#i’ve been chained by this fandom for 8 years now release me

[breeberrypies]

nothing ropes me back in like the voltron fandom. I got back into good omens for TWO DAYS and I had a real handle on one of my new fics I hoped to put out soon. nevermind fellas I saw a klance fanart last night and right now I’m working on another vld art piece and revising my 6 year old klance fic

[purplehairedwonder]

Hearts With(out) Chains Chapter 9

Fandom: One Piece Rating: PG-13 Pairings: Gen (eventual Lawlu) Words: 3523 Characters: Trafalgar Law, Monkey D. Luffy, Nico Robin, Usopp, Sanji, Bepo Note: I’m taking my turn at the Corazon!Law AU because my brain won’t leave me alone until this is written down. Tags will be updated as the chapters come out.

The story title is based on the Ellie Goulding song “Hearts Without Chains.”

Summary: Law is reclaimed by the Family when he's 17 and, with Doflamingo holding the lives of his crew as collateral for his good behavior, eventually becomes the third Corazon. Years later, trapped by his impossible situation, Law finds a strange connection to Monkey D. Luffy, which offers a glimpse of something he's repeatedly had ripped away from him: hope.

Previous chapters: Prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8

Read also at AO3 / FF.N

Law’s head throbbed at the return of consciousness. He screwed his eyes further shut in protest before remembering what had caused that pain. He opened his eyes and found himself staring up at a familiar wooden ceiling. He frowned. The last thing he remembered was Vergo attacking him on the deck of the Thousand Sunny…

“Oy, about time you woke up.”

Law turned his head, wincing at the spike in pain, to see Black Leg sitting at the desk, his leg propped up on a stool. Right. Vergo had broken his leg with his haki-enhanced blows.

“Where’s Vergo?” Law asked, grimacing as his voice croaked. He was really getting tired of being choked.

“Fled.”

Law jolted upright. Vergo was gone? “I need to—” He cut off with a groan as his head spun, and he flopped back onto the infirmary bed, shutting his eyes as he waited for equilibrium to return. Probable concussion after two blows to the head, he absently diagnosed. When he could think again, he opened his eyes.

Black Leg was watching him, but rather than comment, he simply took another drag on his cigarette. With a sigh, Law made a second attempt to sit up but froze once more when he realized his wrists were no longer shackled. He stared at his bare wrists in surprise. The revelation that Vergo was gone and the pain in his head had distracted him from noticing that his strength had returned.

“Seemed pointless to keep those things on when you tried to protect Robin-chan,” Black Leg said, watching Law.

Law blinked and turned back to Black Leg.

“She told us what you said when I was down.” Black Leg studied him.

Doing his best to ignore the other man’s consideration, Law busied himself by slowly pushing himself upright and leaning back against the wall.

“You could have used us as a distraction to get away,” Black Leg said once Law had settled himself, “but you were willing to distract that guy for us.”

“I wouldn’t have gotten very far without the key to the cuffs,” Law deflected.

“Guy like you? You’d figure something out.” Black Leg snuffed out the cigarette in an ash tray.

Law distractedly thought the ship’s doctor wouldn’t appreciate that—or smoking in the infirmary in general.

“Look, I’m from the North Blue too, so I remember hearing about the Donquixote Pirates back then. Even my old man,” Black Leg went on, lips twisting in disgust at some memory, “was grudgingly impressed with them. And he was a warmongering son of a bitch.” Law filed that away for further consideration before Black Leg continued. “But I also know a thing or two about being forced to be part of something you don’t want to be.”

“What’s your point?” Law demanded when the cook fell silent. He didn’t like feeling so blatantly transparent; he worked hard not to be as a matter of survival.  

Black Leg’s lips twitched upward. “Just that I’m starting to see what Luffy was talking about.”

Law frowned in confusion, but any response was interrupted by the infirmary door swinging open to reveal Straw Hat, Long Nose, and Nico Robin.

“Torao, you’re awake!” Straw Hat said with a smile.

“Straw Hat-ya. Black Leg said Vergo fled?” Law asked, swallowing against the brightness of the look directed his way; he forced his mind back to the most urgent business.

Straw Hat nodded. “Usopp rescued me from the water, and when we got back on the Sunny, that guy was attacking you. But then he saw us and ran.” Straw Hat tilted his head. “He was fast, like Sanji.”

Law considered this. Vergo likely wouldn’t want to fight Straw Hat when the latter had backup, even if it was only part of the crew; the bigger the fight got, the more likely he was to blow his cover with the Marines on the island. But if Vergo had gotten away, then he had probably called Doffy by now with news of Law’s “betrayal.” If that was the case, his nakama were in mortal danger with no way—

Straw Hat had continued talking, but he stopped as Law started urgently digging through his pockets. Did he still have it after all the chaos?

“What—”

Law pulled his Den Den Mushi from his jeans pocket with no small relief. He could still warn them.

“W-who’re you planning to call with that?” Long Nose asked nervously.

“My crew,” Law said. “They’re in danger and have no idea.”

“The vice admiral was saying something about your crew,” Nico Robin said, eyeing him. “Is this about that?”

Law nodded, throat tight. “If Vergo tells Doflamingo I’ve betrayed him, he’ll kill them.”

“But—”

Law raised a hand. “I’ll explain. But I need to warn my nakama first.”

Straw Hat looked at him a long moment before nodding in agreement. “Call them.”

Law wasn’t surprised he was given no privacy to make the call; though the shackles had been removed, he was still a wildcard to the Straw Hats. With the Seastone removed, he could have Shambled from the room—or even the ship—but to what end? Vergo and G-5 were still on the island, and the Straw Hats at least weren’t hostile toward him at the moment. He’d take unhostile for now.

Law dialed the familiar number and waited, insides clenching with each unanswered ring. Finally, the snail connected.

“Hello?” Law breathed a sigh of relief at the familiar voice.

“Bepo, it’s me.”

“Oh, Captain!” Bepo’s surprised delight quickly turned worried. “Is everything all right?”

Law licked his lips, doing his best to ignore his audience. “I don’t have time to explain, but the mission is blown. Vergo followed me from Dressrosa.”

Bepo squeaked, “What? Why?”

“He’s finally taking his chance to finish the job.” Bepo would know what that meant.

“Are you okay?” Law’s chest tightened at the concern in his best friend’s voice. After everything Law had put him through, he was still so loyal and kind.

“For now. But I worry Vergo will tell Doffy I’ve failed. Or defected.” Bepo inhaled sharply, recognizing what that would mean. “I need you all to be very careful until I get back. You hear me?”

“You’re coming back?” Law shut his eyes against the ache that sprang up at Bepo’s surprise. But Bepo knew Law was a strategist, and it would be terrible strategy to return to Dressrosa with a potential death sentence on his head.

“Of course,” he said, opening his eyes. He kept his gaze on the Den Den Mushi, which mimicked Bepo’s large bear eyes. “What’s a captain without his crew?”

The snail’s eyes watered, and Bepo hiccupped. “I knew it, Captain,” he murmured. “I knew you were still in there.”

“You’ve always known me best, Bepo.”

“I’ll tell the others. We’ll be careful, and we’ll be ready when you return.”

“I knew I could count on you.” Law swallowed. “I need to go.”

“Okay,” Bepo agreed. “Be careful, Law.”

Law couldn’t help a small smile at Bepo’s use of his name as he ended the call. Then he turned back to the Straw Hats, who were watching him curiously.

“Law?” Long Nose finally asked, breaking the silence.

“My name.”

“Luffy called you Torao.”

Law pinched the bridge of his nose. And to think he thought the Family was ridiculous. “My name is Trafalgar Law.”

“And who was on the line?” Black Leg asked.

“Bepo. He’s my first mate.” Law glanced at Straw Hat. “You saw him on Sabaody.”

Straw Hat thought for a moment then perked up. “The bear?”

“Yes, the bear.”

“Cool!”

“You were going to tell us about Vice Admiral Vergo,” Nico Robin cut in—wisely, as Straw Hat looked ready to go off on a tangent.

Law inhaled and nodded. He was considering what these people needed to know when he noticed Black Leg wincing in pain as he shifted positions. Law turned to him; Black Leg eyed him with some suspicion—despite his declaration not long before, it was wise to be wary of someone like Law—but Law just nodded at his leg.

“I’m a doctor. I can help.”

Black Leg frowned, but Straw Hat piped up. “Torao’s a good doctor, Sanji! And Chopper’s not here.”

Black Leg continued to look suspicious, so Law shrugged, expression one of indifference. “It doesn’t matter to me if you want to hobble around with a broken leg while two vice admirals are on the island.” He made to turn away, but Black Leg broke in.

“Okay, fine.”

Law pushed himself to his feet, his vision spinning momentarily. He probably shouldn’t be using his powers with a concussion, but it wouldn’t be the first time. He approached the chair and opened a small Room, encompassing him and Black Leg. The other man watched warily while Straw Hat grinned. Law reached for Black Leg’s injured leg and touched it lightly; Black Leg hissed in pain but didn’t pull back. Law Scanned the leg and found the fracture. With practiced ease, Law used his Fruit to knit the bone back together. The fracture wasn’t large, so it was a relatively simple procedure, concussion or not.

This… this was something Law didn’t get to do enough of. Yes, he was the doctor of the Donquixote Pirates, but his surgical abilities were far more likely to be used to kill. It felt good to remember that his hands, like those of his parents, could still heal.

Once the fracture finishing knitting together, Law released the Room.

“It’s fixed.”

Black Leg looked at him in shock while Straw Hat whooped in the background. Black Leg slowly pushed himself to his feet and tentatively put weight on the leg. When there was no pain, he allowed more weight. His eyes widened as he was able to balance normally.

“I— Thanks.”

“It’s only logical that your crew’s best fighters be at full strength in the current situation,” Law said, glancing away.

He tensed when rubbery arms wrapped around his shoulders, the casual touch a jolt to Law’s system, running through him like an electric shock. Very few people actually touched Law—and Law appreciated the touch of even fewer people.

“I told you Torao was a good doctor!” Straw Hat gloated.

Law shoved at Straw Hat, but the younger captain’s rubbery limbs simply stretched a short distance before snapping back. He grinned in Law’s face. “I knew you were a good guy!”

“Straw Hat-ya,” Law complained, his face warming.

“Shall we move this conversation from the infirmary now that Sanji-kun is healed?” Nico Robin spoke up. “Perhaps to the galley?”

Law breathed a sigh of relief as Straw Hat let go of him at the prospect of a snack. As the group started to file out, Law lingered behind to root around the drawers until he found some painkillers before joining the others. Once they settled on chairs and stools, the four Straw Hats turned to Law.

“Torao-kun,” Nico Robin prompted, and Law grimaced; he wasn’t losing the nickname, was he? He never should have told Straw Hat his name.

With the eyes of these people, practically strangers yet now inescapably entwined with him, Law felt a crawling sensation under his skin. Bepo, Shachi, and Penguin were the only ones who knew his full background. Violet knew much of it, but Law hadn’t been able to bring himself to share everything with her; the more often he told the story, the more real it became rather than remaining in the realm of Law’s nightmares.

The Straw Hats didn’t need to know everything, but they should have some sense of how dangerous Vergo was.

“Vergo is Doflamingo’s most trusted subordinate,” he said. “He was the first Corazon of the Donquixote Family. He joined the Marines fifteen years ago and worked his way up the ranks, playing informant the entire time. He’s now a vice admiral and base commander of G-5.”

“First Corazon?” Long Nose asked. “So, you’re the second?”

“Third.”                                                                                              

“He seems to have a personal vendetta against you,” Nico Robin said.

“What did he mean about your nakama?” Straw Hat added with a frown.

“It’s a long story,” Law said, clenching his teeth. They weren’t owed his life story.

But they had heard what Vergo had said to him—about him—as well as his call to Bepo. Law thought of Straw Hat’s wide grin and Black Leg’s and Nico Robin’s backs as they stood in front of a defenseless Law even after Law had tried to kill them. He could tell them some of it, anyway, to make it clear what kind of men they were going up against.

Law exhaled slowly to steady himself. “I joined the Donquixote Pirates for the first time sixteen years ago.” They didn’t need to know about the Amber Lead Disease; that was a part of his history that he kept locked up as tightly as possible. “Doflamingo took in kids because he saw his crew as a family. I was ten.” He stared at the floor in front of him to avoid the expressions on their faces. “Doflamingo promised to train me to be his second in ten years.” He swallowed. “But thirteen years ago, the second Corazon tried to get me out.” Law frowned at the floor. “I still don’t really understand why, but he risked everything to do it.”

“Law, I love you!”

“Doflamingo killed him for it.” He looked up at the Straw Hats. “That man was Doflamingo’s younger brother.”

“He killed his own brother?” Black Leg growled.

Law nodded. “Vergo was there that night. Before Cora-san got me out, Vergo attacked us and nearly killed us before leaving us for Doflamingo. Cora-san used the last of his strength to defy his brother and save me.”

“If you got out,” Long Nose said slowly, “then why are you with them now?”

Law dropped his head back to stare up at the galley ceiling. “Doflamingo found me a few years later. I was seventeen and had started sailing around the North Blue with Bepo, Shachi, and Penguin. They were the ones with me at Sabaody,” he clarified, turning back to the Straw Hats. “Doflamingo had just become a Warlord and taken over the throne of Dressrosa. He wanted me back to serve as his second. I didn’t want to return, but he gave me no choice.”

“He threatened your nakama,” Straw Hat spoke up, voice serious.

Law looked at him, startled. He’d been quiet as Law had been speaking. But he’d reached the correct conclusion.

“Yes. As long as I did as I was told, my friends would be fine. But if I acted out in any way, they paid the price.” He grimaced. “I learned quickly to do as I was told. I became the third Corazon when I was twenty, just like he’d promised.”

“What happened after Marineford?” Straw Hat asked.

Law thought of Shachi. “I made a choice, and my nakama paid for it.”

Straw Hat looked stricken.

“Anyway,” Law said, needing to look away from Straw Hat’s expression. “Vergo has considered me a traitor since that night thirteen years ago. He hates that Doflamingo brought me back and keeps me close after what happened. He’s been looking for any chance to finish what he started. I assume,” Law elaborated, “he thinks he can convince Doflamingo I defected because of what I did at Marineford.”

“And if he tells Doflamingo that you betrayed him again,” Nico Robin deduced, “your crew will be in danger.”

Law nodded. “They are the collateral for my good behavior. My betrayal would forfeit their lives.”

“That Mingo,” Luffy snarled.

Law blinked in surprise at the tone. “Straw Hat-ya?”

“He’s a bad guy,” Straw Hat declared, eyes shining. “We gotta take him down. And help your nakama.”

Law was stunned. “What?” he asked dumbly, certain he hadn’t heard correctly. Pirates didn’t just help each other for no reason.

You did, a voice reminded him. At Marineford.

Law shoved that voice down as far as he could.

Straw Hat crossed his arms across his chest. “After we finish here, we’re going to Dressroba—”

“Dressrosa,” Law corrected automatically.

“—and taking Mingo down. Then your nakama will be safe, right?”

“It’s not…” Law shook his head. “It’s not that simple.”

“Why not? We’ve done it before.”

And Law supposed that was true; he’d looked into the Straw Hats’ exploits in the two years they’d been quiet. But there was a big difference between a kingdom like Alabasta and Dressrosa; Crocodile was no Joker.

“Doflamingo is one of the biggest players in the underground,” Law said, unable to believe he was having this conversation. “He has business dealings all over the Grand Line and the Blues. His hand is in just about every war currently being fought, big and small. His biggest business partner is one of the Emperors.”

“Emperors?!” Long Nose squawked.

