardot? The teeth, the eyes? Soon after we did the Guess jean expedition and it was a jumpstart to my job. She likewise detected Eva Herzigov( shes oozing with vigour) and Nadja Auermann, and killed the notorious 1995 Playboy hit that announced that Drew Barrymore was no longer the girl from ET . She has remained in demand although there are the smartphone period has debased the art.

Saddle up: On the high horse, 2015. Picture: Ellen von Unwerth

Its not special any more to be a photographer, she remarks. Even when I take a representation, everybody stands next to me and takes the same image. Five a few minutes later its on everybody else Instagram and Im old information so Im was necessary to take draws on my iPhone too.

She tells me she can usually tell the difference between a photograph a gentleman has taken and one a woman has taken. But I find it crazy how girls photograph themselves all the time. When I was a girl and seemed in the mirror, my stepmother would come in and give me a slap. There was this idea that if you did that, the devil would get in you and steal your identity. Now everyone does this. I request frameworks sometimes, Do you have to take so many selfies? And “theyre saying”: Only when I take selfies do I get likes. Its sad! Narcissism is so celebrated in our society, sometimes people lose interest in other people.

Heimat by Ellen von Unwerth, rate 650, issued by Taschen as a collectors copy of 1,500 mimics, each numbered and signed by the photographer. For more information, go to taschen.com

Read more: www.theguardian.com

The post Ellen von Unwerth:’ Let’s photograph girlfriends enjoying life’ appeared first on vitalmindandbody.com.

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[mltll-gdc-blog]

Evaluation

I chose to study Experimental Typography as I'd never played around with type before, and being on a Graphic Design course I felt that I should push myself out of my comfort zone in this direction. Even after reading the brief, I was still unsure as to what I could expect from the course. In the very first session we looked at the way different typefaces, and in turn fonts, could make us feel and what they communicated with the audience. Our tutor, Kat Jenkins, spoke to us about her own work, and the history of various typefaces. At the end of the session, we were each given a word and asked to return to the following session with 5 fonts that communicated our words. I received the word 'Fierce'. I thought this was a great emotive word, and was excited to get started. Kat encouraged us to use DaFont, which Peter had previously discouraged us from using, and I really enjoyed this. I think the fonts I chose represented 'Fierce' pretty well, but I noticed they were all quite sharp, and realised that my interpretation of a word could be very different to another persons. After this session, I didn't attend the week after, due to personal issues I'd been given time off to address, however I asked my classmates for the work, and completed it from home.We were asked to produce the front cover for our own made up magazine, along with two double page spreads. As the brief was fairly open, I found that I struggled with it initially, as I was unsure of where to begin. I started by looking at magazines that I already read, paying particular attention to choice of images, headers, colours and placement of text, all of which I'd previously taken for granted. I noticed that my favourite magazine, 032c, has a really confident, unconventional layout, which was something I went about trying to replicate myself, however I found that I wasn't confident enough in my own work to achieve this. I chose to use Harley Weir's images in my magazine, as I really admire how honest her work is, and I felt they had an interesting range of colours to use as a starting point. I used DaFont again, selecting what I felt was quite a 'teenage-girls-diary' like font. For the cover, I chose a bold, square font, as I felt this reflected the cover nicely, and made it the same cover as the coat in Weir's image. When I presented my work in front of the class, Kat said she liked the font I chose, however I hadn't kerned the letters very well, which is something I have always struggled doing. Out of all of the Adobe software, InDesign is the one I feel least comfortable wit and the one I know I need to practise. Due to this, I hadn't set up grids when creating the document, and it was awfully obvious. I'd also left a few orphans in the text and hadn't put a barcode on the front cover. At the end of the session we were each assigned a year, spanning over the past 100 years. I was given 2010. We were told to find a photo from our year, which we felt represented it well, and to create a poster reflecting our image, using type only. I found this incredibly daunting, however I was really pleased with the year I was given as a lot of the fashion photographers I like have been more recent. I subscribed to receive monthly editions of Vogue when I was 15, and continued to received them until I was 20, so I knew I wanted to use an image from here. I used Google and Pintrest for my main body of research, as I found these produced the most interesting results. I first looked at Mario Testino's and Annie Leibovitz's work, however I couldn't find anything from 2010 that I liked enough to base a piece of work around. I then looked at Vogue China, as I prefer a lot of their editorial shoots. I eventually found Tiziano Magni's September 2010 Vogue China shoot, featuring Liu Wen. I liked the contrast in these images, and the use of one primary colour against the black and white. Also I think Chinese typography is really beautiful, so I decided to use these images. I first tried to draw out lines, similar to those in the background of the images, however realised this was just copying, and not doing my own version. I did some experiments in paper, and the shone light behind and photographed them, however unfortunately my laptop broken, so I don't have these any more. I prefer my final outcome anyway, with the Chinese type descending down the page. spelling out 'Angel and Demon', the name of Magni's shoot, I used a red layer of text and a white layer of text, both with the same colour outer glow applied, to mimic the backlight in the photo. I put one over the other, to add depth. I did a lot of other experiments, with multiplying the text and having many layers, however although my final design is simple, I think that is what makes it so effective and striking. I'm pleased with my final result, as I think communicates the year '2010' clearly, and reflects my photo well. If I were to do this project again, I would try overlapping the image I'd made on InDesign with the photo I'd taken of type.