“The Revolutionary Army was working to trace Doflamingo’s operations while I was with them,” Nico Robin said thoughtfully. “The web they uncovered was immense.”

Law rubbed his face through his hands. “More than you know. He’s supplying Kaido with a product that is enhancing his fighting force. If Doflamingo were to be taken down, Kaido’s attention would turn to whoever had robbed him of his military strength.”

Law had been to Wano once with Doflamingo, and Kaido’s sheer presence had been… a lot. And he’d been friendly. Law wasn’t particularly interested in courting his disfavor.

Straw Hat shrugged, unbothered. “If I’m going to be Pirate King, I’ll have to fight the Emperors at some point.”

“Don’t say that so casually,” Long Nose snapped at his captain.

“That’s not…” Law sighed heavily then laid it all out there. They needed to understand the sheer futility of what they were suggesting. “Doflamingo’s also a former Celestial Dragon.”

Black Leg choked on the drag he was taking on his cigarette. Long Nose gaped wordlessly.

“Former?” Nico Robin asked, though even she looked mildly startled.

Law had only learned about Doffy’s history when he’d become Corazon, and, while it had explained much, it had also left him shaken. To know that Cora-san, in addition to being a Marine, was also a Celestial Dragon…

The Celestial Dragons, who pulled the strings of the World Government, which wiped out Flevance… Law’s throat tightened as it always did when he started going down that path. He forced himself back to the present.

“The Donquixote family is one of the nineteen families that rules in Mariejois,” he said. “Many members are still there, though Doflamingo’s family left when he was a child. He still has connections there. You can’t underestimate him.”

“I punched a Celestial Dragon,” Straw Hat said with a shrug.

Law snorted despite himself. That was a good memory. “I remember.”

“So, I’ll punch another one!”

“Straw Hat-ya, you can’t just…” Law trailed off as he noticed the accepting expressions of the others in the galley. He looked between them, disbelief rising in his throat. “You have no problem with this?”

“He’s the captain,” Black Leg said simply.

“And the other members of your crew?” Law asked, thinking of those who had gone into the lab. Surely someone on this crew must have at least one iota of sense.

“Eh, they’re used to it,” Long Nose replied with a shrug.

Or not.

Law startled when he felt hands on his shoulders. He looked up from his seat to see Straw Hat looking down at him, gaze steady and determined. Law tried to shrug him off, but Straw Hat just tightened his grip.

“Torao,” Straw Hat said.

“Not my name,” Law muttered.

Straw Hat ignored him. “Do you want to save your nakama?”

“Of course,” Law snapped. No matter what it looked like, he’d been doing his best to protect them for nearly a decade.

“Then we’ll help.”

“You can’t,” Law hissed. People who helped Law always paid the price, often with their lives. Law had so much blood on his hands…

“Bad move,” Long Nose said. Black Leg nodded sagely.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Straw Hat said fiercely.

Law glowered. The best thing Law could do for Straw Hat and his crew would be to push them away, to keep them away from the mess that was Law’s life. But the fiery look in Straw Hat’s eye dared him to try it. After several long moments, Law finally slumped, fight leaving his spine. Straw Hat let go of his shoulders, seeming to sense the change.

“Why?” he asked helplessly. “Why would you help me?”

Straw Hat grinned, and, for the briefest of moments, Law was reminded of another wide grin that had turned his world upside down.

“Because I want to,” Straw Hat replied easily. “Because Torao is a good person and Mingo isn’t. Because Torao helped me!” His grin turned mischievous. “Because I want to fight an Emperor.”

Law huffed a surprised laugh, recognizing his defeat. “Okay,” he said. “Okay.”

Straw Hat stuck out a hand, and, as Law pushed himself to his feet and shook it, he realized the tug in his chest had gone quiet.

Next chapter

[jesus-otaku]

Title: La Pucelle et la Coccinelle (part 12)

Fandom: Miraculous Ladybug

Word count: 2650

Prologue | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11

Discovered while updating my fic master page last night that I never did finish posting this fic here. So I am rectifying that. This is, by far, the most brutal chapter of the entire thing, and may or may not have made me cry while writing it, just as a fair warning. (Also tw for this chapter for some implied/attempted sexual assault.)

Tikki's heart sank. She knew, at that moment, that there would no longer be any mercy for Joan.

________________________

Joan's hair was shaven close to the scalp and she was given women's clothes after her abjuration, which she put on when she had been brought back to her cell. Tikki rejoined her there, sneaking in through the outer wall to avoid being seen by the guards.

Her charge sat in the corner of her cell, staring blankly at the wall across from her, her hands folded limp and unmoving in her lap. “I abjured,” she said in a hollow voice when Tikki landed on her knee with the earrings. “I have betrayed my counsel and my God.” A single tear made its way down her cheek. “What have I done?”

Tikki started to nestle against Joan's hand to comfort her, but the cell door creaked open again, and she was forced to phase through her charge's skirt instead to hide from the guards who entered.

“What could you possibly want with me?” Joan asked them, still in that terrible hollow voice.

“Come now, vachère, is that any way to talk to us?” one of the guards taunted. Joan was yanked to her feet.

“Let go of me!” The hollow tone was gone from her voice, replaced with the keening edge of panic.

“Not so confident without your heretic's garb, are you?” the other guard remarked in a disgustingly honeyed tone. “Under all that bravado, you're just a woman like any other.”

“I said, let go of me!” Tikki could tell from the way she was bracing herself that Joan was doing her best to pull away from the two, but her chains were hindering her efforts. She couldn't even break their grasp. “Let go! Stop touching me! Stop touching me!”

“Aw, but didn't you change for us, vachère? This is so much easier to remove than that pesky hosen.” Someone's hand tugged at Joan's skirt, and Tikki's heart leapt up into her throat. She needed to find somewhere else to hide—but where? And how was she supposed to conceal herself from the guards and protect Joan at the same time?

“Get your hands off of me!”

“Ouch!” The tugging at her skirt stopped. “The witch bit me!”

There was a harsh slapping sound, and Joan went tumbling to the ground.

“You bitch,” one of the guards said. “Mark my words, la Pucelle, we are not finished with you.”

When Tikki finally dared to come back out from her hiding place, Joan had one hand pressed to a hideous red welt on her tear-stained cheek, and her other clutching at the disheveled collar of her dress.

~

The guards made good on their promise. Over and over, they grabbed her, cornered her, fumbled at her clothes and their own, only stopping when Joan bit or got in a good elbow to the gut. The men's clothing which she had been wearing before was dumped in a sack in one corner, a deliberate temptation in the midst of the sexual harassment she was enduring. But she stubbornly kept wearing the dress she had been given.

Until, on May twenty-seventh, the guards stole her dress while she was in bed.

They dumped the male clothing out onto the floor in front of her, laughing the whole time, and stuffed her dress into the sack. Joan sat bolt upright in her bed and stared at the men's clothing as if she thought they might be poisonous. They may as well have been, knowing the consequences she would suffer if she put them on.

“Please, return my clothes to me,” she said to the guards.

They laughed again. One of them pointed to the men's clothes on the floor. “There are your clothes; put them on.”

“You know as well as I that the judges have prohibited me from wearing this clothing,” Joan protested. “Please, I must relieve myself. Return my clothes to me.”

“You have your clothes there,” the guard repeated.

“Sirs, you know this is forbidden me; without fail, I will not accept it.”

“Without fail, we will not give you a woman's garb,” another guard said, in an exaggerated mockery of her tone of voice. “You have clothing there; men's or women's, it is what you ought to wear.”

“I will not. Now return my clothing to me at once.”

But the guards kept refusing, and Joan could only hold out for so long—she had to relieve herself, and there was nowhere to do so in her tiny cell, which meant that sooner or later she would have to dress and leave her cell. She eventually gave up around noon, and put on the men's clothing which she had been trying so hard to avoid wearing. When she returned from relieving herself, she tried again to convince the guards to return her dress, with the same results.

And then the inquisitors came to see her the next day.

“When did you put on men's clothing?”

“I have but recently resumed men's clothes and abandoned women's.”

“Why did you take it, and who induced you to do so?”

“I took them of my own free will,” she answered solemnly, “without being forced; and truthfully I prefer these clothes to women's.”

It was the only out-and-out lie Tikki would ever remember her uttering.

“You promised and swore you would never resume wearing men's clothing,” one of the inquisitors reminded her.

“I never understood myself to be taking such an oath.”

“Why have you resumed it?” she was asked again.

“As I am among men, it is more lawful and appropriate that I should wear men's clothes rather than women's. I have resumed it because your promise to me has not been kept; that is, that I should go to Mass and receive the body of Christ and that I should be released from my chains.”

“Did you not make an oath never to take men's clothes?”

“I would rather die than be in chains,” Joan said firmly. “But if you allow me to go to Mass, and release me from my chains and place me in an agreeable prison with a woman for my companion, I will be good and do as the Church wills.”

“Since last Thursday, have you heard your voices?”

Her answer was a blissful exhale. “Yes.”

“What did they tell you?”

“They said to me that God had sent me word of the great pity it is that I betrayed Him, when I abjured and recanted to save my life. I damned my soul to save my life. Before Thursday, my voices had told me what I should do, and I did it. When I was on the scaffold, my voices instructed me that I should answer the preacher boldly.” Her voice took on a sorrowful, bitter curl. “In truth he is a false preacher; he accused me of many things which I have never done. If I said that God had not sent me, I would damn myself, for truly I was sent by God. My voices have told me since Thursday that I have done a great evil in saying that what I had done was wrong. Whatever I said and recanted, I said for fear of the flames.”

Tikki's heart sank. She knew, at that moment, that there would no longer be any mercy for Joan.

~

The next day went by unbearably fast. Tikki spent most of it huddled up close to Joan's side, holding on with every ounce of strength she had. They didn't talk much. Both of them knew what was coming, and they would say their goodbyes when it came, but for the time being it was better to sit in silence and just be together.

After suppertime, footsteps approached down the hall. Joan's head snapped up to look at her cell door with dread. Tikki buried her face in Joan's clothes as murmurs floated in from the hallway. Then the cell door was opening, and Joan was standing, and Tikki hid herself under the bed in a rush.

“You needn't hide from me, Tikki.”

It was the great guardian's voice.

Slowly, Tikki popped back out from under the bed. She was greeted by the great guardian's kind smile. Joan looked back and forth between the two of them in obvious confusion.

“Joan d'Arc,” the great guardian said, inclining his head to her. “It is a pleasure to see you again after so long.”

Joan's mouth popped open in surprise. “You're…”

He nodded. “The elderly gentleman whom you aided in carrying wares across Domremy, yes.”

She turned to look at Tikki. “And…”

“He's the one who brought me to you,” Tikki answered. “This is the great guardian. He protects all of the Miraculous, and distributes them to those who are worthy during times of trouble.” She turned her attention to the great guardian. “If you're here, then…”

The great guardian nodded again, his expression turning sorrowful. “It is time for you and Jhennette to part ways. We cannot risk the Miraculous falling into the wrong hands.”

A sharp wave of pain stabbed through Tikki's heart. She'd known it was coming. She really had. But it had come much sooner than she had wanted. Joan bit her bottom lip to keep it from wobbling; it looked like she was as upset about the notion as Tikki was.

The great guardian bowed his head. “I will give you time to say goodbye.”

Tikki flew straight to Joan's cheek to hug her. Joan's hand came up to cradle the back of Tikki's head.

“Thank you for everything, Tikki,” she whispered. Tikki felt a tear drop onto the top of her head. “You have been such a gift in my mission.”

Tikki nuzzled her cheek against Joan's fingertips. “I only gave you added protection. Everything else was all your doing. You're the bravest girl I've ever known.” She tried to smile at Joan, but it was hard to smile when her eyes were filling with tears and she was on the cusp of sobbing. “You truly are.”

“I could have died at Orleans without your help,” Joan reminded her. Another tear fell on Tikki's head. “And then what would have become of their Maid? You have been a great gift, and my best aid.” She lifted one finger to tap the dot on Tikki's forehead, just as she had done so many times in the past three years. “I am sorry for ever having thought you were a daemon. It's clear to me now that God brought me to you, and you to me, so that we could accomplish this mission together and show the world His glory.”

Tikki choked down another sob. “If anyone ever deserved to go to heaven, it's you.”

Joan chuckled, and smiled through her tears. “Don't attempt to speak for God, Tikki.” She rubbed the spot on Tikki's forehead. “My counsel has promised me I will be delivered tomorrow, in a great victory for His kingdom. It will be a greater victory even than Orleans. My martyrdom.”

Tikki couldn't say anything to that. She was crying too much to say anything anymore.

Her charge squeezed her close one final time. “Be of good heart, Tikki. By the grace of God, I can go to Paradise tomorrow.”

~

Joan was to be burned the next morning in the old market square of Rouen. The great guardian thought that it might not be a good idea to go watch, but Tikki insisted until he gave in. She was going to be there for Joan even if only as one of those looking on.

Joan stood before her condemners on the platform that had been erected for her to hear her sentence, her white shift fluttering around her ankles. She looked tiny and insignificant on that great platform, with all the robed clergymen opposite her in their glittering baubles and miters, her beautiful black hair shaved to dark fuzz and her deceptively delicate body sheathed in the white of a death shroud. While one of the priests read some long-winded sermon about pruning dead branches off the vine and protecting the Church from heresy, she remained upright and calm. They concluded their sermon with a sentence of her excommunication from the Church, and she was abandoned to the secular authorities.

That was when Joan broke down crying.

As Massieu escorted her down from the platform and took her to where the executioner had already prepared for the fire, she called on the Trinity, on the Virgin Mary, on all the saints she could name and the rest of their communion besides, professing her faith throughout.

“Please,” she begged of the people she was taken past, and of the soldiers who waited at the bottom of the scaffold, “pray for me and for my soul. And forgive me—” she choked on her words, and had to restart her sentence. Tikki, hiding under the cover of the great guardian's hat, stifled her tears. “Forgive me and pardon me for any wrongs I have done any of you, for though I will be killed and my body destroyed by these judges today I pardon them as my Lord Jesus Christ has pardoned my sins. You, Cauchon, who have excommunicated me, and all you judges who have aided him, yes, I forgive you. Though I die through you, I forgive you.”

She kept praying and begging for pardon for a long time, and Tikki wasn't sure her heart could take much more of her lamentations, and even some of the priests who had just condemned her were beginning to cry by the time she was placed on the scaffold. Massieu stayed with her, his hand on her shoulder. She said something more softly, which Tikki couldn't hear from her position. An English soldier near her picked up a stick from the ground and broke it in two, and fashioned a little cross out of it with a piece of string. He offered it to Joan. She took it, smiling at him through her tears, and kissed the cross several times before pressing it to her breast. Again she said something to Massieu, and he spoke to a Dominican priest standing off to the side. The Dominican hurried off, and Joan resumed her prayers and weeping. He came back with the crucifix from the nearby church.

Joan flung her arms around the crucifix, holding it tightly to herself as if it were a lifeline.

One of the English soldiers by the scaffold cut through her prayers. “What, priest,” he said to Massieu, “are you going to keep us here till suppertime?” Massieu was shunted out of the way, off of the scaffold, and Joan tugged away from the crucifix to be tied to the stake.

They didn't even bother to read her death sentence from the secular authorities. The one who tied her to the stake only said to the executioner, “Do your duty.”

The Dominican priest still stood on the scaffold with the crucifix. “Wait,” Joan said to the executioner, and then, to the priest, she said, “Please, move down from the scaffold, and then raise the crucifix very high, and never let it leave my eyes.”

He did as he was told, and the executioner lit his fire beneath the scaffold.

Tikki couldn't see much of what happened after that. Her vision was far too blurred by tears. But the crucifix never wavered from its position in front of Joan's eyes, and over the crackling of the flames, Tikki heard Joan cry, “Jesus!” As the smoke began to rise, the cry came again. “Jesus!”

Be strong, Joan, Tikki pleaded silently. If ever anyone deserved to go to heaven, it's you. You've earned your reward. Your suffering is almost over.

Joan continued to cry out the name of Jesus for several minutes before, at long last, her eyes fluttered shut, and her head drooped down over the little stick cross still pressed to her breast.

It was finished.

[killiansprincss]

Chapters: 6/? Fandom: Once Upon a Time (TV) Rating: Mature Warnings: Major Character Death Relationships: Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan Characters: Emma Swan, Captain Hook | Killian Jones, Neal Nolan, Henry Mills (Once Upon a Time), Snow White | Mary Margaret Blanchard, Prince Charming | David Nolan, Alexandra (Once Upon a Time), Phillip II (Once Upon a Time), Original Female Character(s), Robin | Margot Additional Tags: Neverland (Once Upon a Time), Curses, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Emma Grows Up Happy, Evil Queen curses Emma, season 6 AU, Angst, Magic, Hurt, Canon Divergence Chapters 1|2|3|4|5| okay here is chapter 6 of my Neverland fanfic! I hope you enjoy please leave me a comment on A03 I’d really appreciate it!

I also have a collage for my story below, ignore the badly photoshopped Alex Pettyfer as Neal Nolan! 

Emma woke up on the morning of her 28th birthday and she felt like she had a hangover even though she hadn't been drinking. In fact, it was worse than a hangover because she had woken up with 2 lives inside of her head.

But it wasn’t like in New York, because that life was based on a lie and false memories, she actually had lived 2 lives. One as a daughter, a sister, a friend, and another as. Well, as an orphan.

Henry, and Killian. The two missing mystery men. No wonder she was dreaming of those two the most, as she had no clue where they were. The two most important men in her life and she was clueless as to where to begin looking for them. Hopefully, her parents would have the answers.

Her house. With the white picket fence, with a view of the water.

The two people missing from it were the ones who chose it.

How could this have happened? Things were going so well, the three of them were finally starting to be a family when the Queen ripped that away from them. She searches in her jewellery box that she’s looked through every day, hoping the one thing she wants is in there. Necklaces and bracelets and rings she’s received from her parents and friends over the years. It’s not there she thinks to herself.

But then, at the bottom of the pile, it's there. Liam’s ring, the one Killian gave her back in Camelot all those years ago. She takes the silver ring on the chain and feels a sense of relief as she puts it over her head. She was going to find them, and bring them home.

The drive to her parents’ house, despite it only being less than a 5-minute drive, felt like a lifetime. She kept going over in her head(s) what was happening right now, she was meant to be celebrating her birthday with her parents and younger brother, the way they do every year, but now she was finding it strange that she had a family to do this. She was an orphan who found her family at 28, but she wasn’t really an orphan now. Or was she?

She knocks on the door to her parents house, expecting a huge Happy Birthday banner and for them to sing, but instead her father has the sorrowful look in his eyes when he opens the door. There’s no ‘Happy Birthday’ because he obviously knew what was coming.

“I remember,” is all she says as she just starts to cry.

The old Emma, the orphan would never cry, especially in front of her parents, but the girl who grew up with a family cried over the stupidest things

“Come in, we'll talk all about it.” David says putting his arm around her leading her inside.

Wiping her tears away she asks, “what happened?”

David and Snow look at one another trying to figure out the best way to explain the situation. “The Evil Queen, she said turning you into a toddler was the best way to get to each of us.” They begin to explain, going through all the details of how they eventually captured the Queen using squid Ink and how Regina has sacrificed herself to save everyone.

“Wh-what about Henry and Killian?” Emma asks when they’ve finished.

Snow takes a deep breath before saying, “we don’t know. When it happened they ran off to another realm we think, we haven’t heard from them since it happened.”

Emma looks like she could be sick, or faint, or both.

Seeing her face David quickly adds, “they’re safe though don’t worry. We believe Gold had a hand in wherever they escaped to, we can go ask him.”

“No-“ she cuts them off, “I’ll go. Just me. Henry’s my son and I have no idea where he is, I haven’t been his mother for 25 years.”

“Emma, you didn’t have a choice. He forgives you for putting him up for adoption, of course he’ll forgive you for not being there when you were under a curse.” Snow tells her, caught off guard by her sudden attitude-the Emma she raised would never do something this important alone. She was going to have to get used to the fact that the Emma she didn’t raise was seeping back in, the one who liked to work alone. The Orphan.

“Before you go beat up Gold to find out where Henry is,” David says, giving her a large rectangular box, “I thought you might want this.”

Emma takes the box, and slowly opens it to reveal her red leather jacket. Her armour. She hasn’t needed her armour growing up with a family, but now…

She took off her armour when she realised she wanted a future with Killian. But now, she didn’t know if there was a future with him.

_______

She decides to walk to Golds shop. Feeling slightly betrayed by everyone she needs the fresh air. That is until she bumps into her best friend Alex.

“Happy Birthday Emma!” She screams and hugs as she sees her. “I know it’s only a Tuesday but I was thinking tonight we can go drinking at the Rabbit Hole, like I’m working there until 8 and then I have tomorrow off,” she starts babbling, Emma feels so mean but all she can think about is Henry and getting him back.

“I can’t, I need to find my son. I need to find him I don’t know.” She starts to ramble, she knows Alex won’t understand, but she can’t think straight.

Alex looks perplexed, “I’m confused, you don’t have a son? Emma are you feeling okay?”

“No!” She cries, “nothing in my life is real, none of this. It’s all lies I don’t.”

Alex takes Emma’s hand, “Em. It’s okay. I’m your best friend, I’ve known you for your whole life, whatever you’re going though I’m here.”

“No that’s the problem, you don’t know me. At all. My life, growing up with you, it’s all based on a lie.” As soon as Emma said it, she knew it came out wrong.

Letting go of her hand Alex replies, “okay well if that’s how you feel then forget it. I was only trying to help. So much for being best friends.” And storms away, hurt by what Emma said.

She tried to call after her, but it was no use. And plus even if she tried to explain what was going on she wouldn’t believe it.

___

Standing outside of the Pawn Shop is strange. She had been inside many times before in her past life, but not once in the past 25 years. She stands outside for a moment debating what to say, but in the end she just storms inside. She sees the dark one inside in all his horrific glory, despite not having aged much he still looks awful.

“Where the hell is my son Gold?” She demands.

“Why Miss Nolan, I didn’t realise you had a son?” Emma rolls her eyes, the typical Dark One avoiding the question at hand.

“Don’t play dumb okay. Henry. Your grandson. Where. Is. He?” She demands again.

He finally looks up from his books. “Ah, has it been 25 years already? Well I believe birthday wishes are in order!”

Emma sighs, this isn’t going to be easy. “Look. My parents told me Henry and Killian made some kind of deal with you after what happened to me. They’re in some other realm or something, I want to know where, and how you can get them back.”

“Well I told them where they could go. Doesn’t mean they’re still there. As for getting them back, I’m afraid you’ll have to do that yourself.” He explains.

“Okay then do something to find them.” She practically yells at him.

“Blood magic can be used to find your son, for your one handed pirate lover I'm afraid there’s no way of finding him.” Emma’s heart sinks, but she knows Henry is the most important person to find right now.

He reaches under the counter to grab something, part of Emma wishes she had her gun but at the same time she knew that wouldn’t work on him, and her parents probably got rid of that a long time ago. It’s the same white atlas-like ball he used to locate Henry when he was kidnapped by Pans' minions.

“Before you do anything, if that’s a locator spell we are using my blood. Forgive me if I don’t trust you, it’s been a while since I’ve seen you do anything.” She tells him.

He nods in understanding. Emma gives her hand over and he and he pricks it on the top of the globe, slowly releasing her finger onto the white globe and the blood rushes around forming different shapes until they finally form one shape and glow.

“What does that mean?” She asks.

He smirks, “why it’s Neverland dearie.”

The pit of Emma’s stomach gurgled, and it wasn’t because she hasn’t eaten anything today.

Neverland.

Where Henry was taken the first time. Also the place where she finally admitted to herself that she felt something for Killian, and where he told her after kissing her he saw himself loving someone again.

It was where she accepted the fact she was an orphan, a lost girl.

“So do you have a magic bean or something?” She asks, ignoring her overwhelming thoughts inside her head.

The Dark one just laughs, “you think if I had an endless supply to magic beans I would still live here?”

Emma just glares at him, “so how do I get there? What happened to the wand you had? It created portals before?”

“That wand was lost a long time ago. As for portals, you and your brother are born of the truest love, your powers are of the strongest light magic. You created a portal once when you went back in time, I’m sure after years of training and love you’ll be able to do it again.” He explains. “Meet me back here later with your family and I’ll show you.”

______

______

Neal Nolan was working as an English Teacher in Storybrooke High. He had grown up with his older sister Emma, who was a year older than him. Or so he thought. Neal had no idea of the news he was about to be hit with about his sister.

Neal knocks on the door to his parents’ house with his gift for his sister. He got her a Granny's gift card and a new brown sheriffs jacket (which his girlfriend Thalia helped him pick out) and expects to see Emma in the goofy birthday hat they have both worn on their birthdays since they were 5, but instead, his dad opens the door and he walks in to find Emma looking through the Storybook almost crying.

“Everything okay?” He asks.

Emma looks at him, almost horrified. “We gotta talk.”

He debates whether to say Happy Birthday or not. He decides against it.

“I have no idea how you’re going to take this news,” Emma begins, “One thing is that you are an uncle.”

Nels eyes widen “You’re pregnant?”

“NO!” Emma shouts “Not, no, definitely not.”

Neal is even more confused.

“You are an uncle, but I’m not pregnant. I was, but I'm not now, or well I was a long time ago” Emma starts rambling and making no sense, Neal is even more confused now-When did Emma have a kid?

“Maybe we should back up a little.” Snow says, seeing her son's confused face.

And so the three of them explain how Emma was put through the magic wardrobe to eventually save everyone. How Emma met Neals namesake and thus Henry was born but given up for adoption. Then all about her journey in Storybrooke and breaking the curse, and all the other journeys and curses up until the one where she was turned into a toddler. And how said son and Emma’s boyfriend ran away to Neverland, a place where nobody grows old.

Looking at the photos of Emma holding her baby brother was slightly concerning considering Emma in the photos looked exactly as she did now, yet Neal was a baby. If he hadn’t just been told Emma’s previous life story, he would’ve sworn they were photoshopped.

“Okay, so what happens now?” Neal asks, worried about the answer.

“You and I have to create a portal to Neverland to save my son and True Love,” Emma tells him as though it’s obvious.

“Wait a second, you and I create a portal, like combine our powers?” Neal asks slightly worried about this, they had never combined their powers before and now they were meant to create a portal, everything that could possibly go wrong was likely to happen.

“I realise it’s crazy, but we have no choice. You just gotta trust me.” Emma knows Neal can never say no when she says this, as his older sister Emma always got him to do what she wanted by saying “trust me”. Despite getting into trouble most of the time when they were younger with the whole trusting Emma, even now as a 26 year old man, he couldn't say no to his sister.

Neal just sighs, “Okay. Let's do this.”

Neal had never stepped inside Mr. Gold's Pawn shop. When he was younger he heard stories of kids sneaking in and touching different items therefore getting cursed with the insane amounts of dark magic in his shop. Now he was older, he knew this was just a story, but it didn’t make him any less nervous to enter his shop, there was an insane amount of light and dark magic inside that freaked him out.

There was something different about Emma, the way she walked and held herself. She was less confident, very aware of her surroundings, normally she was more confident and whilst she was aware people knew her (both as Snow White oldest child, and the current sheriff), she never let this bother her, whereas now, supposedly everyone their parents age would have known her before her curse, people were looking at her wondering if she had broken her curse yet. Even as they enter Mr Gold's shop, which wasn’t actually as scary inside as he pictured, she walked in very determined,

“Okay were here. How do we do this?”

“Patience Miss Nolan.” He tells her.

“Ah and the youngest of the Charming broods I see.” Mr Gold says looking at Neal, who suddenly felt a little uncomfortable. He knew of the things he had done to people, innocent people, in the Enchanted Forest and that made his stomach churn. But his parents (and Emma apparently now too) have trusted him in the past, and Neal guessed so should he.

“Before we make this portal, you don’t do things out of the goodness of whatever heart you have left. What did you ask for in return?” Emma really was not the older sister he grew up with, she was this independent, confident and slightly argumentative woman that looked like his sister, but had a different aura about her.

“For my grandson I was willing to let the poor lad have this without a deal. As for the pirate.” He sneers, Neal was told The Dark One had a colourful history with Hook, and he was seeing this already. “I simply reminded him of the 300 years he spent in Neverland and what, desires, may still lurk.”

Neal had no idea what this meant, and neither did Emma by the looks of it.

“Now, you two are born of the purest true love therefore your powers combined can create some pretty serious magic.” Gold explains, “Now I need the two of you to hold your hands together and believe you are strong enough. You need to think of the portal in your minds, you will feel it when it is ready.”

And so the siblings to just that. They take each other's hands, standing opposite one another and close their eyes. They then take a deep breath and think of a portal in their minds, letting their magic grow and rise above them.

Emma thinks of Henry, and of Killian. She thinks of Neverland in her mind, and when Henry was kidnapped, she thinks of how badly she wanted to get him back and the things she had learnt about herself, about how much she loved Henry. And about how she was feeling something for Hook.

Both siblings can feel the magic, it’s a part of them and it's rushing around their insides like their blood. Gold said they would feel it when the portal was ready, and he was not wrong. It almost splits the two siblings apart, but they hold on to one another until they just know it’s ready.

The two siblings open their eyes and see a door, a green door with black etchings and designs. It's the portal to Neverland.

They're going to save Henry. Again.

_______

The four charming family members step through the beautifully crafted door, the portal to Neverland. They had packed a few bags and Emma was going to see her son (and hopefully true love) for the first time in 25 years. She could be sick.

The greenery of Neverland greets them as they walk through the door, the humidity and vast amount of jungle and sea that they had seen once upon a time. They arrive near the coast, and Emma can’t see the Jolly Roger in the water, but she had to think positively. If Killian was here she would find him. But only after they found Henry.

She looks over at her parents, and they have the same look on their faces. Fear, determination and awoken memories they had shoved into the back of their minds. After all, Emma wasn’t the only person to go through hell in Neverland, her father was poisoned with dreamshade and had planned to spend the rest of eternity here after drinking the rejuvenating waters.

And poor Neal who only found out a few hours ago that she was actually a lot older than him and was cursed, and now he was in Neverland searching for two people he had only met as a baby.

“Let’s head into the jungle then.” Emma says to her family. And so they head off, into the green jungle filled with who knows what. Now Pan was dead, who knows who now ruled Neverland.

It looks the same as it did 30 years ago, but it feels different. The Magic on the Island feels different, she knows this now, by studying magic for years taught her to sense different types of magic and this was some kind of mix of light dark magic. Not as powerful as Dark One Magic, but not the light magic she feels inside herself. Whatever was keeping this Island alive was clearly a type of magic not found in Storybrooke.

They’re walking for probably an hour when Neals plucks up there courage and asks, “Do you recognise anything here?”

Emma wants to ignore him and shut him out, the way she would’ve done before, but he was her brother, “Honestly, no. I thought I would but it all looks the same.”

“I think we should keep walking, I think we’re on a ridge right now and I assume there’s flatland where we can set up camp a little further up.” Their mother cuts in. Snow was a bandit and a runaway for years when her father was killed, so she knows how to scope out new lands and find a place to set up camp, so they don’t question it and sure enough another little while and they find flat land that seems like a good enough place to set up camp.

“Let’s not use magic to set it up though,” Emma tells her brother, “we don’t know what sort of magic is used here, or who now rules this Island and if they can detect magic. It’s just safer to do it the normal way.”

Everyone nods as they begin to set up. Emma is terrified, she has been since she woke up and realised her life was a lie. She had grown up the way she always wished to, with a family, but now she had broken her curse, it didn’t feel right. She abandoned two people she loved, one being her son. The first family she had in 28 years.

They had run away. So heartbroken that they ran from their home. That didn’t make her feel good about herself. Henry has forgiven her for giving him up as a baby, but will he forgive her for this?

“Emma! Emma!”

She’s snapped out of her thoughts by her brother's voice.

“Sorry, I was zoned out.” She tells him.

“Hey it’s okay don’t worry.” He can clearly sense what’s happening in her brain, though he has no idea of the extent. “I know you said no magic, but don’t you think it’s a good idea to put up a protection spell around our camp? To keep out whoever or whatever might attack us.”

Her little brother was brilliant. Though his magical abilities were not as good, lucky for him was not the saviour so his magic wasn't as strong, but what he did know was his magical history and the theory behind magic, much more than Emma did.

“That's actually a really good idea! You can cast it if you want, I’m a little weak after the portal.”  She lies, she’s not weak, she's just scared of using her magic. In her real-or before her cursed life, she didn’t use magic unless it was serious, when she was the Dark One she used it for everything just like in her cursed life.

He believes her lie, why wouldn’t he, she never normally lies to him. He casts the protection spell eagerly, not normally given the chance to do magic.

“We should rest. It’s dark, and we’re not gonna be able to find Henry now. Let’s sleep, and we can figure out our plan in the morning. We also don’t know who or what is in charge of this Island, don’t want to run into them in the middle of the night.” David says to his family, to which they all agree. Emma is exhausted and her dad is right, there’s no point starting now all she knows is he is on the Island somewhere, maybe he’s imprisoned, or worse, enjoying his time on the island where you don’t grow up.

Sharing a tent with Neal when they were kids was a fun adventure, but as two adults, one who was snoring very loudly, it was a very different story. As tired and exhausted as Emma was, or thought she was, she could not sleep. Killian once told her he was never able to sleep in Neverland, as you can hear the cries of the other lost boys and girls.

But you can only hear their cries if you are also a lost one.

Sure Emma had a family, and she grew up surrounded by people who loved her, she had 2 best friends and a little brother. She was the furthest thing from a lost girl. But she was an orphan. For 28 years, she was an orphan who was never wanted, and gave up her child at 17. That part of Emma will never go away.

Giving up on trying to sleep, she gets out of the tent and sits on the log to try and clear her head. If it’s even possible to do that with the cries of lost ones.

She thought about the two men she was here to save. The last time she had seen Henry, it was saying goodbye to him on the school bus, it was a Friday so they planned to have a Star Wars marathon that weekend. Emma had stocked the freezer with Ice Cream especially. Finally Killian would learn and understand their references to Star Wars. She hoped Henry would still be the same smart little kid who questioned everything.

And Killian. God she missed him. He would bring her coffee in the mornings when she had an early start, and when she was on a night shift at the station he would be at home cooking her breakfast. If she hadn’t been cursed, they would’ve been married and had a kid or two by now. They were finally happy, finally without walls, and she had a feeling Killian was going to propose. But of course he never got the chance.

She loses her train of thought when she hears a twig being stepped on. Her impulses kick in and she hides behind the large tree to her left. She hears someone whistling, as if signalling to somebody. She sees him in the distance. A lost boy, around 15, dark hair, like…

“Henry!” She jumps from behind the tree and in front of her son.

He looks startled, obviously because she scared him and also he hasn’t seen her for 25 years. “Mom?”

Emma is smiling so hard right now, “Henry!”

Henry can’t seem to get words out, “m-mom? Is? It’s-you-you’re here?”  

She goes to embrace her son with tears streaming down her face. “I’m here. It’s broken. The curse.”

She pulls back and wipes away her tears.

“Is it really you?” He asks.

Emma looks different to how he remembers her. Her blonde hair is in a french braid, something she only learned to do in this life. Her clothes are nicer, but still donning the red jacket. Henry knows it’s her, but could it really be her?

“It’s me. Henry. It’s really me. I know you love cinnamon on your hot cocoa, and Operation Cobra brought me to Storybrooke and you made me believe in magic in everything.” Emma’s practically sobbing, she didn’t expect to see him so soon.

Henry looks nervous constantly checking his surroundings, “I can’t stay. If you’re truly my mom, then meet me here tomorrow morning when the sun rises over the place they took my heart.”  With one last look he runs away into the darkness of Neverland.

Emma is stunned for a second, confused as to what just happened. Was there someone following him, or did he need to be somewhere?

The place where they took my heart

Dark Hollow . She tried to look around but it was dark, hopefully in the morning she would be able to see the sun rising over it.

Just as she’s pondering over the last minute with Henry, she’s startled by another voice.

“Swan.”

She hasn’t heard that name in 25 years. And there’s only one person who calls her that.

“Killian.”

[eurosong]

My ESC ‘20 ranking

Good morning folks, on this rather melancholy “Eurovision day.” Whilst this year may be cancelled and its songs pretty callously binned by the EBU, 2020 was a diverse year that deserves taking a close look at too, so here goes my customary full ranking of the year. I express some candid opinions, but they are just my take on things, no shade intended if you disagree.

41. Estonia - What love is It’s always most difficult to pick a last place because, no matter how sleek Eurovision gets, there are still a few abject horrors that sneak into the contest. With a score that would have been dated 30 years back, and lyrics that manage the peculiar double act of being both pompous and anodyne, this is horrid enough before Uku’s dubious xenophobic comments and his prevailing over a field of much more compelling songs get taken into account.

40. Macedonia - You The Macedonians, having achieved their best result ever last year (I’m happy for them, but also, Kaliopi deserved that), decided that they soared too close to the sun with Proud and decided to crash land this year to build their energy to soar again. That’s the only reasonable explanation I have for this effort which deeply repels me, doubling down on Luca Hänni’s “cocky guy in a sleazy bar” æsthetics and adds to it even worse lyrics, castrato singing and the unintended levity of the interpreter being far more interested in the bartender. Also one of a maddening number of duplicate titles that were nowhere near as good as the originals.

39. Cyprus - Running What is this void in the space of a song? I’ve listened to it dozens of times to do ratings over the past months. I’m still left with an icy emptiness because it does nothing to me, says nothing to me. The only thing that I can say in its favour is that it’s not a replay of replay aka Fuego 3. That’s it. It’s like it’s designed to leave little impression and hope to cruise by on diaspora and friendly votes alone.

38. Austria - Alive Austria have been on an interesting Eurovision journey, going from winning with Conchita to serving up this chirpy homophobe doing his best impression of Timberlake. A monumental step back from the singular tenderness of Pænda.

37. France - Mon alliée (The best in me) La déception de l’année sans doute. France, one of Europe’s cultural powerhouses, really said “forget Destination Eurovision, which showcased our music scene’s diversity and was one of the fandom’s favourite newer NFs. Let’s abolish it all and bring in the guys who made Bigger than us, because we really want a piece of that Big 5 bottom place action! Let’s throw away our cultural caché and get something about as French as flatpack furniture!”

This is like going to a pricey restaurant in Paris, expecting haute cuisine and instead getting some microwave-reheated IKEA köttbullar. And can we talk about how Amir of J’ai cherché fame is partly to “thank” for this in one of the biggest heel turns of the year? It’s like he wanted to ensure that France TV beg him to return by safeguarding his excellent score from being equalled. I also have to say, Tom Leeb seems like a nice guy with a good voice. He did his best to salvage this with the acoustic version, which lifts it up a few places. But not so many given that that Westlife reject b-side ending with a key change remains.

36. Germany - Violent thing Speaking of major cultural players dumping their national finals for no good reason, guten Tag, Deutschland! Germany once had one of the best and certainly most diverse NFs going. Instead of dumping Barbara Schönenberger as hostess - every year she’s presented, Germany have had calamity, and the one year they did well, 2018, she wasn’t host - they decided to pin all their hopes on a bewildered looking gossoon from Slovenia with yet another Timberclone song and some rather dubious live vox. As his countrywoman Lea Sirk said, it’s a hvala ne from me.

35. Spain - Universo Yes, it’s another year of the Big 5 not living up to its automatic qualification rights (except you, Italy, thank you for being the exception to the rule.) So here we’ve got a bland effort from Spain to avoid being bottom 5, except that ain’t how ESC works - you need something to get people to waste their money on voting for your song. And for me, this surely is not it. This was a bit higher on my ranking before because there are more objectively objectionable songs out there. But the nonsensical, repetitive lyrics, the painful attempt at a high note on perdónameeee, and getting stuck on a bus where I had to put up said screeching being played 5+ times means #35 is about right for where it deserves.

34. Armenia - Chains on you Armenia, usually a reliable mainstay in the top half of my listings at least, instead served up one of the most bewilderingly impalatable NFs of the season where every song sounded imported from the ESC anni horribili of the 00s. This has grown on me a little bit - I like tin drums and I like her weird accent - but the lyrics are amongst the year’s most pitiful (“ya wanna take me to a party, because you’re naughty”) and it just feels cheep to me. 33. Bulgaria - Tears getting sober I don’t see the appeal in this bewildering merger of dirge and Disney, and this is coming from someone who likes melancholic music more times than not. I find this one straight up unpleasant to listen to. The lyrics are of someone passive-aggressively glorying in the pain they wallow in to return the hurt, in “look how much you’re making me hurt myself” style. The syrupy score replete with key change is a bizarre, ghoulish accompaniment. Only this high because I recognise some artistic merit in its production.

32. Azerbaijan - Cleopatra Are Azerbaijan now at the stage where they’ve decided to pastiche themselves? The country with the worst LGBT rights of all contesting ESC having the monumental neck to send a song about “gay or straight or in between”? The country who have almost religiously avoided sending anything with any actual Azeri national character or heritage sending a song written by a Canadian, an American and a Frisian about a Greek-Egyptian ruler with a Japanese mantra and Latin affectations, so sending us around the world to pretty much everywhere except Azerbaijan? What can I say in favour of it? It’s a little bit catchy. So are venereal diseases.

31. Poland - Empires How can a country who started their ESC journey with aplomb - and experimental gems like Sama and Chcę znać swój grzech - and who continue to serve in the junior contest, how can they be so almost studiedly bland in ESC these days? This is our 564th knockoff Bond tune, sung a little awkwardly and with lyrics written by a Year 8 who’s been given a creätive writing assignment where they have to use metaphors. “We’re gasoline and a match!” Wow. If it passed to the final, it would only because of loyal Poles abroad.

30. Greece - Superg!rl We leave the territory of complete dirges and enter that of songs I can sort of live with. This one’s a huge step back for the Hellenes though after the gorgeous Better love. Its odd chorus is memorable, but not for the best reasons. Its saving grace is its unintentionally humorous promotional video. A better use of those superpowers would have been to come up with a better song.

29. Moldova - Prison Remember the fun Moldova that used to bring songs like Hora din Moldova and Lautar, with some actual national flavour and flair? That’s long gone. Even the Moldova that brought terrible songs but fun stagings, like that of My lucky day, seems far lost into the fogs of time too. Another wholly unremarkable and mediocre production of the Scream Team that would be lucky to scrape into the finals.  28. Belgium - Release me Has Belgium learnt absolutely nothing in the years Blanche where the wheels of their ESC renaissance have fallen decidedly off? My feeling is no. I have to salute them to some degree for creating nice, very musical compositions, but just like in the past two years, they have forgotten to add a few key elements: some sense of progression or dynamism. This plods along repetitively on one track, one note, and that note is nice enough as background music, but my hunch is that track would have led them to another unsurprising “surprise” NQ.

27. Serbia - Hasta la vista It’s an earworm, but some earworms leave you wanting to get an aural exorcism. Somehow, some sort of collective insanity overcame Serbia and they decided to dump on their beautiful oeuvre of songs, go completely against their trend for qualitative, classical, brooding, orchestral music by instead picking a bunch of time travellers who had been a third rate girl band in Transnistria. How enough Serbians thought they’d win over Europe by going for a sound that was dated even when they made their début bemuses me. 26. UK - My last breath The UK are really soaring high in my rankings as... the last amongst the 26 songs that would make up my notional perfect final. Baby steps. I still think it’s pretty lame how the BBC tanked their own national final for this. It’s not so adventurous. It has so little to say that it’s half a minute shorter than the ESC standard and yet still consists of repetition. It has one of the most annoying chorus quirks with that beat in “my last... breath.” How did this get up this high again?

25. Albania - Fall from the sky It absolutely pains my heart to put Albania out of the top 20 after two thunderous years in which they captured my gold and bronze respectively. What makes it worse is that they could have had a perfect hat-trick, because the original, Albanian language version “Shaj” was my #1 song from December up until mid-March when they released this thin gruel of a revamp with all the things that gave Shaj some authenticity and flavour gone, and with beautiful, heart-rending lyrics replaced with cliché. Only this high because there are plenty of worse songs.

24. Czechia - Kemama I have a soft spot for poor Benny, the interpreter of this song. Ok, so it beat a field containing some vastly superior songs, but it’s nice to have a Czech song without weird lyrics about women for the first time in a while, and the way the kid was put through the ringer for his more Afrobeat-influenced revamp made me sad. For me, it gained a bit of flavour with that change. The lyrics are still poor but I like the colourful musical backdrop.

23. Israël - Feker libi 🇮🇱 Sometimes, you don’t think much of a song but the artist elevates it enormously. Such is the case with Feker libi, a bizarre pot pourri of styles with a very discordant tropical verse (which I like), mid-90s dance track chorus (which I don’t), middle eastern post-chorus and African-sounding outro (jury’s out on both.) Yet Eden Alene is so full of natural charm and exudes “I want to be your friend” that I can’t help but rewatch just because of how joyous she makes it.

22. San Marino - Freaky 🇸🇲 Speaking of atypical countries flying high in my ranking, all was set for San Marrano to take non-pride of place at the bottom of my ranks yet again, but somehow, I ended up quite enjoying their track this year. Yes, San Marino is still a weird zone where, when you descend to Rimini in Italy, you enter the new millennium, but returning up the tiny nation’s steep slopes, you head back to a time in the 70s when disko was king. This disco is fun though. In part thanks to Senhit, a sympathetic performer who deserved more in 2011, in part the lyrics - who doesn’t want to rip up the rules, write new ones and then destroy them too?

22. Switzerland - Répondez-moi It’s nice to have the Swiss singing in a national language for the first time in ages. It’s also nice that they didn’t fall back on their success with Hänni by going with a similar so-called bOp. I also really love some of the artist’s other tracks, like Babi. And I liked this a fair bit more upon first listen, but the combination of less than stellar lyrics - just a succession of somewhat emoïsh rhetorical questions; just because they’re in French, doesn’t make them deep - and a wailing falsetto have made my will to relisten to this often take a serious hit for me. A shame, as musically, it has some undoubted quality. 20. Denmark - Yes 🇩🇰 Denmark seems to be doubling down on 2019 to develop its new niche - catchy, sweet but ultimately a little overly gooey love songs. There’s always something a little bit imperfect about them though: last year it was Leonora’s serial killer-esque nervous gaze; this year, it’s the “I’m not going to even try to make pretend we’re an item” lack of energy from Tan. It’s a little bit too reheated “Little talks” but it’s decent enough.

19. Russia - Uno 🇷🇺 When this first was released, days after the deadline for submitting songs, I was pretty peeved at what seemed like a pisstake against the contest, a bizarre rehash of Aqua for the meme age. And yet.. maybe it’s the quarantine slowly driving me insane, maybe it’s the sheer infectiousness of this that just makes you want to dance, maybe it’s the epic energy of the backing singer (Rosa from Brooklyn 99’s twin) who looks like she wants to kill everyone else... but I’ve actually grown to like this enough to put it top 20. I’m not always entirely predictable!

18. Norway - Attention 🇳🇴 There’s a lot of things that tick my yes boxes with this song, like the beautiful orchestral music laid out by the famed Mørland or the simple but sincere performance. There are also things that take a Sharpie and scrawl in my no boxes too, like the somewhat whiny tone of the vocals or the adolescent and lyrics which, with their “oy’d change anyffink abaat moyself fur a boi” tone, don’t flatter the singer, and from Mørland, I expect better. There’s more good than bad here though, and it has been an earworm since the day it was selected.

17. Belarus - Da widna 🇧🇾 I don’t know what was in the water this year, but we got a bunch of great Slavic language songs, including from countries that don’t typically send songs except in English. I like the chilled out vibe and the curious lyrics. Their live version for Eurovision Home Concerts with just an acoustic guitar sounded a whole lot better, I must say.

16. Australia - Don’t break me 🇦🇺 I’m finally overcoming the horror of the bizarre clown mise-en-scène complete with ropey lyrics at Australia decides and judging this on its potential. Hands down Australia’s best entry at the contest for me. Musically, it’s strong, and lyrically, it’s compelling and very saudadic. I’m sad we won’t see what a glow-up their final staging could have provided. I really hope it wouldn’t have involved clowns, which seriously tanked the song in my ranking for months, no joke.

15. Portugal - Medo de sentir 🇵🇹 A Portuguese entry outside of my top ten? Given their form with me since 2015, this might seem like a harbinger of the apocalypse. I still like it quite a bit, but there are stronger songs this time. It’s heartfelt, the lyrics are powerful (about being afraid to feel again after being hurt) and the melody is pretty. The live was a bit cagey especially because of the not particularly well synchronised voices of Elisa and the pianist, who composed the song. Still a very nice song and it is great to see Portugal staying faithful to its language, but I can’t help but feel sad that songs more in line with its riskier, more trailblazing previous few years. Passe-partout or Gerbera amarela do sul would have been in my top 3 like last year.

14. Latvia - Still breathing 🇱🇻 If you told me in January that not only would this song not be disliked, it’d also end up in my top 15 of the year, I’m sure incredulous laughter would have been the most polite response you’d have probably gotten. And yet - the song I couldn’t stand in Supernova has won me over and I do want to see Samanta Tina return for 2021 since she evidently cares so deeply about ESC so is pretty much one of us. I’ve come to love the weirdness of the track - real meat and gravy given the number of anodyne tracks - the iconic pre-corona hygienic leitmotif of its staging. ST’s joie de vivre and command of the stage. It’d be a guilty pleasure except I don’t feel guilty for it.

13. Georgia - Take me as I am 🇬🇪 Georgia once again are dancing to the beats of their very anarchic drummer and I love them for that. This thinly veiled swipe at both the Big 5 coasting in mediocrity and at narrow-minded fans’ reäctions to Georgia’s extremely varied oeuvre just hits the spot for me. I love the musicality of it, the dark electro-rock vibes, Tornike’s voice and how it blends perfectly with his captivating backing singers. I always vote with my feet for something different in an era where people are aiming to qualify with safe and bland rather than taking risks.

12. Romania - Alcohol you 🇷🇴 Roxen provided one of the most iconic moments of the season by deliberately tanking the ordained bop amongst her national final songs. Her eventual song is one of the most emotional of the year, and also one of the most surprisingly literary: there are tonnes of nuances, allusions, wordplays and so forth in this text, most of which are a lot more graceful than the titular terrible pun. I humbly put it to folk who thinks that this romanticises alcohol that they are missing the point - it’s instead being used as a metaphor for toxic relations which, by the end of the song, Roxen has broken away from. I love her voice, I love the music. It fell briefly out of my affections because of the weird mini-revamp, but it’s risen again.

11. Ukraine - Solowej 🇺🇦 It’s fabulous to see Ukraine singing a song entirely in their language and I hope this trend continues across the Slavic nations like was notable this year. The timeless folksy elements mixing with modern beats makes a curious and entrancing blend, delivered with aplomb. It takes where Poland 2019 went wrong and puts it right. I could have done without the unnecessary revamp, but it’s still one of the year’s freshest cuts. Well done, Widbir!

10. Slovenia - Voda 🇸🇮 In an age where the likes of Albania is stripping away all the beautiful orchestral flourishes of its entry to make a pared and muted revamp, Slovenia went full throttle in the opposite - and in my mind, right - direction and made one of the very few good revamps of the season. Performing with the Budapest philharmonic orchestra, Ana Soklič, who, for my money, has one of the best female voices of the year, unleashed the cinematic, sweeping beauty of Voda. I think this would have surprised many people by doing quite well. On musical and vocal merit alone, and adding to that the subdued saudade of its lyrics, it deserved a lot more love.

09 Malta - All of my love 🇲🇹 In 2018, I would have sooner said that it was more probable for me to have become Grand-Duke of Luxembourg than it was for me to have loved a Maltese song, let alone two i n a r o w. I didn’t expect much of this at all, because I expected we’d get a wailing vocal exhibition, as Ian used to say, focused on exhibiting Destiny’s range rather than giving her a genuinely good song. But this is a genuinely good song. Once again, I love for the gospel edge it has, and Destiny’s vocals soar to impressive heights, without feeling unnatural or ostentatious. I should have known to expect good things with the regal Cesár Sampson on board.

08 Lithuania - On fire 🇱🇹 Prior to this year, few people had any hopes for Lithuania’s long-winded national final selection process. The idea of it being must-watch viewing when there were many other more compelling choices on offer was hilarious. In 2020, that changed. They changed the name to the hilarious but hopeful “Let’s try again”, had a number of fantastic songs, and became one of the most diverse and qualitative highlights of the NF season. The eventual winners, The Roop, deserved the accolade with this cool, super contemporary track with a brilliant dance routine and a genuinely important message about not giving up on yourself.

07. Sweden - Move 🇸🇪 At MF this year, the Swedes put a match to its protracted ‘cocky fuckboi with polished, soulless overproduced pop song’ era, hopefully for good, with an all-female top 4. I will always lament Dotter missing out narrowly, but I’ve still been brought plenty of joy by the radiant Mamas with their fabulous hand-choreography and genuine warmth, and this song of resilience through the tough times. I love gospel-tinged music and this really makes me smile.

06 Ireland - The story of my life 🇮🇪 Before this was announced, I heard Ireland’s track being compared to the oeuvre of pretty much every major 00s female pop star. I was quizzical, but upon hearing it, could see why. In a year with a lot of beige, this is just one big orange and yellow blast of colourful late 90s/early 00s nostalgia, hope, resilience. The kind of anthem I never knew I needed but came right on time. I can’t listen to its wry, conversational lyrics without wanting to dance along. And Lesley Roy herself is an icon. My favourite effort from Ireland since Playing by numbers, and I really hope she returns in 2021.

05 Finland - Looking back 🇫🇮 I’ll never forget a mural in the part of València where I used to live that said “we’re not different for the sake of being different”, and that could sum up my attitudes to Eurovision. Whilst it seemed almost everyone was behind Cicciolina in Finland, I had scant hope for my favourite, and was blown away when it actually did win. This melancholy meditation on the passing of time and people - “we never know what we have until it’s over and we’re looking back” - became emblematic of this year for me and added to what was already a really poignant and moving track. I love the musical style too and the smoothness of Aksel’s voice and how it contrasts with his evident awkward shyness. It has moved me so much that it had to end up top 5.

04 Croatia - Divlji vjetre 🇭🇷 I always will represent and bring love for the Balkans and their adhesion to their musical traditions. This was one of the most pleasant surprises of the NF season for me - I was expecting very little from Croatia, and instead, it greeted me with this beauty. You have the understated classic grace of the music, the exquisite melancholy and poeticism of the lyrics, and one of the finest male vocals of the season. My favourite Croatian track in almost 15 years.

03 Italy - Fai rumore 🇮🇹 Sanremo isn’t just a national final, it’s a cultural experience that digs into your heart over the course of a whole week. This was one of the most memorable I have followed yet - and what a truly deserving winner. It’s just another example of the seemingly endless supply of heartfelt tunes by classy, sincere performers that Italy has on tap, with one of the best lyrics of the contest and the extra level of poignancy from how the lyrical theme of isolation would come to represent us all.

02 Iceland - Think about things 🇮🇸 One of my nerviest and happiest moments of the entire NF season was seeing Daði Freyr and friends win Söngvakeppnin in Iceland. As much as I loved Svala’s Paper, I had also adored his song three years prior - the delightfully awkward and similarly irrepressably earwormy Is this love. And now he was back with a groovy, fun, heartwarming tune about fatherhood that has only continued to grow in my estimations. The bridge still full on gives me goosebumps. It’s the kind of song that just makes me marvel at being human and being on this earth.

01 Netherlands - Grow 🇳🇱 My top few songs are all very closely entwined so much so that they could be considered joint winners, but I’ve been pretty unequivocal ever since Shaj got torpedoed by its revampire: silver turned to gold and my previous 2nd place, Grow, became my new favourite. I love the heartfelt, sparsely poëtic, bravely confessional lyrics. I love the way that it goes from something minimalist and intimate with just organ and voice and slowly builds upon the hints of gospel to something truly anthemic. Such a meticulous arrangement where there’s not a single sound out of place. This song is pure art and, like Soldi, Mall, APD and all those preceding songs which had the magic of being my personal favourite, it moves me upon every listen.

[alicedopey]

New Year’s Kiss

Fandom: Twilight

Genre: Angst / Romance

Pairing: Leah x Embry

Warnings: none

Words: 1984

Summary: Minutes before the new year, Leah and Embry share some thoughts.

A/N: Okay guys, this one has been sitting for a long time in my drafts and I finally decided to share it with you. I have a weird relationship with Twilight, meaning there are a lot of things I don’t like but there is this one character I am really fond of: Leah.

The wind was furiously blowing, snow was heavily falling and yet, Leah sat motionless outside the Cullens’ house, enjoying the weather which reflected her thoughts.

They were happy. They were all happy. She couldn’t. She wouldn’t. It was impossible for her to play best buddies with the perfect leech family when she had nothing.

The mother was nice and the pixie was not that bad; after all, she had bought her the dress she was currently wearing – which was ruined now, thanks to the snow. Nonetheless, how could she be friends with them when they were responsible for everything that had happened to her those last two years?

Phasing, imprinting, death of her father, Sam leaving her…nothing would have taken place if stupid Bella Swan hadn’t come to Forks. She would be happy. Instead, she felt chained to this town, a condemned prisoner waiting for her death to come…or a chance to escape.

And escape, she will. Soon, the Cullens were to leave Forks and no matter which destination they chose, Jacob and the pack would follow. But she wouldn’t. It was her chance to go to college, to get rid of this wolf fur, to have a normal life far away from La Push. It was not as if she would be missed…

Her mother would have Charlie Swan, Seth would be with Jacob, Embry and Quil would probably go back to Sam, everyone would be happy and maybe she would be too, away from this Hell.

“Leah?” She turned around. A surprised and somewhat anxious Embry Call was approaching her in a cautious way.

“I thought you had left. What the hell are you still doing here?”

“Seth absolutely wants to wish me a happy new year before I go.” She rolled her eyes. “As if it would change anything…” She looked at him through narrowed eyes. “What are you still doing here? Quil left ages ago…”

He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not always glued to him, you know. Besides, I was playing video games with Emmett. He is pretty cool.”

Leah snickered. “I bet he is. If he is cool, what made you feel the need to leave the house, then?”

He cringed. “The smell was becoming too overwhelming. I needed some fresh air.” He cleared his throat and asked hesitantly. “May I sit with you?”

Needless to say, Leah was surprised. Embry Call was willing to sit down next to her and probably talk to her too. That was something new! Always playing the unaffected part, Leah just shrugged in response and Embry sat down next to her.

“So…tell me Leah, what were you thinking of all alone in the snow?”

That was even more surprising. “And tell me Embry, why should I tell you?”

He smiled. “Come on! I’m trying to be friendly here.

“Don’t feel obligated Embry. You can go back to the precious Cullens.” She snapped. “I don’t need any company.”

“I believe you do.”

Now he was just getting annoying. “I don’t need any pity either. Go away. Now.”

Embry let out a heavy sigh. “Why are you pushing me away? I just want to know you better.”

“Know me better?” She snickered. “You’re in my head most of the time, there is nothing else to know.”

Embry shook his head stubbornly. “There is a lot of things to know. Obviously, the subject is bothering you or you would tell me about it.”

“Fuck off, Call.” Leah got up to leave but he grabbed her arm and forced her to sit back down. Then, he released her.

Leah glared at him. “Why did you touch me? Do you have a death wish or what?”

The young man just rolled his eyes. “Quit the bitter bitch act with me. I am not Paul, this isn’t going to work. Can’t you just tell me what you were thinking of?”

Against her better judgement, Leah blurted out an answer. “Leaving?”

Embry frowned. “Leaving? Leaving where?”

“Far away from here, from the vampires, the wolves…them.”

A shadow briefly appeared in Leah’s eyes. Embry immediately understood who this “them” was referring to and he could easily get her point of view, but leaving seemed a little bit too much in his eyes.

“I thought you felt better being in Jacob’s pack now.”

“True…but with mini-leech and the imprinting, something tells me the Cullens are going to move very soon and Jacob will follow. What will become of me, then?” She let out a trembling sigh. “I don’t want to go back to Sam. I’m not a masochist.”

It made sense but…Where will you go? What do you want to do?”

“I was thinking about going to the college in Seattle to study Arts or something like that.” She seemed to hesitate a few seconds but chose to spill everything. “I just want to feel peaceful again, you know? “

Embry nodded, fully aware of Leah’s situation and strong need to escape. Nonetheless, he was suddenly feeling bothered by this idea of fighting vampires without her by his side. “What if we need you to kick some vampire’s ass?”

Leah snickered again. “I doubt you will. Forks will become a boring place again once the Cullens are gone.”

“Did you tell Jacob?” He asked, a little bit anxious. He knew Leah wouldn’t appreciate him reminding her that Jacob had power over her…and that he could use it against her will to make her stay. Surprisingly, she did not seem to mind.

“I’ve already mentioned it a few times, actually and Jacob seems okay with it. He understands what I need.

“And what is it that you need?” Embry asked boldly. He was amazing himself with this sudden bravery towards Leah. It was clear the woman could literally kill him.

She just narrowed her eyes and he let out a tiny sigh of relief. “To be away from my dreadful past love life in order to finally break free from those invisible strings.”

Once again, a shadow went through her eyes which suddenly became teary. She blinked several times and turned away from him. Embry wanted to comfort her so much, his hand was burning with the need to touch her skin. But he had to refrain himself for he knew she would castrate him if he ever dared doing it.

He heard her sniff lightly, take a deep breath and she looked at him, composed.

“Anyway, I’ll leave for the next term in September.”

Embry frowned despite himself. “That soon?”

“It’s in nine months, Call. Besides, may I remind you I will be in Seattle. It won’t be that far away from you, suckers.” She smirked and punched his arm.

Had he been a mere mortal, he would have ended up on the floor with the force of her blow but he merely flinched, being the wolf that he was.

He stared at her and Leah fell ill-at-ease for a moment. She had the feeling he was trying to memorize every inch of her face.

“I’m going to miss you, I think.” He whispered.

“You think?” She sneered. “I doubt that. You’ll gloat about the fact that I’m not here to bitch around all the time.”

“I can assure you I won’t.”

Leah rolled her eyes, clearly not believing him at all. “Well, the others will.”

He tilted his head and stared at her. “And it will bother you?”

She sneered, once again. “Since when do I care about what other people do or say when I’m concerned?” “So it won’t bother you at all?” He did not know why he was insisting so much. She was going to murder him.

“What do you want me to say, Call?” A heavy sigh left her lips as she stood up. “That I will be miserable, that I would love for the others to miss me instead of criticizing me behind my back. That I will miss you all.”

He stood up as well and walked towards her until his chest was almost touching her back. He felt her tense but chose to stand his ground. He leaned on her and whispered in her ear. “Just tell me what you feel, Leah. Tell me the truth.”

She shivered when she felt his hot breath on her skin. “Why?” She whispered back. Her voice was unsteady, Embry sensed she was on the verge of tears.

“You have the right to feel, Leah. I’m just curious to know if a friend is alright. Is that too much to ask?”

Another heavy sigh left her mouth. “Why, Embry?” She turned around abruptly and they came face to face. Her eyes were glistening with tears, a mix of sadness and anger he could tell. “So that you can make fun of me because for once, I was weak enough to admit I was feeling something.”

A lonely tear rolled down her cheek. This time, Embry could not help himself. He gently brushed the tear away with his thumb. She flinched, having lost the habit of being touched by anyone. She did not push him away though.

“Feeling is not a weakness, Leah. It is a strength.”

She sniffed. “Being bitter is a strength? Really, Embry?”

It was his turn to sigh now. he stroked her cheek tenderly.

“You are not bitter. You’re just having a really bad time. But it will get better, don’t worry. I’m certain it will.”

She closed her eyes, defeated and shook her head. “I’m broken, Embry. I’m not even sure that moving away from here might change me. I’ll just be way from my pain but when I come back, all of those negative feelings will come back as well….as strong as ever.”

Another tear rolled down her cheek. Once again, Embry brushed it away softly with his thumb.

“You’ve said it yourself, Leah. You’re broken, meaning that one day, you will heal. Maybe sooner than later. You just need to want it.” He gulped almost loudly before letting out his last words. “And if you let me, I’d be happy to help you.”

Leah’s eyes widened, realizing what he was implying. “Embry…”

Suddenly, massive screams coming from the Cullens’ house could be heard “10, 9, 8…”

The countdown had begun. “7, 6, 5…” Embry’s face got closer. Everything in her being wanted to push him away but her heart was screaming not to.

“4, 3, 2, 1.”

Their lips crashed a whole bunch of “Happy New Year” went out from the house.

Embry’s hands cupped her cheeks while his tongue tickled her bottom lip, asking for entrance. Leah tentatively put her arms around his waist as their tongues danced together. It has been a while since she felt those pleasurable sensations that only a kiss could give. If she was honest with herself, she did not want it to end but they both needed to breather.

Embry let go of her lips and sweetly kissed her forehead. “Happy New Year, Leah.”

Leah could not help the smile that stretched her lips. “Happy New Year, Embry.”.

She cleared her throat, suddenly remembering where she was. “I’d better go before Seth comes looking for me.”

“Yeah…”

Reluctantly, she left his warm embrace and made her way to the house. She was just reaching her destination when Embry called her.

“Will I get the chance to kiss you again before Valentine’s Day?”

She turned around and smiled mischievously. ‘We will see.”

Maybe this year could be the start of something new.

Tagging: @naaladareia​ (tell me if you want to be added)

[courage-a-word-of-justice]

Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works 1 - 25 (FINAL) | Waver OVA

Much like the Fate/Zero post, this is mostly a set of notes which has already been released and is preserved here because of the difference editing makes. There was one completely insensitive, uninformed note and a note which I was writing down to be “more in character” which I’ve removed in all instances of the notes, though - it’s better you not know what was being said there. 

F/SN UBW 1 (Prologue)

Now that’s the Rin I know from fandom whispers.

Turns out this is ep. 0 and there’s actually 12 eps…

This brunette reminds me of Maiya.

This wavy haired guy’s a Matou? Geesh, he somehow reminds me of the Great B*stard Archer.

Miss Fujimura’s a bit of a non-sequitur…

If I remember the fan whispers right, his name is Issei Hyoudou…? (Or is that the High School DxD guy?) Update: Issei Hyoudou is the High School DxD guy, this is Issei Ryuudou.

If people die when they are killed, then machines should, too.

I already know from checking up previous info that UBW is for the 5th Holy Grail War and Shiro Emiya is part of it.

The button says “voicemail”…well, it’s actually rusu, where rusuban denwa = answering machine (denwa = phone, so rusu means something like “protecting the house (while you’re gone)”). The best way to translate it would be “voicemail” though.

Fuyuki  Church (Kyoukai)? Rin has them on her voicemail???

I seem to remembr reading that this white-haired character is an alternate universe Shiro Emiya…but I guess we’ll find out later, huh?

Hmm…I’ve seen this Command Seal before. I think it might be Dewbond’s profile pic, in fact…which tells me that he likes Rin.

The compulsion the guy is talking about reminds me of Steph from NGNL and how she was forced to fall in love with Sora.

Rin’s treating this like a gacha game…LOL.

Pride vs. pride, huh? Anyways, I think the really entertaining thing of putting me under the pump like this is that I have such an incomplete understanding of how the Fate/ universe works that the outcomes of everything create enough entertainment for those who’ve committed to said universe. The things that I do know might be really late-game though – such as the white-haired Servant being an alternate Shiro – so I have my own surprises to confirm.

“The Archer class really is made up of archers!” - …and people die if they are killed, y’know? (<- I know this from the memes. I won’t cover Deen/Stay Night, people don’t normally recommend it.)

Why is a cup omnipotent, anyway? Cups don’t have the ability to have knowledge. By the way, I bet Rin’s acquaintance will have something to do with this.

Rin’s Holy Grail War work reminds me of my own experience with piano. Basically, I grew up doing it, so I never questioned it until I thought about what I really wanted to do. I expect Rin will be the same way.

Hmm…Sakura and…the Great B*stard?

Rin says all of this about “crude garbage”, so all I can focus on is the bin off to the side…LOL.

Oooooooh…so this appearance of Sakura is why people put F/Z before this.

Saber…the reason she’s so popular is because she appears in so many incarnations of Fate/ that she’s basically become a poster girl for it.

F/SN UBW 2

There’s something that pisses me off about Sakura. It’s probably because she’s fairly submissive, like a girl who was written to be a guy’s fantasy.

The OP and ED was subbed the first time, so the fact this isn’t is interesting.

I think I’ve seen these scenes before…probably because they look exactly like the setup for Today’s Menu for Emiya Family.

Hypoxia.

Sakura’s boobs jiggled…urgh…

This episode feels a lot more like a VN intro.

Some of these scenes were from a different perspective in the prologue, so I’ll try to skip them.

Stove = heater, if you didn’t catch on.

Oh hey, Emiya isn’t part of the archery club anymore…but there’s some evidence that an alternate Emiya became that Archer Rin has.

That’s Ilya, isn’t it…?

Emiya’s magic incompetence reminds me of Waver.

Shinji is Sakura’s older bro??? I never heard of this…? Step-bro, maybe?

I read one of the labels on the machine – makanai setto – and turns out it’s a [meal] set for staff (teachers).

This series’s messages are like anvils…even more so than F/Z.

Where does Emiya work…? (For some reason, I call Kiritsugu that but Shirou “Emiya”.)

Archer’s not in white…not that much, anyway.

“…I really nearly was killed.” – Yes, and people die when they are killed, Emiya. You said so yourself in Deen/Stay Night.

I know this iconic scene where Emiya stares at Saber! I’ve seen it in all the screenshots and everything.

F/SN UBW 3

The blindfolded woman in the OP is apparently Medea. I think I mentioned her offhandedly in one of the WP posts I did, so I didn’t expect to see her so soon.

Most of this ep is explaining this stuff to beginners. I can skip that.

I don’t get the appeal of Rin, but then again, I’m neutral at best on tsunderes.

Shoten Books? Like, Bookseller Books? How redundant…

“[G]enuine fake priest” - …LOL wut?

Why is Kirei giving me Equilibrium vibes…? Oh, it’s because he has silly hair that reminds me of Christian Bale. That’s why.

Most of this episode was recap from F/Z, so I skipped it.

F/SN UBW 4

I’m laughing – this new Berserker reminds me of Tsukasa (Dr Stone).

Ah, same old Gilgamesh. He’s just in different clothes.

Kiritsugu felt like he actually was a character. Emiya? Just a blank slate, really.

Welp, that was over fast…

F/SN UBW 5

I’m getting sick of Rin’s tsundereness, fast.

Okay, crash course in types of Servants. I needed this.

*Saber reveals the outfit is from Rin* - Ooh, Shiro, don’t go judgin’ Rin like that…

Oh-hoh, Sakura does archery, huh?

I bet Kuzuki actually is a mage. That’s how these things always turn out, no?

Actually, I think Emiya might be a better match for my piano experience. There’s this one person who played at a higher level of piano than I did, but they kept telling me that I was way better than them at piano (although I don’t know if that was self-deprecation and/or inflating my ego). As I mentioned in my relation to Rin, I forcibly cut it out of my life because my parents chose it for me – in short, no desire to hit the target, in one way of speaking.

I can see why Fate/ needed a cooking spinoff now…LOL.

Shinto = New City, with a particular combo of kanji.

Are these Touken Ranbu enemies, Rin…? (They’re called Historical Revisionists, technically, and I specifically refer to enemy wakizashi.)

I seem to remember from somewhere Sakura is Caster’s master…hmm. Another thing to confirm.

F/SN UBW 6

That Rin reaction face! I’ve seen it before!

LOL, that “I haven’t been sleeping lately” is relatable.

Medea is one of the only Servants that was originally a woman, so…it’s interesting to see she’s been given a chain as a method to keep up (but also vaguely annoying to see her have such a short skirt). A chain weapon seems to be the sort of weapon for an agile user, with possible sexual overtones (if you want to interpret it that way), so it seems like it came straight from a male fantasy of a woman.

Rin is the sort that places a lot of stock into obligations, I see.

F/SN UBW 7

I learnt how to read the word “mirage” in Japanese somewhat recently (in comparison to the basics, which I learnt through a CD-ROM maybe…15 or so years ago?). It’s shinkirou.

I find it interesting that these eps. are marked as Fate/Stay Night and the series is Fate/Stay Night UBW, because Deen/Stay Night (as I’ve been referring to the Deen version of F/SN) looks pretty different to Ufotable’s F/SN, judging by that “People die when they are killed” meme.

The subbers spelt “specialty” wrong…

Well, Emiya, being in a room with a girl…alone…you really are a typical VN lead, aren’t you?

LOL! I knew Kojiro was also part of this series and I think I knew he was an Assassin, but s***! He’s an absolute looker!

…and *sigh* Caster is using her sensuality against men. A regular Fujiko Mine, she is.

I think my heart did something when Archer gave that intense stare at Caster, too. This is no time for a reverse harem!

F/SN UBW 8

Ahh! Kojiro Sasaki’s (this Assassin’s) so hot! I love it!

The only person who can beat Saber is another swordsperson, huh? Logic checks out.

That blue ring looks like the one at the start of Shinchou Yuusha’s OP.

F/SN UBW 9

I thought Shinji was gonna barf, but that was actually laughing…that’s what happens when you don’t have the volume on.

This replacement Gilgamesh (Shinji) sucks…

Just squinting at Caster’s chest…boobs do not work that way, people. Fabric goes over things like that, it doesn’t tuck itself so neatly around them.

I think Rin’s a real idiot for ignoring that Shinji is a Master and a mage…

I almost thought Shiro was gonna kiss Sakura for a second there. Apparently you should approach an unconscious person from behind and tap them on the shoulder (as opposed to going from the front to listen for breath), in case they try to punch your lights out.

Watching Eizouken, which doesn’t have girly runs for the girls, and then watching this makes you aware even Rin is capable of girly running…(LOL?)

Gee whiz, I was so sure this purple lady with the whip was Medea and a Caster-class Servant. So she’s a Rider??? Update: So it was Caster, masquerading as Rider…is that how it goes…?

So is this a locked-room – or locked-school – mystery…?

F/SN UBW 10

This is basically “You wanna go?” from Saber.

Considering the coronavirus, these words (about people getting out of the attack completely healthy) seem sort of weird…

Samosan? Seppa seppa? What dialect is this???

*Emiya asks Issei to strip* - Ooh…this is why Fate is popular with women…*thinks of the fact this was a male-oriented VN first* Maybe.

I still think the Great B*stard kinda looks like Kyo from Fruits Basket (…not that I ever mentioned it earlier).

I just realised Taiga’s shirt is striped orange/black…like a tiger.

The amount of still frames in this episode, in comparison to the usual number, is significantly higher.

F/SN UBW 11

I just realised Kinoko Nasu means “mushroom” and “eggplant” if not exactly written the way it is…what a name…

*something about being useful to others* - U-Uwaaaaah…Emiya! Stop reminding me of all the things I’ve done at the cost of myself!

Hmm? I googled Rin’s birthday and I thought she was a Leo – she’s an Aquarius (Feb. 3rd).

Rin absolutely steamrolled Emiya, LOL.

I get the feeling Archer is saying “Only you can save yourself”.

F/SN UBW 12

Randomly, there is a Volkswagen.

*something about Emiya photosynsthesising* - Rin, that’s not how people work…

Batting centre? How can girls go there in skirts without flashing anyone? That’s taking into consideration how short Rin’s skirt is, y’know…(Practicality comes first at all times, people…well, not for Saber, who’s wearing stockings, but I worry about Rin, as you can see.)

People find blushing tsunderes cute…I kinda get it for male tsunderes, but for Rin…not really.

Ack! Another double episode!

Why does this ominous vibe on a bus remind me of Harry Potter…? (Then again, the first things I remember of the movies were a shrunken head and a bus that could squeeze through gaps, which might explain things.)

Hmm? So what is Kuzuki’s place in Caster’s life, huh? Who’s controlling the puppet?

Come to think of it, who is Assassin’s real Master? If Caster has control of him, that means he belonged to someone else before that, right?

I feel sorry for Assassin. I mean, he has to keep talking to Caster with his body torn open like that…

“Princess of Colchis” – So Caster is Medea! Maybe Scott (who said I was wrong about that) was thinking I was referring to Rider. Rider and Caster do look awfully similar…but wait, so what was the real identity of Rider, then? Update: Reading over the notes, I was mistakenly referring to Rider as Caster, hence the comment.

Wolverine!Kirei strikes again, it seems.

Lel, I forgot about Lancer…and Berserker, now that I think of it.

F/SN UBW 13

So this is Brave Shine, huh? It doesn’t sound familiar at all…

…aaaaaaaaand of course Saber is in a fancy white dress. It’ll sell a lot of figures – in fact, I think I’ve actually seen Saber figures with that outfit while browsing for Nendoroids and other merch as of late.

F/SN UBW 14

Well, this blonde guy’s hair is nice…but he’s basically Shou Tucker all over again. (I haven’t even completed Fullmetal Alchemist in any form – I just know what the guy did because the fans talk about it a lot.)

Gosh, evil begets nothing but more evil, huh? (re: Kirei and blondie here)

I gotta facepalm - this blonde dude really shouldn’t have maltreated Medea. She has a reputation for a reason.

It took me a few tries and the brightening of my screen to figure it out, but Caster spotted Kuzuki.

Gilgamesh, what the f*** did you do to those poor maids?! (Even if they were homunculi…)

The subbers appear to have spelt “homunculus” slightly wrong…

F/SN UBW 15

“Going through the front door would be a bad idea.” – Yeah, and people die when they are killed.

I really respect Illya now…and can see why she got her own spinoff.

This snowy mountain makes me realise exactly why they chose Ufotable for Demon Slayer.

F/SN UBW 16

I was wondering what Gilgamesh had torn out of Illya…ew.

I was watching Shazam the other day and a piece of advice the titular superhero gives is “Look out for number one.” (i.e. yourself) Rin has much the same mentality.

I seriously facepalmed when they tried to protect each other. One person should learn to stand down in the relationship for that to work.

Hmm…so this means Lancer’s Master is male, huh? (Why is that Master still a mystery anyway…?)

I facepalmed the third time (the second was soon after the first) when Emiya thought he could seriously protect Rin from Lancer. Knowing who Lancer’s Master is a much bigger priority right now, man – this isn’t a romcom!

I like Lancer’s sideways gaze, LOL.

*Archer comes in* - Well, hasn’t it been a while since we saw this guy? (voice drips with sarcasm)

“druther” – Hmm? I’ve never heard of this word before. Apparently, it means (when used as “If I had my druthers…”) “If I had my way…”.

Hmm? What’s this? There are two pendants instead of one…?

F/SN UBW 17

There’s a lot of shots centring around Lancer’s butt…LOL. (Or is that just the female gaze I’m forcing on to this?) Even still, because Lancer has an outfit like that, it’s kinda hard not to see that he does have a fine one.

“You have a lack of pride in your sword skills.” – Uhhhhhhh…I guess that’s why he’s Archer…?

I never seem to know who the Lancers are…geesh. Like, I could pick one from a crowd of Servants, but not their real names. Update: As it turns out, Karna (the one Indian Servant I had my eye on from Apocrypha) is a Lancer in Fate/Grand Order.

Apparently, Gungnir is the spear of Odin.

Kuzuki is a Master…of the Naruto run. (LOL)

Noting “sieben” and stuff, I think Rin’s magic is German in nature.

Why does Medea have elven ears, anyway…?

F/SN UBW 18

The subs suddenly turned yellow! What the heck?! (Prior to this, subs were white.) Update: Come to think of it, only Aniplex shows have yellow subs, while Funimation ones have white subs (although HiDive let you choose between white and black, the standard is white on the hardsubs). This might mean a switchover between who’s responsible for the show happened while this anime was airing.

“…within your grasp?”

Ooh, this I didn’t expect! Saber joined forces with Rin!

“…your wish was a mistake.”

*Shiro fights swords with more swords* - For some reason, I feel like I need to play some Daft Punk right now. (I don’t even like them as an artist, even though I’m meant to be the EDM expert around here…)

This all but confirms Archer is actually a Shiro Emiya from a distant future.

I just imagined an Archer whose body was made of swords. What a compelling image – a literal human weapon.

Those hand gestures…Shinji is a massive creep.

Huh? I’ve been skipping the post-credits segments for previous episodes because I’m binging, but there’s a post-credits segment here…

Hmm…this next-ep preview had a rook (or a king? I’m no good at identifying chess pieces by their appearance) with a red glowing symbol on it facing what appeared to be the symbol of the Saber class. What an interesting representation of the upcoming inevitable faceoff.

F/SN UBW 19

Wouldn’t it not make sense for future!Shirou to kill present!Shirou? I mean, you know the time travel paradox…if you kill the present guy, the future guy doesn’t exist.

“Sorry about that, punk.” – LOL. Lancer’s great.

Hey, wasn’t Kirei dea-oh right. In fiction, when there is no corpse, you can’t have assumed the character died. They probably skedaddled off somewhere, heavily bleeding and/or on the edge of death…and I’m assuming that was how Kirei got out of his scuffle too.

All this talk about ideals makes me wanna play Odd Future for some reason, LOL. (Well, the first line of that song is “I keep my ideals”, no?)

“…it is you who is disobeying orders.”

A eunuch, huh? Rin, you do know that a eunuch has his *erhem erhem* cut off…right?

Okay, people. Why must women be the source of the Holy Grail? This is only the 2nd time I’ve gotten to this point and you’ve got enough men to fuel the Grail instead. Why not use them??? Update: It’s safe to say I get my wish later.

“You’ve been removed from the bounds of time.” Subbers, I know you’re under pressure to produce subs, but please proofread…? Pretty please? Update: I should proofread too. My E key is a bit dodgy at the moment.

I predicted, a few seconds before it appeared on my screen, that Shirou wasn’t the type to do things he regretted. Yyyyyyyyyyup. That’s Shirou, alright.

F/SN UBW 20

Okayyyyyy. That was not an episode title that needed to be subbed.

Oh, gosh. Can you please just knee Shinji where it hurts, Rin…? I know you’re being choked, but you could still do something lik that.

…(lol)…What the heck, Shinji’s such a self-preserving prick!

So how many times did Lancer actually die and how many times was he faking it out?

“Dying because of some order that comes with being a hero.”

So who’s Gilgamesh’s Master now…?

Hmm…I thought by saving Rin and Saber, Shirou was already a hero. Maybe it’s just a perception thing.

H-Hey, Shirou…you keep saying redundant things…

F/SN UBW 21

Why is Saber just standing there, anyway…? (Well, Shirou did say it was his fight, but…she can do something…)

Okay, whose idea was it to cut after “However…”?! That’s terrible pacing.

This series peaked quite a few episodes ago. Now it’s just stretching for time.

Um, hey. Random question. Didn’t King Arthur draw Excalibur from the sword in the stone? Is that a stone or a tree stump? It’s hard to tell since the zoom quality is funny, but…if it’s a tree stump, someone got a crucial detail wrong. Update: Nup, it’s a stone. Forget I told you.

Having sacrificed myself for over a year for other people’s sake, I can’t say I agree that giving yourself up for others is a beautiful thing. This is speaking as someone who volunteers at a not-for-profit (the charity store). In fact, having thought long and hard about the fact I’ve completely gone down the wrong path from having taken this one opportunity I was given (note I did get rejected from a similar place before I got the position I did), I’ve thought, occasionally, that sort of thing is disgusting.

Did the Great B*stard even age 10 years while waiting for this new war…?

“…left off 10 years ago.”

Uh-oh. I don’t like Shinji – you can clearly tell that from the way I’ve been reacting to him – but there’s no way you’d use him as a Grail vessel…right?

F/SN UBW 22

If I understand the pink box correctly, it says kayumino-ru which is…*checks that up* itch cream(?) Another of the boxes says either iburon or ipuron, but it seems to be some kind of medicine (although I can’t figure out what it does).

“…flashy gold jerk…” – Yup, that’s why he’s the Great B*stard. The most narcisstic of all b*stards –so narcisstic he survived a Holy Grail War without being the victor.

Lemme guess, Rin…if I know my visual novels right, then the way to establish the mana link is either kissing or sexual intercourse, right? Update: Oh well, transplantation of a Magic Crest will work too. With the way Rin was reacting, I thought it was gonna be really intimate, but…nup. It’s just them taking off their shirts for one another…*whistles and pretends to walk away*

The reason I don’t like tsunderes is that whenever they want to be romantic, you can’t tell whether they’re giving mixed signals or not. Then again, you could argue I count as one, so…uh…*sweatdrop*

Shirou, why are you so concerned for the pillow?!

F/SN UBW 23

You can barely recognise the guy (Shinji)…huh.

H-Hey? You couldn’t mean Assassin’s back, right? Update: Y-Yep, that’s Assassin, alright. At least I can gaze upon his handsome face again…(lol) (<- If you’re wondering, there’s a difference between “lol” (or “small LOL”), “lel” and “LOL”. That’s the order they’re meant to be in, going from smallest to biggest laugh.)

Had to check Wikipedia, but Monohoshizao is the pole (?) wielded by Kojiro Sasaki…well, the correct term is nodachi (which I know better as ootachi from Touken Ranbu), but it’s referred to as a pole. To add something interesting to that, the ootachi I like the most (my beloved Taroutachi) is said to be 221 cm (throwing that into a converter, about 7.25 feet) and 4.5 kg (converting again, about 9.92 pounds)...which is basically something no human should be able to use, so if the pole is anything like Taroutachi...I have immense respect for this Assassin as well.

Assassin’s treatment here reminds me of Tora from Juuni Taisen…in a sense, they got what they wanted.

F/SN UBW 24

Cue the law of equivalent exchange from Fullmetal Alchemist, hahaha.

How can you be so sure you’ll beat the Great B*stard, Shirou???

Well, that Grail’s Holey, alright…(I bet you’re groaning at my joke, yes?)

I thought Archer was dead?! How did he fling a weapon at the last moment?!

Archer, you’re disappearing! This is no time for monologuing!

Why do I get the feeling I’ve seen Rin give the thumbs-up before as well…?

F/SN UBW 25 (FINAL)

Eyyyyyy? London…? Update: Oh, it’s the Clock Tower! That OVA is starting to make sense now! (Although I will watch it next, so there’s no need to muse over it.)

Tohsaka without pigtails is…weird.

Sherou (?)

Oh, romantic infighting (voice dripping in sarcasm)…That’s not what I’m here for. This is not a harem.

Ponytail Rin. This just gets weirder and weirder. Also, she kinda looks like Ishtar from Babylonia like that.

Tiny Pigtail Rin…it gets even weirder.

*yells* See?! It is London after all!!!

Update: Prior to this point, I had Silhouettes (by Avicii) playing in my head on occasion, notably when Archer was meeting his end. When Shirou came face-to-face with Saber’s grave, it switched to So Amazing by Luther Vandross. Although I normally don’t mention what I have on my mental playlist in notes like these, I just want to make note of that because it reflects the switch in mood. (Also, this is basically an extended transition into El-Melloi’s Case Files.)

Hmph. Yeah, nothing like hindsight to make something huge look small.

Sakura and Shinji’s relationship…it reminds me of a grumpy old man and his young daughter…(LOL?)

Ryudou’s reaction to romance reminds me of Tenya (from BnHA) in his more crazy moments.

All this talk about the Clock Tower is making me think that older!Waver will show up at any moment now…

…wa-hey? Well, *spits out some held-back laughter* whaddaya know? That’s the older Waver right there!

Ufotable’s older!Waver and Troyca’s older!Waver look fairly different. Ufotable’s isn’t as attractive because his hair has an artificial sheen to it and the man’s face looks more like a snake’s head in shape, so he looks a bit dumb. Update: Certainly Troyca’s Waver has a more egg-shaped head, but at least that makes his hair look nicer, no?

Post-credits segment. Keep watching.

Huh…that segment wasn’t very substantial. Maybe Hoshiai no Sora spoilt me on that front.  

Waver OVA (REWATCH)

*yells* I still think Flat Escardos is a terrible name!

LOL, I think Waver just called out a bunch of political writers right there.

So who are these old people??? (Lennon Glasses and Old Lady here) I still don’t know. Update: You do find out later – Inorai is the old lady and Rocco is the old man.

Okay, so apparently the set of characters used for “Rail Zeppelin” is literally translated to Demon Eyes Collection Train...sounds like something out of Demon Slayer.

If Kayneth is the OG Lord and this Reines girl is the new one, how did Waver become gen. 2? *rewinds a little* She’s el-Melloi Archisorte, meaning that somehow she and Kayneth are blood-related (also note Monkey D Luffy = Luffy is his first name and Monkey is the last name with D being a middle initial, so Reines could have her names around the wrong way as well). Still doesn’t answer the Waver part of the question, though. Update: The character page of the official website says Reines is the rightful heir to the name “Lord (Lady?) El-Melloi”, but she appointed Waver to be the Lord while she waited to become of age and take the position.  

As you know, I gotta question the guy’s (Waver) age. In Fate/Zero he was 19 and he looks much the same ten years later, so his approximate age range is 19 – 29 here. Wikipedia (which I linked earlier) says the anime this OVA is attached to occurs between the Grail Wars, meaning I might not be able to get an exact age. Update: “[A]lmost 10 years”, so I’d wager he’s on the back end of the age range (24 – 29).

Ooh, another good boy (Bram). I forgot he existed…and that’s kinda nasty that he’s got the bloodline of Sola-Ui in him. Update: Oh! Younger sister! That is nasty!

The word shisho (師匠), if I’m guessing the right characters, means “instructor” (or “teacher” if you wanna bend it that way). “Sir” is Waver’s title…I’m guessing that translatio choice is because he’s not a professor in title, assuming professor titles in this are given like they are in real life.

There’s something quite cute about Waver making such an indignant face…then again, he does have permanent worry lines on his face, so maybe not.

Like, whose bright idea was it to crush on the loli? Ravioli, ravioli, don’t crush on the loli! (Then again, I’m probaby worse, chasing after older men…)

Come to think of it, Ufotable is good at action motion (see exhibit A: Demon Slayer), but not free-flowing comedic motion like Waver falling over like this. That’s probably why the show jumped studios to Troyca (aside from divvying up the work of the Fate/ universe – Ei Aoki did F/Z, after all, so it makes sense he’d have some ability to take dibs on whatever works best for his studio…although he wasn’t too involved with this, I don’t think). Update: He was supervisor and storyboarder for this OVA.

Waver: Official butt monkey of the Clock Tower. Calling it now.

Troyca animates F/Z (however briefly)…I must say, they did a good job imitating Ufotable.

All I really remember from the first time around is the car chase, which really shows my priorities in anime…heh heh.

Troyca’s CGI is more noticeable than Ufotable’s, but they’re still on of the best studios for CGI, I think. That’s why they’re on my favourites list over Ufotable (since Ufotable, by general consensus, does better work but I think it looks more artificial in parts – case in point, Waver’s hair).

Setting up a mystery, like all stories, is very much about setting up the boundaries that you’re allowed to play in later. The only thing is that mysteries get more stringently judged for logic.

Hey, whaddaya know? Waver can fit Rider’s old shirt now! (Or maybe it’s the smaller version Waver implied was given to him during F/Z.)

“[W]hydunit” (in English) – LOL? There’s “whodunit”, but not “whydunit” – stick to “motive” or “modus operandi”, people.

[maryellencarter]

memed from @camshaft22 , originally an askbox meme but it's short enough that i can just have opinions at all of it rather than waiting to have the free time to get out of the house and answer asks. (i still have at least a few askmeme questions sitting in my inbox from like a month or two ago... :P)

1. do you find force users or non-force users more interesting? -- non-force users by a mile. there could theoretically be exceptions, like if anybody really got deeply into alternate perceptions / interpretations of the force rather than just kind of toeing the jedi party line as established in the movies, but i haven't seen any that really grab me.

2. which character do you want to be most like? -- oh, now there's a hell of a question. both this and the next one, really. see, let's start at the beginning: when i was a very smol tortoise watching a star war, and by smol i mean like eighteen because that's when i first saw a star war... when i was a smol, i wanted to be han solo (not least because he was hot in a very conventionally masculine way, do not underestimate the importance of that to a smol afab tortoise programmed with much body-loathing ;P), but i identified a lot more with chewbacca. i mean, let's be honest, i was not in great psychological shape as a tiny, and this particular oddment is something i'm still very much sorting out, but: from tiny!jt's perspective, at least, han+chewie is a nonromantic primary relationship that gets displaced by the han/leia primary romantic relationship. but it's still (from anything you see onscreen in the ot) primary *to chewie* even after it becomes secondary to han. that kind of nonreciprocal primary relationship, tagging around after someone who would let me express that kind of devotion and not find it creepy even after they inevitably found a "real", romantic relationship that would be more important to them than me, was the best endgame i could imagine for myself, and frankly i felt like it was way too much to hope for within my own species. i may have spent rather a while wishing i was a dog or something, so that it would be acceptable and appropriate for me to want the most important relationship in my life to be nonromantic. tiny!jt was a *mess*. this was way before i got into fandom, so i didn't really work through it at all or write it down anywhere, either.

uh. that got long. continued under the next question.

3. which character are you actually most like? -- so anyway. yeah. to continue. then i found my way into legends (then still the eu but yanno) and the x-wing books. and then there was wes. ^_^ it would be several more years before i even figured out i *had* ptsd, but here was somebody who had ptsd that presented almost exactly like mine but was also stable and functional and not-depressed and in fact actually cheerful. not to mention he was *also* hot and male and most importantly human, but still showed the kind of undemanding loyalty i was aiming towards, and had it accepted.

(which last is partly because wedge is an oblivious noodle, but still. ^_^ honestly that's probably something to analyze when i'm not one-finger typing on my phone: how much of that kind of relationship being a goal for me is just me being wired kind of subby, and how much is the abuse thing where asking for any kind of emotional reciprocation is Wrong and Too Much. :P)

uh. i had a point here somewhere. um. so i wanted to grow up to be wes, but i didn't think that was an attainable goal. i felt sort of more like wedge with the duty and guilt and everything, but wedge is also way more of a leader than i am, so that's a thing. honestly there was a point there where i felt most like cheriss, just kind of... trying to grow up and dealing with a whole bunch of life shit and intermittently wanting to die a lot. ;P

and now apparently i *am* growing up to be wes and i'm still not sure what to do with that, besides writing a lot of fanfic (which is what i am doing). and trying to figure out the whole subby brain thing. and the executive dysfunction thing. and the not wanting leadership positions thing. and still working on the ptsd thing. and the self-esteem thing. there's a lot.

i'm less wedge, though. which is good. less catholic guilt is always nice.

4. what headcanon will you defend to the death? -- er. i'm not really sure i have any of those. as opposed to just canon things i will make sure people remember and acknowledge. maybe the hoth cuddle pile? you will never convince me the rogues on hoth did not sleep in a giant cuddle pile.

5. what planet would you most like to visit? -- i frankly don't know enough about star wars planets to give a shit.

6. what planet would you most like to live on? -- ditto. not taanab, for sure. mini rancors (and possibly 46-hour days if you don't just disdain that as illogical made-up numbers they threw into the planet guide for variety's sake... ;P I have opinions)

7. who do you hope you never meet? -- of the characters? pretty much any of the bad guys, but my first thought is vader.

8. what is one thing you would change about any movie, show, book, etc? -- ahahahahaaaaaaa. just one? i can't pick. can i say fix all the things about tlj that made me go "okay never watching that"? because there were at least four or five just among the spoilers that i heard. like if it had to be just one i'd make it so poe doesn't disregard chain of command, because that's the one that's making it so i can't rewatch tfa *either*, but from everything i hear, that movie was a hot mess. (alternatively, can i just change the fandom so that people stop saying "if you don't love tlj unquestioningly you're a reddit douchebro!"? because i don't want to unfollow roguepod on twitter but unless i block literally everyone *they* follow there's no way for me to keep that particular Hot Take off my dash and it's consistently re-infuriating me. :P)

uh. i have feelings, apparently. ;P

9. have you ever made fanart or fanfic? do you make edits or any other fan content? -- so much fanfic. so much. i counted last night and just the fics i haven't published yet add up to somewhere around 80k words.

10. do you think the jedi were right or wrong? -- i think the jedi were self-important douchenozzles with a habit of being wrong whenever the plot demanded it. is this a reference to something specific they were right or wrong about? i don't think they have the one true view of the force, and i think they're obnoxious about thinking they do, much like many other religions, so there's that.

11. who is the most underrated character? -- new canon, finn. or rose, possibly, not that i've seen her, because see above re hot mess. old canon, hobbie.

12. do you care who rey’s parents are? -- honestly, i'm at the point in dealing with an open canon where i cannot give fuck about any of the unanswered questions, the upcoming releases, or anything that might happen in the future at all. i haven't even read thrawn alliances. i am Over It, and that is about 99% the fault of the people who keep calling me a reddit douchebro by association. i probably won't see epIX unless kat or sophia tells me i absolutely have to. i'm a legends-only fan at this point. i didn't want to be, i like getting excited about new things, but every time i try it, people are douchewaffles and it's depressing. :P

13. if you could resurrect one dead character, or prevent them from dying, who would it be? -- new canon, hobbie. old canon, there are so damn many options, but probably mara or pellaeon.

14. what is your favorite alien species? -- i'm not sure i actually have an opinion. i have lots of favorite alien characters but like... idek. star wars has a bunch of really well designed alien species and they're all cool.

15. who would you like to bang? -- honestly i don't really care about banging any of the characters. shipping them is more fun. although i would let princess general leia step on me, whether in a sexy way or not.

16. which movie/episode have you watched the most? -- probably anh. the falcon's flying sfx aren't as good as in esb, but if you watch esb without rotj it's just a downer, and i don't really enjoy rotj. like it just doesn't click with me.

17. what is your favorite line? -- uh. from the movies, or from all the star war? uh. either way that's a hell of a question. the one i quote the most from the movies is definitely "we're all fine here, how are you?", but that's more just... versatile. from the books, my favorite is obviously one of allston's, but i'm not sure i could *pick*.

18. what is your favorite star wars book or comic? -- starfighters of adumar. because it is the best one. objectively. ^_^

19. what’s your opinion on legends/expanded universe? -- i'm extremely glad it isn't canon anymore (see also my issues with open canons, but also a significant amount of it was just trash) and extremely glad it's still around.

20. what do you hope will happen in future movies? -- i have no hope. hope is dead. i am, as previously mentioned, Over It. (let oscar isaac kiss john boyega onscreen)

21. if you could switch any character’s gender, who would it be and why? -- in canon? no. there's no point in turning a lady character into a dude, and neither the creators nor the fans are capable of handling anyone who's currently a dude being written as a lady or nb type, even if it was retroactive and they'd always been written that way. just no. it would go Badly. :P

that said. in fanfic? and i am so not capable of writing this yet but i want to. in like five years when we're all living in caves scratching our fanfics on bone. i want to see a cis afab wes janson who just hasn't internalized any of those lessons about not taking up space. who's still brash and loud and enthusiastic and flirtatious and just... female. who doesn't feel any need to explain that she doesn't (or does) want kids, or acknowledge anybody else's opinion about how she dresses or who she fucks. who's smart and badass and competent and out to have fun. and like... *pulls hair* i mean you know the trope. a sexy lady character who knows she's sexy will pretty much always at least consider sleeping her way to the top or whatever. (tim zahn, seriously, stop using that trope. it's not edgy.) i want to see lady!wes dressing up all fancy because it's fun and she enjoys having people admire her body, and like just... not even considering ever having sex for any other reason than "i am attracted to that person, i wonder if they'd like to bang". like it's hard to demonstrate a negative but you know if you read a story like that, where it wasn't called out but just there, your brain would go all fidgety and "what the fuck something is not normal here". or at least mine would. but you know? :S apparently i have a lot of feelings about this too. like trying to portray a lady who's that confident and... and undamaged by misogyny, would be a hell of a thing.

22. favorite droid? -- bb-8. the cutest smol. target has a kit to turn a pumpkin into a bb-8 and i swear i'm thinking about getting a funkin to do that to. even though i already have a bb-8 penny bank and a bb-8 lanyard in storage.

23. what’s your favorite star wars musical piece or theme? -- i'm not great at identifying pieces of music so i'm just gonna go with the opening crawl music.

24. how do you pronounce twi’lek? -- i don't. ^_^ more specifically, i do kind of pronounce it in my head when i read, but it's sort of... neither twee-lek nor twye-lek, but something sort of in between that isn't quite a schwa and might involve an umlaut. Sort of Twülek, if you said it with an Austrian accent. That probably doesn't help at all. XD

25. which character do you have a love/hate relationship with? -- This keeps being a question. I'm honestly not sure I *do* love-hate relationships. I'm like Tinkerbell, I only have room for one emotion at a time. ^_^ Especially with fictional characters, I either love them or hate them. (Unless they're completely meh and I just forget about them, that happens sometimes.)

[todisturbtheuniverse]

Fanfic Year in Review - 2016

I was tagged in this by @hollyand-writes; thanks! :)

Total number of completed stories: 8, plus 1 WIP I started that is still in progress.

Total word count: Just about 90K posted to AO3.

Fandoms written in: Dragon Age (2 and Inquisition), Mass Effect, and Strange Magic.

Looking back, did you expect to write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you’d expected? I expected to write a lot less. That last Inquisitor/Iron Bull story was an abrupt decision, and given that it was 25K words, had a serious impact on my word count. I also didn’t expect These Chains to expand the way it did. Silly me, picking up a project and thinking it’s going to be 20K words or less. Like the dumb slow-burn romance lover living in my head would allow that.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

What’s your own favorite story of the year? That’s tough. Probably Wall Yourself Away, just because I’ve waited a long time for Bull and Kat to get to the mushy stuff, and it was like finally releasing a sneeze to get it written down.

Did you take any writing risks this year? Sort of? I knew when I started writing it that These Chains was not necessarily going to be popular; it’s a pairing that doesn’t come off looking so good in canon, BDSM is divisive, femdom is not super popular, etc. It was a dynamic I’d never written before, so in that regard, it was definitely a risk. But ultimately, it was something that @argharies had the idea for and that we ended up developing together as a fun creative exercise, and oh what fun it was.

Do you have any fanfic or profit goals for the new year? I definitely want to wrap up These Chains. I’m getting fairly close to having no more “active” WIPs floating out there in the wild, and I would really like that to happen this year.

Otherwise, I have a few long-ish fics that have been varying stages of development for varying amounts of time, including:

f!Hawke/Isabela fic set during-and-post-Inquisition, getting into what the heck Hawke was thinking to get involved with the Wardens and what happens when she goes to Adamant (let me tell you: Isabela is Not Happy). This was actually a story I was developing for the 2015 Dragon Age Big Bang. I ended up dropping out because, surprise surprise, it got much longer and more complicated than I had planned, and I ran out of time.

f!Hawke/Isabela modern-ish AU featuring Gangs, Fake Dating, and Lots of Panic (about Castillon’s Lingering Grudge); this one was a lot of fun to play with earlier this year.

f!Adaar/Josephine fic set during the “Of Somewhat Fallen Fortune” quest, which is similar in style to Only Pieces/Wall Yourself Away: a flashback fic showing some historical development for both Adaar and Josephine, juxtaposed with the present goings-on. This one is kind of like a sneeze, too.

Jyn Erso/Cassian Andor fic, the premise for which is so full of spoilers that I’m not even going to get into it. If it ever comes to light, you’ll see. Honestly, the most delightful part of even starting this was that Star Wars was really the first fandom I wrote (shitty, self-insert, never-posted) fanfiction for; coming back to it 15-ish years later feels really fun and indulgent.

Just about two dozen one-shots, of various pairings--mostly Shakarian right now, since I’m working on my replay of ME before Andromeda hits, but plenty of Inquisibull & other DA stuff, too.

I have no idea if any of these are going to actually happen this year. If I had to put money on it, I’d say some ficlets and that f!Adaar/Josephine fic, but if I put my head between my ears, I’d hope to really flesh out that f!Hawke/Isabela story. None of those longfics are going to see a post date until the whole damn first draft is written, though. I’ve learned my lesson.

Best story of the year? Probably a toss-up between In Which Tongue Will We Speak and A Little Rehearsal; I personally thought I nailed characterization/atmosphere/humor the best in these two.

Most popular story of the year? By all accounts, it was all the leaves on the trees are falling, though it hardly seems fair; since I started writing it in 2015, of course it has more hits, kudos, comments, subscriptions, bookmarks, etc. than anything I posted in 2016.

Of those that I started posting in 2016:

Most hits: These Chains

Most kudos: Misfire

Most comments: Wall Yourself Away

Most bookmarks: These Chains

Most subscriptions: These Chains

Story of mine most underappreciated by the universe, in my opinion: Eh, I don’t think any of them were underappreciated. Most have a 10% kudos-to-hits ratio, which is about what I expect (the exception is These Chains, which is at about 5%, for very obvious reasons). They’ve all received comments. I think they’ve gotten plenty of appreciation.

Most fun story to write: I loved A Little Rehearsal. There are some characters and pairings whose voices, for whatever reason, really flow for me, and Garrus/Shepard is one of them. In my opinion, I really get their humor/camaraderie (ymmv; these are, after all, my versions of these characters).

Story with the single sexiest moment: Honestly, probably Wall Yourself Away, just because the emotional component has really come in and joined the party; These Chains would have been a contender if Shepard and Vega were in the same spot, but they’ve got a ways to go.

Most sweet story: We All Fall. Quintessential Josephine/Inquisitor fluff.

“Holy crap, that’s wrong, even for you!” story: Nothing. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I have no shame, or maybe the stuff I’m into/write about is just not niche enough. Plenty of people would probably take issue with both Wall Yourself Away and These Chains for the BDSM aspect, but they’re probably not part of my fandom circle.

Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters: I’m continually adjusting my perception of Bull, more than any other character I’ve ever written, so Wall Yourself Away. When a character’s main personality trait is that they’re a good liar, you kind of constantly second-guess everything you think you’ve interpreted about said character. It is exhausting.

Most unintentionally telling story: Probably Ornamented. Why is it unintentionally telling? Because it tells you all that if I sit down with an hour and a vague prompt, I’m going to churn out Hawke/Isabela fluff with creeping character development. That’s it, lol. That’s what’s in my brain.

Hardest story to write: Well, as the year has gone along, These Chains. I just got knocked out of the right mindset and need to dedicate some time to revisit it so I can get going again.

Biggest disappointment: None, really. I write and post fanfic with zero expectations; there’s plenty that doesn’t get posted because I’m just scribbling, it’s unfinished, it’s not ready, etc., but when I do post it--that end product is still what the starting product was. Basically just something I wanted to offload from my brain, or, usually, the fic that I want to read but can’t find. That other people enjoy it delights me, but if they don’t, oh well.

Don’t get me wrong; in general, I do wish that a greater level of feedback was generated for fanfiction. It’s just that I’m content as-is, personally. I’ve been part of a big enough fandom that I once got a ton of increased views and feedback; the super-long Dean/Castiel fic I wrote back in 2013 has more than 23,000 hits, 668 kudos, was part of somewhat popular rec lists, etc. My personal enjoyment of my own writing, however, is just not changed by the level of feedback.

Biggest surprise: The super-lengthy and loving feedback I got on Wall Yourself Away. I anticipated this fic especially to be a labor of love, mostly written for myself; while I am totally interested in other OCs, I usually still assume that most people do not want to hear about someone else’s OC, and this fic was all-Katrina-all-the-time (plus other OCs I pulled in, too). The fact that a fair few people were captivated was really nice. (I said I was content without much feedback, not that I don’t enjoy it when feedback occurs anyway! :))

Tagging:  Anyone who wants to, really. I’ve seen it going around, so I’m not sure who’s done it and who hasn’t. Feel free!